COVID-19

An Overview Of Vaccine Development, Approval, And Regulation, With Implications For COVID-19
By Aaron S. Kesselheim, Jonathan J. Darrow, Martin Kulldorff, Beatrice L. Brown, Mayookha Mitra-Majumdar, ChangWon C. Lee, Osman Moneer, and Jerry Avorn

Aaron Kesselheim and coauthors review the extensive process followed by the Food and Drug Administration in approving a vaccine and point out the unique benefit-risk balance necessitated by "the fact that the new product will be administered to very large numbers of healthy people in a short period of time." Read More >>

COVID-19 Vaccine To Vaccination: Why Leaders Must Invest In Delivery Strategies Now
By Rebecca L. Weintraub, Laura Subramanian, Ami Karlage, Iman Ahmad, and Julie Rosenberg

Rebecca Weintraub and coauthors point out that "the COVID-19 vaccine portfolio requires urgent, unprecedented investment in the delivery strategies and systems needed to generate vaccine demand and facilitate vaccine allocation, distribution, and verification of coverage." Read More >>

Clinical Outcomes Of A COVID-19 Vaccine: Implementation Over Efficacy
By A. David Paltiel, Jason L. Schwartz, Amy Zheng, and Rochelle P. Walensky

David Paltiel and coauthors use modeling to show that vaccine distribution and uptake, along with levels of community infection leading up to administration, will have at least as much influence on the ultimate burden of COVID-19 as the effectiveness of the vaccine itself.
Read More >>

Consideration Of Value-Based Pricing For Treatments And Vaccines Is Important, Even In The COVID-19 Pandemic
By Peter J. Neumann, Joshua T. Cohen, David D. Kim, and Daniel A. Ollendorf

Peter Neumann and coauthors argue that "robust and sound value assessments to inform product prices can help ensure that tests, treatments, and vaccines are available for this crisis and for crises yet to come." Read More >>

Ensuring Equitable Access To COVID-19 Vaccines In The US: Current System Challenges And Opportunities
By Angela K. Shen, Richard Hughes IV, Erica DeWald, Sara Rosenbaum, Amy Pisani, and Walt Orenstein

Angela Shen and coauthors describe the multiple steps necessary to achieve the goal of equitable access to vaccines in the US. Read More >>

Increased Intensity Of PCR Testing Reduced COVID-19 Transmission Within Countries During The First Pandemic Wave
By Ravindra Prasan Rannan-Eliya, Nilmini Wijemunige, J. R. N. A. Gunawardana, Sarasi N. Amarasinghe, Ishwari Sivagnanam, Sachini Fonseka, Yasodhara Kapuge, and Chathurani P. Sigera

Ravindra Prasan Rannan-Eliya and coauthors analyze data from 173 countries and territories around the world and find that higher rates of testing are correlated with much lower rates of COVID-19 transmission. Read More >>

CONSIDERING HEALTH SPENDING

Arbitration Over Out-Of-Network Medical Bills: Evidence From New Jersey Payment Disputes
By Benjamin L. Chartock, Loren Adler, Bich Ly, Erin Duffy, and Erin Trish

Seeking to resolve the issue of surprise medical bills, in 2018 New Jersey implemented a final-offer arbitration system to resolve payment disputes. Benjamin L. Chartock and coauthors investigate a full year’s worth of data and compare it to Medicare and commercial insurance claims data to determine the effectiveness if Congress followed suit. Read More >>

This article appears in the series Considering Health Spending.

National Health Care Spending In 2019: Steady Growth For The Fourth Consecutive Year
By Anne B. Martin, Micah Hartman, David Lassman, Aaron Catlin, and The National Health
Expenditure Accounts Team

An analysis from the Office of the Actuary at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) estimates that in 2019 health care spending in the United States increased 4.6 percent to $3.8 trillion, or $11,582 per person. The 4.6 percent growth rate in 2019 was similar to the rate in 2018 (4.7 percent) and was consistent with the average annual spending growth rate of 4.5 percent that has been observed since 2016. Faster growth in personal health care spending was offset by a decline in the net cost of health insurance. Read More >>

HEALTH AFFAIRS PODCAST

Value-Based Care Isn’t Transforming Health Care Spending
Alan Weil, Sherry Glied

In this week’s episode of A Health Podyssey, Alan Weil invites Sherry Glied, dean of the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at New York University, to the program to discuss the relationship between administrative costs and high health care prices.

Listen to Sherry Glied share why she thinks value-based care won’t be transformational and how public health is a desirable field to go into now.

Listen here.

