Post-election update:
Ezra Klein: The Next Health Care Schism
Drew Altman: Keeping the Health Reform Coalition Together
CAP: The Health Care Delivery System: A Blueprint for Reform (October 31, 2008)
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Over the weekend, I posted When Can We Expect Health Care Reform (Whoever Wins)? and in the precess (and comments) realized some other links to basic materials might help. This diary is a start at collecting information in one place.
Here are my previous posts and sources for the Sunday piece:
Sources
This is a follow up on Daily Kos posts here (Medical Crisis: The Shape Of Things To Come), here (Perspective on Health Care Reform), here (What's The Effect Of Recession On The Health Care Safety Net?), and here (Health Stories: HR 5449). The posts use public opinion polling from Kaiser, here with a summary tutorial, narrative supplied by Claudia Deane (formerly of the Washington Post polling unit). Further elaboration appears here in more academic form published in the January 24 New England Journal of Medicine with co-authors from the Harvard School of Public Health and John F Kennedy School of Government). The latest poll from NPR/Kaiser/HSPH is dated 2/28/08, and available here.
Other Daily Kos diaries of note:
SCHIP: The GOP Campaign Against Children by DemFromCT
Analysis: GOP Ideology More Important Than Helping Poor Kids by DemFromCT
Multipayer Universal Healthcare: Why It Works by jd in nyc
The real Irony of the Health Care Mandate Arguments (Health Thurs) by DrSteveB
Caution on the Mass Health Care "Success Story" by DrSteveB
more on the flip
This not meant to be exclusionary; this is a start of a growing list.
Key Bills (status reports from GovTrack)
S. 2460 Moratorium on Medicaid and SCHIP Rules Changes
- Sponsor: Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-NM)
- A bill to extend by one year the moratorium on implementation of a rule relating to the Federal-State financial partnership under Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program and on finalization of a rule regarding graduate medical education under Medicaid and to include a moratorium on the finalization of the outpatient Medicaid rule making similar changes.
- Action Diary: Bush Destroying Public Hospitals & Clinics Thru New Regs
- Last Action: Dec 12, 2007: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance
HR 5613 Protecting the Medicaid Safety Net Act of 2008- Sponsor: Rep. John Dingell (D-MI)
- Protecting the Medicaid Safety Net Act of 2008 - Amends the U.S. Troop Readiness, Veterans' Care, Katrina Recovery, and Iraq Accountability Appropriations Appropriations Act, 2007 to extend until April 1, 2009, the moratorium on implementation of a proposed rule ("Medicaid Program; Cost Limit for Providers Operated by Units of Government and Provisions To Ensure the Integrity of Federal-State Financial Partnership") relating to the federal-state financial partnerships under titles XIX (Medicaid) and XXI (State Children's Health Insurance Program) (SCHIP) of the Social Security Act.
- Extends until April 1, 2009, the moratorium on any action by the Secretary of Health and Human Services to restrict Medicaid payments for graduate medical education (GME).
- Amends the Medicare, Medicaid, and SCHIP Extension Act of 2007 to extend until April 1, 2009, the moratorium on certain restrictions relating to Medicaid coverage or payment for rehabilitation services or school-based administration and school-based transportation, including specified proposed regulations, if such restrictions are more restrictive in any aspect than those applied to such areas as of July 1, 2007.
- Establishes additional moratoria until April 1, 2009, on specified regulatory actions concerning Medicaid: (1) treatment of optional case management services; (2) outpatient hospital services; and (3) allowable provider taxes.
S.334 Healthy Americans Act - Sponsor: Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR)
- Requires each adult individual to have the opportunity to purchase a Healthy Americans Private Insurance Plan (HAPI). Makes individuals who are not enrolled in another specified health plan and who are not opposed to coverage for religious reasons responsible for enrolling themselves and their dependent children in a HAPI plan offered through their state of residence. Sets forth penalties for failure to enroll.
