Free Republic

Ms. Faulkner is worth two billion dollars. More than 40% of the U.S. population will have its medical information stored in an Epic digital medical record by 2013. Clients include many of the country’s top hospitals, including the Cleveland Clinic, Johns Hopkins, and Cedars-Sinai. Faulkner largely shuns the press and leads a modest lifestyle.” From Real Clear Politics: Who is Judy Faulkner? Chances are, you don’t know her — but her politically connected, taxpayer-subsidized electronic medical records company may very well know you. Top Obama donor and billionaire Faulkner is founder and CEO of Epic Systems, which will soon store...

The first case of Ebola transmission outside of West Africa has raised questions about how a nurse at a Spanish hospital contracted the virus and whether sufficient protocols were in place to protect health workers there. The nurse became infected at Madrid's Carlos III hospital while treating Manuel Garcia Viejo, a priest who contracted the virus in West Africa. The woman, a "sanitary technician," entered Garcia Viejo's room only twice, according to Spanish officials. In one case, she entered the room to change his diaper; another time, after he had died, she entered to collect his belongings, according to Mercedes...

Democratic Senator Mark Warner (D., Va.) refused to elaborate on the 250,000 Virginians who are losing their healthcare plans due to Obamacare during Tuesday’s Senate debate against Republican Ed Gillespie. Moderator Karen Tumulty asked Warner to respond to taxpayers who are losing their plans, but Warner did not acknowledge the cancellations. Rather, he touted the elements of Obamacare that he believes Virginians support. “Virginians want us to fix healthcare,” Warner said.

Philadelphia teachers vowed to fight a sudden move by the district Monday that cancels their union contract and forces them to start paying health premiums. The teachers union, with about 15,000 members, accused the state-led School Reform Commission of ratcheting up its "war on teachers." However, district leaders said there was nothing else to cut after years of funding woes that have prompted nearly $1 billion in cuts that includes the loss of 5,000 positions and the closure of 30 schools. Many Philadelphia schools operate without a nurse or librarian on duty. "If the contract is blown open, what's going...

THE ELDERLY are such a pain, aren't they? Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel thinks so. Half of those older than 80 have "functional limitations," the prominent health policy analyst and key ObamaCare architect writes in the October issue of The Atlantic. One in three Americans 85 and up has Alzheimer's. Old people are more likely to be disabled, or at least "faltering and declining." They lose their creative mojo. They don't "contribute to work, society, the world." Instead of being regarded as "vibrant and engaged," they grow "feeble, ineffectual, even pathetic."Especially disagreeable are old parents, who can be so irritating: "They set expectations,...

Complete Headline: Dallas Ebola victim's stepdaughter - who took him to hospital as he was 'vomiting wildly' - is given all clear to return to work as nursing assistantThe stepdaughter of Texas Ebola victim, Thomas Duncan, who called 911 and rode in the ambulance with the man she calls 'Daddy' has been told she can return to work, MailOnline can reveal. Nursing assistant Youngor Jallah, 35, has been in 'quarantine' in her small Dallas apartment along with her husband, Aaron Yah, 43, and their four children ages 2 to 11 since Thomas Duncan's devastating diagnosis last Monday. MailOnline has reported...

Have you heard about the insurance company that provides free health coverage for the poor? Me neither. What about the hospital that provides free health care services to the poor? Of course, you say. Many of them do! Indeed, some of these hospitals even go bankrupt in the process. It is beyond the scope of this article to discern how economic values are set in a society, but rest assured that supply and demand are but one factor—especially in health care. Notably, health care is the most regulated industry in the country. With compliance comes massive additional costs, not to...

I’m beginning to think that Obama doesn’t actually have any speech writers or talking-point authors… He’s just recycling the set of talking points he was handed in the first four years of his tenure. During a recent Q&A session at a campaign event in Princeton Indiana, the President trotted out the tried-and-failed talking points of 2012 to defend his signature healthcare law. According to the Free Beacon:“We are seeing almost a double-digit increase in health-care costs every year,” General Manager Mihir Paranjape said. “Do you think that trend is going to go down, and what can we do to control that...

This week’s double-barreled release of government statistics on health insurance coverage leaves us with only one question: How many Americans are insured because of Obamacare? Remarkably, the two highly-regarded government surveys released this week do not even agree whether the number of uninsured increased or decreased. [mandatory excerpted, highly recommend reading the article]

Thousands of Americans will see their health plans cancelled before the November elections in a development that could boost critics of ObamaCare. The Morning Consult, a Washington-based policy publication, reported that nearly 50,000 people will lose their current health coverage in the coming weeks.

