Medicaid Enrollment Spikes to 48 Million; Huge Influx in Weak Economy

Patient Choice Can Prevent Rationing Abuses
This is the fourth installment in a series on correcting the mistakes in the Democrats Health Reform Bill. Click here to read the rest of the series. Uniting insurers and providers into an integrated Health delivery System would better preserve patient choice, insure quality Care and manage Costs than the Democrats Health Reform Bill. Rising Health Costs could better be managed when insurers provide a Budget and affiliated providers make decisions about Care within that Cost...

Medicaid users now at least 48 million
More people signed up for Medicaid last year than at any time since the program's inception, as the Recession wiped out jobs and workplace health coverage. A report released Thursday by the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation found that enrollment in th...

21 Of 22 States Suing Over Health Reform Begin Planning For Exchanges With Federal Funds
21 Of 22 States Suing Over Health Reform Begin Planning For Exchanges With Federal Funds The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced today that it would distribute $49 million in planning grants to help 48 states — 21 of which are suing the federal government over the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act — “to invest in research and planning to get the Exchanges up and running” by 2014. “In my month on the job, I’ve been out meeting...

Healthy Living
In his 2006 book "In Our Hands: A Plan to End the Welfare State," author Charles Murray proposed eliminating Welfare, Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, etc., and just giving every adult American $10,000 per year. Murray argues this would "supercharge" the voluntary institutions of civil society (the heartfelt interactions of families, friends, coworkers, charities, private groups, Associations, religious organizations, etc.), and generate an improvement in Public and private...

Medicaid Enrollment Spikes to 48 Million
Source: Associated Press AP) More people signed up for Medicaid last year than at any time since the program's inception, as the Recession wiped out jobs and workplace health coverage. A report released Thursday by the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation found that enrollment in the safety-net medical Insurance program jumped to more than 48 million. With The Economy barely improving, states are forecasting a 6 percent increase in the rolls next year, meaning another strain on their...

A.M. Vitals: HHS Will Exercise 'Discretion' on McDonald's Insurance
By Katherine Hobson Exercising Discretion : Limited-benefit Health Insurance plans, such as the one offered by McDonald’s, may get some leeway in meeting the Health-care overhaul law’s requirement that 80% to 85% of Premiums are spent on medical rather than administrative costs, the WSJ reports . The Obama Administration says HHS head Kathleen Sebelius will “exercise her discretion” in enforcing the requirement for those “mini-med” plans, which tend to have...

Medicaid users now at least 48 million
A report released Thursday by the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation found that enrollment in the safety-net medical Insurance program jumped to at least 48 million. With The Economy barely improving, states are forecasting a 6 percent increase in the rolls next year, meaning another strain on their cash-depleted budgets. The Medicaid numbers are the latest piece to emerge in a grim statistical picture of the Recession's toll. The ranks of the working-age poor climbed to the highest level...

What Keeps Health-Care Costs Low in Grand Junction, Colorado?
By Katherine Hobson Remember the New Yorker article about how Health-care Costs can vary widely between different areas of the country? The story favorably singled out Grand Junction, Colo., saying that the community is “one of the lowest-cost markets in the country” but “nonetheless has achieved some of Medicare’s highest quality-of-care scores.” Since then, as two researchers write in a perspective piece just published online in the New England Journal of...

Medicaid Enrollment Spikes to 48 Million
There seems to be no end in sight to the fiscal pressure on the Medicaid program, said Vernon Smith, who co-authored the Kaiser report. From December 2008 to December 2009, Medicaid enrollment rose by nearly 3.7 million people, the biggest 12-month increase since the early days of the program's implementation, the report found. That accompanied a surge in demand for other Low-income assistance programs. Nearly 12 million households received food stamps last year, a record. Medicaid is a...

Medicaid costs to wreck state budgets
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- States will have to dig deeper into their already empty coffers next Year in order to pay for rising Medicaid costs. Next Fiscal Year states will spend 7.4% more on the Health Care coverage -- which is already one of their biggest expenses -- according to a report released Thursday by the Kaiser Family Foundation. The severe economic downturn has sent people flocking to state Medicaid programs, which provide Health Care coverage for the disadvantaged. Next Year,...

Study: Obamacare Means Heavy New Burdens On States
The Kaiser Family Foundation is a pro-government Health Care group, but their recent study on the impact ObamaCare will have on the states is notable in that it paints a bleak picture even with that bias. It notes that the states are responsible for implementing many of the biggest aspects of ObamaCare, such as the expansion of Medicaid and the creation of state Health Care exchanges. Some 32 million people nationally are expected to take party in one or the other of those programs, and the...

Lower-income U.S. families see government more favorably: survey
NEW YORK | Fri Oct 1, 2010 4:03pm EDT NEW YORK (Reuters) - Lower-income American families rate government policies more favorably than those of higher-income brackets, according to a survey released on Friday showed. This disparity in views between different income groups in the latest Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan's Surveys of Consumers could play a role in the November 2 Elections and change the political landscape in Washington. In September, 23 percent of households with an annual...

Big Interview: Goolsbee Defends Obama Record on Business
By Sudeep Reddy The new chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers brushed off business leaders’ criticism of the Obama Administration, arguing that President Barack Obama has repeatedly Cut business taxes and is pushing measures to help companies expand. The president has been under fire from business executives and corporate lobby groups for everything from an alleged personal hostility to business to the details of his high-profile Health-care, Tax and...

