Wal-Mart Wants to Be Paid Back for Healthcare Expenses

On NBC Nightly News:

Deborah Shank, a former Wal-Mart employee, suffered significant physical and mental disabilities after her car was hit by a truck. Her husband sued the trucking company of the truck that hit her and was awarded damages to pay for Deborah's care. Wal-Mart now says that its health plan is entitled to all the money that Shank won so that it can recover what it paid for Deborah's medical expenses. The courts agreed with Wal-Mart because Wal-Mart's health plan states that if a worker receives a financial settlement related to an accident, the company can recover all medical benefits paid. Experts say that most companies' health care plans have these provisions. Deborah's husband hoped that Wal-Mart would show some compassion, and Wal-Mart says that it is being compassionate by settling for less money than it is actually owed.

This story was reported by a senior investigative correspondent. It mentioned both the Shanks' and Wal-Mart's positions on the issue of whether it can recover healthcare related expenses. The framing of the story was of the giant corporation versus an injured individual and her husband (which is obviously the situation), but Wal-Mart was legally well within its rights to collect the money, which Shank's husband acknowledged, so it seems to me that this story was over-dramatized. The fact that it was reported by a "senior investigative correspondent" in my opinion gave it that overly dramatic air. And it's unclear what exactly the report was trying to accomplish. It made people aware that many health plans have a provision like Wal-Mart's, but other than that, it just told a sad story.

Video is here

Clinton Announces Healthcare Proposal Details

The New York Times published an article on March 28, reporting an interview given by Senator Clinton in which she attempted to fill what opponents have called gaps in her proposal, from the cost cap to the functioning of mandates. The most important detail announced was Senator Clinton’s goal of placing a cap on the cost of health insurance at 5%-10% of a citizen’s income. The article finished with a brief assessment of the plan by Jonathon Gruber, an MIT health economist.

This article was an impressive example of policy information. It included the most amount of detail I have seen in an article on healthcare, and even avoided depicting the policy debate as a game. The article presented many sides of the story, (Clinton’s, McCain’s, and an “expert’s”), and maintained objective throughout. Though I commend the journalist on the manner in which he presented Clinton’s announcement, I wonder how many people fully read and understood the article. It was filled with numbers and statistics. Though I consider myself relatively educated on the subject and actually interested in the debate I found the article somewhat boring and difficult to read.

Wonkette’s Snarky Attack on the Healthcare System

Wonkette.com made a post
on November 20, 2007, which attacked first the current healthcare system, then Republican candidate proposals. The first paragraph describes the small and complicated market for those who do not receive healthcare from their employer, attributing these complications to the 47 million uninsured in America. The post then aggressively attacks the Republican proposal which assumes that by giving people tax breaks they will be able to self-insure, noting that this doesn’t ensure coverage especially for those with pre-existing conditions.

Since this information was conveyed by a blog it differed from traditional media in two essential ways. First it explicitly stated an opinion, presenting the information through the bias that our healthcare system is broken. Secondly, because op-ed pieces also state opinions, the post is written in an extremely snarky tone. This could convey the policy information to readers more easily, or could simply distract them from the actual issues.

Health Care as a Women’s Issue

On February 1, 2007, weeks after Clinton entered the campaign, the Christian Science Monitor published an article on what her focus would be. The article highlighted health care, saying “her campaign plans appeals aimed directly at [women’s] concerns – including health care.” It also noted that 67% of potential voters believed that among Democratic candidates she would do the best job, implying that this was due to her appeal among women.

While health care has been found to be one of the most important issues to all voters in 2008, the article and Clinton assume it is primarily a concern of women. This is in line with what Lisa Stone discussed in class today regarding candidate pandering to women when discussing health care. Regardless of medium, issue knowledge gains from this article would likely only be about the election, and not at all about any policy proposals of the candidates.

The Election, Women and Health Care

Blogher.com, “the community for women who blog,” posted a detailed, analytic summary of the remaining candidates’ health care proposals on February 25, 2008. The post first contrasts the Democratic candidates’ plans, identifying the main difference as the presence or lack of mandates. McCain’s plan is boiled down to “quit eating crap” by one commenter. The post ends with an extensive table comparing the proposals.

The post makes a better attempt at explaining the subtleties of the proposals than any mainstream newspaper that I’ve seen. While you might have expected it to pander to women in its explanation, as most mainstream press does, by focusing only on family issues rather than the proposals as policy, the article does the opposite. I wondered after reading Common Knowledge what issue knowledge gains were like from blogs. While this is clearly not representative of the entire blogosphere, which I suspect leads to lower issue knowledge gains, reading this post would most likely lead to huge knowledge gains.

CBS News

On CBS News on March 17, 2008
Pa. Governor Ed Rendell spoke about the state's Medicaid program, which refuses to pay hospitals for medical errors. Rendell's plan is to incentivize the system to improve medical care because “nowhere else in the economy do you get paid when you deliver a product that doesn’t work” (as in the case of medical errors). Wyatt Andrews, who conducted the interview, asked few questions, and most of those that he asked were for clarification. Andrews asked only one critical question during the interview. Video is here

Tom Daschle on The Daily Show

On The Daily Show on March 6, 2008:
Senator Tom Daschle talked about his new book on healthcare called Critical. Daschle’s healthcare plan is to create a “Federal Reserve Board” for health because, according to him, Congress isn’t good at making healthcare decisions. This piece did not go into any depth about Daschle's plan. John Stewart asked him one critical question about his plan, and then made some jokes about an aspect of the healthcare system. Video is here

Healthcare Podcast

Americans for Health Care, the largest grassroots health care reform organization in the country, uploaded a podcast from American Health Consultants briefing on December 8, 2005.  In this podcast, two ladies speak about the need to have affordable quality healthcare as an issue for the upcoming election for the Senate.  The first woman discusses how independent women have a major impact on election as the swing voters.  They determine that health care is an issue of family and moral values and they want to push this perspective on the voters.  The mentioned a poll taken and they determined that most of the public are worried that the government is not taking enough action about this problem and they have the responsibility to do so.  

