Brenda Fitzgerald, whom President Trump tapped as CDC director last year, announced her resignation Wednesday, one day after it was reported she had purchased stock in a tobacco company one month into her leadership last year.
If there were ever an occasion for President Trump to create some buzz for his health care agenda in 2018, it was on Monday morning, in a case of man-meets-moment. Trump introduced new Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar before the Cabinet official’s swearing-in ceremony, one day before…
Activists who oppose abortion doubted Donald Trump when he was a candidate because he had once described himself as "very pro-choice." A year into his presidency, however, they happily point to victories he has achieved for them.
For progressives and members of the resistance determined to find evidence of fascism, the story was too good to disbelieve. A report in the Washington Post last weekend claimed that “the Trump administration has informed multiple divisions within the Department of Health and Human Services [HHS]…
Shame worked in Alabama. That's what Tom Nichols argues over at the Washington Post:
Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price resigned Friday afternoon, amid reports that President Trump was considering firing him over his use of private jets for government business, which provoked a public outcry over misuse of public funds.
Despite being forums to question and receive testimony from public officials and experts, House committee hearings often rank near Cher's Twitter feed as informative sources of information about politics and government. Sometimes this is because of the prevarication of the witnesses. Almost always…
Tom Price, President Trump’s choice for secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), has the distinction of being a better fit for the department he's been picked to lead than any other Trump cabinet nominee. But this hasn't helped Price gain Senate confirmation.
The weather Monday in Washington was windy, rainy, and messy—but those were hardly the conditions inside the West Wing on what the Trump administration was calling its first "working day." President Trump had an early meeting with CEOs of some of the country's largest manufacturers, a phone call…
Rep. Tom Price, the nominee to head the Department of Health and Human Services in the new presidential administration, said during his confirmation hearing Wednesday that he was committed to President-elect Donald Trump's vision of providing "insurance for everybody."
Tucked away in Jason Zengerle's New York magazine profile of outgoing Senate minority leader Harry Reid is a little nugget about what Senate Democrats and their new leader, Chuck Schumer, plan to take their first stand on in the new Congress: Donald Trump's nominee for Health and Human Services,…
The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with online editor Michael Warren on Trump's HHS pick—a Georgia Republican doctor with a plan to replace Obamacare.
Tom Price, a Republican congressman from Georgia and orthopedic surgeon, is Donald Trump's choice for secretary of Health and Human Services. The New York Times reports:
The words President Obama used to sell his signature initiative, Obamacare—"if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor"—may end up the most memorable of his eight years in office. But according to information posted on Healthcare.gov, this "guarantee" from the president was wholly without…
I guess all the flacks in the vast Obama administration public relations apparatus are at the beach. What else would explain this inelegant quote from Robert Pear's story today in the New York Times?
Even before the launch of Obamacare, one of the few things that was clear about the program was that the Bush-appointed HHS inspector general, Daniel Levinson, placed self-preservation above his statutory duty to bring public attention to Obamacare’s waste, fraud and abuse. It is a point I have…
The Obama administration in recent weeks has been trumpeting the number of signups for health insurance through the Obamacare marketplaces for 2015, but at least 90,000 consumers who had coverage last year are losing it. In this week's Affordable Care Act open enrollment report, the Department of…
In an effort to sign up as many consumers as possible for insurance under the Affordable Care Act (or Obamacare), the Obama administration has gone to extraordinary lengths to partner with churches and other faith-based groups, even publishing sample church bulletin inserts, flyers, and scripts for…
Along with the individual mandate to buy insurance, the employer mandate has been one of the more controversial aspects of Obamacare. Implementation of the employer mandate has been delayed twice, and other aspects of the law are being phased in, with "transitional relief" to help businesses cope.…
The deadline to get taxpayer subsidized healthcare is coming up quickly. In an apparent effort to increase enrollment in Obamacare, Facebook ads are running trying to get users to checkout the website.
