U.S. healthcare executives say Obamacare is likely here to stay, despite repeated calls from Republican lawmakers for repeal of the 2010 law aimed at providing health coverage for millions of uninsured Americans. Top executives who gathered in San Francisco this week for the annual J.P. Morgan Healthcare conference, say that while President Obama's signature domestic policy achievement may well be tweaked, it is too entrenched to be removed. The Obama administration said in November that it aims to have over 9 million people enrolled in government-backed federal and state health insurance marketplaces in 2015, their second year of operation.
President Obama's healthcare law helped people better afford medical care and avoid financial difficulties related to their health, according to a new survey. Results released Thursday from the Commonwealth Fund's Biennial Health Insurance Survey revealed that 14 million fewer people reported trouble accessing healthcare in the last year. The drop — which totaled 7 percent — was the first time the number of adults who reported this problem had declined since 2003, when the question was added to the survey. Americans had an easier time visiting doctors when they had a medical problem, filling prescriptions, pursuing recommended treatments and receiving specialist care, researchers found.
This season's flu vaccine was only 12 percent effective so far for adults ages 18 to 49 and 14 percent effective for people 50 and older, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimated Thursday. In its weekly Morbidity and Mortality Report, the CDC acknowledged that this season's shot offered less protection because about 70 percent of circulating flu viruses are different or have "drifted" from the one used to create the vaccine. The evolution of viruses cannot be helped and the composition for this year's vaccine had already been chosen before there was evidence of "drift," the CDC said.
In health insurance prices, as in the weather, Alaska and the Sun Belt are extremes. This year Alaska is the most expensive health insurance market for people who do not get coverage through their employers, while Phoenix, Albuquerque, N.M., and Tucson, Ariz., are among the very cheapest. In this second year of the insurance marketplaces created by the federal health law, the most expensive premiums are in rural spots around the nation: Wyoming, rural Nevada, patches of inland California and the southernmost county in Mississippi, according to an analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation, which has compiled premium prices from around the country.
People who bought insurance through the exchanges created by ObamaCare were more likely to book checkups than people covered by employer health insurance in 2014, according to new data from an online appointment service. The statistics signal success for the Obama administration, which touted access to preventive health as a way to shrink the country's healthcare spending. The year of data also revealed more good news for ObamaCare: While customers sought more annual appointments like physicals and women's health exams, there was no spike in demand for other, more costly specialists.
Many hospitals and doctor practices are offering patients the convenience of signing up for appointments and even reservations to be seen in the emergency room, right from their smartphone or laptop. This brings them new patients and retains existing ones wanting to avoid hassles and long waits. At the same time, it helps doctors fill slots from last-minute appointment cancellations and hospital ERs shift patients with non-life-threatening conditions to slower times of the day. Companies providing the online signups, and doctors and hospitals using the services, say most patients are seen within 15 to 20 minutes of their ER reservation or doctor appointment.