Saturday, January 17, 2009

News Clipping Archives

 

Maryland / Regional

Federal dollars for children's health could help to bolster state's Medicaid Expansion (The Gazette)

O'Malley hears plea for Medicaid expansion (Baltimore Sun)

Annapolis: A business wish list for 2009 (Business Gazette)

National / International

House OKs child health care bill (Washington Times)

Peanut butter products are now suspect (Washington Times)

Opinion

Health care found to be lacking (Carroll County Times Letter to the Editor)

 

 

Federal dollars for children's health could help to bolster state's Medicaid expansion

Van Hollen: Health insurance for kids needed ‘more than ever right now'

 

By Sean R. Sedam and Douglas Tallman

The Gazette

Saturday, January 17, 2009

 

The House of Representatives approved reauthorization of the State Children's Health Insurance Program this week, which could expand health-care coverage to 4 million more children nationwide, including 65,000 in Maryland.

 

The legislation awaits a vote by the Senate, which also is expected to pass the measure.

 

In the past year, about 2.5 million Americans have lost their jobs, and with that often their health coverage, said U.S. Rep. Christopher Van Hollen Jr., who joined state and county officials, health-care providers and advocates Monday at a news conference at Community Clinic Inc. in Takoma Park.

 

"We need this health insurance program for kids more than ever right now," said Van Hollen (D-Dist. 8) of Kensington.

 

SCHIP covers about 6 million children in the United States, including 110,000 in Maryland, whose parents earn too much income to be eligible for Medicaid but not enough to afford private health insurance.

 

The bill would use a 61 cent increase in the tax on cigarettes to expand coverage from 6 million children to 10 million children and provide more dental and mental health services for children. Without reauthorization, the program is due to expire March 31.

 

"The difference this time around is we're going to have a president who is going to sign the bill," Van Hollen said. President George W. Bush twice vetoed a reauthorization bill that had bipartisan support.

 

State officials also are hoping that $100 billion of a federal stimulus package will go toward matching states' dollars for Medicaid, as Maryland lawmakers hope to continue to expand health-care coverage in the state.

 

In Annapolis, House Health and Government Operations Committee Chairman Peter A. Hammen (D-Dist. 46) of Baltimore said that he is waiting to see whether Congress approves a flat subsidy to the states or a tiered subsidy, which could mean the difference of hundreds of millions of dollars.

 

In 2007, the General Assembly passed a $1 cigarette tax increase as a way to expand health care to 100,000 more Marylanders.

 

State statistics show that 25,000 people already have signed up for the expanded program since July 1. That is equal to the figure that legislators expected for the entire fiscal year, which ends June 30.

 

With the state projected to face a deficit that could grow to nearly $2 billion, continuing that expansion could be difficult, legislative leaders have said.

 

"States like Maryland are cash-strapped, they are facing huge deficits," Van Hollen said. "And they've got to either raise taxes, which you don't want to do in an economic downturn, or dramatically cut programs, which you don't want to do because it hurts people at a time when they need help the most."

 

Copyright 2009 The Gazette.

 

O'Malley hears plea for Medicaid expansion

 

By Laura Smitherman

Baltimore Sun

Friday, January 16, 2009

 

Health care advocates implored Gov. Martin O'Malley yesterday to continue a planned expansion of the Medicaid program even as he is expected to severely cut the state's budget to fill a huge budget shortfall.

 

O'Malley, a Democrat, indicated he may not be able to fully fund the health care expansion in the budget he submits to the General Assembly next week, though he noted that a federal stimulus package in the coming weeks could change his plans. Congress is working on a package that includes additional Medicaid dollars for states.

 

"There will have to be some slowing of the ramp-up to full funding of certain additional initiatives that all of us believe in. We just don't have the money to do it," O'Malley told reporters at the State House. He added that the amount and timing of federal help is likely to be a "big variable" for the future of the Medicaid program.

 

Many states, faced with deficits brought on by the national recession, are considering Medicaid cuts to balance budgets. Maryland faces a $1.9 billion budget shortfall and is in the process of increasing Medicaid eligibility to eventually insure more than 100,000 low-income residents who lack health insurance. The expansion was adopted by the legislature in 2007.

