Dr. Donald M. Berwick, head of Medicare and Medicaid until last Thursday, stated that up to 30% of spending on health is wasted with absolutely no benefit to beneficiaries (patients). He added that his agency’s cumbersome and archaic regulations are partly to blame…

There is a growing disparity between healthy and sick Americans born after 1980, caused by various factors, including a widening income gap, obesity which tends to hit certain income and ethnic groups more, access to health care services, and some other factors, researchers from Ohio State University wrote in American Sociological Review…

Nearly 2 million adults in California, about 8 percent of the population, need mental health treatment, but the majority receive no services or inadequate services, despite a state law mandating that health insurance providers include mental health treatment in their coverage options, a new report by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research shows…

The United States spends 17.4% of its GDP (gross domestic product) on health care, compared to 9.6% among the rest of the OECD countries, a new OECD report announced today. OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) consists of 34 countries, nearly all of which are the richest countries in the world (with the [...]

Premiums for employer-sponsored family health insurance increased by 50 percent from 2003 to 2010, and the annual amount that employees pay toward their insurance increased by 63 percent as businesses required employees to contribute a greater share, according to a new Commonwealth Fund report that examines state trends in health insurance costs…