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A New York City couple jumped to their deaths from the 9th-floor window of a 17-story office building because they couldn't afford health care, according to their suicide notes. The Daily Mail reports that eyewitness Perry Kim, 49, was outside the Murray Hill building at around 5:30 a.m. on Friday morning when he heard screaming and saw two people falling from the sky. The bodies of 53-year-old man and a 50-year-old woman were found shortly thereafter on 33rd Street between Park and Madison avenues, according to the New York Post. Heartbreaking suicide notes were discovered in the pockets of both...

What do we take away, then, from the earthquake on the Senate floor last week, with wisps of smoke still rising from the ruins of Republican efforts to do something -- anything -- likely to rationalize the health care mess? We take away, or should, the lesson that government can't do everything, and when it tries to, you get something approximating Obamacare: too big and complex to succeed, unless you redefine success to mean: "We're getting there, OK?" Well, no. It's not OK at all. At the center of national attention, currently, are the Republicans' busted plays. Repeal and replace?...

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) revealed that he spoke with President Donald Trump on Monday and told the president that he can take executive action to allow organizations to offer more affordable group health insurance plans. Rand Paul, one of the Senate’s leading conservatives, told reporters that Trump will consider taking executive action to address the many problems with the healthcare system after Sen. John McCain tanked an Obamacare repeal bill last week. The Kentucky senator’s proposed changes would allow groups such as AARP, which represents retirees, to form associations to allow individuals and small businesses to form larger groups to...

HHS seeks applications for new health IT committee Would-be members of the Health Information Technology Advisory Committee have just a few days to get their applications in to the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, as the Aug. 4 deadline approaches HHS is asking for applications for two of the three members it will appoint to the committee, established by the 21st Century Cures Act to recommend policies, standards and other digital health guidance to the ONC. The 21st Century Cures Act stipulates that of the three HHS appointees, one represents HHS and one is a public...

Six month wait for 65-year-old skydiver's glaucoma appointment is 'unacceptable' By JoeBulmer  |  Posted: July 31, 2017 A 65-year-old Devon skydiver suffering with glaucoma has had to wait for months to have his condition looked at and the man's hospital has admitted "patients are waiting longer" to be seen. David Tylcoat, from Burrington near Chulmleigh, is meant to have a routine eye exam every six months to check how his condition is being managed. Two weeks ago David rang the Eye Clinic at North Devon District Hospital to find out why he had not received a notification to come in...

Maine’s Republican Sen. Susan Collins said that she would not be swayed by President Donald Trump’s apparent threats to pull the plug on key Obamacare funds, including subsidies for members of Congress and their staff. In a Sunday interview with Jake Tapper on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Collins first said that even if Trump cut off Congress’ subsidies, it would not change her mind about opposing the health care repeal. Tapper then asked whether if cuts to cost sharing reduction payments, or CSRs, that the federal government provides for low-income people would affect her decision. “It would not affect...

Politicians on Capitol Hill are learning what businessmen around this country already know: don’t cross Donald Trump. This is the kind of President the American people have hungered for. When a group of Republican senators joined Democrats in defeating Trump’s goal to repeal Obamacare, they messed up royally. Now they are dealing with the wrath of President Trump. You’re talking about a president who doesn’t care about political or mainstream media wars, as long as he gets the job done. Trump is not playing the typical game of politics, at least not by the same rules as the Republican and...

Those who do not know their history are doomed to repeat it. So it is, where countless articles have been written now about McCain's recent betrayal on the Obamacare repeal vote, but none of them looks at the issue historically. McCain is being true to his hero Theodore Roosevelt here. This is a high-school boy-crush on McCain's part, and it is pure progressive ideology on display for all to see who wish to see it in its raw ugliness. They all want government to control your healthcare, the progressives, and they've wanted it this way since 1912. One of the...

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (R) on Friday called for the repeal of the 17th Amendment and the return to senators selected by state legislatures after the Senate GOP's effort to repeal and replace ObamaCare died in a late-night vote. The 17th Amendment was ratified in 1913 and established the popular election of senators. Previously, senators were elected by state legislatures. @GovMikeHuckabee Time to repeal 17th Amendment. Founders had it right-Senators chosen by state legislatures. Will work for their states and respect 10th amid The Senate's "skinny repeal" of ObamaCare failed late Thursday night by a vote of 51-49. The...

Government cracks down on tobacco but there is better way to cut health-care costs The federal government has announced plans to reduce the amount of nicotine in cigarettes in a completely untested attempt to reduce smoking, but this approach will take many years to even be put into effect, and such an approach ignores many other proven techniques which will work more quickly, and could slash health-care costs now, says public interest law professor John Banzhaf. Banzhaf has been called “The Man Behind the Ban on Cigarette Commercials,” “The Law Professor Who Masterminded Litigation Against the Tobacco Industry,” and “a...

