Last year I published a study with the Mercatus Center projecting that enacting Medicare for All (M4A) would add at least $32.6 trillion to federal budget costs over the first 10 years. After the study was published, some advocates misattributed a finding to it, specifically that M4A would lower national healthcare costs by $2 trillion over that same time period. This misattribution has since been repeated in various press reports. Multiple fact-checking sites have pointed out that the study contains no such finding, as did a follow-up piece I published with e21 last year. However, because the mistake continues to appear occasionally, this article provides additional detail about how and why it is wrong.
Medicare Advantage (MA) and Part D applications were up 87% during the open enrollment period between January and March compared to the same period last year, according to a new report from eHealth.
The report looks at the costs and reactions from enrollees of Medicare’s latest open enrollment period. During the first three months of this year, the average MA premium dropped 33% from $12 to $8 from 2018, and average out-of-pocket limits decreased 11%. The average monthly premium for Part D coverage decreased during this time as well from $26 to $25.
Hospitals in Lithuania are to start advertising cheap operations to patients in the UK because of a surge in demand on the back of the NHS crisis. Health Tourism Lithuania claims it has been inundated with enquiries from Britons frustrated at having to wait months for routine treatment.
The body has now revealed that, from next month, it will target patients across the home nations with Facebook and Google adverts. NHS data revealed a total of 4.23million people in England were waiting for hospital treatment in March – the longest the waiting list has ever been.
More than 1 in 4 Americans say they or a family member went without needed health care in the past two years because they felt they could not afford it, according to a new poll.
The survey from Monmouth University released Monday finds that 27 percent of adults say they or a member of their household have avoided necessary medical care in the past two years because of cost. That figure is down slightly from 2017, when 31 percent said they had skipped care.
The era of annual eye-popping Obamacare rate hikes appears to be over.
Premium increases in the law’s marketplaces are on track to be relatively modest for the second straight year, according to the first batch of 2020 rates proposed by insurers. The rate filings are an early indication that this year’s small rate hikes weren’t a fluke and that other Trump administration policies — including support for a lawsuit that could torch the Affordable Care Act — have proven less disruptive than some experts feared.
Nine years after Democrats passed the Affordable Care Act and more than a year after Republicans failed in their effort to repeal it, health care promises once again to be a major issue in the 2020 elections.
Drug costs are rising, as are insurance premiums. Rural hospitals are closing. Even as an estimated 20 million people have gained coverage under the ACA, widely known as Obamacare, nearly 30 million people remain uninsured. Surveys consistently find that Americans see the health-care system as broken.
Americans cited health care as the top issue for the federal government to address, ahead of the economy, immigration, national security and other issues, Wall Street Journal/NBC News polling found this month.
The financial burden of health care was of particular concern for American families, according to a new Gallup poll released last week, trumping worries linked to wages, college expenses, housing and taxes.
| Last week the Trump Administration rolled out a semiannual summation of all the administration’s regulatory activity. Noteworthy for health policy observers, the administration has pushed back to November finalization of the proposed rule on manufacturer rebates for drugs purchased through the Medicare Part D and Medicaid Managed Care program. Opposition to the proposed rule has focused on the potential increase in costs to the federal government. It is important, however, to recognize just how uncertain the myriad cost analyses of this proposed rule are. AAF recently reviewed six cost estimates in detail here, but the key takeaway is that the numbers produced by these estimates depend greatly on behavioral responses that are enormously hard to predict correctly. |
Widescale drug importation from Canada, is not a practical solution to the problem of high drug costs. It is a distraction from efforts to address the real prescription drug cost drivers. Perhaps conflating its geographic size, importation proponents seem to overlook Canada’s small population, which is less than California’s. There’s no way that our neighbors to the north could supply the U.S. market—or even a handful of states—with all of its prescription drug needs. President Trump and legislators should redirect their efforts to proposals that could actually make a difference short term and long term in lowering costs.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services will take more time to judge the performance of navigator groups tasked with ACA enrollment outreach, the agency said Thursday. Performance is tied to funding. Starting in the 2020 open-enrollment period, navigator groups will be evaluated on a two-year performance period rather than one year. Federal funding is tied to how many people are signed up by the groups. The CMS said the change will help stabilize the program and improve consumers’ experience.
| Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont and fellow Democratic lawmakers reached an agreement Thursday to create a public option that will allow individuals and small businesses to purchase health insurance through the state. The proposal also calls for re-establishing the individual mandate—a centerpiece of the ACA that required people to have health insurance or pay a penalty—that has since been eliminated at the federal level by Congress. The bill would also have the state seek permission from the federal government to buy prescription drugs from Canada and calls for taxing opioid manufacturers. [As if Connecticut didn’t have enough problems with crippling taxes and regulations, now this…] |