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BOSTON — A hospital that serves thousands of indigent Massachusetts residents sued the state on Wednesday, charging that its costly universal health care law is forcing the hospital to cover too much of the expense of caring for the poor. The hospital, Boston Medical Center, faces a $38 million deficit for the fiscal year ending in September, its first loss in five years. The suit says the hospital will lose more than $100 million next year because the state has lowered Medicaid reimbursement rates and stopped paying Boston Medical “reasonable costs” for treating other poor patients. “We filed this suit...

Massachusetts' budget forces retreat from universal coverage15. July 2009 18:40 "The new state budget in Massachusetts eliminates health care coverage for some 30,000 legal immigrants to help close a growing deficit, reversing progress toward universal coverage just as Congress looks to the state as a model for overhauling the nation’s health care system," the New York Times reports. The affected immigrants are permanent residents who have had green cards for less than five years and are insured through the Commonwealth Care program, an insurance program created by the 2006 law that brought near-universal coverage to Massachusetts. The cuts would save...

As the Senate committee puts on it's usual media dog and pony show for what will ultimately result in the confirmation of Sonia Sotomayor, other Senate members from the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee (HELP) slithered behind the scenes to bring the nation one step closer to Obama's "remade" America with universal health care by passing a a $600 billion health-care reform bill called the the Affordable Health Choices Act. "What was passed today is the foundation for meaningful reform," said Sen. Patty Murray, Washington Democrat. "This bill says that health care is not a luxury, its a necessity....

Excessive Government involvement is what's wrong with our current healthcare system. One prominent example: FDA regulation and Medicare/Medicaid policies are suppressing new drug and device options and increasing healthcare costs. The FDA's approval process for new technologies costs companies between 250 and 800 million dollars. It takes an average of 8.5 years to move through the FDA's clinical and approval phases and there is no guarantee of approval. Out of 5000 compounds discovered in the pre-clinical stage, only about 5 will make it through. The cost of approved and non-approved drugs and devices are passed on to the physician practice,...

This is an article filled with good links, that demonstrates Obama's effort to pretend to offer us a choice, but really the supporters of socialized medicine are out of the closet on the destruction of private health care as a whole. It is not about the efficacy of socialized health care, it is about showing how we are not really being offered a choice, and it demonstrates the slipping support for the plan. http://www.examiner.com/x-14881-Political-Buzz-Examiner~y2009m6d25-Obamas-Health-Care-Reform-debacle

Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky addressing over 500 Chicago area residents and local political leaders at the Health Care For America Now rally in Chicago. The rally called for quality, affordable health care for all in 2009.

Rep. Jan Schakowsky (9th, IL) speaks to a group of sheep regarding the government plans for universal health care.

This video is an entry for the Galen’s Institute’s “Do No Harm” contest.

Is your medical insurance bad for your health? If you have a high-deductible plan, the answer may be yes. The investment firm Fidelity recently surveyed employees at various companies who had opted for a high-deductible health plan linked to a health savings account. About half of those workers said they or a family member had chosen not to seek medical care for minor ailments as many as four times in the last year to avoid paying the out-of-pocket expenses. As any doctor will tell you, small health problems left untreated can become big problems, warns Kathleen Stoll, director of health...

Everyone on both sides of the issue should read this. Frankly, I’m tired of pro universal health care advocates pretending there is a mythological utopia involving government run medical care. The truth is there are more negatives to it than positives. On the other hand, I’m getting tired of opponents of universal health care proclaiming that there are people dead in the street where ever you have government run health care. The truth is there is decent medical treatment in most western universal health care systems. You have the facts with your side, but you can’t blow them out of...

“Systems” appeal to politicians and paper-pushers. Patients need care from human beings. But if you want to know what a government-controlled, monopolistic “system” is like, just visit the DMV − and imagine that not your driving privilege but your life depended on the wisdom and empathy of bureaucrats.

