Wednesday, December 07, 2016

Midweek update

The lame duck session of Congress hurtles toward its impending conclusion. Three important bills remain in play -- the National Defense Authorization Act, the 21st Century Cures Act, and the resolution continuing funding for the federal government. The House has passed the first two bills and the Senate is expected to act on them today or tomorrow. The House leadership unveiled the new continuing resolution last evening.

  • Here's the Wall Street Journal's latest report on the NDAA.  
  • The Boston Globe's STAT provides an overview of the Cures Act under the guise of listing winners and losers.  
  • The Hill reports on the proposed continuing resolution which would fund the federal government through April 28, 2017.  
The leadership's goal is to wrap things up by Friday December 9.

Following up on some other items that the FEHBlog has discussed,
  • The New York Times Upshot blog discusses an obvious flaw in the Affordable Care Act -- one size fits all healthcare.  
  • The Drug Channels blog uses a recent prescription drug manufacturer announcement to again illustrate the fundamental flaws in that market.  
  • The FEHBlog noticed this Aspire Health press release which provides details on the current geographic scope of its services. 
The Justice Department unveiled earlier this week a wide ranging criminal action against a group of doctors and others who were running the Forest Park Medical Center in central Texas.  Their alleged scheme harmed the FEHBP. The OPM Inspector General's office was involved with investigation. A tangled web indeed. 

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