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Sen. Hatch Leaves Bipartisan Negotiations, August Deadline Unlikely
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, removes himself from Sen. Max Baucus"s bipartisan health reform talks in the Senate Finance Committee, leaving six centrist senators in what used to be called "the coalition of the willing." And, Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill., says President Barack Obama"s August deadline is unworkable.

Statement From American Association Of Kidney Patients Kidney Failure Is No Laughing Matter
The American Association of Kidney Patients (AAKP) is very disappointed with Wanda Sykes" comedic comments regarding kidney failure and Rush Limbaugh at the White House Correspondent Dinner over the weekend. While Ms. Sykes" comments were most likely made in a light-hearted manner, hundreds of thousands of kidney disease patients and their loved ones do not see kidney failure as a laughing matter. Nearly 400,000 Americans are receiving dialysis as a life saving treatment for kidney failure and 26 million Americans have been diagnosed with chronic kidney disease (CKD), which means they are at risk for losing their kidney function. In addition, 20 million Americans are at risk for CKD and do not even know it.
News of the day
Report Highlights Importance Of GPs, Australian Medical Association
A new Australian Institute of Health and Welfare/University of Sydney report on General Practice highlights the critical role GPs play in keeping the Australian community healthy, AMA Federal President, Dr Andrew Pesce, said today.
Health Insurance

Co-ops Offer Compromise, But Could Take Decades To Develop

"A network of health insurance plans run by the customers they serve, proposed in the U.S. Congress to offset opposition to a government-run system, may take a generation to pay off, even with $10 billion in seed money," Bloomberg reports. The co-ops, according to Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., who first floated the idea last month could lower costs, cover more Americans, and gain bipartisan support. President Obama said in late June that he was "open" to the idea. However, based on the experience of existing co-ops, the plan could take decades to develop into an effective mechanism for achieving those broad goals. "If we had 25 years, and we weren"t staring down the barrel of a shotgun on health costs, it"s a pretty neat concept," Paul Keckley, of the Deloitte Center for Health Solutions, told Bloomberg. Bloomberg reports: "Conrad would give the co-ops at least $10 billion in seed funding, said New York Senator Charles Schumer, the chamber"s third-ranking Democrat, in an interview last week. Christopher Thorne, a Conrad spokesman, didn"t immediately return e-mails over the weekend asking about the funding." Washington State"s insurance commissioner, Michael Kreidler, praised Washington"s existing co-op, Group Health Cooperative, a 600,000 member plan that employs 922 doctors and 1,700 nurses, but noted that it took 60 years to develop, the paper says, adding: "While Group Health"s premiums are generally no cheaper than competitors", the plan has been less aggressive than private companies at trying to purge sicker, costlier patients." Conrad, meanwhile, points to success stories in other industries. Ace Hardware, and Land O"Lakes, a dairy company with $12 billion in sales last year, are both co-ops (Nussbaum, 7/6). This information was reprinted from kaiserhealthnews.org with kind permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, search the archives and sign up for email delivery at kaiserhealthnews.org. © Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.


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