Just two days before Christmas, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) took the first step to prepare for a possible "surge" of unaccompanied minors in 2015. HHS posted a "Sources Sought" notice to gather information on "options for contract surge capacity to shelter and care" for…
As 2015 open enrollment for Obamacare nears, Healthcare.gov has been telling consumers that "plans and estimated prices for 2015 coverage will be available in early November." Although signup is not possible until November 15, the website promises this "window shopping" experience will come sooner:
The Ebola outbreak has grabbed the attention of the country if not the world in recent days, but the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is also concerned about a more mundane, but still potentially deadly problem: the flu. Thursday, the agency began seeking sources for "Medical…
Even before the Healthcare.gov website disaster unfolded in October 2013, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) had been looking to the future. HHS announced in June of that year that Hewlett-Packard would be replacing Terremark, a Verizon subsidiary, as the main contractor hosting the…
These days, mentioning birth control and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in the same sentence will likely draw some strong reactions. But a recent contractor inquiry by HHS for its National Institutes of Health (NIH) campus in Bethesda, Maryland adds a new wrinkle. This time, the…
The Department of Health and Human Services is looking to school the entertainment industry media when it comes to reporting on substance abuse and mental health disorders. In a notice posted this week on behalf of HHS's Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), the agency…
The Department of Health and Human Services recently recognized the RISE project (Recognize, Intervene, Support, and Empower) in Los Angeles County for its work to fight "anti-gay and anti-transgender bias" in the child welfare system in the county:
In June 2013, even before the launch of Healthcare.gov, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) awarded a contract to Hewlett-Packard to replace Verizon's Terremark subsidiary as host for the Obamacare website and related Data Services Hub (DSH). However, as the March 31, 2014 date for…
The administration for children and families, part of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), issued guidance in a memo on Wednesday regarding application of the federal government's policy on same-sex spouses/marriages to all Head Start and Early Head Start programs.
Four years after Obamacare became law, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is notifying Medicare providers and suppliers of new fingerprint-based background checks. Eventually, all individuals who hold a five percent or greater stake in a Medicare supplier or provider that is…
To begin on a positive note about the outgoing Secretary of Health and Human Services: Kathleen Sebelius was perfectly cordial the one time I met her.
Kathleen Sebelius had one final glitch on her way out the door. At her resignation celebtration at the White House Rose Garden today, she was missing the final page from her prepared remarks:
The first official word from the Obama administration on Kathleen Sebelius's resignation as secretary of health and human services is a retweet by the official White House Twitter account of a tweet by Vox.com's Ezra Klein:
Despite the Obama administration's insistence that everyone -- the government, insurance companies, doctors, medical providers, and consumers -- will reap benefits from Obamacare, a recent grant proposal by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) suggests that the agency does have…
In the months and weeks leading up to March 31, the Obama administration pushed the message through press releases, tweets and blog posts that the last day in March was the final opportunity to get health insurance in 2014. A White House blog post on Monday is typical, beginning with the words,…
For the latest installment in the Department of Health and Human Services' Obamacare "My #GetCovered Story" series, HHS has borrowed a line from the traditional wedding vows: "In sickness and in health." In a blog post of that title, a "theater artist" from Chicago tells the story of how her own…
The January 31, 2014, Boston Globe front page included two life-and-death stories. One announced that the U.S. Department of Justice would seek the death penalty for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who is facing trial for the Boston Marathon bombing. Animated debate about the proper penalty for Tsarnaev…
Healthcare.gov has eliminated the web chat customer service option. Sometime around the beginning of March, the online chat feature that has been present since Healthcare.gov was launched disappeared. Although previous posts on the Healthcare.gov blog still refer to the "live chat" feature, the…
Testifying Wednesday before the House Ways and Means hearing on the Health and Human Services (HHS) budget, Kathleen Sebelius was bombarded with questions about implementation of the Affordable Care Act. She was asked to provide details on the administration's claims about current enrollment…
