On Friday, CMS Chief Actuary Richard Foster said in a memo on the (less costly) Senate version of theprogram that premiums would be setso high they would discourage healthier people from buying in.
In many states, Medicaid patients cannot access timely, specialized care (especially on the outpatient side) when they need it because reimbursement has been setso low, and the doctors partaking in theprogram are often poor.
Once their colleagues in orthopedic surgery saw the plan in action, they bought extra equipment so that they, too, could set aside some operating rooms and set up a surgeon-of-the-week program.