Final push begins on health legislation
Philadelphia Inq Reports:
WASHINGTON – Congressional Democrats and President Obama resumed work yesterday to resolve difficult issues still standing in the way of their national health-care overhaul.
Topping the list: How to help Americans pay for insurance premiums.
Republicans weren’t invited, and they complained that the Democrats intend to deliberate behind closed doors – though lawmakers often do [...]
Progress in Senate Democratic health care talks
Philadelphia Inq reports:
WASHINGTON – After agreeing tentatively to jettison a key liberal priority , a full-blown government-run insurance option , Democrats say they are getting close to pushing President Barack Obama’s health care bill through the Senate.
“We’ve overcome a real problem that we had,” Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said in announcing what he called [...]
A Hill pep talk on health care
Philadelphia Inq reports:
WASHINGTON – Casting health-care overhaul as a legacy to benefit the American people and failure as politically unthinkable, President Obama yesterday rallied Senate Democrats to deliver on their party’s half-century quest to expand the social safety net to include access for all.
At the Capitol during a rare Sunday session of the Senate, Obama [...]
GOP’s bid on Medicare fails
Philadelphia Inq reports
WASHINGTON – Senate Democrats closed ranks yesterday behind $460 billion in politically risky cuts in Medicare payments that are crucial to their health-care legislation, thwarting a Republican attempt to doom the overhaul.
The GOP bid to reverse cuts to the popular program drew two Democratic defectors but failed, 58-42.
Approval of the amendment would have [...]
Health care issues: Medical cost inflation
Philadelphia Inq Reports:
A look at key issues in the health care debate:
THE ISSUE: Why do medical costs increase at a rate faster than inflation?
THE POLITICS: Health care spending over the past year increased by 3.2 percent even as overall consumer prices dropped 2.1 percent. That’s not unusual in the United States, where health care spending [...]
Pa. hospital, union ink new contract, avert strike
Philadelphia Inq reports:
POTTSTOWN, Pa. – A strike at Pottstown Memorial Medical Center has been narrowly averted.
Health care workers voted Tuesday by a 93 percent majority to ratify a new three-year contract with hospital owner Community Health Systems.
The settlement comes after two contract extensions and averts a strike deadline that was scheduled for 7 a.m. Wednesday.
The [...]
Democrats decry ’scare tactics’ as GOP senator says seniors will ‘die sooner’ under overhaul
On the Senate floor in health care debate Senator Coburn says seniors citizens will die sooner because of this bill. Democrats defend the bill calling this a scare tactic. The bill cuts medicare funding by $400 billion, which Senator McCain opposes and plans to amend.
Hospitals Round-Up for 11.24
See what’s up with Mount Nittany Medical Center, Jefferson Health System, the University of Pennsylvania Health System, Temple University Health System, Albert Einstein Healthcare Network, Aria Health System, Mercy Health System, Abington Memorial Hospital, and a proposed new women’s health center
The latest advice on mammograms…missing the point
Even a routine mammography may not have discovered this woman’s cancer, however, preventative care can save lives.
Mammography: What to Do Now?
US News & World Report reports:
WEDNESDAY, Nov. 18 (HealthDay News) — When a U.S. government task force recommended that women wait until they’re 50 to get their first mammogram to check for breast cancer, reaction was swift.
Critics such as the American Cancer Society vowed to stand by its advice that annual screening begin at age 40 [...]