Weekend Update

Congress is entering into its final week of the August recess. The Washington Post is reporting that "The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee plans to hold a hearing on the postal proposals [to withdraw from the FEHB Program, etc.] Sept. 6." No information on the hearing has been posted on the Committee's website yet. 


The federal government has launched a new website performance.gov . The site provides a handly link to OPM's performance and accountability report which the FEHBlog discussed last year when the report was issued. According to Govexec.com,  "the performance.gov site faces major performance challenges of its own. A last-minute deal between the Obama administration and House Republicans to avert a government shutdown in April cut fiscal 2011 funding for online open government initiatives by more than three quarters to just $8 million."

Kaiser Health News featured a lengthy report on the efforts of self-insured employers and health plans to control the high cost of specialty or biologic drugs. Interestingly, the article does not discuss the Food and Drug Administration's delay in creating the pathway to less expensive bio-similar drugs that the Affordable Care Act