Kaiser Daily Health Policy report feature highlights recent blog posts

While mainstream news coverage is still a primary source of information for the latest in policy debates and the health care marketplace, online blogs have become a significant part of the media landscape, often presenting new perspectives on policy issues and drawing attention to under-reported topics.

To provide complete coverage of health policy issues, the Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report offers readers a window into the world of blogs in a new roundup of health policy-related blog posts. "Blog Watch," published on Tuesdays and Fridays, tracks a wide range of blogs, providing a brief description and relevant links for highlighted posts.

John King of Action for Better HealthCare discusses the July issue of Consumer Reports and concludes that "the publication seems set on a course of taking a more aggressive role in educating the public, advocating for health reform and providing transparency on the huge variation in treatment patterns and costs of health care."

The American Prospect's Ezra Klein discusses his disagreement with a McClatchy article about presumptive Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain's (Ariz.) health care plan, saying that "there's no doubt that [an aspect of McCain's plan that equalizes] the tax code has some progressive effects. But towards conservative ends."

Michael Cannon from Cato@Liberty, commenting on an article about Medicare fraud, suggests one explanation for the program's low administrative costs is that it pays most claims without review.

Igor of the Center for American Progress Action Fund's Wonk Room blog discusses problems with high-risk insurance pools in reaction to a Washington Times editorial that argues pools are an effective approach for addressing coverage of people with pre-existing health conditions.

Con Carroll of the Heritage Foundation's The Foundry blog discusses challenges the government faces in reducing health care costs, saying that "politicians are incapable of turning off the federal spending spigot when their constituents could be harmed."

Maggie Mahar from Health Beat Blog writes an overview of spending on nursing homes.

Michael Miller of the Health Care Policy and Communications Blog discusses the benefits and challenges of two proposals from a new Medicare Payment Advisory Commission report. The proposals would increase reimbursement rates for primary care practitioners and increase the number of Medicare beneficiaries with medical homes.

Health Care Policy and Marketplace Review's Bob Laszewski discusses a possible shift from employer-based health insurance to an individual marketplace, noting that "a whole series of developments seem to be ... [putting] this idea front and center."

Paul Testa of the New America Foundation's New Health Dialogue reports on an AARP forum with campaign representatives who discussed how the presidential candidates' plans would address health care costs.