This brief focuses on consumers’ understanding of health insurance costs and examines existing federal protections that seek to address barriers to understanding the cost of coverage and care, such as price transparency, self-service price estimator to…
This brief examines a proposed rule that seeks to change how ACA plans would cover gender affirming care services. If finalized the rule could lead insurers to drop coverage or shift costs to individuals and states, making access to gender affirming ca…
In this JAMA Health Forum post, Executive Vice President Larry Levitt recalls the mid-1990s’ public backlash against Health Maintenance Organizations (commonly known as HMOs) – all of which preceded the recent outpouring of health insurance concerns –…
Promoting price transparency in health care is a policy approach with bi-partisan support in Congress and the public at large. This analysis examines the vast troves of price transparency data that payers are required and finds unlikely prices, inconsi…
This analysis presents key facts about hospitals with more than 40 charts related to national spending on hospital care, characteristics of the hospital industry, rural hospitals, use of hospital care, out-of-pocket spending and medical debt, hospital …
This analysis compares 2021 data about deaths in the U.S. and 11 other large, wealthy countries by age and cause to understand the primary drivers of the longevity gap between the U.S. and the comparable countries. It finds that the primary reasons for…
KFF’s January 2025 Prescription Drug Advertisements Poll looks at the public’s experiences with prescription drug advertisements, whether they’ve talked to a doctor about advertised drugs, and how this has influenced the care they receive.
This analysis and interactive map illustrate how much more enrollees in Affordable Care Act (ACA) Marketplace plans would pay in premiums at the congressional district level if the enhanced subsidies were to expire in 2026 as under current law. The too…
This post looks at federal government databases with key health data that went offline on Jan. 31, 2025, including several related to HIV, some of which had returned by Feb. 2, 2025. It briefly describing the affected databases, which include widely us…
This policy watch provides a short overview of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), describing its history, budget, organizational structure and its major programs and responsibilities.
