Healthcare Daily Digest for 27 February: Political Arguing About the Cost of Obamacare

A top Republican with the Senate Budget Committee thinks it’s important that you know this: President Obama’s healthcare law will add $6.2 trillion to the deficit over the next 75 years.

Now, there are several responses to this:

1) It’s a reasoned critique of a complicated plan;

2) Of COURSE a Republican found fault with Obamacare;

3) Isn’t it ridiculous for us to think that providing healthcare for everyone was going to come with no price tag? Like, when did that become okay thinking?

The Republican is Jeff Sessions of Alabama, and here’s his honey of a quote: “The report reveals the dramatic falsehoods that were used to push [the bill] to passage.” Sessions then had to go take a call from the kettle.

Obama and his administration aren’t helping matters, though, by suggesting that “the law will reduce the deficit.” Again: we’re probably going to need to spend money in order to take care of each other. But this should not be a matter of political posturing.

Here are your Wednesday headlines:

• What’s Our Old Friend Chris Christie Up To?: He’s essentially a Democrat now, right guys? “New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie on Tuesday became the eighth Republican governor to endorse the Medicaid expansion in President Obama’s healthcare law.”

• They Also Never Murdered Those Hoboes: UPMC has never been misleading on charity care. “In response to Debra Srogi’s ill-informed letter to the editor (Pittsburgh Business Times, Feb. 15-21, 2013), I wish to correct the gross inaccuracies regarding the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s contribution for charity care vs. uncompensated care.”

• How Do You Say “It Hurts When I Do This” in Languages Other Than English?: “Current trends in the medical tourism industry indicate that the needs of international patients are challenging health service providers to come up with advanced solutions for quality healthcare outcomes.”

• One Solution? Help People Not Get Sick in the First Place: “In today’s health-care system, a doctor’s main job is to diagnose and treat patients’ ailments, but in the future, their focus will shift to prevention.”