NEW YORK (AP) — Weary Republicans in Washington may be ready to move on from health care, but conservatives across the United States are warning the GOP-led Congress not to abandon its pledge to repeal the Obama-era health law — or risk a political nightmare in next year’s elections. The Senate’s failure this past week to pass repeal legislation has outraged the Republican base and triggered a new wave of fear. The stunning collapse has exposed a party so paralyzed by ideological division that it could not deliver on its top campaign pledge. After devoting months to the debate and...

Former Vice President Joe Biden reportedly called Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) ahead of Friday's vote on Senate Republicans' healthcare bill, asking that he oppose the legislation. According to a report by The Washington Post, McCain was called by both Biden and former Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) ahead of the vote, both pleading with McCain to oppose the "skinny' repeal. Lieberman supported voting for ObamaCare while a senator, and reportedly explained that continued support to McCain during his call.

Sen. John McCain is returning home to Arizona to begin radiation and chemotherapy treatment, following his decisive vote to block his party's attempt to repeal parts of Obamacare. The Arizona Republican will begin the treatment Monday at the Mayo Center in Phoenix, but keep his work schedule and plans to return after August recess, according to a Friday statement from his office. The 80-year-old senator was diagnosed with glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer, after doctors performed surgery on a blood clot above his left eye. McCain's vote was critical in Republican's failure to pass a "skinny repeal" of...

WASHINGTON — President Trump on Saturday indicated he will make good on a months-old threat to destabilize the health insurance market if Senate Republicans cannot repeal and replace major elements of the Affordable Care Act. The first part of the ultimatum likely refers to cost-sharing reduction payments made by the federal government to insurers, which in turn offer plans with discounted deductibles and copays for many low- or middle-income Americans buying plans through ACA marketplaces. The second portion, while far narrower in scope, is significant in that it highlights an additional tool at the president’s disposal for acting unilaterally on...

“The countries like Cuba or Canada or Russia or a lot of places in this world spend half what we spend per capita and they got better health outcomes than we do,” (deputy chair of the Democratic National Committee Rep. Keith Ellison, July 24th)But why pick on Rep. Ellison? Adulation for the putrid disaster known as Castroite “healthcare” seems indigenous to Democrat Party DNA. To wit:  “Castro brought superb systems of healthcare and education to his people.” (Jimmy Carter, 2002.)“The United States recognizes the progress that (Castro’s) Cuba has made as a nation, its enormous achievements in education and in health...

All congressmen and federal employees have better healthcare insurance than everyone else; they are exempt from Obamacare. We need a law and policy that states all federal employees must be subject to and abide by all laws that they create. They shall participate in all programs including healthcare, identical to taxpayers, NO EXCEPTIONS.

My good friends at Free Republic. We must force Congress to live under the same laws as all of us normal Americans. The time is now. We are not surfs. We own this country, we make it run. The Trump Presidency has given us the window we need to fix our criminal Congress. No Congressman should get lifetime anything in excess of what any U.S Soldier, Sailor, Airman, or Marine, Coast Guard earn defending this country. No special health care, No lifetime perks, no insider trading. We must show up at every event where our elected representatives and make it...

THIS FALL, the National Institutes of Health will launch a major study to determine whether regular consumption of alcohol helps prevent heart attacks. The clinical trial will comprise nearly 8,000 participants, recruited from 16 sites in North and South America, Europe, and Africa. The volunteers will be randomly assigned to one of two groups: Those in the first group will have one drink each day, while those in the other group abstain. This enormous study will come with an enormous price tag: more than $100 million.If you're like me, news of the planned NIH study may make you wonder: Does...

By now, the events related to Republicans' plans for health care early Friday morning have reverberated across Washington. Three GOP senators voted down a so-called "skinny repeal" plan, a devastating blow to President Donald Trump and Republican leadership. House Republicans met Friday morning. The closed-door conference was planned to be a discussion where House Speaker Paul Ryan laid out the conference committee structure/next steps. In fact, GOP aides say they were planning to vote to go to conference, appoint conferees and motions to instruct Friday before they left town. That obviously isn't applicable anymore.

A couple distraught over health care costs jumped to their deaths in Murray Hill early Friday — leaving suicide notes pleading for their children to be cared for, a law enforcement source told The Post. The bodies of the man and woman, both in their 50s, were found on 33rd Street between Park and Madison avenues.