Tag Archives: healthcare
Health as a Human Right: A Position Paper From the ACP
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 5th November 2023The American College of Physicians, the country’s premiere organization devoted to Internal Medicine, has issued a position paper describing its commitment to health as a “human right”. It’s appended below so you can read it independent of my comments about its worth and coherence. The ACP and the authors of the paper are serious both…
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The Vanishing Patients
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 8th June 2020Medical facilities are bemoaning the loss of revenue that has followed the COVID-19 epidemic. The conventional explanation is that patients are staying away from hospitals and clinics because they think them unsafe and fear contracting the virus should they go. Hospitals say they’re losing $50 billion dollars a month. Extrapolated to a whole year that…
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Terrorism and Healthcare Reform
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 29th December 2009The recent attempt to blow up a US airplane as it was about to land in Detroit may not seem to have much connection to healthcare reform, but on reflection the relationship is proximate and interesting. The would be underwear bomber was known to the federal bureaucrats charged with protecting us from what is now…
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Massachusetts Health Care Reform – What Does it Mean?
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 26th December 2009Massachusetts Health Care Reform — Near-Universal Coverage at What Cost? That’s the title of an article in the November 19th, 2009 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.The authors of the piece, Joel S Weissman, PhD. and JudyAnn Bigby, MD, work for the the Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services. You can…
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If It's Broke Make It Worse – More Healthcare Reform Incoherence
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 25th November 2009I’ll just put up a few items which speak for themselves which won’t stop me from a few comments. Paul B Ginsburg has an article in tomorrow’s NEJM – Getting to the Real issues in Health Care Reform. He describes the bills emerging from the House and Senate which would “reform” the country’s healthcare “system”….
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House Healthcare Bill
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 29th October 2009Below is the complete text of the House Healthcare Bill – all 1990 pages. I haven’t read it but a quick search finds “tax” in it about 275 times. I wonder if anyone has read it. House HCR bill
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New Doctors Poll
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 16th September 2009There’s been some back and forth in the comments section of Medicare’s Overhead about what doctors think of the healthcare reforms bills now before congress. It started when I said that I didn’t think many practicing physicians favored any of these proposals. A new poll commissioned by Investors Business Daily says that two thirds of…
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Healthcare Abroad and at Home
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 7th August 2009The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article about healthcare in France. It details the financial difficulties that France’s national healthcare plan is experiencing. The data on this graph need a little explaining. It presents the percentage change in medical (not health as it states) cost in four countries. To accurately analyze the data you…
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Reality Strikes
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 19th May 2009The May 14 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine contains an article, Picking the Right Poison — Options for Funding Health Care Reform, that sets a new tone for the journal. It looks at health care reform through a clear lens. Funding universal health care is going to cost a lot of money. Be…
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A More Efficient Medical System
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 12th May 2009I was going to call this “Brooklyn Bridge Still for Sale”, but thought that I might be besieged with offers so I changed it to the more prosaic one above. Our troubles with the high cost of medical have been solved. The American Medical Association, America’s Health Insurance Plans, and the American Hospital Association are…
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