If you were concerned that the Affordable Care Act might add the the nation’s unemployment woes, as predicted by the Congressional Budget Office, then you might take heart from what a senior administration official is saying:
Nearly two months after Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced that her agency would create a new Chief Risk Officer (CRO) position to prevent a repeat of the Healthcare.gov debacle, the position is apparently still unfilled. HHS, however, has continued to solicit…
As the full breadth of the Healthcare.gov debacle became apparent, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) turned to the architect of the Federal Data Hub to lead the team of contractors to fix the woefully inadequate website that had disastrously launched just weeks before.…
Two days before Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Kathleen Sebelius announced on December 11 that she was ordering a comprehensive investigation into the reasons behind the Obamacare launch debacle, HHS announced an upcoming Contracting with CMS Conference with topics such as "The Good,…
On Thursday, the Department of Health and Human Services released a set of "additional steps" designed to "help" Americans get health insurance before the start of the new year. Philip Klein discusses those guidelines over at the Washington Examiner, reporting that HHS is "encouraging" health…
Concerns have increased over the security of personal information collected by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as the volume of personal data has multiplied dramatically with the implementation of Obamacare. Security experts have testified before Congress about flaws they have…
The Supreme Court has agreed to hear two challenges to the constitutionality of the HHS mandate that employer-provided health insurance cover certain reproductive services free of charge even over the employer’s religious objections. Of the many who will be closely watching the high court’s…
The Department of Health and Human Services revealed on Wednesday a plan to spend up to $7 billion to find ways to reduce spending under the Affordable Care Act while maintaining or improving the quality of health care. The solicitation for bids for this wide-ranging project appeared today on the…
Former press secretary Robert Gibbs again called for heads to roll in the government after the botched rollout of the Obamacare website. He made the remarks today on the Today Show:
As surely as the Obamacare rollout has been a disaster, the calls are now ringing throughout Washington, especially in conservative ranks, for Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius to resign. It won’t happen. And if The Scrapbook has its way, it shouldn’t happen, either.
A week after THE WEEKLY STANDARD reported that the Obamacare website Healthcare.gov was using a copyrighted web script without attribution, the lines have been quietly added back to the code. In a tacit admission that the lines should not have been omitted, the full attribution now appears at the…
The contractor who helped design the Obamacare website confirmed to Congress this morning that there was "no pilot program" to test healthcare.gov before it went live on Oct. 1:
"Bullying doesn't just happen on the playground," so begins an article in an online Health and Human Services (HHS) publication called Let's Talk. The HHS's Federal Occupational Health agency cites a recent study finding that more than a third of Americans report being bullied at work, though only…
Healthcare.gov, the federal government's Obamacare website, has been under heavy criticism from friend and foe alike during its first two weeks of open enrollment. Repeated errors and delays have prevented many users from even establishing an account, and outside web designers have roundly panned…
The launch of federal government's Obamacare insurance exchange, Healthcare.gov, has been plagued with delays, errors, and poor website design, even prompting USA Today to call it an "inexcusable mess" and a "nightmare". Now comes another example of why the website's reputation is in tatters.…
A portion of the website of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) was apparently hacked as long as two months ago. SAMHSA is an agency of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). HHS also runs the new Obamacare insurance marketplace, Healthcare.gov.
Sam Cappellanti of the American Action Forum claims that the Department of Health and Human Services is using "faulty" data to mislead on Obamacare.
In August, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (HHS/CMS) quietly awarded a maximum $11.6 million contract to Novitas Solutions of Camp Hill, Penn., already a CMS contractor, for financial management services related to the…
The Department of Health and Human Services released a statement today saying that gay spouses are now eligible for key Medicare benefits. The announcement is presented as "guidance" for "implementing Supreme Court’s decision on the Defense of Marriage Act."
