WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Eight months before President Barack Obama’s health care law goes prime time, a confederation of industry and business groups is ramping up its lobbying apparatus for an 11th-hour assault on the web of new taxes and regulations.

Medical device makers, health insurers, retailers and restaurants are waging what lobbyists call a coordinated effort to gain Senate Democratic support for overturning $130 billion in taxes that will be used to fund the new law, and repealing a mandate requiring employers to provide insurance coverage for full-time workers or pay a fine.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Obama administration on Wednesday said its experiments at controlling healthcare costs could need up to a year to produce results, frustrating congressional lawmakers eager to know if new innovations in care delivery can actually work.

Dr. Richard Gilfillan, who is overseeing the initiative at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, told the Senate Finance Committee that his agency is now testing three-dozen care delivery models involving 50,000 healthcare providers and more than 1 million beneficiaries.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Two Republican state senators from Arkansas may soon accomplish what seasoned Washington politicians couldn’t: make the main provisions of President Barack Obama’s healthcare overhaul palatable to hard-core conservatives.

Jonathan Dismang and David Sanders, with two colleagues from the state House, believe they have come up with an alternative to the Medicaid expansion, as laid out in the law. Their idea is to use privatization to avoid the proliferation of government bureaucracy that conservatives vehemently oppose.

WASHINGTON, March 19 (Reuters) – Two Republican state
senators from Arkansas may soon accomplish what seasoned
Washington politicians couldn’t: make the main provisions of
President Barack Obama’s healthcare overhaul palatable to
hard-core conservatives.

Jonathan Dismang and David Sanders, with two colleagues from
the state House, believe they have come up with an alternative
to the Medicaid expansion, as laid out in the law. Their idea is
to use privatization to avoid the proliferation of government
bureaucracy that conservatives vehemently oppose.

WASHINGTON, Feb 28 (Reuters) – Medicare Advantage insurance
plans that meet the program’s higher quality standards should be
in a strong position to withstand federal payment reductions
proposed for 2014, a senior U.S. health official said on
Thursday.

Jonathan Blum, acting principal deputy administrator for the
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), told the
Senate Finance Committee that insurance plans with four-star and
five-star Medicare quality ratings have seen enrollment more
than double in recent years, despite a huge drop in federal
payments.

WASHINGTON, Feb 25 (Reuters) – The White House escalated a
campaign on Monday to convince Americans dire consequences await
if government spending cuts go ahead on March 1, warning of a
slow down in global trade, a stalled fight against cancer and
Alzheimer’s disease and compromised security at U.S. borders.

At the same time, prominent Republicans said President
Barack Obama was overstating the potential damage of the $85
billion in government-wide cuts to frighten the public.

WASHINGTON, Feb 24 (Reuters) – A new bipartisan
deficit-reduction plan to slash a massive $600 billion from U.S.
healthcare spending over two decades has policy experts
scratching their heads over how such an ambitious target can be
reached.

Democrat Erskine Bowles and Republican Alan Simpson have yet
to declare what they would do to wring savings from Medicare,
Medicaid and other programs, according to analysts who provide
the two deficit hawks with their facts and figures.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Obama administration on Friday finalized new consumer safeguards for health insurance that impose tighter restrictions on what insurers can charge older customers, despite industry warnings that the young may be forced to pay more as a result.

The Department of Health and Human Services rejected an industry request to phase in a reform prohibiting insurers from charging older beneficiaries premiums more than three times higher than those available to younger adults.

WASHINGTON, Feb 20 (Reuters) – The Obama administration on
Wednesday issued its long-awaited final rule on what states and
insurers must do to provide the essential health benefits
required in the individual and small-group market beginning in
2014 under the healthcare reform law.

A cornerstone of President Barack Obama’s plan to enhance
the breadth of healthcare coverage in the United States, the
mandate allows the 50 U.S. states a role in identifying benefit
requirements and grants insurers a phased-in accreditation
process for plans sold on federal healthcare exchanges.

WASHINGTON, Feb 20 (Reuters) – The Obama administration on
Wednesday issued its long-awaited final rule on essential health
benefits that insurers must offer consumers in the individual
and small-group market beginning in 2014 under the healthcare
reform law.

A cornerstone of President Barack Obama’s plan to enhance
the breadth of healthcare coverage in the United States, the
mandate allows the 50 U.S. states a role in identifying benefit
requirements and grants insurers a phased-in accreditation
process for plans sold on federal healthcare exchanges.