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Getting four Pinocchios from The Washington Post for the “if you like your health plan…” comment didn’t do it.  Getting another three Pinocchios from the Post for blaming health insurance companies for people losing their health coverage didn’t do it. But finally, hearing an earful from 16 panicked Democratic senators apparently got through to the president, convincing him that he needed to come … [Read more...] about Post Pinocchios

Someone who is diagnosed with a disease such as diabetes needs to know as much as possible about the illness and treatment options. But too often, information online is scattered and even unreliable. Pfizer’s “Value of Medicines” fact sheets are a valuable resource to help patients understand their diagnosis and learn the importance of proper care. The Pfizer papers are based upon solid academic … [Read more...] about Patient-Centered Medicine Starts with Quality Information

In May 2010, two months after the Affordable Care Act squeaked through Congress, President Obama’s top economic aides were getting worried. Larry Summers, director of the White House’s National Economic Council, and Peter Orszag, head of the Office of Management and Budget, had just received a pointed four-page memo from a trusted outside health adviser. It warned that no one in the administration … [Read more...] about Goldstein and Eilperin: HealthCare.gov: How political fear was pitted against technical needs

By Grace-Marie Turner The White House is trying to shift responsibility to health insurance companies for forcing people out of their existing health plans, but the companies are required to discontinue these plans to comply with the president’s health law. The administration is trying to deflect Americans’ rightful anger over losing the health plans they were promised they could keep, but the … [Read more...] about The administration’s audacious blame game

Given the failed launch of Obamacare, there’s a real chance that the entire scheme falls into an “insurance death spiral” — but not as visibly (or rapidly) as the way these sorts of unsuccessful insurance pools usually unravel. A death spiral happens when only the sickest beneficiaries get into an insurance pool, causing the cost of medical claims to rise, and in turn raising future … [Read more...] about Scott Gottlieb: Obamacare Faces A ‘Death Spiral’ — But It Turns On The Declining Participation Of Health Plans, Not Just Rising Premiums

I was on a radio program yesterday where the host compared President Obama’s speech on the ObamaCare exchanges to an infomercial hosted by the late Billy Mays. There are of course some big differences.  Unlike healthcare.gov, OxiClean actually works.  Most important, Mays didn’t stuff his pitches with statements that were outright falsehoods. By my count there were at least eight such … [Read more...] about David Hogberg: The Eight Biggest Falsehoods in Obama’s Rose Garden Speech

Kurt Wrobel mediated a Q&A with Grace-Marie Turner and David Cutler about the Affordable Care Act. The exchange was featured in The Society of Actuaries' October 2013 Health Watch newsletter. The Q&A can be found below, or on page 44 of Health Watch.  The ACA—Two Policy Experts’ Perspectives with Kurt Wrobel With the upcoming deployment of the most important aspects of health care reform, … [Read more...] about The ACA—Two Policy Experts’ Perspectives

Federal officials considered only one firm to design the Obamacare health insurance exchange website that has performed abysmally since its Oct. 1 debut. Rather than open the contracting process to a competitive public solicitation with multiple bidders, officials in the Department of Health and Human Services' Centers for Medicare and Medicaid accepted a sole bidder, CGI Federal, the U.S. … [Read more...] about Richard Pollock: Feds reviewed only one bid for Obamacare website design