January 2010 Archives

There is no way to save health care reform until everyone realizes there is no way to save health care reform. Then it's easy.  As soon as everyone realizes there is only one way to save health care reform, then health care reform can be saved.  The House can pass the Bill that the Senate already passed, and President Obama can sign it into law.  It's as simple as that. In ...
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And has evidence based medicine become the third rail of health reform?Consider what President Obama said to ABC News's George Stephanopoulos: "We know that we need insurance reform, that the health insurance companies are taking advantage of people," ..."We know that we have to have some form of cost containment because if we don't, then our budgets are going to blow up, and we know that small businesses are going to need ...
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Lentil and Red Bean Dahl (vegan) The hottest thing in the fast food industry is the "Dollar Menu" during this recession, but at the grocery store, a whole package of lentils costs just 79 cents.  Add an onion and some spices and you can feed a big family several times over for a dollar or two.   This recipe is an example of sloooooow cooking.  It could well be a week or more ...
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The ongoing reform debate often tends to obscure a very basic fact -  that insurance is expensive for groups of beneficiaries that consume a lot of care.  Basically insurance premiums track the cost of care.  Administrative costs and profits are merely icing on the cake.  So it is impossible to have much impact on premiums without cutting care.A basic goal of healthcare reform is bringing costs under control, which will ...
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As negotiators work quietly to come up with a health reform compromise that is either the beginning of the end or the end of the beginning--depending on one's political perspective, it is worth taking a moment to consider the role of the three men who constituted the beginning of the beginning when they began agitating more than a quarter century ago: Alain Enthoven, Paul Ellwood and Jack Wennberg. The three big ...
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