- Ezra Klein 12/06
- Lewin Group analysis
- This bill is in the first step in the legislative process. Introduced bills go first to committees that deliberate, investigate, and revise them before they go to general debate. The majority of bills never make it out of committee. Keep in mind that sometimes the text of one bill is incorporated into another bill, and in those cases the original bill, as it would appear here, would seem to be abandoned. [Last Updated: Jan 27, 2008]
HR 5449- Sponsor Steve Kagen (D-WI)
- DemFromCT 2/28
- "The essential elements of this necessary legislation are: (1) No Discrimination due to pre-existing conditions, (2) Open Disclosure of all prices, and (3) Every Citizen is allowed to Pay the Lowest Price available. These ideas must be included in any successful comprehensive health care reform legislation. At this very early step in the process, I am pleased to have the encouragement and support of many of my freshman colleagues, AFSCME and Families USA. I am looking forward to presenting this bill and these ideas in a Congressional hearing this spring." – Steve Kagen
- This bill is in the first step in the legislative process. Introduced bills go first to committees that deliberate, investigate, and revise them before they go to general debate. The majority of bills never make it out of committee. Keep in mind that sometimes the text of one bill is incorporated into another bill, and in those cases the original bill, as it would appear here, would seem to be abandoned. [Last Updated: Feb 14, 2008]
HR 676 United States National Health Insurance Act- Sponsor: Rep. John Conyers (D-MI)
- United States National Health Insurance Act (or the Expanded and Improved Medicare for All Act) - Establishes the United States National Health Insurance (USNHI) Program (the Program) to provide all individuals residing in the United States and in U.S. territories with free health care that includes all medically necessary care, such as primary care and prevention, prescription drugs, emergency care, and mental health services.
- This bill is in the first step in the legislative process. Introduced bills go first to committees that deliberate, investigate, and revise them before they go to general debate. The majority of bills never make it out of committee. Keep in mind that sometimes the text of one bill is incorporated into another bill, and in those cases the original bill, as it would appear here, would seem to be abandoned. [Last Updated: Jan 26, 2008]
HR 1424 Paul Wellstone Mental Health and Addiction Equity Act of 2007- Sponsor: Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI)
- Paul Wellstone Mental Health and Addiction Equity Act of 2007 - Amends the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), the Public Health Service Act, and the Internal Revenue Code to prohibit treatment limits or the imposition of financial requirements on mental health and substance-related disorder benefits in group health plans which are not similarly imposed on substantially all medical and surgical benefits in any category of items or services under such plans.
- DemFromCT 3/08
- This bill has been passed in the House. The bill now goes on to be voted on in the Senate. Keep in mind that debate may be taking place on a companion bill in the Senate, rather than on this particular bill. [Last Updated: Mar 5, 2008]
HR 493 Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2007- Sponsor Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-NY)
- see lengthy summary, including: Amends the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), the Public Health Service Act (PHSA), and the Internal Revenue Code to prohibit a group health plan from adjusting premium or contribution amounts for a group on the basis of genetic information.
- Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Oklahama) has placed a hold on the identical S 358
- DavidNYC 2/08
- Having passed in identical form in both the House and Senate, this bill now awaits the signature of the President before becoming law. [Last Updated: May 20, 2008]
- Bush signs genetics anti-discrimination law
Blogs (left, right and center; personal, medical and industry):
Ezra Klein (highly recommended place to start)
Health Care Policy and Marketplace Review
The Health Care Blog
Managed Care Matters
Health Beat
Health Care Renewal
Effect Measure
Patient Safety and Quality Health Care
Mike Leavitt's blog (yes, for real)
Candidate comparisons and candidate news
Comonwealth Fund
Kaiser Foundation
Health Care Policy and Marketplace Review
How to Compare Health Care Proposals - McCain, Obama, Clinton
Websites of Note in the Reform Discussion
California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee
Physicians for a National Health Program
The Commonwealth Fund
Kaiser Family Foundation
Polling
pollingreport.com/health care
Kaiser Family Foundation polls
California's Failed Health Care Reform
from Health Affairs blog
Recent Media Reports
About Those Health Care Plans by the Democrats ... NY Times, 3/3/08
- Some experts say the only real way to tame health care costs is by limiting access to expensive treatments or by requiring affluent Americans to pay for more of their health care.
Coming Soon: Health Care Debate, Part 2 NY Times, 3/2/08
- THE skirmishing between the Democratic presidential candidates over the mechanics of universal health coverage will soon give way to a quite different general-election debate — about whether universal coverage should even be a national priority.
Please feel free to add relevant links in the comments.