Deane Waldman
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#Healthcare policy director @TPPF. Retired pediatric cardiologist & system theorist analyst for American healthcare. Avid cyclist & sci-fi aficionado. #txlege
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Articles by Deane Waldman
Is America’s Healthcare Crisis a Sleeper Issue for the Midterms? As insurance premiums soar and federal debt mounts, great political dividends await the party that offers a viable program for ending third-party payment. Original
Whether it is exorbitant business expenses or unaffordable consumer costs, healthcare costs may indeed be the determining “sleeper issue” of the midterms. A 30 percent increase in consumer health costs projected for next year, on top of increases in employer expenses of 7.2 percent in 2025 and 8.8 percent in 2026 will likely drive many voters to support whoever says they can relieve the burden of this truly unaffordable yet necessary expense.
Dealing with health-care costs
The cost of health insurance may indeed be the key “sleeper issue” that determines the mid-term elections. A 30 percent increase in consumer costs planned for next year, on top of a 7.2 percent increase for 2025 and 8.8 percent for 2026 will drive many voters into the arms of whoever says they can relieve the burden of this truly unaffordable necessity. The problem for voters is no one has a workable answer.
‘Only YOU’ Can Make Health Insurance Affordable
As Americans complain bitterly that they can’t afford current health insurance prices, insurance companies plan to raise their rates next year by as much as 30 percent. This is on top of recent increases of 7.2 percent (2024) and 8.8 percent (2025). Incredible! At this rate, the only person who can afford health insurance will be Elon Musk. Over the last 25 years, when inflation averaged 3 percent, annual increases in insurance rates were 6-9 percent.
‘Only YOU’ Can Make Health Insurance Affordable
As Americans complain bitterly that they can’t afford current health insurance prices, insurance companies plan to raise their rates next year by as much as 30 percent. This is on top of recent increases of 7.2 percent (2024) and 8.8 percent (2025). Incredible! At this rate, the only person who can afford health insurance will be Elon Musk. Over the last 25 years, when inflation averaged 3 percent, annual increases in insurance rates were 6-9 percent.
Population Health vs. Personal Medicine: What COVID Taught Us About Patient Autonomy The pandemic exposed the dangers of centralized health policy and renewed the case for putting the individual patient first.
Between constant complaints about disparities in health outcomes and the COVID pandemic, optimizing public or population health has become the dominant theme for healthcare officials both in Washington and the World Health Organization. Population health (or medicine) refers to optimizing the health status of a group, community, or nation in contrast to personal health, which is the confidential, fiduciary patient-doctor relationship aimed at optimizing the health of a single individual.
Population Health vs. Personal Medicine: What COVID Taught Us About Patient Autonomy The pandemic exposed the dangers of centralized health policy and renewed the case for putting the individual patient first.
Between constant complaints about disparities in health outcomes and the COVID pandemic, optimizing public or population health has become the dominant theme for healthcare officials both in Washington and the World Health Organization. Population health (or medicine) refers to optimizing the health status of a group, community, or nation in contrast to personal health, which is the confidential, fiduciary patient-doctor relationship aimed at optimizing the health of a single individual.
Making Health Insurance Affordable Healthcare needs price controls. Just not Washington’s.
Health insurance costs are at the heart of our current consumer financial “crisis.” A recent poll asked 2533 Americans what to do about unaffordability. Fifty-nine percent responded, “government should limit healthcare prices to make care more affordable.” In other words, Washington should impose price controls on services, goods, and insurance in healthcare. Even states like Indiana and Vermont are considering price caps to address the problem. Unaffordability in healthcare is certainly not new.
Making Health Insurance Affordable Healthcare needs price controls. Just not Washington’s.
Health insurance costs are at the heart of our current consumer financial “crisis.” A recent poll asked 2533 Americans what to do about unaffordability. Fifty-nine percent responded, “government should limit healthcare prices to make care more affordable.” In other words, Washington should impose price controls on services, goods, and insurance in healthcare. Even states like Indiana and Vermont are considering price caps to address the problem. Unaffordability in healthcare is certainly not new.
Healthcare fraud in California reaches new low
Every time you think you have seen it all, something comes along that proves you wrong. The California tax scam — a “legal fraud” — seemed to be an unbeatable nadir of government corruption. Then, Governor Gavin Newsom set the bar at a new low for greed and hypocrisy with the following recent announcement.
Health Insurance Costs Are Soaring. Here’s Why Costs have more than quadrupled as consumers lost control over healthcare spending.
Next year’s hike in health insurance consumer costs is projected to be 9.5 percent. That is on top of this year’s 9 percent increase and 6 percent in 2025. From 2000 to today, when inflation rates were typically 3 percent or less (except during COVID), the growth rate for health insurance costs has been 6-to-9 percent. Because of compounding, this means in the last 25 years, consumer insurance costs have more than quadrupled.
Why Healthcare Price Transparency Will Fail Five fatal flaws — and how putting patients back in control of their own money fixes everything.
