Health Wonk Review: Disaster edition

Welcome to the disaster edition of the Health Wonk Review!

Fire, fire everywhere

At Workers’ Comp Insider, Julie Ferguson focuses on response and recovery in the California fires. The cleanup of the toxic devastation poses enormous environmental health risks to fire fighters and residents alike.  She also offers a tribute to the workers who battled the fires, including a little-recognized segment –prisoners who volunteer for fire fighting duty.

Can it get any worse?

Roy Poses at Health Care Renewal shares the Worst Revolving Door Health Care Case So Far.

After having followed and documented many instance of conflicts of interest and outright corruption affecting health care over the last 13 plus years, I am close to dumbfounded in response to the casualness that control of health policy and regulation is being handed over to top players in corporate health care who are most subject to these policies and regulation. 

Sabotage or bailout?

Leave it to InsureBlog to plumb the mysteries of the Trump Administration’s targeting of the cost sharing reduction component of the Affordable Care Act. It’s neither sabotage nor bailout we are told. It’s a clear look at the issues involved, but I do find Part 1 (why CSR is not a bailout) more compelling than Part 2 (why it’s not sabotage). Part 2 leaves out how the uncertainty created by Trump undermines the plans and asserts as a fact that the boost in premiums is comparable to what was happening on the exchanges anyway. It leaves out the broader context and other examples of sabotage.

#CareTalk – protecting the vulnerable

In this month’s episode of #CareTalk, CareCentrix CEO John Driscoll and your host, David Williams from Health Business Group chat about the recent hurricanes that have impacted the US and what can be done to protect vulnerable populations.

—

That’s it folks! A light edition but I’ll take quality over quantity.