I’m a huge fan of Switzerland, largely because its voters approved a spending cap that should be a role model for other nations.It’s called the “debt brake” and it has helped reduce the burden of government spending in Switzerland at a time when most nations in Europe have been moving in the wrong direction.But that’s not the only reason I like Switzerland.I also appreciate the fact that Swiss voters seem to be much more sensible than voters in other nations.Every so often I see polls, for instance, suggesting that French voters overwhelmingly want less government spending. But then they go...

Swiss voters on Sunday rejected a plan for a seismic shift from the country's all-private health insurance system to a state-run scheme. Referendum results showed that almost 62 percent of voters had shot down a reform pushed by left-leaning parties which say the current private system is busting the budgets of ordinary residents. The results also underlined the national divisions over the hotly-contested issue as the country's German-speaking regions voted against the plan, while their French-speaking counterparts were in favour. Switzerland's private insurance lobby hailed the vote.

Obamacare enrollees are straining the finances of community health centers around the country, some health center leaders say. The issue is that many lower-income patients with insurance coverage through the federal and state exchanges bought bronze-tier plans with lower premiums but high deductibles, coinsurance and copayments and no federal cost-sharing subsidies. When these patients face high out-of-pocket costs for care that falls below the deductible, they can't afford it. So the centers are subsidizing that care by offering them means-tested sliding-scale fees. When the centers, which are not allowed to turn away patients for inability to pay, try to get...

Last week, esteemed doctor and one of our ObamaCare Architect Overlords penned a column for the Atlantic that should win a Pulitzer Prize for passive-aggressive shaming. Although Emanuel claims that *he* doesn't want to live past the age of 75, the article itself could have been a listicle titled, "Top 15 Reasons No One Over 75 Should Receive Healthcare." Emanuel even includes a monstrous but brightly colored graph that is meant to tell anyone over 75 that their "last contribution" to society likely occurred more than a decade ago. Good God. The phrase "the banality of evil" gets bandied about...

NOTES Before starting, let me say that I do NOT believe the Ebola epidemic will get as bad as these projections indicate. I believe it will get pretty bad, especially for those in Africa, but not as bad as the current numbers say. I think there will be a number of factors that will significantly mitigate these numbers. How much? I don't know. But no one else does, either. I am not predicting the end of humanity. I'm simply showing where the current numbers lead, should nothing change. But of course, things will change. In any case, I do believe...

Health Reform: It seems the administration had been exaggerating the number of people enrolled in ObamaCare to the tune of about 700,000. We're shocked! Shocked! At a hearing Thursday, Marilyn Tavenner, head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, finally confessed that 7.3 million were enrolled in ObamaCare plans as of mid-August. In other words, the administration had been inflating the "enrollment" number nearly 10% by counting anyone who had completed the application process, not those who paid their premiums. Now, they say it's no big deal, because everyone expected some attrition. But even this new, lower number is...

The uninsured rate fell 1.3% in the first three months of this year to the lowest point since the Centers for Disease Control began tracking it in 1997. The CDC's survey, on top of others by Gallup, the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Urban Institute, appears to show that ObamaCare is succeeding in its main goal of cutting the ranks of the uninsured. But the picture is far murkier than these surveys suggest. In fact, it's not entirely clear what impact ObamaCare is having on the uninsured, or what part of the law deserves credit if it is.

A Welsh nurse has been forced to wait for potentially life-saving treatment after local health bosses refused to fund her care in England. Beth Prout, from Pembroke, West Wales, has been diagnosed with a rare form of stomach cancer. There are two hospitals in the UK able to provide the treatment the 57-year-old needs. But NHS chiefs in Wales have refused to cover the cost of sending her to England for therapy. A hospital in Manchester has agreed to provide the care, which could save Ms Prout's life.  Welsh NHS bosses have agreed to pay £1,000 for an assessment, but...

Last week, Virginia lawmakers learned that 250,000 residents will see their health plans canceled this year, due to ObamaCare. The president's second "keep your plan" promise was as worthless as the first.

CENTENNIAL, Colo., Sept. 13 (UPI) -- A man is suing the Arapahoe County jail and its contracted health care company after most of his right foot was amputated due to infected blisters.