As questions remain about the security of the Federal Services Data Hub to be used in conjunction with the Obamacare marketplaces beginning October 1, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has agreed to a settlement with the not-for-profit Affinity Health Plans, Inc., for the company's…
In my recent WEEKLY STANDARD essay, “Privacy Be Damned,” I warned about the operational problems and privacy issues raised by the “health exchanges” that HHS will force tens of millions of Americans to use as of October 1 of this year. In that essay, I noted that “the HHS inspector general and the…
Women Speak for Themselves, a grassroots organization of more than 40,000 women for religious freedom, gathered today at Lafayette Square in Washington, D.C. to protest enforcement of the Health and Human Services mandate, which requires employers (including some religious institutions) to cover…
Faithful readers of The Scrapbook may remember the small scuffle that ensued when the Census Bureau briefly proposed removing a question about “number of times married” from its annual American Community Survey. The question is our best tool for understanding patterns of marriage and divorce, and…
In connection with the observance of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) Pride Month, the Administration for Native Americans division of Health and Human Services is hosting an online seminar ("webinar") on Thursday. The focus of the seminar is concept of the "Two Spirit" individual in…
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) website Healthfinder.gov even has a selection of over 100 eCards that can be sent to friends and family to encourage them to lose weight, quit smoking, get screened for various diseases, and even stop bullying.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) put out a press release today promoting the savings to consumers from Obamacare in 2012. The department claims that the average consumer receiving a refund will get about $100 as a result of rules on how insurers must spend premium dollars. The…
As the IRS scandal grows, the Department of Health and Human Services today published a blog post titled "Health Datapalooza IV Tops Off a Huge Year in Data Liberation":
During Tuesday’s hearing of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Congresswoman Jackie Speier (D., Calif.) declared that failing to encourage people to sign up for government-mandated health insurance is downright “un-American.” Speier was referring to Congress’s refusal to fund…
Earlier this week, a listing entitled "Parking Spaces at Democracy Blvd." appeared on the Federal Business Opportunities website. The contract was awarded on February 19th before the sequester took effect, but the timing could still prove embarrassing for the Obama administration.
Early this morning, the Hill reported that the Obama administration’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is relying on a private company — a subsidiary of UnitedHealth Group — to play a central role in establishing and running Obamacare’s insurance “exchanges.” As the Hill writes, the…
The American Action Forum has released new analysis of the burden of new regulations under President Obama. It's most striking finding? The cost of added regulations under President Obama is now estimated to be $488 billion.
Addressing a largely Catholic audience Monday night at an event sponsored by the John Carroll Society in Washington, D.C., Cardinal Timothy Dolan emphasized the non-sectarian, non-partisan—catholic with a small “c”—nature of the fight for religious liberty. “It is not some far right, extremist…
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has taken a bold stand for religious freedom. In a recent statement, titled “Our First, Most Cherished Liberty,” the bishops call for repeal of contraception coverage mandated by the Department of Health and Human Services. The clarified position…
Via Ed Morrissey, here's a must-watch video of Democratic congresswoman Kathy Hochul getting tripped up at a townhall meeting by a constituent's questions about Obamacare's contraception/abortifacient mandate:
What do Americans think about the Obamacare contraception mandate? It depends how you ask the question. A new Quinnipiac poll shows, Politico reports, that a majority (54 percent to 38 percent) support the White House's so-called "accommodation" on the Department of Health and Human Services rule.…
Politico: "Joe Biden, Bill Daley warned of contraceptive backlash"
On the last weekend of January, priests in Catholic churches across America read extraordinary letters to their congregations. The missives informed the laity that President Obama and his administration had launched an assault on the church. In Virginia, Catholics heard from Bishop Paul Loverde,…
Hot Air: "Report: At least 200 murders in Mexico now linked to Fast & Furious weapons"
The Wall Street Journal editorializes on the latest activities of Kathleen Sebelius, President Obama’s secretary of Health and Human Services. Sebelius has decided effectively to tell the elderly CEO of Forest Labs to get a new job. The Journal's editors write:
Politico reports that the Obama administration’s pro-Obamacare Andy Griffith TV ad cost taxpayers $3.66 million, according to records obtained from the Department of Health and Human Services. Actually, there were at least three such ads (here, here, and here), so it’s not clear whether this was…
According to Politico, President Obama will be forced to abandon his controversial nomination of Donald Berwick as the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). Politico reports that “Senate Democrats have given up on confirming Don Berwick as CMS administrator in the…
If you type “Obamacare” into a search engine — whether Google, Bing, or Ask — you’ll find that the first site that appears at the top of the page is healthcare.gov. That site will tell you everything you want to know — or, rather, everything the Obama administration wants you to know (and nothing…
Providing a strong indication of how personal, accessible, understandable, user-friendly, customer-service-oriented, and not at all posthuman your health care would be under Obamacare, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has just released a 347-page, 118,072-word "rule" to implement…
The New York Times reports that the Obama administration's Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has been busy granting selective waivers to Obamacare's mandates, restrictions, and requirements. The Times reports that, “To date, the administration has given about 30 insurers, employers and…