Gainesville, FL (Special to Informed Comment)- Medicare open enrollment season begins October 15th, running through Dec.7, 2023. And very soon, everyone will be bombarded with new smarmy health insurance Medicare Advantage ads featuring healthy and happy-looking seniors playing tennis and telling us how wonderful their Medicare Advantage plan is and how much of a no-brainer […]
End Predatory Private Medicare “Advantage” Plans Now
Gainesville, Florida (Special to Informed Comment) — Wendell Potter, a New York Times bestselling author, highly respected health care and campaign finance reform advocate, authority tackling corporate and special interest propaganda, alerts us to the dangers of Medicare Advantage plans now offered by the private health insurance industry. “In just a few weeks”, says Potter, […]
Let’s Celebrate Medicare’s 58th Birthday with “Medicare for All”
Gainesville, Florida (Special to Informed Comment) – In the long history of struggle to establish a national health insurance system for the USA, Medicare was finally established on July 30. 1965. Congress enacted Medicare under Title XVIII of the Social Security Act to provide health insurance to people age 65 and older, regardless of income […]
The Journey to Medicare’s 58th Anniversary
Gainesville, Florida (Special to Informed Comment) — The most successful U. S. health insurance program, Medicare, was enacted ln July,1965, to provide health insurance for people ages 65 and older and the disabled regardless of income or medical history. In the 58 years since, Medicare has become living proof that public, universal health insurance is […]
States are Shrinking number of Medicaid Recipients, but Everyone would Benefit from its Expansion
Gainesville, Florida — When the COVID-19/pandemic-era ‘continuous coverage’ Federal requirement ended recently, states could resume eligibility checks that can purge people from Medicaid rolls. Many states are currently doing this, with coverage being lost for hundreds of thousands of individuals/families. These cuts are mostly occurring for procedural reasons, not because enrollees actually lack eligibility. Reports […]
New Medicare-for-All Legislation introduced by Sanders, Jayapal, Dingell, others: Why is the greatest Health System in the World only for the Affluent?
Gainesville, Fl. (Special to Informed Comment) – The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was supposed to contain costs and make insurance for health/mental health care affordable. It did bring coverage to 20 million but 30 million remain uninsured. Data indicate that the bad outweighs the good. ACA is too expensive, unsustainable, overly complex and bureaucratic. Even […]
End the “Citizens United” Ruling with a “Democracy for All Amendment”
Gainesville, Fl. (Special to Informed Comment) – In the United States government has been privatized by the Citizens United ruling of the SCOTUS. Government is now really up for sale and auctioned off to the highest campaign contributors.The Supreme Court ‘Citizen’s United’ decision opened the floodgates for big money in our politics, allowing giant corporations […]
Big Pharma spent more on Stock Buybacks and Dividends than on Research and Development even during COVID
Gainesville, Florida (Special to Informed Comment) – The 14 largest publicly-traded pharmaceutical companies spent $747 billion on stock buybacks and dividends from 2012 through 2021 — substantially more than the $660 billion they spent on research and development. So argue economists William Lazonick, professor emeritus of economics at University of Massachusetts, and Öner Tulum, a […]
Parasitic Private Equity is Consuming U.S. Health Care from the Inside Out
Gainesville, Fl. (Special to Informed Comment) – Private equity has succeeded in depicting itself as part of the productive economy of health care services. even as it is increasingly being recognized as being parasitic. The essence of this toxic parasitism is not only to drain the host’s nourishment, but also to dull the host’s brain […]
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