Grace-Marie Turner

Twenty years ago today, in a huge ceremony at DAR Constitution Hall near the White House, President George W. Bush signed into law the Medicare Modernization Act, creating major new programs that put power in the hands of consumers instead of government. The MMA created a tax break for working Americans to save for their health care expenses and gave seniors new options to get … [Read more...] about Happy 20th!

Health care is back in the headlines, but not in a good way.  Democrats are salivating over the latest post from former President Trump proclaiming on Truth Social that “Obamacare Sucks!!!” and saying he would terminate the program. They see the opportunity to use Obamacare as a weapon against Republicans for yet another election cycle.  President Biden said yesterday: “My … [Read more...] about Ready to Respond 

The mainstream media is lax in covering writings and actions in the market-based policy community on health reform, but a lot of important work is being done by our colleagues in the Health Policy Consensus Group and elsewhere that deserves attention.  Here are examples, exposing the failures of government-centric policies and the importance of patient-centered reform ideas. Brian Blase of … [Read more...] about A Cornucopia of Things You Won’t Read Elsewhere

The Wall Street Journal provides clear evidence that the government’s draconian price control scheme already is quashing drug development.   In “How Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act Killed a Cancer Study,” the editors explain that Seagen, a Seattle-based biotechnology firm, has scrapped further study on a new cancer drug because of the law.   The drug at issue, … [Read more...] about It’s Already Happening

Virtually all of the news coverage about the health care positions of newly elected Speaker Mike Johnson have focused on his evangelical advocacy for pro-life, pro-family, and religious liberty principles. Those are very important but not the whole story.  Speaker Johnson served as the chair of the Republican Study Committee, the largest Republican caucus in the House, where he showed … [Read more...] about Renewed Hope

Fifty percent of Americans believe reducing health costs should be the government’s primary focus on health care.  And 39% of voters say they’d be willing to cross party lines to support a candidate whose top priority is reducing health cost, according to a survey by West Health/Gallup. While conservatives avoided health reform like the plague (during the plague), this can either be a threat or … [Read more...] about Focus on Health Costs

Tom Miller of the American Enterprise Institute is engaging a conversation about rechanneling health policy to focus on better health. “U.S. health policy was (and remains) pathological:  We are neurotic, and we insist on making government psychotic,” he writes in “Doing Better, Still Feeling Worse.”  Health spending is astronomically high yet Americans’ longevity is … [Read more...] about Quick Takes

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy predicted the dissidents in his caucus would try to oust him after he passed, with big bi-partisan support, a spending deal, which no one thought had a prayer, to keep the government open.  He worked under the threat that any one Republican could bring a motion to remove him on a whim, which Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz gleefully did on Tuesday, along with seven … [Read more...] about What a Mess