No lateral moves allowed between health systems: an illegal conspiracy in North Carolina--or the future of medicine that UCSD is aggressively seeking in California?

Is this the future in California if UCSD wins its poaching lawsuit against Dr. Paul Aisen regarding Aisen's decision to transfer his Alzheimer's study to USC? Is it unlawful restraint of trade? Science magazine reports on what happens when health systems collude to stop their employees from moving to other institutions.

“[L]ateral moves of faculty between Duke and UNC are not permitted.”
–UNC's chief of cardiothoracic imaging

An academic 'poaching' lawsuit from a scientist who didn’t move
By Beryl Lieff Benderly
Science
September 10, 2015

In August, we reported on the lawsuit brought by the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), against the University of Southern California (USC) in Los Angeles, in an effort to stop USC’s alleged attempt to bring a multimillion-dollar Alzheimer’s disease research project along with its new recruit, neuroscientist Paul Aisen, from UCSD to USC. We noted that though some observers view universities’ efforts to bring major researchers to their campuses from elsewhere as effective recruiting, others see it as harmful poaching.

In North Carolina, meanwhile, another scientist’s effort to move from Duke University in Durham to the University of North Carolina (UNC), Chapel Hill, has also resulted in a lawsuit, but for an entirely different reason. Danielle Seaman, an assistant professor of radiology at Duke, claims that “an illegal conspiracy” among Duke, UNC, and the two universities’ health systems not to raid each other’s talent barred her from consideration for an advertised opening at UNC, according to the complaint filed with the court.

Allegedly, the institutions’ goal was to “suppress the compensation of their employees,” according to the complaint. “Without the knowledge or consent of their employees, [Duke’s] senior administrators and deans entered into express agreements [with UNC] to eliminate or reduce competition … for skilled medical labor” by not “hir[ing] or attempt[ing] to hire” from each other. This deal, the complaint argues, constitutes an unlawful restraint of trade.

When UNC advertised a position in cardiothoracic imaging, the complaint claims, Seaman wrote to the division chief to express interest in applying. As quoted in the complaint, he wrote back saying “I agree that you would be a great fit. … Unfortunately, I just received confirmation today from the Dean’s office that lateral moves of faculty between Duke and UNC are not permitted. There is reasoning for this ‘guideline’ which was agreed upon between the deans of UNC and Duke a few years back. I hope you understand.” (Emphasis is in the original.) Seaman did not understand, so she wrote back to ask about this “reasoning.” The guideline arose, the division chief allegedly replied, “in response to an attempted recruitment by Duke a couple of years ago of the entire UNC bone marrow transplant team; UNC had to generate a large retention package to keep the team intact.” (Emphasis is in the original.)

The universities have not commented on the case, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education. Still, The Chronicle quotes a former senior vice president for public affairs and government relations at Duke as saying, “[i]n my time in the administration, there was a general practice that we did not recruit aggressively at the other institution, and vice versa. … It was based on thinking both institutions were better if each institution was strong.”

Seaman is represented by a North Carolina law firm and also by Lieff, Cabraser, Heimann & Bernstein (no relation to this reporter), the San Francisco-based legal powerhouse that won a $415 million settlement against tech giants Google, Apple, Intel, and Adobe for colluding to keep wages down by not hiring each other’s workers. Seaman’s complaint requests a jury trial and approval of the case as a class action “on behalf of a class of similarly situated individuals,” presumably the employees of Duke and UNC. Stay tuned for developments.

Beryl Lieff Benderly writes from Washington, D.C.

No lateral moves allowed between health systems: an illegal conspiracy in North Carolina--or the future of medicine that UCSD is aggressively seeking in California?

Is this the future in California if UCSD wins its poaching lawsuit against Dr. Paul Aisen regarding Aisen's decision to transfer his Alzheimer's study to USC? Is it unlawful restraint of trade? Science magazine reports on what happens when health systems collude to stop their employees from moving to other institutions.

