Cue the funeral bagpipes. My fourth health insurance plan is dead. Two weeks ago, my husband and I received yet another cancellation notice for our private, individual health insurance coverage. It's our fourth Obamacare-induced obituary in four years. Our first death notice, from Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, arrived in the fall of 2013. The…

The latest iteration of Obamacare repeal has likely failed. Senate Republicans were unable to pass a watered-down repeal effort that offered states some meager level of federalism in the form of block grants. Now, we're again going to hear a lot of noise about the need to embrace a "bipartisan" approach to fix health care. "Since nearly…

In recent months, late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel has taken to scaremongering his audience with well-worn Democratic Party talking points regarding health care insurance policy. Between yuks, he occasionally accuses Republicans of being would-be baby killers, which is treated as an important political development because, well, Jimmy Kimmel…

Bernie Sanders' Medicare for All Act, introduced last week, outlaws private health insurance. Curiously, not one of the Democratic presidential wannabes crowding around Sanders for photo ops mentioned this alarming fact. If Sanders has his way, 180 million Americans who currently have private coverage would have it ripped away and be automatically…

Brace yourself for the next health insurance crisis: the uninsured middle class. The Affordable Care Act added millions of mostly poor people to the insurance rolls. But the law is driving premiums so high that middle-class people can no longer afford insurance. Several million are expected to drop coverage in 2018. Under Obamacare, poor lives matter…

Nursing home residents trapped in wheelchairs with floodwaters rising to their waists—the photo of Hurricane Harvey everyone's seen. But even where the weather's fine, nursing home residents are in peril. An alert issued Monday by the inspector general for the federal Department of Health and Human Services calls for urgent action. It cites incidents…

If you're a baby boomer, you're expecting Medicare to pay for that knee replacement or cataract operation you'll need in 10 or 20 years. Don't count on it. Health care reform is taking a dangerous turn. Democrats, energized by the failure to repeal Obamacare, are again pushing a government takeover of health care they call "Medicare for all."…

By now it's apparent that majorities in Congress consider ObamaCare too precious to repeal and replace.  So why does Congress itself remain immune from the law it passed under ignominious circumstances, and insists on sustaining?  If Congress demands that other Americans endure ObamaCare and its provisions, under what concept of fairness…

"The doctor will see you now." It's a common phrase, but it's no longer true. Even in the examining room, you're unlikely to make more than fleeting eye contact with your doctor. That's because federal laws and regulations have turned doctors into robotic clerks. Your doctor has to stay glued to the computer screen, clicking boxes, following…

When President Ronald Reagan was asked why he settled for a 5 percent tax cut in 1981, half what he had proposed, he answered that "half a loaf is better than none." That's good advice right now. This week's news that the Senate failed to repeal Obamacare is a bitter disappointment to the 18 million people in the individual market struggling…

Why are Republicans on Capitol Hill having so much trouble repealing and replacing Obamacare? There are reasons all over the place: subsidies, tax credits, tax cuts, Medicaid, essential health benefits, and many others. But there is one fundamental obstacle to getting rid of Obamacare, and it is very simple: Once the government starts giving away,…

Die-hard Obamacare defenders are out in force over July 4 to protest Republican repeal efforts. The protesters are falsely claiming the repeal will gut Medicaid, causing frail, indigent seniors to be evicted from nursing homes. It's sheer demagoguery. But even these phony claims could have redeeming value if they get the public to take a closer look…

BOSTON — On the day Boston Children's Hospital celebrated being named "the number one pediatric hospital in the nation" by U.S. News & World Report, I was interviewing Dana Gottesfeld in nearby Somerville, Massachusetts. Dana is the young wife of Martin "Marty G" Gottesfeld, an imprisoned technology engineer/activist…

Former President Barack Obama is joining the demagogic slugfest against the GOP's latest bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. He claims the bill would "ruin Medicaid." Not so fast, Obama. Your health care law ruined Medicaid. Now, about half of all women who give birth in the United States are on Medicaid, a staggering figure. The Republican…

President Trump calls Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin his "100-to-nothing man" because Shulkin was confirmed by the Senate 100-0. That unanimity is turning out to be a red flag. Shulkin is not delivering 100 percent for vets. He told Congress last week that he plans to end the Veterans Choice Program, a setback for vets stuck on…

