The No Surprises Act was passed in 2020 to end surprise medical billing — the practice of patients receiving enormous out-of-network bills they never agreed to, often from providers they didn’t choose. Emergency physicians. Anesthesiologists. Radiologists. The law created an Independent Dispute Resolution (IDR) process: when a provider and...
In 1945, the American Medical Association launched what became one of the most expensive lobbying campaigns in American history. Their target was Harry Truman’s proposal for national health insurance. Their weapon was a single, powerful phrase: socialized medicine. The campaign worked. And for the next two decades, the AMA...
I was at a dinner party once when someone said, with complete confidence, that the United States doesn’t have government healthcare. Several people nodded. I didn’t know where to start. We have an enormous amount of government healthcare. We have been building it, piece by piece, for sixty years....
Last week, congressional Republicans began quietly laying the groundwork for a second budget reconciliation bill. Congressional leaders said they plan to target healthcare spending as part of a new budget reconciliation bill that could be enacted by July. That’s three months from now. And buried in the framework is...