“[L]ateral moves of faculty between Duke and UNC are not permitted.”
–UNC's chief of cardiothoracic imaging

An academic 'poaching' lawsuit from a scientist who didn’t move
By Beryl Lieff Benderly
Science
September 10, 2015

In August, we reported on the lawsuit brought by the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), against the University of Southern California (USC) in Los Angeles, in an effort to stop USC’s alleged attempt to bring a multimillion-dollar Alzheimer’s disease research project along with its new recruit, neuroscientist Paul Aisen, from UCSD to USC. We noted that though some observers view universities’ efforts to bring major researchers to their campuses from elsewhere as effective recruiting, others see it as harmful poaching.

In North Carolina, meanwhile, another scientist’s effort to move from Duke University in Durham to the University of North Carolina (UNC), Chapel Hill, has also resulted in a lawsuit, but for an entirely different reason. Danielle Seaman, an assistant professor of radiology at Duke, claims that “an illegal conspiracy” among Duke, UNC, and the two universities’ health systems not to raid each other’s talent barred her from consideration for an advertised opening at UNC, according to the complaint filed with the court.

Allegedly, the institutions’ goal was to “suppress the compensation of their employees,” according to the complaint. “Without the knowledge or consent of their employees, [Duke’s] senior administrators and deans entered into express agreements [with UNC] to eliminate or reduce competition … for skilled medical labor” by not “hir[ing] or attempt[ing] to hire” from each other. This deal, the complaint argues, constitutes an unlawful restraint of trade.

When UNC advertised a position in cardiothoracic imaging, the complaint claims, Seaman wrote to the division chief to express interest in applying. As quoted in the complaint, he wrote back saying “I agree that you would be a great fit. … Unfortunately, I just received confirmation today from the Dean’s office that lateral moves of faculty between Duke and UNC are not permitted. There is reasoning for this ‘guideline’ which was agreed upon between the deans of UNC and Duke a few years back. I hope you understand.” (Emphasis is in the original.) Seaman did not understand, so she wrote back to ask about this “reasoning.” The guideline arose, the division chief allegedly replied, “in response to an attempted recruitment by Duke a couple of years ago of the entire UNC bone marrow transplant team; UNC had to generate a large retention package to keep the team intact.” (Emphasis is in the original.)

The universities have not commented on the case, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education. Still, The Chronicle quotes a former senior vice president for public affairs and government relations at Duke as saying, “[i]n my time in the administration, there was a general practice that we did not recruit aggressively at the other institution, and vice versa. … It was based on thinking both institutions were better if each institution was strong.”

Seaman is represented by a North Carolina law firm and also by Lieff, Cabraser, Heimann & Bernstein (no relation to this reporter), the San Francisco-based legal powerhouse that won a $415 million settlement against tech giants Google, Apple, Intel, and Adobe for colluding to keep wages down by not hiring each other’s workers. Seaman’s complaint requests a jury trial and approval of the case as a class action “on behalf of a class of similarly situated individuals,” presumably the employees of Duke and UNC. Stay tuned for developments.

Beryl Lieff Benderly writes from Washington, D.C.

If God had wanted poor Americans to have health care, he would have given them money, right?

Either that or he would have chosen any other industrialized nation for their birthplace. But maybe it's not that simple. Maybe it's Republicans, not God, who don't want poor Americans to have healthcare.

See all posts on health care coverage for everybody.

Idaho tea party candidate wants government out of health care, has 10 kids on Medicaid
by Laura Clawson
Daily Kos Oct 18, 2013

This is how Greg Collett, a two-time Republican candidate for Idaho's state House, defends himself against charges of hypocrisy for the fact that, while "I don’t think that the government should be involved in health care or health insurance," his 10 kids are on Medicaid:

Am I a hypocrite for participating in programs that I oppose? If it was that simple, and if participation demonstrated support, then of course. But, my reason for participation in government programs often is not directly related to that issue in and of itself, and it certainly does not demonstrate support. For instance, I participate in government programs in order to stay out of the courts, or jail, so that I can take care of my family; other things I do to avoid fines or for other financial reasons; and some are simply because it is the only practical choice. With each situation, I have to evaluate the consequences of participating or not participating.

