Hoosier biz groups oppose Senate health bill
Group presidents tell Indiana senators that the reform bill would expand dysfunctions of current health care systems.
Group presidents tell Indiana senators that the reform bill would expand dysfunctions of current health care systems.
Under the current proposal, the same type of groups that made the CDC’s recommendations will outline guidelines about which treatment will be offered under a government program.
Two weeks after reaching a stalemate on a proposal that would broaden the city’s workplace smoking ban, City-Council
Council members voted Monday night to resurrect the measure.
At this point in the health reform debate, you have to take numbers from any side with a grain of salt. That said, Indianapolis-based
WellPoint Inc. has done perhaps the only local analysis of how proposed reforms would affect the cost of health insurance
for employers.
The health care overhaul bill produced by House Democrats would impose an array of new taxes, fees and government mandates
on major players in the health industry, including drug companies and big medical-device makers headquartered in Indiana.
Bloomington-based Cook Group Inc. could find itself cutting as many as 1,000 local jobs if Congress enacts a tax on
medical devices to pay for health care reform, company founder Bill Cook said in an interview.
Founder of medical device firm says Congress should fund network of low-cost clinics.
As health care legislation
continues to wend its way through Congress, Indianapolis-area industry leaders still harbor strong
opinions about the issue. Five industry insiders discussed how to improve the health care system during
IBJ’s Power Breakfast Sept. 25 at the Westin Indianapolis.
The insurance industry sharply escalated its criticism of the Senate health care bill Sunday, charging that the legislation
would shift costs to privately insured people, raising the price of a typical policy by hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars
annually.
The health reform bill sponsored by U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., would help pay for expanded health insurance coverage
by levying fees of $13 billion a year on the health care industry. The fees would deliver a hefty bill to just
about all of Indiana’s major health care companies. But how they’re reacting to the fees is all over the map.
Health reform that would cover millions of uninsured Americans would theoretically send a flood of new
patients to physicians. Yet in Indiana and nationwide, there’s already a shortage of doctors.
The Indiana Division of Aging wants to change Medicaid rates to nursing homes to reward quality care and penalize the lack
of it, leaving the industry divided over whether to support the groundbreaking rule or to seek revisions and a slower phase-in.
Most business groups cheered when Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., introduced a health reform bill with no so-called public option,
a controversial government-run insurance plan for working adults. But there’s a big group that would like
to see it back on the table—hospitals.
The Westfield City Council passed a smoking ban 7-0 last night that will prohibit smoking in most public places, including
outdoor arenas, stadiums and amphitheaters.
Eli Lilly and Co. and its peers might be back in Congress’ sights as lawmakers hunt for more ways to cut health care
costs. A new study in the influential Health Affairs journal concludes that European drugmakers operating
in markets with pharmaceutical price controls have produced proportionally more innovations than their U.S. counterparts.
Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels outlined his concerns about some of the health care proposals being debated in Congress in a letter
sent to the state’s congressional delegation and released by his office yesterday.
A health care reform push that aims at the insurance industry misses a much bigger target in its quest to lower rising costs,
WellPoint Inc. CEO Angela Braly said in a speech.
There was a time, of course, when journalists had the time, space, resources and respect to sort things out for us.
In almost every place that two or more Americans gather, health care is debated. Because the bills before Congress are
inaccessible, the debate has shifted instead to principles such as the role of government and individual freedoms. I think this a healthy thing.
A panel of five leaders of the state’s life sciences
industry took on a wide range of topics
July 24 at IBJ’s Power Breakfast
at the Westin Indianapolis.