ACA
lborkowski | July 20, 2012by Kim Krisberg
Legislative attacks on women's health care are so commonplace these days that they make proposals that don't include a state-mandated vaginal probe seem moderate.
In fact, so many legislators are introducing proposals under the guise of protecting women's health (2011 marked a record number of reproductive health restrictions), that it was pretty refreshing to read how the Affordable Care Act will actually protect women's health. Like, for real.
Last week, the Commonwealth Fund released a report finding that the health reform law is already making a difference in the lives of…
lborkowski | June 28, 2012by Kim Krisberg
For me, there were few better places to hear about today's 5-4 Supreme Court ruling upholding the Affordable Care Act and its individual insurance mandate than at a meeting of the American Public Health Association (APHA). Here in Charlotte, N.C., for APHA's Midyear Meeting, I was surrounded by hundreds of public health practitioners, researchers and advocates as we all watched the magnified scroll of Scotusblog.com, anxiously waiting for the decision.
At 10:08 a.m., the blog declared: "The individual mandate survives as a tax."
That was when the cheers (and tears) began. You…
lborkowski | June 20, 2012As we're waiting to learn whether the Affordable Care Act will survive the upcoming Supreme Court decision, it's a good time to remember what's at stake with the individual mandate -- the part of the law that's least popular with the public and that some Supreme Court Justices seem to find objectionable. I've written before about why the mandate, which requires everyone who can afford it to purchase health insurance or pay a penalty, is a necessary part of the healthcare law and is not the same as requiring everyone to buy broccoli. Now, the Washington Post's Sarah Kliff adds to the…
lborkowski | April 16, 2012by Kim Krisberg
Broccoli. A nutritious green veggie of the cabbage family? Or a symbol of the federal government's over-reaching power grab? Like most things in life, it all depends on your perspective.
I've been thinking about that word -- broccoli -- since last month's Supreme Court hearings on the constitutionality of provisions within the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Specifically, I've been pondering this comment from Justice Antonin Scalia during arguments on the ACA's individual insurance mandate:
SCALIA: . . . could you define the market -- everybody has to buy food sooner or later, so…
lborkowski | March 30, 2012Unless they've deviated from their normal procedure, the Supreme Court justices have now decided on how they'll rule on the Affordable Care Act - but, as the Washington Post's Robert Barnes points out, we'll have to wait until late June to hear their verdict. In the meantime, this is a good opportunity to recap the key issues in the case and highlight some of the more insightful commentary about them.
The first issue on which the Court heard arguments was whether it could rule on this case to begin with, since it involves a tax on people who don't have health insurance coverage (or a hardship…
lborkowski | March 20, 2012Friday will be the two-year anniversary of the signing of the Affordable Care Act, and there's plenty of discussion about the law's impacts and the upcoming Supreme Court oral arguments. While many of the law's provisions won't take effect until 2014, it's already having an impact on some aspects of health insurance. I described several of these in a post on the law's one-year anniversary, so now I want to focus on two recent stories that underscore the difficulty and importance of changing how the US handles health insurance.
First, it's important to remember that the law isn't an overhaul…
lborkowski | February 21, 2012By Kim Krisberg
Friday wasn't a great day for public health.
That day, Congress voted to raid the Affordable Care Act's Prevention and Public Health Fund to the tune of $5 billion. The move comes as part of a deal to delay scheduled cuts to Medicare physician payment rates and was part of a legislative package to extend the payroll tax cut and unemployment benefits. Both the Senate and House voted by wide margins to pass the bill, and President Obama is expected to sign it.
Of course, this was hardly the intent of the Prevention and Public Health Fund, which was created via the Affordable…
lborkowski | December 14, 2011Following up on last year's nine-minute animated video explaining the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the Kaiser Family Foundation has produced a new interactive feature that gives examples of how different individuals' situations will change (or not) in 2014 when the law is fully implemented. Click on character - 23-year-old uninsured graphic designer Phil Butler, the Santos family who gets insurance through work, etc. - or an employer to get the details about how the individual or family's situation will change. In some cases, like when a person gets health insurance through an…
lborkowski | December 21, 2009This post was originally published on our Wordpress site
In a historic achievement, 60 Senators have agreed to a healthcare bill that will dramatically expand health insurance coverage and curb some of the insurance industry’s worst practices. Getting agreement between the Senate and the House, which has passed its own healthcare bill, will still be an arduous process, but the chambers agree on most essential elements, and this is the farthest Congress has come in decades towards fixing our healthcare system’s serious problems. (If you want to compare the House and Senate bills, the Kaiser…
lborkowski | August 17, 2009This post was originally published on our old Wordpress site.
Both the Washington Post and the New York Times report that the Obama administration is signaling a new willingness to jettison the public plan element of healthcare reform legislation. Jonathan Cohn at The Treatment questions whether anything’s really changed, though, because Obama has consistently praised the public option as a good idea without insisting that it be included in the final bill.
As the summer has worn on and Congressional committees have come out with specific proposals, healthcare reform supporters are getting a…