Hmm. Okay, the staying out of jail thing makes some sense. But that hardly explains the "taking government health care for your kids" part, which seems to fall under his much broader category of using government services "for other financial reasons." Or "because it is the only practical choice." No discussion of why one might oppose something despite finding it to be the only practical choice. If you're curious what government services Collett uses even though he opposes them, assess how much time you have, because the list, it is long...


Idaho tea party candidate criticized for having 10 children on Medicaid
By DAN POPKEY
idahostatesman.com
October 17, 2013

Greg Collett, a two-time GOP legislative candidate in Canyon County, is defending enrolling his 10 children in taxpayer-funded Medicaid while he declines to buy his own insurance under the Affordable Care Act.

Collett got 25 percent of the vote in the 2010 GOP Senate primary against then-Sen. John McGee and 34 percent in 2012 against Rep. Gayle Batt, R-Wilder.

He is featured in an Oct. 4 NBC News story, "Health care holdouts: Uninsured but resisting," telling the network, “I don’t think that the government should be involved in health care or health insurance.”...

Life Spans Shrink for Least-Educated Whites in the U.S.

Here is more evidence about how much we harm children by failing to educate them.

Life Spans Shrink for Least-Educated Whites in the U.S.
By SABRINA TAVERNISE
New York Times
September 20, 2012

For generations of Americans, it was a given that children would live longer than their parents. But there is now mounting evidence that this enduring trend has reversed itself for the country’s least-educated whites, an increasingly troubled group whose life expectancy has fallen by four years since 1990.

Researchers have long documented that the most educated Americans were making the biggest gains in life expectancy, but now they say mortality data show that life spans for some of the least educated Americans are actually contracting. Four studies in recent years identified modest declines, but a new one that looks separately at Americans lacking a high school diploma found disturbingly sharp drops in life expectancy for whites in this group. Experts not involved in the new research said its findings were persuasive.

The reasons for the decline remain unclear, but researchers offered possible explanations, including a spike in prescription drug overdoses among young whites, higher rates of smoking among less educated white women, rising obesity, and a steady increase in the number of the least educated Americans who lack health insurance.

The steepest declines were for white women without a high school diploma, who lost five years of life between 1990 and 2008, said S. Jay Olshansky, a public health professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago and the lead investigator on the study, published last month in Health Affairs. By 2008, life expectancy for black women without a high school diploma had surpassed that of white women of the same education level, the study found.

White men lacking a high school diploma lost three years of life. Life expectancy for both blacks and Hispanics of the same education level rose, the data showed. But blacks over all do not live as long as whites, while Hispanics live longer than both whites and blacks...

Mary Brown, 'Obamacare' foe -- and broke

Mary Brown's hospital bills will be shifted to others since she refused to carry health insurance

Mary Brown, 'Obamacare' foe -- and broke
A woman whose case is before the Supreme Court is an exemplar of a problem the healthcare law was designed to address.
Los Angles Times editorial
March 11, 2012

Mary Brown, whose case against the 2010 healthcare reform law is pending before the Supreme Court, argues that the government shouldn't be able to force her to carry health insurance. Joined by three other individuals and a small-business trade association, she's asking the justices to rule that the law's insurance mandate is unconstitutional and that the rest of the act should be thrown out with it. But new revelations about her own situation make the case for the other side.

As The Times' David Savage reported, Brown and her husband have fallen on hard times since filing the lawsuit, largely because their auto repair business in Florida failed. The couple have filed for bankruptcy protection, asking a federal court to wipe out close to $60,000 in consumer debts. Significantly, their unpaid bills include $2,750 owed to a local hospital and physicians group and $1,735 to out-of-state medical specialists.

The disclosures are political gold for the Obama administration, transforming Brown from a champion of individual liberty into an exemplar of a problem the new law was designed to address. Uninsured and underinsured Americans rack up about $60 billion in medical bills every year that they cannot afford, forcing doctors and hospitals to pass those costs on to federal taxpayers and those patients who can pay their bills. It's not impinging on personal freedom to ask people to cover their own medical tabs. The mechanism Congress created to do that is the individual mandate.

