Maryland Health Care Reform 2010

1. Maryland Health Care Reform 2010 http://www.dhmh.state.md.us/pressreleases/2010/ltgov031510.html

2. Recovery Act – Stimulus Bill • The Maryland Health Care Commission will receive $9,313,924 for • health information exchange and • advance health information technology • The funds (American Recovery and Reinvest Act) are part of a $2 billion effort to • achieve widespread meaningful use of health IT and • provide use of an electronic health record by every citizen by 2014

3. Recovery Act – Stimulus Bill • A non-profit organization, Chesapeake Regional Information System for our Patients (CRISP), was selected to develop the state's health information exchange • It was awarded $10 million from the State's unique hospital all-payer rate setting system as initial funding for the project

4. Recovery Act – Stimulus Bill • Used together with electronic health records, the exchange will help • improve treatment, • prevent errors, and • reduce health care costs • Lt. Governor Brown leads the O'Malley-Brown administration efforts on health care and is currently championing two pieces of legislation • the Maryland False Health Claims Act of 2010 and • the Patient Centered Medical Home bill • Goal: lower costs, improve the quality of care and protect taxpayers from Medicaid fraud

5. Health care bill and Maryland http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/wypr/news.newsmain/article/0/1/1627233/WYPR.News.in.Maryland./Local.Reactions.Vary.on.Health.Care.Reform • PRO: John Colmers, the secretary of Health and Mental Hygiene: • Incl. the bill, MD will cover close to 95 percent of the population • 600,000 additional Marylanders through both the public and the private sector, beginning in 2014 • It will save the state money because for the first 10 years the federal government picks up 100 % of Medicare costs (did he mean Medicaid??)

6. Health care bill and Maryland • AGAINST: Senator Andy Harris, a Baltimore County Republican, warned that the newly insured may run out of doctors • It’s going to drive practitioners out of practice, it’s going to stop new practitioners entering the field • the government is going to dial back reimbursement and • its going to begin rationing care • Even worse, he said, it forces Americans to buy a product.

7. Health care bill: Maryland • “It may not be communism but it is a step toward socialized medicine.” • Yet Rex Crowdy, executive director of the Maryland Health Care Commission, argued that requiring people to buy insurance will help drive down premiums • "Everybody's gotta be in the pool so that the healthy people help pay for the sick people, that’s the way insurance works....“ (diminish adverse selection)

8. Health care bill: Maryland • Governor Martin O'Malley: the increase in the number of people who are insured will drive down hospital rates • In Maryland, no one gets turned away from a hospital, and the cost of caring for those who can't pay gets rolled into the bills of those who can. • He conceded that voting for the bill may be disastrous at the polls in November, but he said it's the gamble you take when you do something you believe is important for the country.