News

Biden’s $7.3 trillion budget: 16 healthcare takeaways By Madeline Ashley, Kelly Gooch and Alexis Kayser March 11, 2024   President Joe Biden proposed a $7.3 trillion budget March 11, including various initiatives to lower healthcare costs and an $800 million investment in hospital cybersecurity protection.   16 healthcare takeaways:   1. Medicare. The proposed budget […]

BETWEEN YOU AND YOUR DOCTOR: How Medicare Advantage care denials affect patients By Matthew Cunningham-Cook March 4, 2024   In 2023, insurance behemoth UnitedHealth spent $8 billion buying back its stock to juice its stock price—and its executive compensation, which is tied to the company’s stock price. It spent 39% more on stock buybacks in

Indigenous Americans — The Journal’s Historical “Indian Problem” By David S. Jones, M.D., Ph.D., Moustafa Abdalla, M.D., D.Phil., and Joseph P. Gone, Ph.D. January 4, 2024   By the time the Journal was launched in 1812, Boston had witnessed two centuries of destructive confrontations between Europeans and Indigenous Americans. Although some Indigenous communities persisted in

Key Messages: Health Care at Risk for Millions By California Hospital Association 2024  

A Hospital’s Overflowing Emergency Room, Our Sick Health System By Mark Kreidler February 15, 2024   Last summer, officials at Martin Luther King Jr. Community Hospital in South Los Angeles made a decision: If they didn’t start yelling for help, their facility was headed for a total shutdown.   In the abstract, the problem seemed

The Ethos of Emergency Medicine Hangs in the Balance by Monica Saxena, MD, JD, Dara Kass, MD, Esther Choo, MD, MPH, and Jennifer A. Newberry, MD, JD, MSc March 8, 2024   The ethos of emergency medicine — any patient, any time, any problem — could be radically changed, considering pending legal challenges that may

Letters to the Editor: If Canada can have single-payer healthcare, so can California Including Editorial from HC4US.org’s own James Sarantinos February 28, 2024   To the editor: Rivas is disingenuous in his claim that the state can’t afford a single-payer healthcare system in the face of spiraling budget deficits.   Such a system will generate

Americans Paid $11 Billion To Make Drugs You Can’t Afford By Helen Santoro February 22, 2024   As the government begins its first-ever price negotiations for a handful of medicines under Medicare, the pharmaceutical industry has launched an all-out legal and PR assault on this meager attempt to control out-of-control drug prices for the country’s

California Achieves Near-Universal Coverage, But Budget Deficits And Single-Payer Proposals Remain By Paul Roberts, REBC, Sr. Director of Education & Market Development February 12, 2024   On January 1, 2024, California took a significant step toward achieving universal health coverage for its residents. By expanding its Medi-Cal program, the state now ensures that every resident,