Blue Shield of California seeks rate hikes of as much as 59% for individuals

Blue Shield of California seeks rate hikes of as much as 59% for individuals
By Duke Helfand
Los Angeles Times
January 5, 2011

Another big California health insurer has stunned individual policyholders with huge rate increases — this time it's Blue Shield of California seeking cumulative hikes of as much as 59% for tens of thousands of customers March 1.

Blue Shield's action comes less than a year after Anthem Blue Cross tried and failed to raise rates as much as 39% for about 700,000 California customers...

Health care for me, not for you: incoming GOP congressman wants his free government healthcare now!

Nov 16, 2010
Incoming GOP congressman wants his free government healthcare now!
By Alex Pareene
Salon.com

Representative-elect Andy Harris, a Maryland Republican and anesthesiologist, beat his incumbent Democratic opponent by campaigning against the terror of universal socialized medicine. Despite the fact that his opponent voted against healthcare reform, Harris insisted that once elected he would vote to repeal healthcare reform. Now he is elected! And he was shocked to learn that his free, taxpayer-funded, government-run healthcare won't kick in until 28 days after he's sworn in. This made him upset!

“He stood up and asked the two ladies who were answering questions why it had to take so long, what he would do without 28 days of health care,” said a congressional staffer who saw the exchange. The benefits session, held behind closed doors, drew about 250 freshman members, staffers and family members to the Capitol Visitors Center auditorium late Monday morning.”

Then he came up with a pretty good idea: "Harris then asked if he could purchase insurance from the government to cover the gap...." Yeah -- why can't people just purchase health insurance from the government? Oh, right, because of Joe Lieberman and every Republican in Congress.

"'This is the only employer I’ve ever worked for where you don’t get coverage the first day you are employed,' his spokeswoman Anna Nix told POLITICO." It's funny because lots of people have worked places where you don't get coverage any day you're employed.

Rand Paul wants to take us back to the days of sit-ins at lunch counters/No to health care

Refusing to allow entire groups of people to participate freely in our economy is bad for everyone, and it's a worse crime than punching someone in the face and taking their money.

Rand Paul and his Tea Bagger friends seem not to understand that a civilized society must rein in the most base human behavior. Or perhaps they just have an odd definition of what base behavior is. How about subjecting people to abusive treatment based on the color of their skin? That's a formula for degraded human interaction if there ever was one. I would rather be punched in the face (which is obviously a crime) than to be exposed every day of my life to the possibility that I might be locked out from ordinary experiences that people with a different color of skin take for granted. I think refusing to serve people of a given race is a serious offense to basic human decency, and should continue to be a crime.

Perhaps more to the point, it would be a burden on our economy--and protecting the economy is another obligation of government.

And then we have arbitrary laws which have nothing to do with baseness. For example, the President of the US must be native born. That seems like a reasonable law to me. The problem is that Tea Partiers believe that their own arbitrary beliefs should have the same power as law(such as their irrational idea that Barack Obama was not born in Hawaii despite newspaper announcements at the time of his birth and his often-produced birth certificate). This belief is plain nuts and is based on simple racism.


Paul Remarks Have Deep Roots
By JONATHAN WEISMAN
Wall Street Journal
MAY 22, 2010

Republican candidate Rand Paul's controversial remarks on the 1964 Civil Rights Act unsettled GOP leaders this week, but they reflect deeply held iconoclastic beliefs held by some in his party, and many in the tea-party movement, that the U.S. government shook its constitutional moorings more than 70 years ago.

Mr. Paul and his supporters rushed to emphasize that his remarks did not reflect racism but a sincerely held, libertarian belief that the federal government, starting in the Roosevelt era, gained powers that set the stage for decades of improper intrusions on private businesses.

Mr. Paul, the newly elected GOP Senate nominee in Kentucky, again made headlines Friday when he told ABC's "Good Morning America" that President Barack Obama's criticism of energy giant BP and of its oil-spill response was "really un-American."

