- Since 2020, CMS has allowed MA plans to offer telehealth services as part of their basic benefit structure.
- Peter Orszag: Our federal debt is dangerously high. (NYT)
- Larry Kotlikoff: Our real debt is even higher.
- Review of the MAHA report.
- New York Governor Kathy Hochul on Medicaid: Young family members “can make $37 an hour by sitting home with your Grandma.”
- A flesh-eating parasite is inching its way toward the US.
Category: News and Events
NYT: Americans Were Not Healthier 60 Years Ago
The Secretary of Health and Human Services wants to return America’s public health to a simpler time – you know, the good ole days – back when Americans were healthier. Kennedy, whose uncle became president 65 years ago, has often claimed people were much healthier back then. The following was reported by The New York Times.
Wednesday Links
- Among beneficiaries without subsidies, the percent who did not fill a prescription for a specialty drug within 90 days was 30 percent for anticancer drugs, 22 percent for hepatitis C treatments, and more than 50 percent for disease-modifying therapies for either immune system disorders or hypercholesterolemia.
- Why Social Security finances will steadily worsen indefinitely into the future.
- On current trends Africans will make up over 80% of the world’s poor by 2030.
- Some hospitals are still getting hundreds of millions in Covid funding from FEMA. (Statnews)
- The federal government’s new-car fuel economy standards (CAFE) have resulted in thousands of traffic deaths.
AI May Be Eavesdropping on Your Next Doctor Visit
I have never had another person in the exam room with my doctor and me during a physician visit after childhood. With the introduction of electronic medical records many people complained there was hardly even a doctor in the room listening to them. Health insurers, and public health advocates, all want a ton of documentation from each physician visit. Increasingly there is another party eavesdropping on your doctor’s visit. An artificial intelligence (AI) interface passively recording and processing the visit discussion and turning the conversation into a coherent medical record.