New York Daily News editorial: Senate Republican vote –“An embarrassment wrapped in cruelty wrapped in political disaster.” (E)

July 23, 2017

“I don’t know whether we’re proceeding to the House bill, a new version of the Senate bill, the old version of the Senate bill, the 2015 repeal-and-hope-that-we-come-up-with something-in-two-years bill. I truly don’t.” (Senator Collins) (A) “Deductibles could become so high under the GOP plan, the CBO said, that many low-income people might decide not

“….. the parliamentarian has taken an already very difficult process for enacting health care legislation in the Senate and made it nearly impossible….”

July 22, 2017

“The official rules keeper in the Senate Friday tossed a bucket of cold water on the Senate Republican health bill by advising that major parts of the bill cannot be passed with a simple majority, but rather would require 60 votes. Republicans hold only 52 seats in the Senate. Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough said that

“McConnell is still planning votes on health-care legislation next week. But many things have to go right for his strategy to succeed, and not all of them are within his control.”

July 21, 2017

As we head towards next week’s vote, you might take a look at an excellent New York Magazine analysis. Here Is Where Things Stand With the Senate Health-Care Bill , by Ed Kilgore, highlight and click on http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/07/where-things-stand-with-the-senate-health-care-bill.html Excerpts: “Getting Senate moderates to vote for a bill with a Medicaid per capita cap and the

“The vote is a reward to the ultras who sabotaged repeal and replace by allowing them to posture one more time as purists who have not forsaken the true faith.”

July 20, 2017

“A new official analysis released Wednesday finds that repealing much of Obamacare without a replacement law would increase the number of people without health insurance by 32 million people, double insurance premiums in the individual plan market and leave most of the United States without an insurer selling such plans by 2026. The report comes

“Houston Braces for Another Brush With the Peril of Zika” *. But they are doing passive not active surveillance. IS YOU AREA’S HEALTH CARE SYSTEM PREPARED FOR A SURGE OF AN EMERGING VIRUS LIKE ZIKA?

July 20, 2017

“With 4.5 million people in a hot, muggy metropolis built atop a bayou, America’s fourth-largest city, Houston, is a perfect target for the mosquito-borne Zika virus. But it may be better prepared than any other urban center to stop an outbreak. The city last year increased its mosquito-control budget by 33 percent. Officials are testing

Are Republicans going to LET Obamacare die or MAKE it die? How can the individual market exchanges be stabilized?

July 19, 2017

“Mr. Trump declared that his plan was now to “let Obamacare fail,” and suggested that Democrats would then seek out Republicans to work together on a bill to bury the Affordable Care Act. If he is determined to make good on that pledge, he has plenty of levers to pull, from declining to reimburse insurance

After another day of Republican health care bill fiascos: “President Trump: ‘Let Obamacare Fail…I’m Not Going to Own It’”.

July 18, 2017

“President Donald Trump said Tuesday he would let Obamacare “fail” in the aftermath of his party’s botched efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. “I think we’re probably in that position where we’ll let Obamacare fail,” Trump said at the White House. “We’re not going to own it. I’m not going to own