That followed a tussle over the landmark civil-rights law, which Mr. Paul embraced after suggesting Wednesday that the act may have gone too far in mandating the desegregation of private businesses...


Rand Paul's American Mistake: Taking 'New' for 'Unconstitutional'
Garrett Epps
The Atlantic
May 25 2010

..."[W]e've never done it before" by itself is never a good argument that something is unconstitutional.

Today, almost no one can imagine the United States without the Civil Rights Act of 1964 -- not even "little" Dr. Paul, who has disowned his theoretical musings. The Civil Rights Act completed the creation of a continental economy, where any citizen can go anywhere. Without it, America would be a different country, one that is missed only by those who write for websites named "Stormfront" or "Whitehonor.com."

A generation hence, I suspect, we are likely to be bemused that people ever thought the Constitution would block a modern nation from creating a modern health-care system.

White House rules young adults to remain covered by their parents’ health insurance policies up to age 26

Rules Let Youths Stay on Parents’ Insurance
By ROBERT PEAR
New York Times
May 10, 2010

The White House issued rules on Monday allowing young adults to remain covered by their parents’ health insurance policies up to age 26.

The promise of such coverage has attracted great interest. Employers and insurers say they have been flooded with inquiries.

Under the rules, an employer-sponsored health plan or a company selling individual insurance policies must offer coverage to subscribers’ children up to the age of 26, regardless of whether a child lives with his or her parents, attends college, is a dependent for income-tax purposes or receives financial support from the parents...

I think Lorena Gonzalez might be my new best friend

Photo below: Richard Barrera, Lorena Gonzalez, Evan McLaughlin (see story at end of this post)
I went to the rally at Logan Elementary today to stop education budget cuts. David Lagstein of ACCE (formerly ACORN)announced a list of corporations that don't pay their fair share of property taxes in California. Another speaker was Lorena Gonzalez of the Labor Council.

I had the chance to talk to Lorena after the rally. Unless I'm badly mistaken, she liked me a lot. Well, maybe I am mistaken. Come to think of it, I think she resented it when I talked about the top-down management of the teachers union. I said that teachers are not encouraged by the union to be thinkers. She seemed confident that she knew more about the teachers union than I do, but since I started teaching before she was born, and I've become closely acquainted with CTA officials and lawyers, I think I have the edge regarding this particular union.

But it occurs to me that Lorena might not really have any power at all to make any union more democratic. Perhaps keeping her position requires her to stay "on message" just like the rank and file teachers I was talking to her about.

I do want to thank Lorena for the wonderful work she does for workers and their families. An example of this is her effort on behalf of healthcare reform.


Statement by Lorena Gonzalez on Passage of Health Care Reform
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Statement by Labor Council Secretary-Treasurer/CEO Lorena Gonzalez on Passage of Health Care Reform

SAN DIEGO – (Sunday, March 21, 2010) – Lorena Gonzalez, the Secretary-Treasurer/CEO of the San Diego and Imperial Counties Labor Council, AFL-CIO, made the following statement following the House of Representatives’ passage of a health care reform bill this evening:

"For the past year, the men and women of San Diego’s Labor Movement joined millions of Americans in calling on the President and Congress to reform our nation’s broken health care system. We told Washington we wanted a system that put people before Health Insurance companies by making healthcare accessible and affordable for everyone by lowering costs and expanding coverage.

"We live in a county where a half-million people have no medical coverage. With the passage of health care reform tonight, we know that thousands and thousands of San Diegans are on the pathway to obtaining the health care they and their families need.

"This bill means long-term health security – and that’s the most important thing for our future, and our children and our children’s children...


San Diego Politico
Monday, March 31, 2008
Labor Council Unanimously Re-Elects Lorena Gonzalez as Secretary-Treasurer

The San Diego-Imperial Counties Labor Council’s delegates voted unanimously to re-elect Lorena Gonzalez to a four-year term as Secretary-Treasurer and CEO on last week.