Did the fact that Canada has a socialist, government-run healthcare system --similar to the kind that President Obama wants to ram down the throats of Americans-- kill acclaimed actress Natasha Richardson?

To no one’s surprise, President Obama plans to ask Congress to spend billions of dollars on public education. As he stated in his presidential agenda on education, the country cannot afford four more years of neglect and indifference. This neglect and indifference, according to the president, occurred despite the fact that in the last four years, the federal government and the states have spent more money on public education than at any other time in the history of our nation. What is surprising about Mr. Obama’s education initiative is his priority on early childhood education. His “Zero to Five Plan”...

H.R.676 Title: To provide for comprehensive health insurance coverage for all United States residents, improved health care delivery, and for other purposes. Sponsor: Rep Conyers, John, Jr. [MI-14] (introduced 1/26/2009) Cosponsors (42) Latest Major Action: 1/26/2009 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce, and in addition to the Committees on Ways and Means, and Natural Resources, for a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- SUMMARY AS OF: 1/26/2009--Introduced. United States National Health Care Act...

Covertly slipped into GL Obama’s faux “stimulus bill” last weekend—by leftist Democrats—was the Socialist Universal Healthcare program. Contained within the bill is the provision that doctors will now be forced to report any and all of their patient treatments to the federal government for approval to treat. Also contained within this portion of Obama’s non-stimulus bill is the rationing of healthcare services to senior US citizens and the withholding of potentially life-saving measures. As Democrat Tom Daschle wrote in his book “Critical: What We Can Do About the Health-Care Crisis” senior citizens “should be more accepting of the conditions that...

Obama Signs SCHIP Legislation, Says Bill Is 'First Step' Toward Universal Health CoverageMain Category: Medicare / Medicaid / SCHIP Article Date: 06 Feb 2009 - 5:00 PST President Obama on Wednesday signed into law a bill (HR 2) that will reauthorize and expand SCHIP to an additional four million children, the AP/San Francisco Chronicle reports. Obama said that expanding the program is "the first step" to achieving universal health coverage in the U.S. (Freking/Elliot, AP/San Francisco Chronicle, 2/5). The House cleared the final version of the measure by a vote of 290-135 earlier in the day. Forty Republicans voted in...

Teresa Ghilarducci: The 401(k) Retirement System Has FailedJanuary 30, 2009 03:51 PM ET | Emily Brandon **SNIP** Under Ghilarducci's plan, outlined in her book When I'm Sixty-Four: The Plot Against Pensions and the Plan to Save Them, all workers who don't have a traditional pension would be required to contribute 2.5 percent of their income to a government account with a 2.5 percent employer match. A 3 percent return above inflation would be guaranteed by the government. U.S. News asked Ghilarducci about her controversial retirement plans. Excerpts: **SNIP** How will GRAs fix the retirement system? After 30 years of experience...

••• Q: If there are things that are wasteful in the stimulus package, what would you see go? A: I actually brought a list of a few that I uncovered here. ... There’s $1.1 billion on research to compare the effectiveness of medical treatments. It might be a nice program, but I’m not sure if I would consider that stimulus. There’s a $726 million for an after school snack program. Again, it’s wonderful, something I think maybe we should put in our regular budget, but I think this falls outside the stimulus. $400 million for habitat restoration, $200 million...

Hawaii is dropping the only state universal child health care program in the country just seven months after it launched. Gov. Linda Lingle's administration cited budget shortfalls and other available health care options for eliminating funding for the program. A state official said families were dropping private coverage so their children would be eligible for the subsidized plan.

By Rebecca Smith, Medical Editor The shake-up of NHS dentistry has been condemned as a failure after official figures showed fewer people are receiving health service treatment. More than 300,000 people lost their NHS dentist in three months alone Eight hundred thousand fewer people saw an NHS dentist in the two years up to December than in the last two years under the old dental contract. The shake-up was aimed at simplifying the payments system, encouraging more preventive work and reducing the 'drill and fill' culture in NHS dentistry. But the contract was so unpopular many dentists left the NHS...