THIS WEEK ON THE BLOG

COVID-19

Prescription Drug Policy: The Year In Review, And The Year Ahead
By Rachel Sachs (1/7/21)

To effectively confront the health and economic crises facing the nation now and into the future, maintaining a robust Medicaid program is essential. No other public program has the reach and power to affect population health that Medicaid does, particularly for historically poor and oppressed communities. Time is of the essence to rebuild and preserve Medicaid as a source of hope and help, not one of frustration and fear. Read More >>

FOLLOWING THE ACA

What A Democratic Congress Means For The ACA
By Katie Keith (1/7/21)

With the Senate runoff elections now complete in Georgia, Democrats will control the White House and both chambers of Congress. This post attempts a first pass at what this trifecta of Democratic control might mean for the Affordable Care Act and coverage expansion, with an emphasis on the use of the budget reconciliation process and the Congressional Review Act.
Read More >>

COSTS & SPENDING

State Policies To Make Health Care More Affordable During COVID-19 And Beyond
By Roslyn Murray, Suzanne Delbanco, and Jaime King (1/8/21)

State experiences with policies to control the growth of total health care costs or regulate hospital pricing can offer helpful insights in efforts to moderate health care prices during and after the pandemic. Policy makers will need to navigate the unique policy and political considerations in their states to find solutions that effectively tackle the price issue while addressing the needs of all health care stakeholders. Read More >>

SYSTEMS OF CARE

The Perils Of PECOS: Using Medicare Administrative Data To Answer Important Policy Questions About Health Care Markets
By M. Susan Ridgely, Cheryl L. Damberg, Mark Totten, and José J. Escarce (1/7/21)

We do not know as much as we should about health systems, and current efforts to document the relationships among health care providers are hampered by significant limitations in existing data sources. Read More >>

HEALTH PHILANTHROPY

The Five Most-Read GrantWatch Blog Posts Of 2020
By Lee-Lee Prina (1/6/21)

These five posts—including two, not surprisingly, on COVID-19—were the most read during this past year in our section on health philanthropy. Read More >>

HEALTH CARE FINANCE

How Can State Legislation Promote Value In Health Care? Three Innovative Models
By Roslyn Murray, Suzanne F. Delbanco, and Jaime S. King (1/6/21)

A small number of states have made progress in advancing value-based payment through legislation to create Medicaid accountable care organizations (ACOs) and establish new regulatory authorities. These initiatives can serve as helpful models for new state efforts to support the sustainability of physician practices, ease the pandemic-induced strain on state budgets, and improve health care value for all who use and pay for health care services.
Read More >>

Supporting Health Care Competition In The Era Of COVID-19: Three Legislative Models For States
By Roslyn Murray, Suzanne F. Delbanco, and Jaime S. King (1/4/21)

As demand for office visits and elective procedures has declined during the pandemic, independent physicians and hospitals have suffered unprecedented revenue losses that make them vulnerable to foreclosure or acquisition by large health systems. As a result, provider consolidation could accelerate and access to care may be diminished. States with bans on anticompetitive contract clauses, certificate of public advantage legislation, and modified scope-of-practice laws are better positioned to mitigate the effects of consolidation.
Read More >>

LEGAL & REGULATORY ISSUES

Coverage Provisions In The 2021 Appropriations And COVID-19 Stimulus Package
By Katie Keith (1/4/21)

On December 27, 2020, President Trump signed a legislative package that appropriated more than $1.4 trillion for fiscal year 2021 and included $900 billion for pandemic relief. The wide-ranging legislation addresses many important health-related policies and programs. This post focuses on the bill’s coverage-related provisions. Read More >>

PAYMENT

Despite Early Success, Vermont’s All-Payer Waiver Faces Persistent Implementation Challenges: Lessons From The First Four Years
By Adam Atherly, Eline van den Broek-Altenburg, Stephen Leffler, and Claude Deschamps (1/5/21)

There have been a number of notable initial successes with Vermont's all-payer model. All hospitals in the state now participate, as do more than half of primary care providers. However, there are a number of practical challenges to implementing an all-payer program statewide. Read More >>

HEALTH AFFAIRS BRANDED POST

Study Shows Improved Outcomes In Medicare Advantage As Compared To Traditional Fee-for-Service Medicare

By Allyson Y. Schwartz (1/5/21)
Supported by Better Medicare Alliance

As Medicare Advantage now exceeds 40 percent of all Medicare enrollment, and with continued robust growth year over year, interest in quality and cost as compared to traditional fee-for-service Medicare grows as well. Read More >>

About Health Affairs

Health Affairs is the leading peer-reviewed journal at the intersection of health, health care, and policy. Published monthly by Project HOPE, the journal is available in print and online. Late-breaking content is also found through healthaffairs.org, Health Affairs Today, and Health Affairs Sunday Update.

Project HOPE is a global health and humanitarian relief organization that places power in the hands of local health care workers to save lives across the globe. Project HOPE has published Health Affairs since 1981.

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