Health Care Reform Articles - April 25, 2011

A Call to Lead

Imagine a microbe that lowers life expectancy. Suppose this

microbe also causes increases in obesity, drug use, teen

pregnancy, incarceration rates, and homicide rates, and a

breakdown of social cohesion.

We would expect pharmaceutical companies and the

Centers for Disease Control to engage in a no-holds-barred

campaign to develop an antibiotic or a vaccine to do away

with the threat and protect public health.

The threat is here. It is real and it is causing untold harm.

But the threat is not a microbe. It is us, or more accurately,

how we organize our social environment.

http://download.journals.elsevierhealth.com/pdfs/journals/0002-9343/PIIS0002934311000039.pdf

April 24, 2011

A Fight Over How Drugs Are Pitched

By NATASHA SINGER

Before pharmaceutical company marketers call on a doctor, they do their homework. These salespeople typically pore over electronic profiles bought from data brokers, dossiers that detail the brands and amounts of drugs a particular doctor has prescribed. It is a marketing practice that some health care professionals have come to hate.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/25/business/25privacy.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=print

April 24, 2011

Let’s Take a Hike

By PAUL KRUGMAN

When I listen to current discussions of the federal budget, the message I hear sounds like this: We’re in crisis! We must take drastic action immediately! And we must keep taxes low, if not actually cut them further!

You have to wonder: If things are that serious, shouldn’t we be raising taxes, not cutting them?

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/25/opinion/25krugman.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

Advocates plan campaign on immigrants’ health care

By Russell Contreras

Associated Press / April 25, 2011

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Immigrant advocates in Massachusetts say they are preparing an “intense’’ lobbying effort to help about 20,000 legal immigrants who are at risk of losing their state-sponsored health care coverage under a proposal to slash state spending.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2011/04/25/advocates_plan_campaign_on_immigrants_health_care/


The following articles highlights yet another unfixable problem with fee-for-service payment:

Under Health Law, Colonoscopies Are Free—But It Doesn't Always Work That Way

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TOPICS: HEALTH REFORM, INSURANCE, MEDICARE, HEALTH COSTS

By Harris Meyer

APR 25, 2011

This story was produced in collaboration with 

For years, doctors have urged patients over the age of 50 to get colonoscopies to check for colorectal cancer, which kills 50,000 Americans a year. Their efforts were boosted last year by the federal health care law, which requires that key preventive services, including colonoscopies, be provided to patients at no out-of-pocket cost.

But there's a wrinkle in the highly touted benefit. If doctors find and remove a polyp, which can be cancerous, some private insurers and Medicare hit the patient with a surprise: charges that could run several hundred dollars.

http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Stories/2011/April/20/health-law-colonoscopy.aspx