Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI), Vox’s Sarah Kliff and Jeff Stein report, has a smart new plan to improve America’s health care system: allowing ordinary health insurance consumers to buy into Medicaid.
The proposal combines many of the beneficial aspects of former President Barack Obama’s original proposal for a public health plan — a government backstop for people who can’t find good insurance on the private market, a benchmark plan that can potentially driv...
health
Trump agrees to pay key Obamacare subsidies, extending its lifeline
Everyone and their doctor has asked President Donald Trump to continue funding Obamacare cost-sharing reduction (CSR) payments. After flirting with eliminating these payments to insurance companies, he finally agreed to pay them for the month of August. A White House spokesman told multiple news sources on Wednesday that the Trump administration will make the payment.
CONFIRMED: Trump administration will make the August CSR Obamacare payments, a WH spokesman tel...
Texas governor signs controversial ‘rape insurance’ abortion coverage into law
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) signed a bill Tuesday afternoon, approved by the Senate over the weekend, that would prohibit all insurance companies from covering non-life threatening abortion care in standard health plans. Women, trans, and non-binary people will need to pay an additional insurance premium if they want their health plan to cover abortions performed outside medical emergencies; there will be no exceptions for instances of rape or incest. Opponents of the bill are calling it &#...
Republicans will try to bring back Obamacare repeal, despite unpopularity with Americans
The House Freedom Caucus will file a petition Friday in an effort to get House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) to bring a “clean” Obamacare repeal bill to the House floor, despite the fact that 60 percent of Americans think it is a “good thing” that the Senate failed to pass the bill that would have repealed and replaced Obamacare.
The news that Republicans in Congress will once again attempt to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was first reported by Politico on Friday — the same ...
A doctor on the front lines describes Medicaid’s role in the opioid crisis
For decades, the residents of Baltimore, have been dying from opioid overdoses and have been incarcerated due to addiction.
“There’s no doubt that the opioid epidemic is worse than before, but it’s not a new problem,” says Baltimore City Health Commissioner Dr. Leana Wen. “I do think there are elements of racial inequalities, racial disparities, racial discrimination, and that needs to be taken into account.”
Baltimore has been a leader among localitie...
Abandoning Latino Obamacare outreach is poor policy planning
Key members of the Latino Affordable Care Act (ACA) outreach coalition told Talking Points Memo the Trump administration has not reached out to begin preparing for open enrollment that begins November 1st.
By this point last year, the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) and other major Latino organizations, like the National Hispanic Medical Association and National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health and Concilio, would be in the midst of enrollment frenzy. But th...
Trump administration moves closer to effectively banning patients from suing nursing homes
Advocate groups are rallying to protect an Obama-era rule that would give patients and their families the right to sue long-term care facilities. The Trump administration has threatened to roll back the rule and implement revisions that would make filing such suits virtually impossible.
The rule specifically states that facilities that rely on Medicaid or Medicare may no longer use forced arbitration clauses in their patient agreements. Forced arbitration, which nearly all facilitie...
Maine asks Trump for permission to start charging Medicaid recipients premiums
Maine could be among the first states to fundamentally change its Medicaid program by requiring low-income adults to meet work requirements and pay monthly premiums, if the state’s requests are approved by the Trump administration.
The Maine Department of Health and Human Services filed an application to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Wednesday evening, requesting core changes to its Medicaid program, dubbed MaineCare.<...
Senate Republicans quietly wave the white flag on Obamacare repeal
Multiple Republican lawmakers seem to have dismissed Trump’s call to keep moving on health care.Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Ky., listens to a question while speaking with the media, June 27, 2017. CREDIT: AP Photo/Alex Brandon
After six months of Republican-led closed door meetings on health care, Senate leadership finally looks to be pivoting.
On Tuesday at the Senate committee on...
