- The Covid vaccine works against cancer.
- Why New Yorkers voted for a socialist mayor.
- Polling on what to do about Social Security finances.
- Beginning in January, Medicare will begin paying over $1,000 for an artificial intelligence product that analyzes CT scans of the heart for signs of harmful plaque that can cause a heart attack. (Statnews)
Category: Health Economics & Costs
Does Your Doctor Need a Boss?
In my early days as a health economist, it became something of a fad for health policy analysts to argue that the U.S. health care system needed more vertical integration. Basically, your doctor needed a boss, who oversaw numerous doctors coordinating your care. I recall reading numerous articles with titles like, “does your doctor need a boss?” The Cato Institute published an article on the topic in 2009, as did many others.
Tuesday Links
- Community Health Centers serve one in ten Americans.
- Even though 90 percent of US prescription drugs are generic, the number of U.S. facilities producing generic drugs has fallen by 27 percent since 2013. (NYT)
- The “worst test” in medicine is driving America’s high C-section rate. (NYT)
- Rising housing costs since 1990 are responsible for 11% fewer children, 51% of the total fertility rate decline between the 2000s and 2010s, and 7 percentage points fewer young families in the 2010s.
- CMS: “The average Marketplace premium after tax credits is projected to be $50 per month for the lowest cost plan in 2026 for eligible enrollees.”
What’s Wrong with Obamacare
In 2014, when the ACA’s key provisions took effect, individual market premiums rose nearly 50 percent.
From 2014 to 2026, premiums increased nearly twice as rapidly as employer plan premiums.
The ACA’s subsidies are ill-designed and inflationary. The enrollee’s share of the premium is capped, regardless of the total premium. Because enrollees pay only a small slice of the premium, insurers face virtually no price discipline—giving them incentives to inflate costs rather than improve value….
COVID-era subsidy boosts resulted in fully subsidized coverage and led to massive fraud.
In 2025, there are 6.4 million people enrolled in fully subsidized plans who are not eligible, costing $27 billion. In 15 states, there are more than twice as many enrollees in fully subsidized plans than are eligible.
Source: Senate Testimony of Brian Blase