Democrats are making an election issue of rising health care costs, so it’s strange that they are now criticizing a new Trump Administration rule that would make cheaper insurance available to more Americans. Maybe they fear people will like it.
At long last, the Trump administration has created a “freedom option” for people suffering under Obamacare. A final rulemaking reverses an Obama-era regulation that exposed the sick to medical underwriting.
Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar recently outlined an ambitious health care policy agenda that is positively Reaganesque. The states’ diverse health insurance problems, he noted, are best resolved by the people of the states themselves.
Having stacked the deck in favor of Medicare for All, a new report comes up with a price tag: By 2031, the federal government would be spending an additional $4.2 trillion a year. For reference, the amount is slightly more than the total the U.S. government expects to spend this year.
Medicaid is meant to serve as a backstop for the truly disadvantaged. It’s not supposed to be a replacement for a job. Physically able enrollees ought to work in exchange for their benefits.
Many Republicans assume their party will take another stab at repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act if the midterm elections go their way, even though GOP candidates aren’t making a big deal about it on the campaign trail.
Telemedicine is making better care, quicker care and life-saving care available to more patients every day. Thanks to technological breakthroughs, we don’t need to travel to a doctor’s office or a hospital for every medical need. We can get much of our care right in our own home.
Since they were created in 2004, tax-advantaged Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) have become a successful tool toward promoting patient choice in health care. HSAs are utilized in combination with a high deductible health plan and have proven to be a free-market health-care proposal that does not rely on mandates or cash subsidies. Today, 25 million American families and individuals save and spend their own money tax free on a variety of healthcare expenses — more than double the number of individuals that use ObamaCare exchanges.
The U.K.’s government-run healthcare system, the National Health Service, turns 70 this month. There’s not much to celebrate. The NHS is collapsing. Patients routinely face treatment delays, overcrowded hospitals, and doctor shortages. Even its most ardent defenders admit that the NHS is in crisis.
States are testing the waters with Medicare-for-all type plans while waiting for federal solutions. The cost of single-payer plans could be the biggest hurdle.”Medicare for all” is becoming a rallying cry in state elections, with state legislators coming up with their own versions of single-payer healthcare despite, or possibly because of, the stagnation of similar ideas at the federal level.
. . .