Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee’s Health Panel Refers to Medical Insurers as “The General Motors of Medical Care”
In an interview with the Wall St. Journal, Rep. Pete Stark (D-Ca), Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee’s Health Panel, referred to medical insurers as “the General Motors of medical care delivery,” saying that he would not negotiate with insurance companies on health-care overhaul, and that the industry has “been trying to destroy Medicare for the last eight or ten years.” Read full article here. Read WSJ Health Blog commentary here.
The Congressional Budget Office Puts Numbers on It
Articles in both the NY Times and Kaiser.org explain the recently published CBO findings regarding the financial impact of various health reform proposals and parts thereof. The CBO issued two reports: “Key Issues in Analyzing Major Health Insurance Proposals,” and “Budget Options, Volume 1: Health Care.” Both CBO reports may be accessed through the hyperlinks above which include the reports, charts, and a CBO explanatory blog. The reports may also be accessed through the “Resources” section of this blog.
According to the CBO blog, “The first document, Key Issues in Analyzing Major Health Insurance Proposals, focuses on large-scale proposals, provides extensive background information, and explains CBO’s analysis of numerous issues that could arise should the Congress seek to enact major changes in the health insurance system.”
“The second document, Budget Options, Volume 1: Health Care, is much more specific and focused on discrete changes. It presents 115 discrete options, encompassing a broad array of issues related to the financing and delivery of health care. (Volume 2 of Budget Options, which will address policy options in other areas of the federal budget, will be issued in 2009.) The health care volume includes some options that would reduce spending and others that would increase it, as well as changes that would reduce or raise revenues.”
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