The delegates, a representative body of members from all 119 local unions affiliated with the Labor Council, declared Gonzalez the winner of the regularly-scheduled election after no other candidates were nominated.

Gonzalez served as the Labor Council’s political director from September 2006 to the end of last year, when Jerry Butkiewicz stepped down from the position.

“It is an honor to represent the working families that make up the Labor Council,” Gonzalez said. “I look forward to growing San Diego’s labor movement during the next four years and beyond.”

Labor Council President Mickey Kasparian nominated Gonzalez.

In addition to winning another term themselves, Kasparian and Gonzalez were re-elected alongside First Vice President Sandra Oleson, Second Vice President Virginia Cobb and Sergeant-at-Arms Ricardo Guzman...




Evan McLaughlin, who now works for the Labor Council, won an award for journalism when he was at Voice of San Diego:
2007 SPJ Awards Winners
July 30, 2007
The San Diego Pro Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists announced the 2007 Journalism Awards June 28.
...Political/Government, Daily Reporting/Writing
Honorable Mention: Andrew Donohue Voice of San Diego.com – Still Wearing the Pants
2nd Place: Evan McLaughlin, Daniel Strumpf Voice of San Diego.org – San Diego Wrestles with Military Past
1st Place: Evan McLaughlin Voice of San Diego.org – Board Stiff
Judges’ Comment: A well-written explanation of how a small group of entrenched supervisors are able to completely dominate San Diego County.

I think Lorena Gonzalez might be my new best friend

This post has been moved to HERE.

Should businessmen who covered up defect in defibrillator face criminal charges?

Two doctors urge U.S. court to reject Guidant plea
Apr 21, 2010
Reuters

Two cardiologists who cared for a 21-year-old college student who died when his implantable defibrillator made by Guidant failed to deliver a life-saving shock are urging a federal judge to reject a plea agreement with the company.

Guidant LLC, which was acquired by Boston Scientific Corp in 2006, agreed to pay $296 million -- the largest criminal penalty against a medical device company -- for withholding information from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration regarding catastrophic failures in some of the devices.

Judge Donovan Frank of the U.S. District Court of Minnesota is reviewing the settlement agreement and will likely accept or reject it by the end of the month.

In a letter to the court, Drs. Robert Hauser and Barry Maron, wrote: "We are extremely dismayed by the U.S. Attorney General's decision to enter into a plea agreement with Guidant LLC, rather than prosecute the company and the individuals responsible for this egregious act...

Why health care law is needed: WellPoint: dropping breast cancer patients

U.S. to WellPoint: Stop dropping breast cancer patients
Fri Apr 23, 2010
Reuters

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius has called on health insurer WellPoint to stop dropping coverage for patients recently diagnosed with breast cancer, calling the practice "deplorable."

In a letter dated April 22 to Angela Braly, WellPoint's chief executive, Sebelius said she was "surprised and disappointed" to learn from a Reuters report that the company had targeted women with breast cancer for aggressive investigation with intent to cancel their policies.

"As you know, the practice described in this article will soon be illegal," Sebelius wrote. "The Affordable Care Act specifically prohibits insurance companies from rescinding policies, except in cases of fraud or intentional misrepresentation of material fact."

Reuters reported on Thursday that WellPoint, the largest U.S. health insurer by enrollment, was using a computer algorithm that automatically targeted patients recently diagnosed with breast cancer, among other conditions.

The software triggered an immediate fraud investigation by the company as it searched for excuses to drop coverage, according to government regulators and investigators...

That health mandate GOP is suing to stop? It was their idea

03.24.10
Health bill included big Republican idea: the individual mandate
By John Dorschner
Miami Herald

The lawsuit against the health care overhaul filed Tuesday by Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum is focused on a provision that has long been advocated by conservatives, big business and the insurance industry.

The lawsuit by McCollum, a candidate for governor, and 12 other attorneys general, focuses on the provision that virtually all Americans will need to have health insurance by 2014 or face penalties.

The lawsuit calls this an "unprecedented encroachment on the liberty of individuals." It states the Constitution doesn't authorize such a mandate, the proposed tax penalty is unlawful and is an "unprecedented encroachment on the sovereignty of the states."

