Ricardo Lara

Whenever health insurance companies face real political pressure they know it’s best to change the messenger. Their executives and spokespeople clam up and turn to paid surrogates who attack reformers in order to take the public’s eye off the ball: health industry price gouging.
 
With the heat turning up nationally for California single payer proposal Senate Bill 562 (Lara),  which threatens to upend industry profiteering, the same paid attack dogs who came out against regulating skyrocketing health insurance premiums are back.
 

The California Medical Association should get over its reactionary opposition to reform that would curb the prescription opioid and heroin overdose epidemic.

Yesterday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued new painkiller prescription guidelines recommending that doctors check state prescription drug databases before prescribing opioids to a patient. This simple tool has been proven to reduce overprescribing, but only when doctors are required to use it.

Inadequate physician networks and out-of-network billing have cast an ugly shadow over the expanding healthcare market as more people have access to healthcare. Next Monday, the Department of Insurance will hold a hearing on new proposed regulations covering network adequacy and out-of-network billing in emergency services.