Over the last decade, a new industry has emerged that may eventually contribute as much to administrative waste as the insurance industry does today. This industry has no name. Because the participants in the industry all promote a new scheme known as “value-based payment,” and because they all make money off it, we propose to call the new industry the value-based payment (VBP) industry. Like the insurance industry, the VBP industry hovers over doctors and patients and seeks to influence (and in some cases, dictate) doctor-patient decision-making, and in the process diverts resources away from medical care. Unlike the insurance…
Health Insurance
White House Says Funding for Testing and Vaccines for Uninsured May Run Out Soon
On Tuesday, the White House announced that the government may soon have to stop providing free COVID vaccines, testing and treatments for uninsured people because Congress failed to approve more funding to address the pandemic in recent spending packages. If COVID funding continues to stall, providers won’t be able to submit claims for COVID testing and treatments starting next week, the White House warned. In April, the program will run out of funds to allow people without health insurance to get COVID vaccines for free. People without health insurance have been at a higher risk of dying due to COVID…
Schumer Got $66K From Top Health Insurance Lobbyist Amid Build Back Better Talks
This article was produced by Sludge, an independent, ad-free investigative news site covering money in politics. Click here to support Sludge. In the third quarter of this year, as the Democratic leaders of Congress were scrambling to decide what to keep in President Biden’s reconciliation package and what to cut, Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer accepted a $66,000 bundle of campaign contributions from the head of the health insurance industry’s top lobbying group. The bundle of checks, collected and given to Schumer’s campaign by Matt Eyles, the president and CEO of America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), was disclosed in a…