Health reform and the Obama administration: Reflections in mid-2010

Abstract

The reforms that finally emerged from the Obama administration's initiative were the result of a year of nasty, demagogic and misleading claims in the US public forum, coupled with the complexities of crafting legislation that stood a chance of passing both the House of Representatives and the Senate. The resulting "hybrid" approach to healthcare reform produced a conservative strategy that ignores the experience of other wealthy democracies. More significantly, its long period of implementation, given a possible change of administration in 2012, increases uncertainty regarding whether and how reforms will be rolled out by 2014 and after.