BOSTON — Massachusetts has the nation's highest rate of residents with health insurance. Visits to emergency rooms are beginning to ease. More residents are getting cancer screenings and more women are making prenatal doctors' visits.
Still, one of the biggest challenges for the state lies ahead: reining in spiraling costs.
Six years after Gov. Mitt Romney signed the nation's most ambitious health care law — one that would lay the groundwork for his presidential opponent's national version — supporters say the Massachusetts law holds promise for the long-term success of Barack Obama's plan.
Like the federal law it inspired, the Massachusetts law has multiple goals, among them expanding the number of insured residents, reducing emergency room visits, penalizing those who can afford coverage but opt to remain uninsured, and requiring employers to offer coverage or pay a fine.
Supporters of the Massachusetts experiment are quick to point out its successes.
An additional 400,000 individuals have gained insurance since 2006, meaning about 98 percent of residents have coverage.
A recent study by the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation found that between 2006 and 2010, the use of emergency rooms for non-emergency reasons fell nearly 4 percent. That was a key goal of the law, since using emergency rooms for routine care is far more expensive than visiting a doctor.
State health officials also point to what they say are increases in mammograms, colon cancer screenings and prenatal care visits and a 150,000-person reduction in the number of smokers after the state expanded coverage for smoking cessation programs.
"Since Gov. Romney signed health care reform here in Massachusetts, more private companies are offering health care to their employees, fewer people are getting primary care in an expensive emergency room setting, and hundreds of thousands of our friends and neighbors have access to care," said Gov. Deval Patrick, a Democrat and co-chairman of Obama's re-election committee.
Another reason the law remains popular may be that so many Massachusetts residents receive insurance through work and have been largely untouched by its penalties. The Blue Cross Blue Shield study found 68 percent of non-elderly adults received coverage through their employers in 2010, up from about 64 percent in 2006.
The study also found no evidence to support one fear lawmakers had when they approved the law — that employers or workers might drop coverage because of the availability of public coverage.
Another indication of the law's acceptance in Massachusetts is the reduction in the number of those assessed a tax penalty for failing to have insurance despite being able to afford it. In 2010, 44,000 Massachusetts tax filers were assessed the penalty under the "individual mandate." That's a drop from the 67,000 people required to pay the penalty in 2007, the first year it was assessed.
In 2010, the highest penalty was $93 a month, or $1,116 a year. In 2012, the highest penalty increased to $105 a month, or $1,260 a year.
Massachusetts is the only state with an individual mandate, although the Supreme Court last week upheld the constitutionality of a similar mandate in the federal law.
Despite the penalty, most polls place support for the initiative at more than 60 percent, about double the approval rate for the federal health care law.
Supporters say there's a lesson there too. The more people begin to understand the benefits of the federal law, they say, the more support for the federal law should increase.
"The first lesson is that you can meet the goals we set out in Massachusetts, you can cover the majority of the uninsured and fix the broken market" for health care, said Jonathan Gruber, who helped craft both the state law and the federal law as an adviser to Romney and Obama.
"And you can do so with broad public support," Gruber said. "Based on what we've seen in Massachusetts, people like this."
There are other indications of improving access to care in Massachusetts since the law was approved in 2006.
Residents are more likely to have a place they usually go when they are sick or need advice (up 4.7 percent), more likely to have had a preventive care visit (up 5.9 percent), more likely to have had multiple doctor visits (up 5 percent) and more likely to have had a dental visit (up 5 percent), the Blue Cross Blue Shield report found.
The charge that the 2006 law has been a "budget-buster" in Massachusetts has also been challenged.
A recent study by the business-backed Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation found that during the five full fiscal years since it was implemented, the law has cost the state an additional $91 million a year after federal reimbursements — well within initial projections.
The idea of exporting Massachusetts' law to the rest of the nation has its critics too.
Josh Archambault, health care policy director for the Pioneer Institute, a conservative-leaning Boston-based think tank, said a narrower approach would be better.
"There are many unintended consequences when Washington tries to design a policy that meets the very different needs of states as diverse as Massachusetts and, say, New Mexico," he said. "We need some specific federal actions to increase access to affordable health care, but the (federal law) went too far."
Source: www.msnbc.msn.com
London 2012 Olympics: 24 days to go - live blog - The Guardian
Hello and welcome to today’s Olympics live blog.