This demonstrates how the grassroots organization is keeping up with the new media to get across their message.  They are broadcasting their message through podcasts so it can be available to anyone at any time.  It appears to be a new type of blog almost.  This podcast is clearly biased towards electing officials that will help their constituents be able to afford quality health care.  How do you think having podcasts to project their message helped their cause?  Will expanding to other types of new media help with their objective?

Blogs and the SCHIP Attack on Clinton

The Boston Globe article questioning Senator Clinton’s role in the passing of SCHIP was posted by several blogs, including the Huffington Post and Health Care BS. Most posted large sections of the article, summarized below, if not the entire thing. On the Huffington Post the only difference in presentation was the large comment section below, aggressively attacking either Clinton or her detractors. Health Care BS simply extracts the portions of the article which call Clinton a liar, calling her campaign “home of the whopper.”

How will the role of blogs, with no attempt at objectivity, be different in the 2008 election than the role of more traditional media? Will they be able to influence voters, or will people simply read blogs fitting into their political beliefs, further dividing voters this year?

An Attack on Senator Clinton from the Mainstream Media?

On Friday, March 14, the Boston Globe published an article questioning Senator Clinton’s claim that she “helped to start” the State Children’s Health Insurance Plan in 1996. The article cites numerous sources, including Senator Orrin Hatch, who say that while Clinton may have lobbied for the bill behind the scenes, ultimately it was Senator Hatch and Senator Edward Kennedy who deserve credit for the passing of the bill.

This article is an excellent example of the role of the media in an election. The Globe presents both sides of the argument without choosing a side. However, is this an example of the press unfairly attacking Hillary Clinton, or is this an example of the press actually fulfilling its role as fact checker? While it is important for the press to identify falsehoods put forward by the candidates, this needs to be balanced with articles examining the other candidates. As our discussion in class last week showed, this is not happening and could be a significant factor in Clinton’s swing from front runner to second place.

Senate President Murray about MA health costs

On March 4th, 2008 WBUR reported on a new health bill presented by Senate President Therese Murray for Massachusetts.  Massachusetts enacted a universal health care system for the state which has increased costs for the state since they must cover uninsured residents.  She has outlined a plan that will lessen the cost and improve health care.  Martha Bebinger reported this news story by giving background to the new bill and played a short clip outlining her plan.  Bebinger then began to analyze the details of the bill but cited some popular problems with the plan as well, playing clips by experts from Massachusetts Medical Society, Tufts Health Plan and Health Connector.  Each of these experts were given a lot more time to explain their disagreements with the bill.  Bebinger played clips from people who supported the plan such as Gov. Deval Patrick, but their agreements were very short and that "there were a lot of good ideas" in the bill. 

When I first listened to this health care segment I was surprised of how subjective WBUR was of this plan and how many people they had on the show to disagree with the new bill.  However, WBUR did add at the end that all in all, this bill is getting better support than most bills get when they are first introduced. 

Site: http://www.wbur.org/news/2008/75409_20080304.asp

Senate President Murray about MA health costs

Market Forces and Blogs

The same day as the Star Tribune addressed CMS’ health care cost projections, Medicare Update, a blog written by attorney Michael Apolskis focusing on pressing Medicare information, wrote a post on the news as well. The post quickly summarizes the projected increases in health care costs, without presenting the political aspect of the news.

This is the first blog discussed here to include advertisements; it is also the first blog here to remain objective in its discussion of an issue. Perhaps this is an example of market forces affecting the content of a blog, which we expect to be outside traditional market forces.

Local Newspapers and Health Care Cost Projections

On February 26, 2008 the Minneapolis Star Tribune published an article on the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid’s health care cost projections as the baby boomer generation ages. By 2017 health care costs are expected to reach $4 trillions dollars a year, with the annual rate of increase nearly tripling that of inflation at 6.7%. Bush has proposed cuts in Medicare and Medicaid by slowing yearly growth from seven to five percent, while Democrats propose cutting payments to the private insurers who oversee the care of some Medicare recipients.

While the article acknowledges that the country’s health care system is in need of reform, it continues the trend of traditional media’s objective coverage of the debate, neutrally giving equal time to both sides of the argument.

NBC Report; Update on lack of reports from other sources

2-26-08 NBC Nightly News
Dr. Nancy Snyderman (Chief Medical Editor) compares Clinton, Obama, McCain, and Huckabee's plans for healthcare and then consults health economist Len Nicholas who says that this campaign is historic because it's the only one in recent years in which Democratic and Republican candidates are proposing coverage for many more Americans and being serious about making the system more efficient and sustainable. Video is here
Coverage of candidates is balanced - each candidate's plan is summarized. Consulting Nicholas (an expert) gives this report further credibility.

ABC News hasn't had a healthcare story since at least 2-18-08. CBS News has also not done a healthcare story (at least that I could find on the website) in the past week.

Neither The Daily Show nor the Colbert Report have have done healthcare stories in the past week.