Health Politics

Remember that funding for health information technology in the stimulus package? We know, it's been a little while, and when it comes to health reform, we've had a lot on our minds lately. But states haven't forgotten about health IT and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 boosted both their motivation and resources to get health IT programs up and running in two to six years. That states are interested in establishing electronic health information exchanges isn't exactly breaking news, but the recent progress in investment, implementation, and infrastructure is pretty exciting.

The stimulus package included the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act of 2009 (HITECH Act), which lays the groundwork for advances in health care quality. Late in August, the Obama administration announced $1.2 billion of the stimulus funds would be released in the form of health IT grants, reports American Medical News.

In case you were so deep in the health wonkosphere that you missed the one about the heart-shaped potato...

Last night, President Obama appeared on the Late Show with David Letterman for a conversation that ranged from political to personal, as the president discussed race, the war in Afghanistan, the economy,his family, and of course,  health care reform. And the potato.

President Obama said that our economy is improving, but we're not out of the woods yet. He called for "rules of the road" to make health care more efficient and health insurance affordable and sustainable for all Americans. He asked, "Why wouldn't we want to create a health care system that will save money over time, work better, and make people healthier? " Good question. 

He also got to take home that heart shaped potato from an audience member. See for yourself in the video below:

While you listen to the Democrats (and Republican Olympia Snowe) on the Senate Finance Committee talk about affordability and access, and the Republicans (minus Snowe) talk about malpractice, partisanship and "rush jobs" (are there any members of the panel who haven't spent years and years in the Senate, House or state government pondering how to fix health care?)  -- we wanted to also point your attention to another White House paper on "The Burden of Health Insurance Premium Increases on American Families."

The paper points out that insurance keeps costing more and more, and, on the whole, we keep getting less and less. Insurance premiums have doubled in the last decade (and our wages sure haven't) and they are going to keep rising. One in five adults under age 65 was uninsured in 2008. Those numbers, too, are rising.

Health reform won't just expand coverage. Insurance regulation has the potential to change the very nature of coverage, with real consumer protection. As the White House paper put it, "Stability and security will be accomplished by establishing the following rights for all Americans:"

Veteran health advocate and researcher Stan Dorn is guest blogging for us today. Stan has worked on health policy for 25 years at the state and federal level. He began as a legal aid attorney helping low-income Californians obtain health care. Later as health division director at the Children's Defense Fund he led the organization's health policy team in a national campaign that contributed to the creation of the Children's Health Insurance Program -- and he helped defeat Newt Gingrich's proposal to replace Medicaid with a block grant.  He is now a senior research associate at the Urban Institute. The views here are his own.

If health reform legislation does not guarantee a public option, could progressives support it, in good conscience?

I hear this question a lot. My answer is yes -- so long as the bill provides millions of low-income uninsured with affordable, comprehensive health coverage.

We'll be tweeting the Senate Finance Committee mark up all day today. You can follow our coverage of the event live on Twitter (tag: #SFC).

President Obama appeared on five Sunday morning talk shows to "reclaim the health care debate" but all eyes are on one person -- Maine Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe -- who may have heard his message.

"I'm going to support the right policy. That's what guides me and governs me; it always has, and I think the right policy will garner the votes," Snowe told John Harwood of the New York Times and CNBC. "I will vote for the right policy. That's what I've always done -- that has been my guiding light."

President Obama hopes that her guiding light will shine on the path that the Democrats are on. We'll  learn a lot more about where Snowe stands when the Finance Committee takes up the America's Healthy Future Act of 2009 markup Tuesday morning

Democrats hope she will provide a measure of bipartisan support, and  the 60th vote needed to block a Republican filibuster.

In case you missed it...Bill O'Reilly backs the public plan.

I want that. I want, not for personally for me, but for working Americans, to have a option, that if they don’t like their health insurance, if it’s too expensive, they can’t afford it, if the government can cobble together a cheaper insurance policy that gives the same benefits, I see that as a plus for the folks.

(Hat tip to Think Progress).

We are not quite sure what Lyndon Johnson would have done had he lived in the age of YouTube (the mind boggles), but his daughter, Linda Bird Johnson Robb, jumped in to make a video with the Alliance for Retired Americans that aims to reassure U.S. seniors that health reform is in their interest, and in the interest of a  healthy sustainable Medicare program.

Robb, who reached Medicare eligibility age herself this year, recalled the achievements of  Presidents Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy and Johnson -- "Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and more."

Baucus's bill is out. Markup starts Sept. 22 (next Tuesday).

We weren't surprised to hear President Obama back some kind of malpractice reform. As we wrote in back in July 2008, in March of this year, and in more detail this past July, Obama and key Democrats were sending just that signal to physicians' groups. Exactly what shape (or shapes) malpractice reform will take is not yet clear. But Obama emphasized on "60 Minutes" this Sunday that he is no fan of the strict limits on damages that Republicans have proposed repeatedly for many years -- and which have always been shot down in Congress even when Republicans had the majority.

PRESIDENT OBAMA:

Tort reform.  That's not something that historically has been popular in -- in my party.  But on Wednesday I specifically said that I think we can work together on a bipartisan basis to do something to reduce defensive medicine.  Where doctors are worrying about lawsuits instead of worrying about patient care.