Losing weight is hard. And keeping it off once you’ve lost it–that’s probably even harder. Just ask Oprah. So maybe those of us who are overweight or obese should simply focus on not gaining more weight than we’ve already gained. Surely that’s easier. Right? Well, not long ago a group of researchers ran a study…
“Specialty drugs” – that’s what they’re called. Not the pills of old, these pharmaceuticals are often given intravenously or through injection. Often more biologic in their synthesis than chemical, they are expensive to produce and often target narrow disease processes, meaning the number of patients likely to benefit from them is much much smaller than,…
When Lorie Duff was pregnant with her third child, she did what all good moms are supposed to do. She went to the ObGyn clinic for prenatal care. But she fell behind on the clinic payments. She only made about $25,000 a year managing an auto parts store while her husband stayed home with their…
Here’s a picture from a New England Journal of Medicine article showing that in 2015 and 2016, Obamacare premiums grew more slowly than private insurance premiums rose before the law came into effect: The Obamacare markets are new and unsettled. But so far they aren’t leading to runaway inflation. But what will happen to these…
Imagine that you are gasping for breath, literally on the verge of death. Then someone injects you with a medicine and – miracle! – you are perfectly healthy again. Would you pay $300 for that injection? The treatment is epinephrine; your illness was a life-threatening allergy. And that $300 price? That reflects a six-fold increase…
Here is what one group of experts thought:
The Journal of the Association for Consumer Research (yes, there is such a thing!) had an outstanding issue dedicated to eating behavior recently. Here is a picture from that issue worth sharing:
Want to know why we continue to spend so much more on healthcare than other countries? We have a price problem, one that experts predict will play a huge role in future healthcare spending: If we want to reign in healthcare spending, we must go after high prices. That means taking on physicians, hospitals, pharma…