Opinion
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MSAs Can Be a Windfall for All
Opinion -Managing Editor’s note: Greg Scandlen—senior fellow in health policy at the National Center for Policy Analysis and assistant editor of Health Care News—sits on top of the mountain when it comes to Medical Savings Accounts. -
States Ready to Wield Drug-Purchasing Power
Opinion -Several states have banded together to form a multistage drug-purchasing pool to negotiate cheaper prescription drug prices for residents covered by government health insurance plans. -
Prior Authorization: What Does it Really Cost?
Opinion -Prior authorization, like many pharmacy management processes, can be used to improve the quality of medical care delivered to patients. -
NGA Touts Rx Purchasing Pools
Opinion -The National Governors Association (NGA) announced on October 24 the release of a report on pharmaceutical purchasing pools, touted by West Virginia Governor Bob Wise during a media blitz he used to launch the Southern States Coalition’s pharmacy working -
Free-Market Health Insurance Flourishes Online
Opinion -Small businesses are the perfect online insurance customer: wired and Internet- savvy. -
12/2001: State Legislative Update
Opinion -The year 2001 saw a wide range of health care proposals at the state level, including efforts to address long-term care, Medicaid access and budgets, mental health, prescription drug coverage, women's health, and SCHIP. -
More Troubles for TennCare
Opinion -In November, Tennessee officials shifted 279,000 members of Access MedPLUS, the largest health plan in the troubled TennCare system, into a plan operated by BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee. -
Are Insurers Prepared for the Mental Health Fallout?
Opinion -Throw out all the studies on the psychological effects of a national disaster that were conducted prior to September 11, 2001, says child psychiatrist Dr. -
Providing Health Care Security for Displaced Workers
Opinion -The September 11 terrorist attacks have created massive dislocations in certain sectors of an already-weakened American economy. Within the major airlines, for example, 73,000 employees are expected to be laid off. -
Study: Affordable, Comprehensive Coverage Available
Opinion -What do people actually buy if they have a chance to buy their own insurance coverage? Is there a real market out there that reflects consumer choice? As it turns out, there is such a market . . . -
An Asymmetric Bias toward Government Regulation
Opinion -Does the Nobel Prize committee know something health insurance markets don't? -
12/2001: The Pulse
Opinion -I was in Maine recently debating single payer with John Ross, MD, president of Physicians for a National Health Program. -
Health Care in England: Not Your Cup of Tea: Part 1
Opinion -It is one thing to read the U.S. media's meager reporting on the critical condition of Britain's health care system. -
Prescription Drugs by Lottery
Opinion -How do the British address prescription drug coverage—currently among the most contentious of health care issues in the U.S.? Not in any way we’d consider to be a model! -
Socialized Medicine at the Back Door
Opinion -What's happening in Portland, Maine (see the news story on page 1 and The Pulse, page 3) is not just activists chanting their favorite leftist sound-bites, nor is it the action of "well-intended" people unaware of the "unintended" consequences of their -
Unintended Consequences Buried in Patients’ Bill of Rights
Opinion -Some surprising facets of the bipartisan Patient Protection Act are beginning to emerge. The House of Representatives, with the backing of the Bush administration, passed its amended version of the patients' bill of rights (H.R. -
Employers Embrace Consumer-Driven Insurance
Opinion -In a continuing effort to give employees more control over their health insurance coverage, defense contractor Raytheon Co. -
Private-Sector Rx Firm Offers National Discounts
Opinion -GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) announced the creation of a new discount program allowing low-income Medicare beneficiaries who lack drug coverage to purchase most of the company's medications at discounts of at least 25 percent. -
Medicare Plans May Get Cash ‘Infusion’
Opinion -CongressDaily reports Thomas Scully, administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), predicted on October 15 a "better than even chance" lawmakers would provide Medicare managed care plans with an additional "infusion of cash" -
The SimpleCare Story
Opinion -Editor’s note: In “Fee-for-Service Health Care Makes a Comeback,” published in the inaugural (March 2001) issue of Health Care News, we offered a brief introduction to SimpleCare, and described how the program had grown to about 600 medical providers in -
Vermont Senator Joins Rx Advocacy Group
Opinion -State Senator Cheryl Rivers (D-Windsor), considered one of the most liberal members of the Vermont Senate, has left her seat to take a job with a lobbying group that advocates government control of prescription drug prices. -
11/2001: The Galen Report
Opinion -The warning from all quarters, including HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson, is to avoid complacency, since the current economic downturn will mean many more people will lose health insurance coverage this year. -
Doctors Support Market-Based Health Care
Opinion -At the Washington State Medical Association's (WSMA) annual meeting in early October, a majority of some 200 doctors present voted to continue supporting the existing market-based health care system, while still striving for universal coverage. -
Hospital Costs Drive Medical Inflation
Opinion -Pharmaceutical companies, it seems, are not the bad guys after all. "Tracking Health Care Costs," a new study published by the journal Health Affairs, puts things into proper perspective.
