Steward Health Care chain quits Mass. hospital group
For-profit chain says it can better advocate for its unique interests
http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2011/12/29/steward-health-care-chain-quits-mass-hospital-group/s5eDWPGjiW6SxawZlclFFP/story.html
Blue Shield to pay $2 million over dropping of policyholders
The settlement of a suit filed by L.A. ends a probe into more than 1,000 cases. The insurer was accused of dropping clients who got ill and needed expensive treatment. The city and county will split the money.
By Lisa Girion, Los Angeles TimesDecember 29, 2011
Blue Shield has agreed to pay $2 million to resolve accusations that the company improperly dropped policyholders after they got sick and needed expensive treatment.
The settlement, announced Wednesday by Los Angeles City Atty. Carmen Trutanich, ends an investigation into more than 1,000 so-called rescissions by Blue Shield, a San Francisco-based not-for-profit company.
Blue Shield spokesman Steve Shivinsky said the firm settled to avoid litigation.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-me-blue-shield-20111229,0,7711606,print.story
Hospital is facing a bleak prognosis
A Victorville hospital has agreed to deals with Prime Healthcare, which has a record of stripping out low-margin or unprofitable medical services.
Michael HiltzikDecember 28, 2011
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hiltzik-20111228,0,3750553,print.column
Awards for health care reform wimpery and obfuscation
Created Wednesday, December 28, 2011
By Wendell Potter
iWatch News, Dec. 22, 2011
I'm sitting by the hospital bed of a grateful Medicare beneficiary — my mother. She seems to be making progress in her battle against pneumonia, and she doesn't have the worry that many other patients here have about how they are going to pay their medical bills. Because private insurance companies and employers have shifted so many Americans into high-deductible plans, many of the younger patients here will soon find out that they are terribly underinsured and thus will be on the hook for thousands of dollars not covered by their policies.
Earlier today I went to the gift shop to buy Mom a brush. Amid the Christmas candy, cards and cheap do-dads near the cash register was a basketful of something that brought back a painful holiday memory: little lacquered lumps of coal.
Several years ago, a friend who had been in the habit of giving me a biography of some long-dead politician or literary figure surprised me by giving me instead a Christmas stocking with nothing but a lump of coal in it. In her opinion, I had been such a jerk during the year I didn't deserve anything else.
That lump of coal was probably the best present I've ever received. I was so wounded I resolved to be a better, more thoughtful person. I’m still working on that.
So knowing from personal experience how beneficial lumps of coal can be at the holidays, I have decided to give out a few lumps of my own to folks whose recent actions make them deserving recipients.
http://www.pnhp.org/print/news/2011/december/awards-for-health-care-reform-wimpery-and-obfuscation
WWLP News, Channel 22 NBC, Dec. 15, 2011
BOSTON - Five years after redrawing the lines in the national health care debate, Beacon Hill is looking at new reforms, closely studying payment system plans to lower costs and examining a government controlled single-payer model.
“We will end up with a government option at some point. We will end up with a single-payer at some point, and wouldn’t it be wonderful if that point was now, and the place was Massachusetts?” said Sen. Dan Wolf (D-Harwich) at a Thursday afternoon legislative hearing.
http://www.pnhp.org/print/news/2011/december/advocates-push-for-public-health-care
iWatch News, Dec. 22, 2011
I'm sitting by the hospital bed of a grateful Medicare beneficiary — my mother. She seems to be making progress in her battle against pneumonia, and she doesn't have the worry that many other patients here have about how they are going to pay their medical bills. Because private insurance companies and employers have shifted so many Americans into high-deductible plans, many of the younger patients here will soon find out that they are terribly underinsured and thus will be on the hook for thousands of dollars not covered by their policies.
Earlier today I went to the gift shop to buy Mom a brush. Amid the Christmas candy, cards and cheap do-dads near the cash register was a basketful of something that brought back a painful holiday memory: little lacquered lumps of coal.
Several years ago, a friend who had been in the habit of giving me a biography of some long-dead politician or literary figure surprised me by giving me instead a Christmas stocking with nothing but a lump of coal in it. In her opinion, I had been such a jerk during the year I didn't deserve anything else.
That lump of coal was probably the best present I've ever received. I was so wounded I resolved to be a better, more thoughtful person. I’m still working on that.
So knowing from personal experience how beneficial lumps of coal can be at the holidays, I have decided to give out a few lumps of my own to folks whose recent actions make them deserving recipients.
http://www.pnhp.org/print/news/2011/december/awards-for-health-care-reform-wimpery-and-obfuscation
Want government-run single-payer system
By Andy Metzger, State House News ServiceWWLP News, Channel 22 NBC, Dec. 15, 2011
BOSTON - Five years after redrawing the lines in the national health care debate, Beacon Hill is looking at new reforms, closely studying payment system plans to lower costs and examining a government controlled single-payer model.
“We will end up with a government option at some point. We will end up with a single-payer at some point, and wouldn’t it be wonderful if that point was now, and the place was Massachusetts?” said Sen. Dan Wolf (D-Harwich) at a Thursday afternoon legislative hearing.
http://www.pnhp.org/print/news/2011/december/advocates-push-for-public-health-care
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