The deadliest superbug yet—Candida auris—is invading hospitals and nursing homes, killing a staggering 60 percent of patients it infects. Some exposed patients don't succumb to infection but silently carry the germ and infect others. So far, the lethal germ has sickened patients in New York, New Jersey, Michigan, Illinois and Massachusetts…

Here is what happens if you try to tell health care stories that defy big government orthodoxy: When GOP Congressman Rodney Davis of Illinois tried to recount how his wife, a nurse and colon cancer survivor, struggled in the nationalized Canadian health care system, liberal protesters responded by uttering "Ugh!" and catcalling him. When…

I feel your pain. But please use your brain. On Monday, late-night TV comedian Jimmy Kimmel delivered an emotional monologue about his newborn son. His baby was born with a congenital heart defect that required emergency open-heart surgery. Millions of American parents, myself included, have walked in Kimmel's shoes. We've experienced the terrifying…

The House vote on the GOP's Obamacare repeal bill vote is down to the wire, with dozens of Republicans waffling as "undecideds." What's the hold-up? Ninety-six percent of people who have to buy their own insurance stand to benefit from this bill, which will likely drive down premiums by double digits. The remaining 4 percent —…

"We're going to go when we have the votes," Speaker Paul Ryan said Thursday when asked when the House will pass a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. Lawmakers will not be constrained by any "artificial deadline," Ryan declared. On March 24, when the Speaker pulled the GOP Obamacare bill before what would have been a sure defeat…

Going into a hospital? It's getting riskier because of drug-resistant infections—the kind almost no drug can cure. Despite one federal government "action plan" after another, the germs are winning. Government authorities are clueless about how many infections there are, or how many patients are dying. Alarming new research shows that…

First of all, the preferred free-market plan for health care policy should be no plan whatsoever. The idea that we need a federal top-down strategy to manage a huge chunk of the economy is at the very heart of the problem. We don't need a federal plan for health care. Yet Republicans have allowed liberals to frame the entire health insurance debate…

What's the biggest killer in hospitals? Secrecy. That's the bottom line from the Government Accountability Office and the Food and Drug Administration. Both report that hospitals are failing to disclose when medical devices injure or kill patients by spreading cancer cells throughout their body or infecting them with superbugs. Federal regulation…

On Saturday, Democratic Senators Chuck Schumer and Bernie Sanders called for nationwide protests to stop Republicans from repealing the Affordable Care Act. The trigger event was Friday's confirmation of Dr. Tom Price as President Trump's Secretary of Health and Human Services. Price is charged with making good on Trump's promise to repeal and replace…

Congressional Republicans are huddling at a closed-door retreat this week to craft a replacement for the Affordable Care Act, but it's President Trump who's calling the shots. On Friday, hours after taking office, he issued his first executive order. No surprise, it targeted Obamacare, instructing federal agencies to do everything possible while the…

As the new Congress convenes, budget cutters are eyeing Medicare, citing predictions that the program for seniors is running out of money. But federal bean counters have erroneously predicted Medicare's bankruptcy for decades, largely because they ignore the impact of medical breakthroughs. Worse, medical ethicists like Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, 59, insist…

Democrats are warning that once Obamacare is repealed, people with serious illnesses won't get health insurance. President Obama says repeal will mean going "back to discriminating against Americans with pre-existing conditions." That's fake news. The truth is, every Republican plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act protects…

Going to a hospital is taking your life in your hands. New research shows patients treated at the worst hospitals are three times as likely to die as patients with the same health problem treated at the best hospitals. Yet most people pick a hospital based on convenience, a friend's recommendation or where their doctor practices. In fact, your doctor…

Last week, Veterans Affairs got caught covering up the quality ratings of its 146 medical centers. VA Secretary Robert McDonald insists, "No VA medical facility is bad or failing." Really? Not even a hospital that earns only one star out of five? McDonald denies he's hiding anything. But he and other VA brass have plenty to hide. In 2014…

On the stump, Donald Trump promised to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. Now obstacles are emerging on the left and right. Democrats are sowing panic, falsely predicting that 20 million will lose coverage. Newly elected Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer claims Trump will "rue the day" Obamacare is repealed. Meanwhile, on Trump…