 

The Maryland Hospital Association and the Maryland Citizens' Health Initiative called on O'Malley to preserve the expansion, which has enabled more than 25,000 residents to enroll through promotions that included the Ravens football team. They argued that the expansion saves lives and reduces costs that add to insurance premiums for all residents.

 

Under the law, parents with annual incomes up to 116 percent of federal poverty guidelines, which is about $20,500 for a family of three, became eligible for Medicaid last July. The limit had previously been 40 percent of poverty, which many considered low in a state with among the highest median income in the nation. Adults without children up to the higher level are scheduled to become eligible this July.

 

Copyright 2009 Baltimore Sun.

 

Annapolis: A business wish list for 2009

Groups seek help for biotech, transportation, other interests

 

By Kevin James Shay

Business Gazette

Thursday, January 8, 2009

 

A year ago, Maryland business leaders were scrambling to campaign against a potential sales tax on computer services.

 

As the legislature prepares to open its 2009 session on Wednesday, business executives don't have a similarly galvanizing issue to rally around. Rather, they are addressing a mish-mash of concerns, from reining in spending to boosting the state's biotechnology industry.

 

While it's unlikely that a computer sales tax or something similar will come up this session, that doesn't mean business executives such as John Eckenrode are not monitoring the legislature. The state's budget shortfall for fiscal 2010 could reach $2 billion, making executives wonder if tax hikes will be proposed.

 

"Unlikely does not mean it won't happen," said Eckenrode, president of Baltimore high-tech company CPSI and co-founder with Thomas Loveland of the Maryland Computer Services Association. The group formed about a year ago to lobby for tech concerns and was a key player in the campaign that resulted in the repeal of the computer tax.

 

"In the unlikely event that a computer sales tax gets proposed, we'll be there in a hurry, unlike the 2007 special session, where we just plain weren't there," Eckenrode said.

 

The tech organization plans to share with legislators data from a report by the Economic Alliance of Greater Baltimore released in November that showed that the Baltimore-Washington region, which includes Northern Virginia, ranked second only to New York in information technology employment with 270,000 workers. Of those, about 100,000 are in Maryland.

 

From 2003 to 2007, Maryland companies attracted more venture capital than those in Virginia, $2.8 billion versus $2.2 billion, according to the report. Nationally, the region ranked seventh.

 

Health insurance a concern

Health insurance has long been a key concern to businesses, and that issue is again high among the 2009 legislative priorities of groups such as the Maryland Chamber of Commerce. A new state program launched last year to help small employers subsidize health insurance costs has been slow to attract participants.

 

The program is designed for employers with two to nine full-time employees that did not offer health insurance during the previous year and whose workers have an average salary below $50,000. Some have said it is hard to meet those requirements.

 

Another program, the small group health insurance plan, is hampered by laws that provide "no incentives for cost containment, limit plan design flexibility and require among the highest number of mandated health benefits in the country," Maryland chamber executives said. The plan saw its participation decline by 9 percent from 1999 to 2007 to about 54,000 employers, according to state figures.

 

The chamber is asking that legislators broaden rating bands in the small group plan to help attract lower risk, younger participants to the pool, and incorporate rating factors to encourage cost containment.

 

"We must reduce the heavy subsidies that the current rating methodology requires so that we can attract more of the young and healthy to the pool," Ronald Wineholt, Maryland chamber vice president of government affairs, recently testified before a state joint committee on health care delivery and financing.

 

Other priorities for the Maryland chamber include limiting workplace regulations and securing more federal funding for transportation improvements.

 

Despite budget problems, the state should not save money by cutting back its international presence, said Kenneth D. Weiss, president of Plans and Solutions Inc., a Gaithersburg business consulting company that works in areas such as international trade and marketing.

 

"It's getting harder for companies here to sell overseas and harder for companies outside ours to sell here," Weiss said.

 

This report originally appeared in The Business Gazette.

 

House OKs child health care bill

 

By Sean Lengell

Washington Times

Thursday, January 15, 2009

 

The House easily passed a proposed expansion of a popular health care plan for millions of uninsured children Wednesday, providing President-elect Barack Obama with the possibility of signing bills to protect children and equal-pay rights for women during his first days in office.

