Today's Opinions and Editorials: Support for Berwick and health reform's next tests

In Berwick, Obama Chooses Innovative Leader For Medicare The Boston Globe
He is well-qualified to make the many crucial decisions surrounding Medicare and Medicaid, and could end up being one of the most significant appointees in the administration (5/17).

Health Reform's Next Test The Washington Post
While the achievement of health insurance reform was historic, it is time to focus on the next step: improving quality while bending the unsustainable cost curve significantly (Jim Yong Kim and James Weinstein, 5/17).

Consumer-Friendly System Emerges Politico
We have a long way to go. But a more consumer-friendly health insurance system is already taking shape (HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, 5/17).

GOP Will Hook Dems With Health Care Politico
From town halls to marches on the Capitol — not to mention in poll after poll — concerned citizens warned Democrats to back down from their reckless health care agenda. Instead, the majority spent months negotiating backroom deals and devising underhanded legislative tricks as it attempted to sneak its agenda through Congress and deflect political heat from vulnerable members (Rep. Pete Sessions, 5/17).

The Health Care Cost Problem We Refuse To See Kaiser Health News
Rather than continue to throw stones at insurers (or, at least in addition to doing so), we should be supporting political leaders who will not cave in to what is likely to be heavy industry pressure to weaken those reforms (Austin Frakt, 5/17).

New York Needs A Cultural Rx The Albany (N.Y) Times Union
While 25 percent of the cost would be the responsibility of New York, costs savings will be realized from greater preventive health care measures, earlier diagnoses and treatment and less emergency and critical care (Vanessa Cullins, 5/17).

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This article was reprinted from khn.org with permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. Kaiser Health News, an editorially independent news service, is a program of the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan health care policy research organization unaffiliated with Kaiser Permanente.