- Obamacare is making health insurance companies rich.
- Aaron Carroll reviews health care systems around the world in 10 minutes. Pretty good on the market-based systems in Switzerland and Singapore and the public/private systems in Australia and New Zealand. But when it comes to the UK and Canada, he fails to mention the extraordinary waits and health care rationing.
- Federal health bureaucracies operated by doctors and lawyers regulate about a fifth of our economy and a quarter of the federal budget – jobs that need the insights of economists.
- When the cost of prevention is included, the total loss from Covid was lower in the U.S. than in the EU.
- The CBO estimated that (Obamacare) exchange enrollees would cost federal taxpayers $6,850 each by 2021. The reality: $20,739, or over three times as much.
Author: John C. Goodman
Wednesday Links – 27 March 2024
- Contrary to the AMA and the CDC, there is no maternal mortality crisis. The authors found that the maternal mortality rate remained essentially flat between 1999 and 2002 (10.2 per 100,000 live births) and 2018 and 2021 (10.4). This would put the U.S. on par with other developed countries.
- Biden to lower the hammer on short-terms health insurance plans any day now.
- There were 17,597 dog bite liability claims filed across the country in 2022, with payouts totaling more than $1 billion.
- Average life expectancy has declined because a lot of young people are dying early (e.g., drug overdoses); among people who make it to old age, life expectancy is longer than ever.
Tuesday Links
- Why your EV is mostly made in China even if it is produced in the U.S.
- NYT finally admits that Covid school closures were harmful.
- Primary care costs less in Medicare Advantage.
- Research has linked diets high in ultra-processed foods to increased risks of obesity, Type 2 diabetes, cancer, cardiovascular disease and depression.
- Roughly one in five relatively healthy people over the age of 50 has at least one organ that is aging much more quickly than the others.
Monday Links
- More young people are getting cancer.
- FDA gives up in its battle against ivermectin.
- Adultery is a crime in New York. (And you don’t get a jury trial.)
- US life expectancy is rising again. HT: Tyler.
- Future deficit spending may be worse than what the CBO is projecting.
- For the first time since the Black death, the world’s population is set to decline.