Medicaid enrollment spikes to 48M in weak economy
A report released Thursday by the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation found that enrollment in the Low-income medical Insurance program jumped to more than 48 million. With The Economy barely improving, states are forecasting a 6 percent increase in the rolls next year, meaning another strain on their cash-depleted budgets. Nearly 6 million people have signed up for Medicaid since the start of the Recession in December 2007, according to Kaiser. Starting in the fall of 2008, the federal...

Americans and the Healthcare Reform Legislation
Where does Healthcare Reform Legislation stand at this point -- from the perspective of the American public? I found five Polls on the topic conducted within the last month or so. Each Poll contains a question about the Healthcare Reform Legislation worded at least somewhat differently from every other Poll. Each is located within the particular context of a particular survey. We would therefore expect some differences. There are. Four of the five surveys show a net negative reaction to...

Exemption from national health-care law no boon to Hawaii business
By Laura Brown — Business and Health Insurance costs to remain high under Hawaii’s exemption to national healthcare law

Whose Federal Spending?
In the midst of a very sensible and useful article on why federal Spending always seems to go up, Paul Waldman makes an important point about the disconnect between conservative Rhetoric and the raw facts: Our federal Spending has increased by a few points in the last two years (from 20.7 percent of gross domestic product in 2008 to 24.7 percent in 2009), but it is still small compared to that of our friends in Europe. Of course, that doesn't tell us what the optimal level of Government is....

Study: ObamaCare will make doctor shortage 50% worse by 2015
More good news on what we found out about ObamaCare after its passage comes from two different sources today. First, a new study by the Association of American Medical Colleges and reported by Reuters shows that the bill will have a big impact on an expected shortage of physicians over the next few years — by amplifying it: The U.S. Healthcare Reform law will worsen a shortage of physicians as millions of newly insured patients seek Care, the Association of American Medical Colleges...

No Advice and No Consent
It is remarkable that President Obama has been lecturing Afghan president Harmid Karzi on government ethics and the Rule of Law. None of us condones Corruption in Afghanistan, but President Obamas admonishment to follow constitutional principles and procedures is coming from a man living in a glass house. President Obama has, for example, demonstrated a complete disregard for the constitutional process of making key Appointments. From the beginning, President Obama has stretched his...

It ain't over till it's over
The race for control of the House is far from over. Clearly, Republicans have the momentum, but this will still be decided on a district-by-district basis. Right now Democrats have a 39-seat margin. Republicans probably need to pick up 43 seats to get to a majority since there are some Republican seats that could go Democratic. These include William Jeffersons (D) old seat in New Orleans; a Hawaii seat taken by the GOP in a three-way Special Election when Neil Abercrombie (D) resigned...

Pennsylvania revenues rise, aided by business tax
NEW YORK | Fri Oct 1, 2010 6:08pm EDT NEW YORK (Reuters) - Pennsylvania raked in an extra 3.1 percent of General fund Revenue in September, buoyed by a rise in taxes paid by corporations, though Moody's Investors Service kept its negative outlook for Pennsylvania. The Commonwealth's General fund -- which counts most State dollars except some fees, taxes and Federal Aid -- took in $2.3 Billion in September. That was almost $70 million more than expected, the State Department of Revenue said in...

Whale snot, bat sex win 2010 IgNobel spoof prizes
WASHINGTON - Researchers who used a remote-controlled Helicopter to collect whale snot, documented bats having oral sex and showed that swearing makes you feel better when you stub a toe were among the winners of spoof IgNobel Prizes Thursday. The Prizes, meant to be both humorous and to encourage scientific research, are given every year by the Journal of Improbable Research as a whimsical counterpart to the Nobel Prizes, which will be awarded starting next week. IgNobels also went to...

Texas Pharmacies Sue CVS Caremark
A group of Texas pharmacies has filed a Lawsuit against CVS Caremark, the nations largest pharmacy Health Care provider, saying it violates racketeering and Privacy laws. The Texas companies filed the suit Thursday in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas. The suit quotes extensively from CVS plans, presentations and even a job posting for a data analyst. “The practice of CVS Caremark in violating the Privacy of patients and unfairly competing with its...

Sebelius: Anonymous Political Speech 'Dangerous'
Filed under:  Cato Publications ; Government and Politics ; Health, Welfare & Entitlements ; Law and Civil Liberties Tags:  Andy Griffith , anonymous Speech , Campaign Finance reform , Censorship , chill Speech , Citizens United , CMS , free Speech , Freedom of Speech , Health Care reform , Health Insurance exchange , hhs , Kathleen Sebelius , Medicare , ObamaCare , Political Speech , Speech Rationing , Wisconsin right to life Share/Bookmark

Health Reform to Worsen Doctor Shortage
The U.S. Healthcare Reform law will worsen a shortage of physicians as millions of newly insured patients seek Care, the Association of American Medical Colleges said on Thursday. The group's Center for Workforce Studies released new estimates that showed shortages would be 50 percent worse in 2015 than forecast. "While previous projections showed a baseline shortage of 39,600 doctors in 2015, current estimates bring that number closer to 63,000, with a worsening of shortages through 2025,"...