Inside Opinion » health care

Tobacco use: Too expensive for U.S. health care

Patrick O'Callahan — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 03:52:43 +0000

This editorial will appear in tomorrow’s print edition.

The Franciscan Health System – an empire of hospitals and medical clinics in Pierce and King counties – is about to take the big step from a no-smoking policy to a no-smoker policy.

To a nicotine addict seeking a job at, say, St. Joseph in Tacoma or St. Clare in Lakewood, it will be brutal. Although the rule won’t be applied retroactively to current employees, Franciscan will effectively be hanging out a “smokers need not apply” sign as of March 1.

Franciscan is far from alone. Some other large companies, such …

Health mandates need a hard look from lawmakers

Patrick O'Callahan — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 03:57:27 +0000

This editorial will appear in tomorrow’s print edition.

It shouldn’t need pointing out, but this is hardly the time for lawmakers to be squeezing another benefit into health plans that hundreds of thousands of Washingtonians already can’t afford.

State Sen. Ed Murray, D-Seattle, has the best of intentions. He proposes to require all state-regulated health policies to cover smoking-cessation treatment, including at least two cessation courses a year and coverage for over-the-counter and prescription drugs.

The idea is to curb the enormous health care costs that tobacco inflicts on society and help the smokers themselves escape an addiction that …

In store for state: Pain, pain and more pain

Patrick O'Callahan — Sun, 19 Dec 2010 02:07:28 +0000

This editorial will appear in tomorrow’s print edition.

Gov. Chris Gregoire had to perform an agonizing arithmetic to come up with a budget for the next biennium.

After the recession and the voters knocked a $4.6 billion breach between revenues and existing services, there was no way to balance the budget without hurting hundreds of thousands of people.

Cut health insurance for the poor, and people will die. Cut crucial education programs, and some children will forfeit their futures. Cut prison funding too far, and predators will go free. Cut food programs, and kids will go to bed hungry.

Cruel …

An income tax to throw good money after bad

Patrick O'Callahan — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 02:35:57 +0000

This editorial will appear in tomorrow’s print edition.

Initiative 1098 is the most slickly packaged measure on the November ballot.

It would enact a new income tax on wealthier Washingtonians – 5 percent on individuals earning more than $200,000 a year or couples earning more than $400,000. If the idea of soaking the rich doesn’t quite close the deal, the initiative throws in two other sweeteners: a 20 percent cut in the state property tax and a higher exemption from the state business and occupation tax.

The latter two provisions allow its supporters to tout I-1098 as a tax cut. …

The U.S. Senate wraps a Christmas gift for the uninsured

Patrick O'Callahan — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 03:58:24 +0000

This editorial will appear in tomorrow’s print edition.

It’s fitting that the U.S. Senate is poised to approve historic health care legislation during Christmas week. Like a big present under the tree, the package looks gorgeous, promises to run up the Visa card and conceals things known to only a few.

But shaking the box tells you quite a bit. The immense bill would extend coverage to most Americans now uninsured, require all individuals to carry medical insurance (subsidized as necessary), and prohibit insurance companies from refusing to sell coverage to the sick or dropping them after they get sick. …

Share the cost of health care premiums

Patrick O'Callahan — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 02:41:16 +0000

This editorial will appear in tomorrow’s print edition.

It took the worst recession since the Great Depression to force the issue, but Pierce County may finally do the unthinkable: require workers to share the cost of their own health insurance.

County Executive Pat McCarthy’s 2010 spending plan is a brutal budget for brutal times. But one of the economies it proposes has long been routine in the rest of the world: splitting the cost of premiums with county employees.

Assuming it’s adopted, this would soften the sweeping budget cuts McCarthy is proposing by a cool $3 million.

It’s amazing …

Get your flu shots, health care workers

Cheryl Tucker — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 02:12:30 +0000

This editorial will appear in Friday’s print edition

Health care providers are urging their patients to get flu shots this fall – against the regular seasonal flu and the new swine flu virus.

Uh . . . physicians, heal thyself.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, fewer than half of health care workers got a flu shot last year. That might fly during a normal flu season, but the 2009-2010 season is shaping up to be anything but normal.

The nation’s health care delivery system may be taxed far more than usual due to the new swine flu virus …

Health reform must tackle Medicare costs

Kim Bradford — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 01:15:46 +0000

This editorial will appear in Monday’s print edition.
Congress returns this week from a summer of discontent to stare down health care legislation – including Medicare reform – once again.

Fresh from their battering back home, Democrats will be trying to figure out how to salvage health care reform without setting themselves up for a fall in next year’s mid-term elections. President Obama is expected to lay out his must-haves in a Wednesday address to Congress that will likely be two parts “go get it done” and one part “I’m in this with you.”

The prospects …

Friday’s editorials: Medicare reform, French burqas

Kim Bradford — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 22:39:01 +0000

Washington’s congressional delegation has long railed against Medicare reimbursement rates that penalize this state for having an efficient health care system. They shouldn’t squander the opportunity to finally do something about them in the health care legislation before Congress.
UPDATE: We’re holding this editorial and running one about the court ruling on the Kent teacher strike instead.

The controversy gripping France – whether or not to ban the burqa worn by some conservative Muslim women – has nothing to do with couture and everything to do with the tricky dilemma of balancing religious rights in a secular society.

If …