 

The measure to expand the State Children's Health Insurance Program, or SCHIP, passed by a vote of 289 to 139 -- providing the incoming administration the first of what it hopes are many legislative victories on a path to universal health care coverage.

 

The House last week passed two pay-equity bills that would extend the time period in which women can file pay-discrimination lawsuits and would let them sue for more money while making companies meet higher standards to justify pay disparities. The Senate is scheduled to take up the measures Thursday, with a final vote expected later this week or next.

 

The SCHIP measure would provide $32.3 billion over 4 1/2 years to add an additional 4 million children to the 7 million already covered in the program.

 

The measure would increase the federal tax on cigarettes by 61 cents to a dollar a pack to pay for the program.

 

A similar Senate version is expected to pass soon after Tuesday's inauguration.

 

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called passing SCHIP a “monumental achievement for our children, for our country and certainly for this Congress.”

 

“This is only the beginning of change we will achieve with the new president,” the California Democrat added.

 

The Democrat-controlled Congress twice in 2007 passed measures to expand SCHIP by $35 billion over five years, to $60 billion. President Bush vetoed both bills, objecting because they were too costly, would cover some adults and children in middle-class families and would be paid for, in part, with an increase in the federal cigarette tax.

 

Mr. Obama said he will sign the bill if it reaches his desk.

 

The most significant change from 2007 versions would allow states, at their choosing, to end the five-year waiting period for low-income, uninsured children who are legal residents.

 

Many Republicans complained that too many adults receive medical care under the program at the expense of children.

 

“This program ought to cover poor children first,” said House Minority Leader John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican. “Unfortunately, in many states, more than two-thirds of those enrolled in the SCHIP program are adults and there is nothing in this bill that ensures poor children will be brought into the program first.”

 

Rep. Tom Price of Georgia, chairman of the conservative Republican Study Committee, accused Democrats of using SCHIP as a “political tool used to expand the federal bureaucracy and extend benefits to individuals who fall well outside of the bill's original intent.”

 

Forty Republicans joined 249 Democrats in supporting the bill, while 139 Republicans and two Democrats voted no.

 

But Democrats said the Republican complaints were disingenuous, maintaining that under the bill no new waivers to cover parents of children that receive SCHIP benefits would be issued. And childless adults who are covered under the program no longer would be eligible.

 

Democrats also dismissed Republican claims that some illegal immigrants would be covered by the program.

 

“It's fairy tale at best to claim that anyone who is here illegally would have a chance to qualify for these benefits,” said Rep. Xavier Becerra of California, vice chairman of the House Democratic Caucus.

 

The initial 10-year authorization of the program expired in September 2007. Temporary funding extensions for the program expire at the end of March.

 

Copyright 2009 Washington Times.

 

Peanut butter products are now suspect

 

Associated Press

By Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar

Washington Times

Saturday, January 17, 2009

 

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Federal health authorities on Saturday urged consumers to avoid eating cookies, cakes, ice cream and other foods that contain peanut butter until authorities can learn more about a deadly outbreak of salmonella contamination.

 

Most peanut butter sold in jars at supermarkets appears to be safe, said Stephen Sundlof, head of the Food and Drug Administration's food safety center.

 

"As of now, there is no indication that the major national name-brand jars of peanut butter sold in retails stores are linked to the recall," Sundlof told reporters in a conference call.

 

Officials are focusing on peanut paste, as well as peanut butter, produced at a Blakely, Ga., facility owned by Peanut Corp. of America. Its peanut butter is not sold directly to consumers but distributed to institutions and food companies. But the peanut paste, made from roasted peanuts, is an ingredient in cookies, cakes and other products that people buy in the supermarket.

 

"This is an excellent illustration of an ingredient-driven outbreak," said Dr. Robert Tauxe, who oversees foodborne illness investigations for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

 

So far, more than 470 people have gotten sick in 43 states, and at least 90 had to be hospitalized. At least six deaths are being blamed on the outbreak. Salmonella is a bacteria and the most common source of food poisoning in the U.S., causing diarrhea, cramping and fever.

