Opinion
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Four Apply for Marijuana under New Nevada Law
Opinion -Four people formally applied for cards allowing the possession of marijuana during the first week of Nevada's medical marijuana law. -
How Government Rations Health Care
Opinion -Currently, a Statewide Health Care Insurance Plan Task Force is meeting in Arizona with the goal of expanding existing benefits in the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS), the state’s health care plan for low-income residents. -
Individual Health Insurance: Solution for the New Economy? Part 2 of 2
Opinion -The employer-based health insurance system has worked well in the United States for a number of years. But changes in the workplace and the health care system are making employer-based health insurance an anachronism. U.S. -
Nationalizing Health Care One Slice at a Time
Opinion -The medical privacy provisions of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 undermine our ability to get an accurate assessment of the costs and benefits of information disclosure. -
PhRMA Responds to New Study
Opinion -The Center for Studying Health System Change study found that, while hospital care fueled the largest portion of last year's spending on health, total spending on prescription medicines also increased. -
Subsidizing Prescription Drugs: An Ill-Advised Path
Opinion -While federal officials ponder how to create a new federal entitlement for prescription drugs, many states already have ventured down this ill-advised path. -
Tennessee Employers May Face ‘Play or Pay’
Opinion -Ironically, the notion that businesses, commercial insurers, and health care providers should either participate (play) in TennCare or subsidize it (pay) could emerge as a divisive issue in the Volunteer State’s next legislative session, which convenes -
‘Individual Identifier’ Controversy Resurfaces
Opinion -Eight years after then-President Bill Clinton failed in his attempt to put the federal government in charge of all matters health care, critics of the scheme are still doing battle with it, piece by piece. -
Improving Accountability in Congress
Opinion -I must admit I had my doubts about George W. Bush leading the country as our new President. His opposition to the Kyoto Protocol and to the ergonomics rules began to give me some confidence in his leadership abilities. -
High-Risk HIP Will Return to Tennessee
Opinion -On September 28, Tennessee Governor Don Sundquist unveiled plans to revamp the state’s troubled TennCare program, replacing it with a high-risk pool for people with pre-existing medical conditions, a managed-care Medicaid program, and a premium support -
Politicians Delight in Killing Goose that Lays Golden Eggs
Opinion -Most adults in the U.S. can remember when doomsayers announced health care costs were about to destroy our nation’s economy. Double-digit inflation in health-related expenditures would cripple local, state, and national budgets. -
Whitman requires Hudson dredging
Opinion -Pulling out of last-minute negotiations for a compromise solution, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christie Whitman announced on August 1 the agency would require the General Electric Company to pay over half a billion dollars to dredge a -
Mayor says Seattle will implement Kyoto Protocol
Opinion -Seattle Mayor Paul Schell announced at a July 24 press conference that his city would abide by the Kyoto Protocol, whether or not the U.S. government does. -
HIAA Supports Private-Sector LTC
Opinion -The Health Insurance Association of America (HIAA) is promoting "Americans Planning for Today and Tomorrow," a grassroots campaign designed to build stronger and broader support for the Long-Term Care and Retirement Security Act of 2001. -
500,000 Seniors to Lose Medicare+Choice Insurance
Opinion -Health care costs that outstrip federal reimbursements by a 6-to-1 margin are mostly to blame for the health insurance industry's decision to drop 500,000 seniors from their Medicare+Choice health insurance plans next year, according to Karen Ignagni, -
Leapfrog Group Recognized for Efforts to Reduce Medical Errors
Opinion -The Business Roundtable’s “Leapfrog Group” has received the esteemed Ellwood Award for outstanding efforts to foster consumer-focused accountability in health care. -
Uninsured Population Overstated
Opinion -Since the early 1980s, the U.S. Census Bureau has used questions in its Current Population Survey (CPS) to arrive at estimates of the uninsured population. -
PhRMA Asserts itself in Court Action
Opinion -The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) said it will ask the U.S. -
ESA blamed for firefighter deaths
Opinion -An investigation into the July 10 "30-mile fire" in central Washington state has uncovered that the Endangered Species Act (ESA) played a central role in the deaths of four young firefighters combating the blaze. The U.S. -
Bush energy plan clears first hurdle
Opinion -President George W. Bush's national energy policy cleared its first major hurdle August 2 when the U.S. House of Representatives gave its stamp of approval to the measure. -
Congress preempts EPA in mandating new arsenic standards
Opinion -A close vote in the U.S. House of Representatives and a near-unanimous vote in the U.S. Senate have forced the Bush administration's hand on the issue of arsenic levels in drinking water. -
Why the arsenic standard should not be changed
Opinion -A strange thing happened in the last days of the Clinton administration: The Environmental Protection Agency rushed to set a new arsenic drinking water standard. -
Klamath Basin a departure from common-sense environmentalism
Opinion -This spring, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation shut off irrigation water to 1,400 farmers and 210,000 acres of land in the Klamath River Basin of Southern Oregon and Northern California, effectively ending farming for the year. -
Everglades sparrow stirs controversy in southern Florida
Opinion -Efforts to protect the endangered Cape Sable seaside sparrow have divided residents throughout southern Florida. The controversy surrounds a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers plan to pump water into the eastern Everglades to facilitate sparrow nesting.
