Public Policy Engagement Posts
RWJF Makes Historic Commitment to Kids’ Health
Building on a $500 million pledge made in 2007, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) announced yesterday that it will commit an additional $500 million over the next ten years to help all children grow up at a healthy weight.
New Report: Doctors’ Participation in Interrogation and Torture in U.S. Detention Centers
a new report from the Institute on Medicine as a Profession (IMAP) says that military doctors and psychologists have let national security interests trump ethical standards, leading them to design, enable and engage in torture of detainees in U.S. military detention centers.
Changing the Way Doctors Are Paid
According to a report from the National Commission on Physician Payment Reform, a Burness client, changing the way doctors get paid is the first step to fixing our health care system. The report details 12 sweeping recommendations aimed at reining in health spending and improving quality of care.
A Call for More (Strange) Bedfellows
Two politicians—one very progressive and the other very conservative—joined forces, and took their advocacy on the road, all over the country. Their message was simple: we may agree on very little, but we agree on the need for opportunity for all our children, and there’s no opportunity for anything if your child is sick or living with an untreated chronic condition.
10 ‘Big Ideas’ from Day One of the Aspen Ideas Festival
One of the great perks of working at Burness is the range of topics we encounter– from fighting the scourge of neglected diseases around the world and improving the health care system at home to improving our nation’s community colleges. Experts from a number of different fields came together in the mountains of Colorado at the Aspen Ideas Festival– many whose work relates to the organizations we support--and discussed some thought-provoking ideas for us to ponder.
How Healthy Is Your County?
The University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (a Burness client) released the 2012 County Health Rankings. The Rankings highlight the healthiest and least healthy counties in every state, as well as those factors that influence health outside of the doctor’s office
Two Years After CHIP
A new state-by-state scorecard reveals that the CHIP reauthorization and Medicaid expansions in the economic stimulus bill succeeded in preserving and, in some states, even expanding health coverage for kids, in spite of the economic downturn. That’s the good news.
A Discussion with National Health Information Technology Coordinator David Blumenthal
“We have to start seeing health information systems as a mainstream technology that is part and parcel of medical practice, not something that is appended to it as an afterthought, not something that’s imposed on it, but something that will very soon be integrated into it and indistinguishable from all the other work that physicians and other health professionals do every day.”
