drugs
OP-ED: Be careful in making changes when the glass is half full
There is good news on Connecticut health spending – and we can use it. Analysis of new data has found, not surprisingly, that Connecticut residents spend a lot on healthcare. But the good news is that our average annual rate of growth, at 1.8%, was the ninth lowest among states from 2013 to 2019. We…
Read MoreGood news on CT healthcare costs
New data from researchers at the University of Washington on state per person healthcare spending finds that between 2013 and 2019, Connecticut’s costs grew at the ninth lowest level among states. We dropped from seventh highest in the US in 2014 to eleventh in 2019. Our growth rate was lower than nearby comparator states and…
Read MoreCTNJ Op-Ed: Advice from an advocate for the next OHS Director
Op-Ed: Advice from an advocate for the next OHS Director This week the Lamont administration announced that Vicki Veltri will be leaving state service in a few weeks. She will be missed. Director of the Office of Health Strategy is a tough job. The cost of healthcare is straining every budget in the state, including…
Read MoreCost Cap finds drugs driving up healthcare spending, but we knew that, and their numbers are misleading
The latest analysis by Mathematica for the Office of Health Strategy’s plan to cap healthcare costs used a small slice of a small slice of Connecticut’s drug spending. We already knew, from other sources, that drug spending is a main driver of rising healthcare costs in Connecticut and the problem is skyrocketing prices. OHS’s analysis…
Read MoreCTNJ Op-Ed — Policymakers did little to lower healthcare costs this session
Healthcare costs featured prominently in CT News Junkie’s 2020 candidates’ survey. It’s very likely that candidates will hear the same concerns from voters again this year. Last year, policymakers accomplished little, and healthcare costs haven’t gotten any better since then. Incumbents will be asked what they did this year to provide some relief. Unfortunately, they…
Read MoreBook Club: The Long Fix
I’ve been avoiding reading The Long Fix: Solving America’s Health Crisis with Strategies that Work for Everyone by Vivian Lee. But this semester, one of my students asked if she could read it for her Book Review assignment. I couldn’t really refuse, so I had to read it too. The author, a physician and healthcare…
Read MoreCTNJ: Fact Check Shows That Raising Primary Care Spending Doesn’t Lower Total Healthcare Costs
The Office of Health Strategy and their consultants have asserted that it is critical to double spending on primary care in Connecticut to lower skyrocketing total healthcare costs. It’s very appealing to think that increasing investments in prevention and care management will reduce total costs. It avoids the difficult work of getting large health systems…
Read MoreTestimony supporting Governor’s drug price cap and opposing OHS primary care plan
The Insurance and Real Estate Committee is hearing today the Governor’s healthcare bills. Areas of disagreement include a proposal to limit how much drug prices can rise and the Office of Health Strategy’s (OHS) plans to cap the growth of overall healthcare spending while doubling spending on primary care. Among non-state agencies, fifteen people and…
Read MoreCTNJ op-ed: Governor’s plan to lower healthcare costs — what’s in and what’s missing
It’s an election year and voters want relief with healthcare costs and insurance premiums. Governor Lamont has proposed a slate of bills to address the problem. He has a good proposal to limit drug price increases, an unnecessary proposal to draft yet another report on what’s driving up costs, and a bad one to divert…
Read MoreICER report on fair access to drugs prompts six insurers to change coverage policies
A powerful new scorecard from the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review (ICER) assessing 15 of the largest US formularies for barriers to accessing 28 fairly-priced drugs found generally good policies for clinical standards (96% are fair), step therapy (99%), and prescriber restrictions (100%). However, the report found poor policies for cost sharing tiers (77%)…
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