Health Affairs

In terms of both health and health care, America is an unequal nation. There are well-documented differences in health between whites and racial and ethnic minorities—for example, in life expectancy.  There are also demonstrable differences in health care provided to people of different races and ethnicities—for example, in screening rates for cancers. Despite these gaps,... Read the rest of this entry »

Of all the issues bandied about in the recent debate over the debt ceiling, none generated more contention, more TV ads and more unseemly rhetoric than potential changes to Medicare. Health economists generally believe that Medicare is on an unsustainable course and is desperately in need of reform. Yet public opinion polls show that most... Read the rest of this entry »

Other than the egg-laying exercise surrounding the ACO regulations, 2011 was a quiet year among Washington health policy experts until June 6 when McKinsey released the results of a survey of employer plans under the Affordable Care Act. The McKinsey study found that roughly 30 percent of employers were considering dropping their employee insurance coverage... Read the rest of this entry »

The women recounted how their lives had been saved as they pleaded for the Food and Drug Administration not to withdraw approval for Avastin as a treatment for advanced breast cancer. They did so even without evidence that it provides benefit and with evidence that it confers risks. Their efforts were ultimately not successful: the... Read the rest of this entry »

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA)  is designed to increase the number of U. S. citizens with access to health insurance.  Along with augmented access to health insurance and hopefully health care for millions of the currently uninsured, as well as some degree of overall health care cost containment,  the ultimate success of... Read the rest of this entry »

Republicans have aggressively announced their determination to overturn recently passed health reform legislation. However, GOP leaders could be in for an unpleasant surprise if they interpret their election victories as a mandate to repeal the Affordable Care Act and enact other elements of a strictly conservative agenda, Bob Benenson, senior election analyst at the CQ-Roll... Read the rest of this entry »

At an October 27 Health Affairs media breakfast, pollsters Celinda Lake, Whit Ayres, and Stan Greenberg discussed how the 2010 electorate was likely to be older and whiter than the 2008 electorate, to the detriment of the Democratic case on the issue of health reform. In a blog post on The New Republic Web site,... Read the rest of this entry »

In next week’s elections, voters will punish Democrats for passing health reform legislation that focused on expanding coverage rather than controlling costs, Republican pollster Whit Ayres said at a Health Affairs media breakfast this morning. Democratic pollsters Stan Greenberg and Celinda Lake argued that the issue of health reform would play better for Democrats in... Read the rest of this entry »

On July 28 the Obama Administration surprised many in the health sector by withdrawing a pending Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) final “breach notification” rule governing when consumers must be informed of illicit access or use of their medical records. With this exceptional action, the Administration now has a critical opportunity to correct... Read the rest of this entry »

A national push on comparative effectiveness research is under way as a result of federal stimulus and health reform legislation.  The research, which is aimed at answering critical questions about what works—and what doesn’t—in health care, is the subject of the October issue of Health Affairs.  The issue explores the myriad challenges inherent in making... Read the rest of this entry »

At long last, health reform legislation appears headed for a series of final votes in the next few weeks. The ultimate outcome in treacherous political waters is uncertain. What should happen, from the perspective of a consumer advocacy organization, is abundantly clear: Congress should pass legislation this year to begin dramatically improving health care access,... Read the rest of this entry »

With apologies to Arthur Miller … President Obama went back before the cameras again Wednesday, providing yet another recycling of fading rationales for his health reform product that more voters would rather leave on the Capitol Hill store shelves than purchase.   But “attention must be paid” whenever the president speaks.  He tried to claim that “we... Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Note: In the aftermath of President Obama’s State of the Union address, what is the state of health reform? Where do we go from here? In the post below, Henry Aaron of the Brookings Institution addresses these questions. See also other posts on the same issues from Joseph Antos of the American Enterprise Institute and Timothy Jost... Read the rest of this entry »

On October 13, the day the Senate Finance Committee passed its version of health reform, the Health Affairs Blog held a roundtable on public opinion and health reform. Participants included Bob Blendon, professor of health policy and political analysis at Harvard; Chad Bohnert, director of marketing and e-commerce at Zogby International; Mollyann Brodie, vice president, public... Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Note: What follows is the transcript of a roundtable on public opinion and health reform that took place on October 13,  the day the Senate Finance Committee approved its version of health reform legislation. Participants included Bob Blendon, professor of health policy and political analysis at Harvard; Chad Bohnert, director of marketing and e-commerce at... Read the rest of this entry »

Posts on public opinion about health reform and how to achieve high-quality, low-cost health care topped the Health Affairs Blog most-read list for October. Additional comment on these and all posts is always welcome. Can Slumping Support For Health Care Reform Be Turned Around? by S. Ward Casscells, Hiliary Critchley, Thomas Amoroso, James Tyll, and... Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Note: In addition to S. Ward Casscells, M.D. and Hiliary Critchley (photos and bios above), coauthors of this post include Thomas Amoroso, M.D., of the Quincy Medical Center; James Tyll of James Tyll Consulting, LLC; and John Zogby of Zogby International, Inc. The authors are also grateful for analytical advice contributed by Grace Ren... Read the rest of this entry »

On September 30, 2009, the Harvard School of Public Health, NPR, and the Kaiser Family Foundation released the findings of some new polling on how the public perceives the current debate about health care or health insurance reform.  NPR discussed how most of the public feels that they are not represented in the debate, although... Read the rest of this entry »

On September 22, 1993, President Bill Clinton spoke to a joint session of Congress about the imperative of enacting health reform. It was a powerful speech. Clinton emphasized the need to fix a “badly broken” system that cost too much and left too many Americans without insurance. He eloquently cited stories of how ordinary Americans... Read the rest of this entry »

Few of us could have predicted (or were ready for) the firestorm of opposition that provisions in the stimulus bill related to electronic health information or comparative effectiveness research created a few weeks ago. Oh, we might have thought that privacy issues related to electronic health records (EHRs) might be of concern. Or the fact that... Read the rest of this entry »