Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Viewpoints: Trumpcare Is Progress? Fewer Insured, Higher Rates, Debt; Amazon's Goals Full Of Conflicts
Los Angeles Times: The Stupidity Of Trumpcare: Government Will Spend $33 Billion More To Cover 8.9 Million Fewer Americans, As Premiums Soar
Those fiscal geniuses in the White House and Republican-controlled Congress have managed to do the impossible: Their sabotage of the Affordable Care Act will lead to 6.4 million fewer Americans with health insurance, while the federal bill for coverage rises by some $33 billion per year. Also, by the way, premiums in the individual market will rise by an average of more than 18%. (Michael Hiltzik, 2/26)
The Washington Post: These ‘Buffalo’ Health Plans Are A Load Of Bull
Last year , much of the country watched with growing fury as Republicans tried to undo President Barack Obama’s signature achievement, the Affordable Care Act. Americans stormed town halls. They jammed congressional phone lines. Some got hauled off to jail for acts of civil disobedience. Bill after bill attempting to dismantle Obamacare imploded. By October, it looked like Republicans had given up at last. How wrong that was. In the months since the last Obamacare vote in the Senate, the Trump administration and Republicans on Capitol Hill have engaged in a sneakier, backdoor repeal. (Catherine Rampell, 2/26)
Bloomberg: Warren Buffett's Health Venture Goals Are Easier Set Than Met
The health-care industry may hope a joint venture on its turf by Amazon.com Inc., Berkshire Hathaway Inc., and JPMorgan Chase & Co. (ABC from now on) might be happy just rolling out an app and driving better deals with third-party vendors. But that's wishful thinking, according to Warren Buffett. The Berkshire CEO said in an interview Monday that ABC is looking for "something much bigger than that." (Max Nisen, 2/26)
USA Today: Self-Insured Employers Can Solve Our 'Too Much Medical Care' Crisis
I have full confidence that the collective power of Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan to negotiate bulk pricing and cut out pharmacy benefit managers will lower the price point of medications, but the real question is: Do people even need these medications? (Dr. Marty Makary, 2/26)
National Review: The Medicare ‘Savings’ In The New Budget Deal
Previously, [Medicare Part D] insurers had some incentive to drive drug costs down and keep patients out of the doughnut hole: The insurer still had to pick up a big chunk of the drug costs once the patient fell into the gap. That’s a big reason why Part D insurers have aggressively encouraged the use of generic drugs .... That’s why, under the current incentive structure, only one in four Part D patients hits the doughnut hole. This new budget provision [in the tax law passed in December] eliminates that incentive. Insurers will now bear just a tiny fraction of the doughnut-hole expenses — so they’ll have little reason to keep costs under control. In fact, they may even have a reason to drive costs up: The sooner patients hit that catastrophic-care threshold, the sooner the government steps in and takes over virtually the entire bill. (Kenneth E. Thorpe, 2/23)
St. Louis Post Dispatch: Drug Firms Lead The Way On Pocketing Tax Cuts
Anew survey of U.S. companies from analysts at Morgan Stanley estimates that 43 percent of the savings from the Republican tax cut bill will be paid to investors in the form of higher dividends and stock buybacks. Leading the way are large pharmaceutical companies, which Axios.com reported last week are spending a combined $50 billion on stock-buyback programs. Only 13 percent of corporate America’s tax-cut savings will be passed on to employees, the Morgan Stanley analysts reported. Much of that will go to executives, whose compensation is often tied to stock prices, and they’ll benefit as well when share buybacks cause stock prices to jump. (2/26)
Columbus Dispatch: Time To Rein In US Drug Prices
Compared with the rest of the world, the U.S. market for prescription drugs is rigged against consumers and in favor of the pharmaceutical industry.Unlike other advanced nations, the United States refuses to use its purchasing power to negotiate better prices. When Congress, in 2003, passed the Medicare Part D bill to help senior citizens buy prescriptions, it prohibited the government from negotiating cheaper prices for those drugs. The federal government also sets strict limits on when and how Americans can buy drugs from other developed countries. As a result, prescription-drug prices are artificially higher here. (2/27)
Los Angeles Times: The Homeless In L.A. Are Not Who You Think They Are
Many people think of homelessness as a problem of substance abusers and mentally ill people, of chronic skid row street-dwellers pushing shopping carts. But increasingly, the crisis in Los Angeles today is about a less visible (but more numerous) group of “economically homeless” people. These are people who have been driven onto the streets or into shelters by hard times, bad luck and California’s irresponsible failure to address its own housing needs. (2/26)
Bloomberg: After Parkland, U.S. Witnesses A Sea Change In Gun Politics
The politics of guns in America seems to be changing for the better. The difference is not the latest gun massacre, which killed 17 students and teachers on Feb. 14 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. The difference is the public reaction inspired by the survivors of the shooting. Teenagers demanding reasonable action to protect lives have galvanized a nation. (2/26)
The Wichita Eagle: Gun Violence Protests Will Make America Better
As important as these protests will be to the gun debate, they are crucial for an altogether different reason: These protests mark the emergence of a new generation into the arena of civil discourse. ...For the young students who protest, it will be an opportunity to build not only knowledge, but confidence as well – the confidence that comes with having a voice, and with standing up for what you believe is right, no matter who is yelling back from the other side. (Blake Shuart, 2/26)
Charlotte Observer: Don't Stigmatize Troubled Teens On The Way To Reducing Gun Violence
Most troubled kids don’t shoot up schools, even those who post ugly messages on social media. The mentally ill are more likely to hurt themselves than others. Further stigmatizing wayward youngsters will lead to more false positives for law enforcement to investigate. It’s akin to looking for a needle in a haystack by first adding more hay. We must try to prevent as many shootings as we can. That starts by not making the task more difficult than it already is. (2/26)
Press Herald: In Opioid Fight, Stigma Remains A Huge Barrier
It’s become a grim and frustrating annual tradition, a call-and-response exercise that says a lot about the opioid epidemic. Each year around this time, we report that Maine yet again set a record for fatal drug overdoses in the previous year, and each time we hear from readers who say the dead had it coming. And it’s not just those who have the privilege of staying uninformed on addiction, or the luck to be untouched by its devastation. Too many people with the ability to shape and implement policy remain committed to this misguided view of substance abuse. (2/26)
Stat: NIH Needs To Raise The Bar For Funding Alternative Medicine Research
Suppose you needed to have a CT scan for a sudden, severe headache and partial loss of vision and your doctor asked a nutritionist to read it, rather than a radiologist. Would you trust the diagnosis? Evaluation by a different — and what most would consider a lesser — standard is essentially how a significant amount of research funding is approved by one component of the National Institutes of Health. (Henry I. Miller, 2/26)
The Hill: Sugary Drinks Are Causing Chronic Illnesses — We Need Policy Changes To Combat Them
When we think of the major killers of Americans, we naturally gravitate towards drugs and violence as the major culprits. These are often graphic deaths that occur abruptly. Too often we neglect chronic diseases, which silently claim far more lives. Heart disease is the leading killer in the United States, followed closely by other related illnesses such as stroke. As a physician, I am used to treating conditions that contribute to heart disease and stroke in adults — high blood pressure, diabetes, and obesity. Now, I am seeing children sickened by the same diseases. (Dr. Leana S. Wen, 2/26)