"The truth is this is a Republican idea," said Linda Quick, president of the South Florida Hospital and Healthcare Association. She said she first heard the concept of the "individual mandate" in a Miami speech in the early 1990s by Sen. John McCain, a conservative Republican from Arizona, to counter the "Hillarycare" the Clintons were proposing...



Poll show health care plan gains favor
March 23, 2010
By Susan Page
USA TODAY

Source: USA TODAY/Gallup Poll of 1,005 adults Monday. Margin of error: +/-4 percentage points.

More Americans now favor than oppose the health care overhaul that President Obama signed into law Tuesday, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds — a notable turnaround from surveys before the vote that showed a plurality against the legislation.

By 49%-40%, those polled say it was "a good thing" rather than a bad one that Congress passed the bill. Half describe their reaction in positive terms — as "enthusiastic" or "pleased" — while about four in 10 describe it in negative ways, as "disappointed" or "angry."

The largest single group, 48%, calls the legislation "a good first step" that needs to be followed by more action...

Houses passes historic health care bill

Charles Dharapak / AP


Houses passes historic health care bill
Carolyn Lochhead, Chronicle Washington Bureau
San Francisco Chronicle
Sunday, March 21, 2010

After a year of political upheaval that swung from a triumphant Democratic sweep in Washington to the rise of the Tea Party movement, Congress on Sunday night sent to President Obama the most sweeping social program since Medicare was enacted in 1965.

The vote on the health care overhaul was 219-212, with not a single Republican supporting the measure.

Before the final debate, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco locked arms with her Democratic lieutenants, including civil rights veteran John Lewis, D-Ga., to enter the Capitol through a phalanx of angry protesters. It was an emphatic show of solidarity after several ugly incidents on Saturday when demonstrators hurled racial slurs at several African American members of Congress and anti-gay insults at Rep. Barney Frank, the openly gay Massachusetts Democrat.

"We will be joining those who established Social Security, Medicare and now, tonight, health care for all Americans," Pelosi told House members as she brought the debate to a close at 10:30 p.m. She invoked the memory of the late Sen. Edward Kennedy, whose death so complicated passage of reform, saying health care "is the unfinished business of our society, that is, until today."

The health deal was sealed by early afternoon Sunday when anti-abortion Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., secured an executive order by the White House that would reaffirm the long-standing Hyde Amendment banning taxpayer funding of abortions...



Obama secures landmark healthcare victory
John Whitesides and Donna Smith
Mar 22, 2010

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama secured a landmark victory with the House of Representatives giving final approval to a sweeping healthcare overhaul, expanding insurance coverage to nearly all Americans.


...The health insurance industry vigorously opposed the overhaul. Insurance stocks rallied late last week as investors began to realize their worst fears had not materialized.

The overhaul will extend health coverage to 32 million Americans, expand the government health plan for the poor, impose new taxes on the wealthy and bar insurance practices such as refusing to cover people with pre-existing medical conditions...



Mar 22, 2010
Mitt Romney's healthcare hypocrisy and the GOP base
Just four years ago, conservatives saluted him for signing a healthcare law that's very similar to ObamaCare
By Steve Kornacki
AP/Cliff Owen
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney in February.

It’s not news when man bites dog, so why should it be any different when Mitt Romney makes a brash and insincere pronouncement?

And yet there was the one-time Massachusetts governor forcing his way into Monday morning’s headlines with what may have been the most over-the-top of all of the over-the-top Republican reactions to the House’s passage of Barack Obama’s healthcare plan.

“An unconscionable abuse of power,” Romney declared while asserting that the president “has betrayed his oath to the nation.”

When Mitt starts talking like this, it’s usually because he knows his own past record makes him vulnerable on the issue at hand.

And when it comes to healthcare, his hypocrisy is particularly galling. Romney is actually the only governor in American history ever to impose an individual health insurance mandate on his citizens. And an individual mandate, of course, is at the heart of Obama’s reform package.

