On Friday, shortly before word of pending indictments from Special Counsel Robert Mueller sucked up all the oxygen in the news cycle, the Trump administration dropped a 365-page proposal including numerous potential tweaks to the rules governing Obamacare. Among other things, the proposed rulemaking from the Department of Health and Human Services could allow insurers to sell stripped down health plans in the Obamacare exchanges, potentially leaving people without coverage when they need i...
health care
Trump declares public health emergency over opioids, adds no new funding
President Donald Trump has finally declared the opioid crisis a public health emergency, two months after he first said he would. The belated declaration is short of what is immediately needed to combat this epidemic. It offers no new funding that experts on the frontlines of the crisis say is needed — one expert says hundreds of billions in investment is necessary — and does not seem to yet prioritize increased access to the critical overdose reversal drug nalox...
The U.S. abortion rate fell dramatically. Will Trump learn the right lessons?
A new study found that the U.S. abortion rate fell dramatically between 2008 and 2014, thanks in large part to more people using effective birth control. But researchers are worried that lawmakers won’t learn the right lessons from the study’s findings — and that recent progress in the area is already being reversed under the Trump administration.
One of the other central findings of the study, authored by Guttmacher Institute researchers Rachel Jones and Jenna Jer...
The uninsured rate is rising as Trump successfully sabotages Obamacare
Providing some of the clearest evidence yet about President Donald Trump’s ability to undermine Obamacare even without the GOP votes in Congress required to officially repeal it, the national uninsurance rate is now on the rise.
According to Gallup, which has been tracking the uninsurance rate since 2008, the percentage of Americans without health care has been gradually ticking up since Trump was elected.
The uninsured rate had been on a steady downward trajectory sinc...
U.S. abortion rate falls, but the procedure is still common among certain groups
The U.S. abortion rate fell 25 percent between 2008 and 2014, though the procedure is still a common experience, according to a new study published Thursday in the Journal of Public Health. The falling rates were also not even across all groups, and the procedure has become increasingly concentrated among lower-income people.
The study found that, in 2008, there were 19.4 abortions per 1,000 women and gender minorities between the ages of 15 and 44. By 2014, that number had...
Trump changes his mind about bipartisan health care deal for the fourth time in three days
President Donald Trump flip-flopped on a flip-flop Thursday afternoon, telling reporters he’s “open to” a bipartisan health care deal Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) and Patty Murray (D-WA) struck earlier this week.
During a press conference with Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Tuesday, Trump said that he wouldn’t sign the bill, and then said 11 minutes later it was a good solution, and then tweeted the next morning that he could “never support” it.
I...
The acronym at the center of Trump’s war on Obamacare, explained
On Wednesday morning, President Donald Trump, as he is wont to do, took to Twitter.
“I am supportive of Lamar as a person & also of the process, but I can never support bailing out ins co’s who have made a fortune w/ O’Care,” Trump tweeted.
I am supportive of Lamar as a person & also of the process, but I can never support bailing out ins co's who have made a fortune w/ O'Care.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) ...
Most people don’t know Obamacare open enrollment starts in 14 days, thanks in large part to Trump
Most people who are eligible for coverage offered on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) marketplace do not know when they can sign up for insurance. Open enrollment, the time period during which people can enroll in private plans offered on the marketplace, begins on November 1.
The Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), a leading health policy analysis center, reported its new findings on Wednesday. A majority of uninsured people did not know either when open enrollment begins (85 percent) or ...
A reporter finally asked Trump to just explain his health care plan. His response was a train wreck.
During a joint White House news conference with the prime minister of Greece on Tuesday, President Trump was asked an extremely basic question about his health care plan. He responded with a lengthy, incoherent word salad.
Trump was responding to Fox News’ John Roberts, who noted that Trump’s efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act through legislation have failed, and then asked him, “I’m wondering, at this point, what is your health care plan, sir?”<...