 

Officials said new illnesses are still being reported in the outbreak investigation.

 

The Kellogg Co., which listed Peanut Corp. as one of its suppliers, has recalled 16 products. They include Austin and Keebler branded Peanut Butter Sandwich Crackers, and some snack-size packs of Famous Amos Peanut Butter Cookies and Keebler Soft Batch Homestyle Peanut Butter Cookies. Health officials said consumers who have bought any of those products should throw them away.

 

Peanut Corp. has recalled all peanut butter produced at the Georgia plant since Aug. 8 and all peanut paste produced since Sept. 26. The plant passed its last state inspection this summer, but recent tests have found salmonella.

 

Health officials are focusing on 30 companies out of a total of 85 that received peanut products from the Georgia plant. Sundlof said Peanut Corp. is a relatively small supplier on the national scene.

 

The outbreak has also triggered a congressional inquiry and renewed calls for reform of food safety laws. For example, the FDA lacks authority to order a recall, and instead must ask companies to voluntarily withdraw products.

 

"Given the numerous food-borne illness outbreaks over the past several years, it is becoming painfully clear that the current regulatory structure is antiquated and ill-equipped to handle these extensive investigations," said Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., who chairs a panel that oversees the FDA budget.

 

Seattle-area lawyer William Marler, who specializes in food safety cases, said the government shouldn't wait for the results of more tests to request recalls.

 

"At least 30 companies purchased peanut butter or paste from a facility with a documented link to a nationwide salmonella outbreak," said Marler. "The FDA has the authority actually, the mandate to request recalls if the public health is threatened. Instead, the FDA has asked the companies to test their products and consider voluntary recalls. It is just not enough."

 

Health officials in Minnesota and Virginia have linked two deaths each to the outbreak and Idaho has reported one. Four of those five were elderly people, and all had salmonella when they died, although their exact causes of death have not been determined. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the salmonella may have contributed.

 

An elderly North Carolina man died in November from the same strain of salmonella that's causing the outbreak, officials in that state said Friday.

 

The CDC said the bacteria behind the outbreak typhimurium is common and not an unusually dangerous strain but that the elderly or those with weakened immune systems are more at risk.

 

Copyright 2009 Washington Times.

 

Health care found to be lacking

 

Carroll County Times Letter to the Editor

Saturday, January 17, 2009

 

Editor:

 

The closest thing to socialized medical insurance is what social service currently provides to disabled people.

 

My sister-in-law suffers from several chronic conditions which prevent her from working. She calls her doctors, who send her in to the emergency room frequently.

 

She recently had a complicated surgery to help with her constant pain after fighting with the system for a year to find a surgeon to perform the operation. Then, last week, she ended up in the hospital with aspiration pneumonia due to a series of seizures. Of course, as soon as her current doctor got back from vacation he sent her home, saying she could take care of herself at home.

 

A couple days later I was hauling her back in, where she waited seven hours to be seen, then at about midnight the doctor came, sprawled into a chair and asked what the problem seemed to be. She already had given this story three times, but still given her history I think if someone walked in and the patient said I think something ripped loose in my gut the doctor might feel the stomach area or asked for and x-ray. But no. Without saying much the doctor walked away, leaving my sister-in-law in a room without a call button and being ignored by the staff.

 

At about 2:30 a.m. I got a call to come get her after she had gotten out of bed and walked out of her little holding room to find the doctor sitting there chit-chatting and laughing. The doctor then pooh-poohed her away when she tried to ask her a question and my angry sister-in-law ripped out her own IV, which they only used for blood test, then got up and walked out using the pay phone in the waiting room to call.

 

When the charge nurse finally calmed her down and got another doctor they found her bladder was kinked and drained some 3,500 ccs of urine with a catheter. A backed up bladder could cause serious kidney damage among other things.

 

Now just imagine yourself as this patient with no recourse against such an indifference system. Fortunately, if she dies because of neglect the family still can still sue the hospital under the new system that might disappear.

 

James E. Wheeler

Westminster

 

Copyright 2009 Carroll County Times.

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