Nor is the mandate the only common ground between RomneyCare and ObamaCare; the Massachusetts plan that Romney signed into law in 2006 is essentially the blueprint for Obama’s plan. Both rely on the same basic formula: a requirement that everyone purchase insurance and government assistance for those who can’t afford it.

But Romney can never admit this...

Insurance company to me: Drop dead

Healthcare Reform
Mar 19, 2010
Insurance company to me: Drop dead
Blue Shield won't pay for radiation therapy that could save my life. But I'm fighting back, and you can help Video
By Cary Tennis

I've been recovering from cancer surgery and waiting for the insurance company to approve the next course of treatment, which is eight weeks of proton beam radiation therapy at Loma Linda Hospital in Southern California.

This treatment is what my surgeon, Dr. Christopher Ames of UCSF, calls the standard of care for sacral chordoma.

Today I learned that the insurance company has denied the request for this treatment...

Insurer targeted HIV patients to drop coverage

Insurer targeted HIV patients to drop coverage
By Murray Waas Murray Waas
Reuters
Mar 17, 2919

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – In May, 2002, Jerome Mitchell, a 17-year old college freshman from rural South Carolina, learned he had contracted HIV. The news, of course, was devastating, but Mitchell believed that he had one thing going for him: On his own initiative, in anticipation of his first year in college, he had purchased his own health insurance.

Shortly after his diagnosis, however, his insurance company, Fortis, revoked his policy. Mitchell was told that without further treatment his HIV would become full-blown AIDS within a year or two and he would most likely die within two years after that.

So he hired an attorney -- not because he wanted to sue anyone; on the contrary, the shy African-American teenager expected his insurance was canceled by mistake and would be reinstated once he set the company straight.

But Fortis, now known as Assurant Health, ignored his attorney's letters, as they had earlier inquiries from a case worker at a local clinic who was helping him. So Mitchell sued.

In 2004, a jury in Florence County, South Carolina, ordered Assurant Health, part of Assurant Inc, to pay Mitchell $15 million for wrongly revoking his heath insurance policy.

In September 2009, the South Carolina Supreme Court upheld the lower court's verdict, although the court reduced the amount to be paid him to $10 million.

By winning the verdict against Fortis, Mitchell not only obtained a measure of justice for himself; he also helped expose wrongdoing on the part of Fortis that could have repercussions for the entire health insurance industry.

Previously undisclosed records from Mitchell's case reveal that Fortis had a company policy of targeting policyholders with HIV. A computer program and algorithm targeted every policyholder recently diagnosed with HIV for an automatic fraud investigation, as the company searched for any pretext to revoke their policy. As was the case with Mitchell, their insurance policies often were canceled on erroneous information, the flimsiest of evidence, or for no good reason at all, according to the court documents and interviews with state and federal investigators...

Workers paying more toward insurance premiums

Workers paying more toward insurance premiums
San Francisco Chronicle
Victoria Colliver, Chronicle Staff Writer
March 17, 2010

The amount California workers contributed to their employer-backed health coverage increased 83 percent between 2000 and 2008 while their income stayed the same, according to a report released today.

The study, commissioned by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, looked at the impact of rising health costs and found middle-class Americans were particularly hard hit. Three million workers nationwide lost the coverage they had obtained through their employers and many of them earn too much to qualify for government insurance programs...

Catholic hospitals support health care bill

See all health care posts.


Catholic hospitals support health care bill
March 13, 2010
The Associated Press(AP)

WASHINGTON — A group representing Catholic hospitals is rallying behind President Barack Obama's health care bill.

Support from the Catholic Health Association could help persuade anti-abortion lawmakers to provide critical votes in the House for the overhaul.

The group's chief executive, Carol Keehan, writes on the association's Web site that the legislation isn't perfect, but is "a major first step" toward covering all Americans and would make "great improvements" for millions of people.

The association's support widens a split among abortion opponents. They're divided on whether the legislation does enough to deny taxpayer money for abortion. The National Right to Life Committee and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops say it doesn't.