Congress again delays Medicare payment cuts. Congress agreed Monday to another delay in Medicare payment cuts for doctors, giving a reprieve to a looming healthcare crisis for the nation’s elderly. The postponement of the 23 percent drop gives the lame-duck congress another month to fix the federally funded health plan that covers 46 million elderly and disabled Americans, according to the Associated Press.
Vitamin D makers look set for good run. A report from a Institute of Medicine panel recommends tripling the amount of vitamin D most Americans should take and small increases in calcium levels for children to build and maintain strong bones, but some panel members warned that the guidance is flawed., according to The Boston Globe.
Senators widen investigation of "mini-med" health plans. What started as a probe into McDonald’s Corp.’s (NYSE:MCD) insurance plan for its restaurants’ workers is expanding into broad scrutiny of bare-bones health-insurance policies that could ensnare large "mini-med" carriers including Aetna Inc. (NYSE:AET) and Cigna Corp. (NYSE:CI), according to The Wall Street Journal.
Obama proud of healthcare reform. President Barack Obama, in a wide-ranging, reflective interview with Barbara Walters, staunchly defended his controversial policies — including sweeping healthcare reforms — as bold but necessary steps to help transform an economy that was at the brink of collapse into one that is “growing,” Politico reports.
"ObamaCare" is backwards. A fundamental precept of so-called "ObamaCare" is that by controlling health insurance costs, healthcare costs can be better controlled, according to a health insurance blog. This is patently and demonstrably untrue, because it’s healthcare costs that drive health insurance costs, claims a health insurance company employee in InsureBlog.
NanoBio gets grant for nasal vaccine. NanoBio, the developer of new vaccine formulations in Ann Arbor, Michigan, has received a $6 million grant from the Seattle-based Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to develop the first nasal spray vaccine against a common bug that causes lung diseases in infants, according to Xconomy Detroit.
GlaxoSmithKline buys piece of biotech ‘partner.’ Pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE:GSK) has agreed to buy $129.4 million-worth, or 19 percent, of the common stock of Theravance (NSDQ:THRX), the San Francisco-based biotech company, Xconomy San Francisco reports.
‘Meaningful use’ products overpriced? A majority of hospital CIOs in an informal poll by HealthSystemCIO.com say they are preparing to meet “meaningful use” requirements, but many of them are worried vendors are using pumped-up demand for their products as an excuse to raise prices, according to FierceHealthIT.
Bio tax credits create jobs. In the latest BIO survey, leaders of U.S. biotechnology companies say the new tax credits available through the Therapeutic Discovery Project Program will help create jobs and progress research at their companies, according to BIOtechNow.
J&J to pay $130M to settle botched trial. An arbitration panel has ruled that Johnson &a Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) must pay Swiss drug maker Basilea $130 million to resolve a botched and embarrassing attempt to run clinical trials for an anti-MRSA antibiotic the smaller company has been developing, according to Pharmalot.
Material from MedCity News was used in this report.
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