Under the Medicare drug negotiations provisions in the reconciliation bill, the federal government would see its outlays reduced by about $300 billion. That reduction wouldn’t result from cuts in benefits. Instead, Medicare would be empowered to leverage its market power to pay lower prices for certain drugs.
As California Gov. Gavin Newsom claims the role as the national Democratic Party’s political attack dog, he is trolling red-state governors over their positions on guns and abortion. He’s also making a case for himself — with health care front and center.
Tennessee expects to soon disenroll about 300,000 people from its Medicaid program. But families like the Lesters have suffered when bureaucracy and clerical mistakes caused them to unfairly lose coverage under the same program.
The federal government is stepping in to assist student loan borrowers. But little public attention has been focused on what is — statistically, at least — a bigger, broader debt crisis in our country: An estimated 100 million people in the U.S., or 41% of all adults, are saddled with pernicious health care debt.
Health insurers and self-insured employer plans are now required to post their negotiated rates for almost every type of medical service. But navigating through the trove of information is no easy task.
State and federal laws require health plans to offer accurate lists of participating doctors and facilities, but consumers still struggle to get timely appointments with providers.
The advocacy group American Commitment said empowering Medicare to negotiate drug prices would raid it of billions of dollars. Drug pricing experts say that that’s not the case and that such policies would instead reduce costs for the Medicare program and seniors.
Two things happened in Washington this week that were inevitable: President Joe Biden tested positive for covid-19, and the Senate agreed to move forward on a budget bill that includes only a sliver of what Biden hoped it would. Still, the bill to allow Medicare to negotiate some drug prices, cap out-of-pocket drug costs for seniors, and extend temporary subsidies for Affordable Care Act insurance premiums would represent a major step if Democrats can get it across the finish line. Meanwhile, abortion battles continue to escalate around the country, with Texas leading the way in restrictions. Shefali Luthra of The 19th, Joanne Kenen of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Politico, and Rachel Cohrs of Stat join KHN’s Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more. Also this week, Rovner interviews Dr. Jack Resneck Jr., the new president of the American Medical Association.
Amparo and Victor Rios began searching for answers about their son’s development when he didn’t hit some milestones after turning 2. Three years later, they are still trying to get their insurance to pay for expensive therapy to help him.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill last month that authorizes a statewide Medicaid contract for HMO giant Kaiser Permanente. But details still need to be worked out in a memorandum of understanding.
