NewsRack: 'Public Option' news in 'Health Care' topic for user newstrust

Nets Ignore Congressional Democrats’ Push for Public ObamaCare Option	21.9.2016	NewsBusters
After watching many of the largest health insurers in America pull out of the ObamaCare exchanges, Senate Democrats recently put forward a resolution that shows their support for the creation of a “public option” for the failing program. “Even before the end of the Obama administration, Democrats are pushing a major change to Obamacare,” reported Fox News Correspondent Rich Edson on Tuesday. Even with such a major alteration to the law the “Big Three” networks were silent on the ...
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Behind health law's 'growing pains,' more serious problems?	15.9.2016	AP National
WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama told insurers this week his health care overhaul has had some growing pains. But with premiums rising and marquee insurers bailing, could the real diagnosis be "failure to thrive?"...
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Jill Stein tells The Times editorial board why she thinks voting Democrat or Republican makes little difference	7.9.2016	LA Times: Commentary
The following is a transcript of Green Party presidential nominee Jill Stein’s meeting with the Los Angeles Times editorial board. Nicholas Goldberg (editor of the editorial pages): Do you want to start with a very brief introduction? Jill Stein: Yes, so… I’m a medical doctor by training. I’m a...
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Cartoon: Modern medical marvels	3.9.2016	Daily Kos
If there was any doubt that Martin Shkreli represents the rest of the for-profit healthcare industry, recent headlines removed it. Mylan’s gouging of Epi-Pens, and Aetna sulking away from Obamacare markets because they weren’t profitable enough are making quite the case for putting a public option into the Affordable Care Act. The public option was originally in there, but removed to placate conservatives, who spent the past 6 years trying to repeal it anyway. Unless the House changes hands in November, a public insurance plan will remain a pipe dream and healthcare costs will keep going up. That’s good news if you happen to be a well-compensated healthcare CEO. I’m not even going to pretend that single-payer will ever happen. Too much money’s at stake, and no number of lives can top ...
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Noah Smith: Don't be scared of a health-insurance public option	30.8.2016	Salt Lake Tribune
One of the big debates in health care right now is whether to create a public option for health insurance. Most observers of President Barack Obamaâs health-care law agree that the big problem is private insurers pulling out of health-care exchanges. That leaves smaller states with only one or two insurers participating, which kills competition in insurance markets and raises costs. Although there are many intermediate fixes available, some are suggesting bringing back an idea that didnât make i...
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Recent headlines signal need for single-payer Medicare for All—now	29.8.2016	Daily Kos
A pharmaceutical company raises the price of the EpiPen from $100 to more than $600, and increases its CEO’s salary from $5 million to $19 million. An insurance company withdraws from the Affordable Care Act exchanges with the claim that it is losing money, as opposed to admitting it was fulfilling a threat because its merger didn’t get approved. A recent report debunks the lie that drug prices are high by necessity, in order to promote the development of new medicines. Ever- increasing deductibles make standard health insurance policies seem like catastrophic health plans. Many healthy people are opting to pay the penalty instead of getting health insurance. Each of the realities mentioned above is the manifestation of serious flaws in the Affordable Care Act. The inability to regulate or bargain for better drug prices allows companies to fleece consumers. The absence of a public option gives insurance companies the power of extortion to remain on the Obamacare exchanges. Lies about ...
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Can Clinton save health overhaul from its mounting problems?	28.8.2016	AP Politics
WASHINGTON (AP) -- With the hourglass running out for his administration, President Barack Obama's health care law is struggling in many parts of the country. Double-digit premium increases and exits by big-name insurers have caused some to wonder whether "Obamacare" will go down as a failed experiment....
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Health-care exchange sign-ups fall far short of forecasts	28.8.2016	Washington Post
Several insurance companies, citing financial losses, have stopped offering plans, which may leave some markets with only one insurer. The success of the law depends on the exchanges being profitable for insurers — and that requires more people to sign up.
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Tribune Editorial: Private insurers need to show they want to stay in the game	27.8.2016	Salt Lake Tribune
Despite all the misleading hyperbole about how the Affordable Care Act was âsocialized medicineâ or a âgovernment takeover of health care,â the fact is that the plan also known as Obamacare bent over backwards to keep the same old private health insurance companies in the loop. But there is increasing evidence that that nod to the private sector has become the ACAâs weakest link. The number of private companies offering approved Obamacare plans on state and federal exchanges is shrinking. For e...
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Aetna’s Retrenchment Is No Big Deal	26.8.2016	Health Affairs Blog
When your party guests leave early, naturally you wonder what’s wrong. A similar sort of anxiety is swirling around the Affordable Care Act (ACA) Marketplaces. The recent announcement that Aetna, the country’s third largest health insurer, will withdraw from Marketplaces in 11 of the 15 states that it currently serves, follows major retrenchments by United Health and Humana, two other large, publicly traded insurers. Critics of the ACA are citing these departures as evidence of the law’s fatally flawed design . Even supporters worry about how to staunch the outflow. And the news reverberated in presidential politics, on both sides . What’s really going on here? Are these big insurers bailing because Obamacare is just too risky? Will more such desertions cripple the Marketplaces? Putting the Departures in Perspective Not all health insurance companies are the same, nor do they necessarily serve the same customer segments. In fact, most medical insurance companies, unlike Aetna and United, are regional ...
