As with his presidential campaign, Barack Obama’s approach to health reform will leave little to chance. His strategy for enacting the first major coverage expansion in more than 40 years is starting to take shape. He is building public support for reform early in the hope that it will be enough to counter the opponents of healthcare reform when they eventually flex their muscles. more…

If, like me, you’re used to a parliamentary system where the party with a majority in Parliament runs the government and, if it has a big enough majority, pushes through its manifesto commitments without too much difficulty, policy making in American can seem utterly chaotic.

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Banks, insurance companies and home owners have already fallen victim to the US financial crisis. Now healthcare is under fire. Last week, the state of Hawaii announced that it was ending Keiki Care, the only universal health insurance program for children in the United States. In the face of a projected deficit of $900 million by 2011, Hawaii Governor Linda Lingle was forced to cut the program just seven months after she had signed it into being. On the national stage, the presidential candidates have refused to explicitly shelve any one of their proposals for office, including health reform. But Hawaii’s decision augurs badly. more…

Buried in last week’s legislation to bail out Wall Street was a small but important victory for healthcare in America. At the same time as passing a $700 billion rescue package for the financial sector last Friday, the US House of Representatives also passed a bill on mental health parity. Rumour has it that parity was added to the bail-out bill as a sweetener for reluctant House members. more…

Yesterday, the Tax Policy Center released its initial analysis of the health reform plans of the two presidential campaigns. The center is a joint initiative of the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute, two leading Washington think tanks. more…

After the Democratic Convention last week, when healthcare featured in almost every major speech, I had been waiting all week to see whether the Republicans would talk about it at all during their Convention in Minneapolis. Yesterday, on the last day of the Convention, healthcare reform finally got a mention when John McCain took to the stage to deliver his acceptance speech. more…