Coming up today:
• The Team GB athletics squad will be announced – we’ll have live coverage from about 1pm. Dwain Chambers is expected to make a return to the Olympic arena after an absence of 12 years, joining teenager Adam Gemili in the 100m. It will be interesting to see whether head coach Charles van Commenee picks for the 800m team Jenny Meadows, who won a bronze medal at the 2009 World Championships in Berlin but has had an achilles injury for the last six months. Meanwhile Lynsey Sharp has been in great form lately but has not run the necessary qualifying time, although she has beaten all her three British rivals. A quirk in the rules means that Van Commenee and his fellow selectors could select Sharp, but only if they left out everyone else and decided to send her alone in the 800m. The alternative would be that Sharp is left out, but three of the runners she has beaten go instead.
• Boris Johnson, the mayor of London, has given some Olympic tips to the capital's about-to-be long-suffering commuters. More details as I get them.
In Olympic news so far this morning:
• Gary Linekar carried the Olympic torch in his home city of Leicester, where he played from 1976 to 1985, this morning. I'll put a picture up as soon as I get one. The torch is travelling from Leicester to Peterborough today. If you are out taking a look send me a photo at paul.owen@guardian.co.uk.
• Sun Yang, the 1,500m freestyle swimming world-record holder, has given a modest and downbeat speech to China’s national swimming team. He told his team-mates:
I feel like a tough warrior, with shield in hand. I am about to go all out. I am ready, London. We are coming. Chinese men are coming!
• The Olympics will deliver a £16.5bn boost to the UK economy by 2017 and help create the equivalent of 62,200 jobs, a new report has claimed. The estimated benefits are from 2005, when the Games were awarded, to the five years after the Games finish, and will come mainly as a result of building Olympic sites and the boost to tourism, according to the study by Lloyds Banking Group. Lloyds, whose Lloyds TSB is a London 2012 sponsor, said nearly a third of the gains - worth £5bn - will come over the five years following the event, when Olympic sites are converted to other uses and tourism continues to see a boost.
• Michael Phelps is dropping out of the 200m freestyle at the London Olympics, leaving the American swimmer with seven events for his Games swansong.
• Gold is my target, says our Olympic diarist Nicola Adams.
• I thought my Olympic dream was over, Beth Tweddle tells Donald McRae.
• And here’s Owen Gibson’s full story on Stuart Pearce’s decision not to choose David Beckham for his Team GB football squad.
Stay tuned for all this and more throughout the day.
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
London 2012: Michael Phelps targets only seven gold medals - BBC News
Michael Phelps has opted out of the 200m freestyle at the Olympic Games and will instead chase seven gold medals.
The American is expected to concentrate on two butterfly and two individual medley events as well as three relays.
Phelps, the most successful Olympian ever with 14 golds, swam and won eight events in Beijing in 2008.
Phelps' epic eight Olympic medals
He had been expected to target eight golds in London, but coach Bob Bowman said: "No-one should be expected to do that twice. Once was enough."
Phelps won the 200m freestyle in Beijing four years ago but has since been beaten over that distance in the last two World Championships.
His 200m freestyle spot in the US team will go to Ricky Berens, who finished third in the 200m freestyle at the trials behind Phelps and Ryan Lochte.
Ryan Lochte“In the past four years, I've gone a lot faster and I know what my body can handle ”
"It was a fun week but there are still a lot of things that need to be perfected," said Phelps after the trials.
Phelps, 27, has won a total of 38 world and Olympic gold medals in his career but admitted he struggled for motivation after Beijing 2008.
He has also faced increasing competition from Lochte, who will now be favourite for the 200m freestyle after Phelps's withdrawal.
The Phelps and Lochte rivalry is expected to be one of highlights of the Games, which begin later this month.
"Neither one of us wants to lose," said Phelps.
"When we get in the water we race as hard as we can, whether we're playing cat and mouse by the end, we're going all out.
"They're fun, exciting races and Ryan has proved he's been the best over the past couple of years."
Lochte sounded a warning to Phelps after the trials. "I'm used to racing against him, I've been doing it for eight years now," he said.
"In the past four years, I've gone a lot faster and I know what my body can handle. This meet was just stepping stones for what I really want to do in London."
Phelps finished first in the 200m individual medley final and the 200m freestyle final at the trials, while Lochte beat him in the 400m individual medley final and also won the 200m backstroke final.
Missy Franklin, 17, is set to become the first US woman to swim in seven events at the Games after she won the 200m backstroke in 2:06.12.
"I felt really strong. It really hurts so bad at the end but if it doesn't then you're not doing it right," she said. "I can't believe I have seven events. It's so overwhelming but so exciting at the same time."
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
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