2012 December Health Care News

The December issue of Health Care News reports on new estimates from the Congressional Budget Office, which finds two million more Americans than initially expected will be forced to pay President Barack Obama’s individual mandate tax, and more Americans than previously predicted will lack health insurance in 2016.

Also in this issue:

• The failure of accountable care organizations – a key element of President Barack Obama’s health care law designed to lower costs and save taxpayers money – could signal broader problems with the law’s approach to achieving savings.

• Government attempts to save money by identifying Medicaid fraud have cost taxpayers more than the fraud they uncovered.

• Vermont’s governor has disavowed his own consultant on the expected results of the state’s upcoming single-payer plan, while businesses and analysts express increasing concerns over the costs of Green Mountain Care.

• The Obamacare employer mandate to provide health insurance could stall Texas’s economy – the most consistent in the nation – if it’s implemented as scheduled.

• A comprehensive survey of the nation’s physicians finds broad-based pessimism about the health care industry, concern about government regulations, and doubts about meeting subsidized demand.

• Like many other states, Nevada has prepared two different budget plans for Medicaid in advance of the election and its possible effect on President Barack Obama’s Medicaid expansion mandate.

• Thirty-one different lawsuits have been brought across the country against the federal mandate that all employers pay for full insurance coverage of contraception and abortifacients.