Healthcare-NOW

Obama administration unlikely to block Arizona plan to cut 250,000 from Medicaid rolls

By N.C. Aizenman for the Washington Post – The Obama administration would permit a controversial plan by Arizona’s governor to cut an estimated 250,000 impoverished adults from Medicaid, despite a provision in the new health-care law barring states from tightening their eligibility standards for the program, federal officials said Wednesday. Gov. Jan Brewer (R) formally…

The Insurers’ Real Agenda for Change

By Wendell Potter for the Huffington Post – The media had lots of health care news to obsess about last week. A federal judge ruled the health care reform law unconstitutional, and Senate Republicans tried in vain to repeal the law. But most of the press paid virtually no attention to a potentially much more…

Conyers Reintroduces “Expanded & Improved Medicare For All” Bill (HR 676)

Citing Rising Health Care Costs & Other Systemic Problems With For Profit Health Care As Reason To Move Forward With Non-Profit, Publicly-Financed Health Care Download HR 676 here (.pdf). Download a summary of HR 676 here (.doc). See the full list of Congressional cosponsors here. Washington DC- Representative John Conyers, Jr. (D-Mich.), a long-time national…

Single-payer is still needed to ensure health care for all

By Madeline Zevon for LoHud.com – By 2019, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will improve health-care access by extending health insurance to 32 million more people than are now covered — 16 million through Medicaid starting in 2014, and the rest through subsidies to help lower-income people to afford health insurance. Although the…

Enrollment in high-risk insurance pools lagging behind predictions

By Amy Goldstein for the Washington Post – More Americans have been signing up for special health plans designed for people with medical problems that caused them to be spurned by the insurance industry, according to new government figures. But enrollment continues to lag significantly behind original predictions. The number of people who have bought…

February Single-Payer Newsletter

We just sent out our latest email newsletter (see it here). If you’re not on our email list, you can sign up for them here. February’s single-payer newsletter includes these articles: Dr. King and Health Reform By Claudia Fegan, M.D. – “There are 50 million Americans who are uninsured. African Americans are represented disproportionately among…

State Budget Cuts Are Bad for Your Health

By Bill Boyarsky for Truthdig.com – The budget cuts being proposed in state capitals around the country may sound vague and abstract, but what they boil down to are many scenes of misery. Picture, for example, an asthmatic kid waiting several hours in an emergency ward for treatment that will allow her to resume normal…

A Better Approach to Health Care

As the current health law comes under attack and our national deficit continues to grow, single-payer plans are gaining more and more interest. By Margaret Flowers, MD for YES! Magazine – Last month, fulfilling a campaign promise, Republicans in the House of Representatives voted to repeal “Obamacare.” The vote was primarily a symbolic gesture. House…

Vermont Governor Lays Out Details for Single Payer Pathway

By Nancy Remsen for Burlington Free Press – The Shumlin administration released the legislative details of how to move the state to a single payer health care system, with the first steps beginning this summer. “We are committing to reforms that get us as many of the benefits of a single payer as possible under…

Dr. King and Health Reform

Beyond the flawed Obama health care reform The following remarks were delivered by Dr. Claudia Fegan, past president of Physicians for a National Health Program, to the Louisville (Ky.) Urban League on Jan. 15. 2011 The time is always right to do what’s right: Dr. King and health reform By Claudia Fegan, M.D. It is…