Healthcare News and Research

Latest Healthcare News and Research

House Democrats unveil 1,000 page health bill, complete with surtaxes on wealthy

"House Democrats unveiled ambitious legislation Tuesday to remake the nation's health care system and called on medical providers, businesses and the wealthiest Americans to pick up the tab for President Barack Obama's top domestic priority," the Associated Press reports.

15 Jul 2009

Details emerge as House Democrats plan to release health bill

"House Democrats are preparing on Tuesday afternoon to unveil a full draft of their sweeping health care legislation, including an income surtax on the country's highest wage-earners to help pay the 10-year, roughly $1 trillion cost of the measure," the New York Times reports.

15 Jul 2009

House Democrats to unveil health care bill details

"After a series of false starts, House Democrats are finally expected to unveil the details of a sweeping reform measure on Tuesday that would drastically revamp the country's health care system," Politico reports.

15 Jul 2009

Healthcare costs for U.S. companies seen rising nine percent

"Healthcare costs for U.S. businesses are seen rising by 9 percent in 2010, according to a PricewaterhouseCoopers PWC.UL survey, which showed that employers will expect workers to pay more of the bill," Reuters reports.

15 Jul 2009

Upcoming health IT decisions could spell success or failure

"An unprecedented effort to computerize the nation's hospitals and physician offices could be the key to reducing crippling health care costs - or a giveaway to technology vendors whose sales will be subsidized by taxpayers," the Dallas Morning News reports.

15 Jul 2009

WHO recommends vaccine makers move forward in mass production of H1N1 vaccine

"Saying the new H1N1 [swine flu] virus is 'unstoppable', the WHO gave drug makers a full go-ahead to manufacture vaccines against the pandemic influenza strain on Monday and said healthcare workers should be the first to get one," Reuters reports (Fox, 7/14).

15 Jul 2009

Senate panel looks to health insurers for health savings

"U.S. health insurers were in talks with the Senate Finance Committee Monday to discuss how to save the Medicare program $100 billion over a decade, a source familiar with the talks said," Reuters reports.

14 Jul 2009

Key Democrats summoned to White House meeting

"The White House summoned two lawmakers critical to President Barack Obama's hopes for health care overhaul to a private meeting Monday as the timetable for a comprehensive bill continued to slip," the Associated Press reports.

14 Jul 2009

House seeks to pay for reform with new tax on wealthy

House Democrats are expected to begin marking up a health reform bill this week that members of the Ways and Means committee said "would cost less than $1 trillion over 10 years, [and would be] paid for chiefly by a combination of spending reductions in the health care system and a surtax on wealthy taxpayers," CQ Politics reports.

14 Jul 2009

Lobbying groups prepare for reconciliation process, step up fight on bill features

Lobbyists are beginning to consider how their clients would fare if health reform moves to a reconciliation process to pass legislation, Roll Call reports.

14 Jul 2009

Australian national health system on the waiting list

Any hope of a truly national health system as promised by Kevin Rudd in the run up to the last election now appears to have stalled, at least for the time being.

13 Jul 2009

Administration faces challenges from Democrats on health proposals

President Obama has asked Congress to deliver a bill by October that would "cut healthcare costs and provide medical coverage to most of the 46 million uninsured Americans," a goal that may no longer be realistic as members of the president's own party move to stall efforts, the Reuters/The Washington Post reports (Allen, 7/9).

12 Jul 2009

Tales of health insurance plights highlight overhaul efforts

Analysts say many in America take jobs they otherwise wouldn't simply for the health insurance coverage, Reuters/Boston Globe reports.

12 Jul 2009

Twenty people arrested in California Medicaid fraud case

Twenty people in California were arrested on Thursday "in a $4.6-million Medi-Cal fraud scheme that law enforcement officials allege used unlicensed individuals to provide in-home nursing care for disabled patients," The Los Angeles Times reports.

12 Jul 2009

Experts urge revamping of long-term Medicare funding mechanisms

Health policy experts see a major revamp of the long-term Medicare funding mechanisms as a critical part of health reform.

12 Jul 2009

Largest-ever study looks at safety of Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory drugs (NSAIDS)

They are a group of drugs which millions of people rely on to keep pain at bay but they can have unwanted side-effects which are sometimes more serious than the original health problem. Now scientists at The University of Nottingham are taking part in the largest-ever study on the safety of Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs (NSAIDS) that has ever been performed.

12 Jul 2009

Democrats divided as Congressional health overhaul efforts stall

Senators working feverishly to pass health reform ahead of Congress' August recess raised doubts Wednesday on whether they will be able to pass reform on schedule, The Boston Globe reports.

9 Jul 2009

Healthcare reform gets boost from hospital groups

"In the face of mounting Republican opposition to its healthcare agenda, the Obama administration received a boost Wednesday, winning a preliminary agreement with leading hospital groups to cut federal payments to the industry over the next decade," The Los Angeles Times reports.

9 Jul 2009

Legislation includes provisions for healthy lifestyle infrastructure

Sweeping healthcare legislation in Congress includes money for walking paths, streetlights, jungle gyms, and even farmers' markets. While supporters cite their importance for preventative health, critics see the billions of dollars for such provisions in the Senate and House versions as pure pork.

9 Jul 2009

New heart disease risk score outperforms existing test

An independent external validation of QRISK® - a new score for predicting a person's risk of heart disease - has shown that it performs better than the existing test and should be recommended for use in the United Kingdom by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE).

9 Jul 2009