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Public Option Would Fix Health Insurance Marketplace	24.8.2016	American Prospect
(Photo: AP/CQ Roll Call) Protesters march in support of health-care reform on March 9, 2010, in Washington, D.C. L ast week's announcement by Aetna that it would stop selling health insurance in 11 of the 15 states where it offers coverage through public exchanges is not a death blow to the Affordable Care Act, but it’s certainly not good news for President Obama’s signature health-care law. Aetna maintained it was losing hundreds of millions of dollars on the health law’s marketplaces, and the company is one of more than a dozen major insurers that have announced plans to bail out of the exchanges. The failure of the marketplaces to generate robust competition, as Obama had predicted, should focus liberal attention on what many on the left now regard as a major policy objective: establishing a public option for the health insurance exchanges. The Affordable Care Act has been a substantial success on balance, but it also has serious flaws. On the plus side, roughly 20 million people have health insurance ...
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Democrats, don't shoot yourselves in the foot on healthcare reform	18.8.2016	Daily Kos
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) has been a hero on gun violence. He's been a solid progressive voice and vote in the Senate and an asset. So he should not be saying things like this : “The public option was a good idea in 2009, and it’s a still a good idea today. [But] I don’t know that the politics have changed at all on it,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), a top ObamaCare advocate, said by phone Wednesday. Particularly after this: Both Sanders and Hillary Clinton, his former rival in the Democratic presidential primary, have touted the public option on the campaign trail, with Clinton mentioning it in a speech as recently as Thursday. Last month, President Obama also urged Congress to “revisit a public plan to compete alongside private insurers” to help boost competition. With Democrats having a real shot of winning back the Senate this fall, Sanders and other public option supporters are making their move. Here's a reminder about how much a united progressive narrative matters: just five years ago President ...
Aetna decision to pull back from Obamacare exchanges exposes weaknesses in health-care law	17.8.2016	Washington Post
Large insurers are losing money in marketplaces, and addressing problem could lead to fight in Congress.
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For French Teens, Smoking Still Has More Allure Than Stigma	15.8.2016	NPR: Morning Edition
French teens smoke at a much higher rate than their American counterparts. The French health minister is trying to remove the glamour and raise the price.
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New “gap map” scores Colorado counties on helping the needy get food, health care	10.8.2016	Denver Post: News: Local
Colorado’s national reputation for helping the needy contradicts itself -- the state is exemplary in enrolling people in government health insurance and abysmal at making sure they have food assistance. A new six-month project from the Colorado Center on Law and Policy breaks those statistics down by county on an interactive website that includes data on enrollment in several government programs, including child-care assistance and nutrition for pregnant women and young children.
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It's time for the government to play hardball with reluctant Obamacare insurers	10.8.2016	LA Times: Commentary
It’s easily forgotten that Congress and the Obama Administration did the health insurance industry an enormous favor in enacting the Affordable Care Act in 2010. Several favors, in fact. They placed commercial insurers at the center of Obamacare, giving them most of the responsibility for covering...
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The Party Platform Democrats Won't Stand On	31.7.2016	Truthout.com
Cameras in the Wells Fargo Center for day three of the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, July 27, 2016. (Photo: Eric Thayer / The New York Times) "Thanks to the millions of people across the country who got involved in the political process -- many for the first time -- we now have the most progressive platform in the history of the Democratic Party." These were the triumphant words of Bernie Sanders as he prepared to endorse the candidate who beat him, Hillary Clinton, for president. The Democrats' platform, passed early on at the party's convention in Philadelphia, has been held up as the most tangible evidence that the Sanders campaign had an impact on the party, despite the hostility of its established leadership. But a closer look reveals that the 2016 platform is far less progressive than Sanders delegates argued for. For example, the platform calls climate change an "urgent threat" and proposes that the U.S. should be powered by 100 percent clean energy by 2050. But every one of ...
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Only the sickest Coloradans on Medicaid get breakthrough treatment for hepatitis C	29.7.2016	Denver Post: Local
Pressure for change is increasing against the state Department of Health Care Policy and Financing, which has restricted access to a breakthrough hepatitis C drug due to its cost. State officials say they must balance the public health issue with the taxpayer expense of paying the prescriptions of the more than 8,000 people with hepatitis C on the government insurance system.
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How much is just enough?	28.7.2016	Le Monde Diplomatique
The basic income — paid to all, and for life — is now a fashionable idea across Europe. But would it supplement welfare or replace it? Olli Kangas, a director at Finland's social insurance body, Kela , says: ‘To talk about a basic income without being specific is like talking about getting a kitten without saying whether you mean a cat or a tiger.' Over the last few months, the idea has been gaining traction in Europe and beyond, and those who advocated it early on are surprised to see the many (...) - 2016/08 / Open access, 2016/08 - Basic income
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Hospital CEO says health care system broken, favors Medicare for all	16.7.2016	Chicago Tribune: Business
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders' call for a single-payer "Medicare for all" health system during his presidential campaign didn't have a lot fans, even among fellow Democrats. But Bill Kottmann, president and CEO of Edward Hospital in Naperville, is sympathetic to the idea. Kottmann said the current ...
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