As Democrats and Republicans fight over details of new rules for medical price transparency, the welfare of patients is lost in the fog of partisan war. If you look critically at how healthcare dollars currently flow, it is clear that price transparency won’t work. Moreover, all such rules can be made unnecessary. Both House and Senate bills preserve and build on current legislation.
Why Healthcare Price Transparency Will Fail Five fatal flaws — and how putting patients back in control of their own money fixes everything.
As Democrats and Republicans fight over details of new rules for medical price transparency, the welfare of patients is lost in the fog of partisan war. If you look critically at how healthcare dollars currently flow, it is clear that price transparency won’t work. Moreover, all such rules can be made unnecessary. Both House and Senate bills preserve and build on current legislation.
Why Healthcare Price Transparency Will Fail Five fatal flaws — and how putting patients back in control of their own money fixes everything.
As Democrats and Republicans fight over details of new rules for medical price transparency, the welfare of patients is lost in the fog of partisan war. If you look critically at how healthcare dollars currently flow, it is clear that price transparency won’t work. Moreover, all such rules can be made unnecessary. Both House and Senate bills preserve and build on current legislation.
The Wrong People Hold Health Care Purse Strings Healthcare will never become affordable until Americans — not employers, insurers, or government bureaucrats — control their own medical spending.
When the American Heart Association (of which I was a member) reports on our “healthcare affordability crisis,’ they describe a major symptom for both the nation and individual Americans. They do not identify the etiology or root cause of unaffordability: “bureaucratic diversion.” Last year, the U.S. expended $5 trillion on its healthcare system. That is a greater amount than the entire GDP of Japan.
The Wrong People Hold Health Care Purse Strings Healthcare will never become affordable until Americans — not employers, insurers, or government bureaucrats — control their own medical spending.
When the American Heart Association (of which I was a member) reports on our “healthcare affordability crisis,’ they describe a major symptom for both the nation and individual Americans. They do not identify the etiology or root cause of unaffordability: “bureaucratic diversion.” Last year, the U.S. expended $5 trillion on its healthcare system. That is a greater amount than the entire GDP of Japan.
Reject The System That Stole Your Medical Freedom Original
On July 4, 2026, when our country commemorates its 250th birthday, Americans will celebrate the Constitution and the freedoms it bestows. There is, however, one freedom missing that we need to reclaim: medical autonomy. Americans are free to speak their minds, except when they contradict the official medical narrative, shown by the government’s response to Covid-19. Americans are free to gather, to work, and to pray until a federal bureaucrat declares a public health emergency.
The Healthcare/Health...Care Seesaw Goes Both Ways
Democrats’ latest ploy to divert Americans’ attention from unaffordable insurance and inaccessible care is to add long-term care benefits to Medicare. They ignore the fact that adding new spending will hasten Medicare’s projected insolvency. Republicans’ latest solution emphasizes new rules about how you buy your health care, building on their sop of last December’s $1,500 for people to spend in lieu of ACA subsidies.
Medicaid Fraud Is Rampant — But There’s A Solution
As many times before, Medicaid fraud, particularly in Minnesota and California, dominates the domestic news cycle. The Trump administration is withholding $1.3 billion in Medicaid payments and halting approval of new home healthcare services as well as hospice services. Vice-President Vance was visibly angry when he announced the need to have a nationwide crackdown on fraud in the healthcare system. The fraud process in Minnesota was straightforward.
Do You Really Want Washington As Your Doctor?
Why is the federal bureaucracy your “doctor”? You didn’t choose them. You don’t want them. Yet, by third parties following their stringent regulations, Washington makes all your medical as well as financial decisions, not you and not a doctor of your choice. What happened to your medical freedom (autonomy) that is supposedly protected by law? What is going on in U.S. healthcare? Care decisions You get to see the doctor when a scheduling program decides, not you and not even your assigned doctor.
Why Your Phone Got Cheaper — and Your Health Insurance Didn’t In a market where patients don’t pay and providers don’t compete, costs rise, care shrinks, and Washington shrugs and calls it inevitable.
Skyrocketing health insurance prices are Americans’ “top cost concern.” In fact, subsidizing staggering insurance price increases for 2026 was the Democrats’ predicate for the 2025 government . Premiums were increased as much as above 2025 rates, along with greater out-of-pocket copays and higher deductibles. Political bickering and affordability fears have led many to accept rising insurance costs as inevitable. That assumption deserves a closer look.
Empower Patients, Reclaim Healthcare The EPI Plan could restore medical freedom, slash costs, and end the insurance monopoly.
Gallup recently reported that healthcare remains the biggest domestic concern for Americans. It is clearly their longest-running frustration (60+ years). Yet, Washington won’t even consider an effective solution called the Empower PATIENTS Initiative (EPI).
Empower Patients, Reclaim Healthcare The EPI Plan could restore medical freedom, slash costs, and end the insurance monopoly.
Gallup recently reported that healthcare remains the biggest domestic concern for Americans. It is clearly their longest-running frustration (60+ years). Yet, Washington won’t even consider an effective solution called the Empower PATIENTS Initiative (EPI).
Stop Prior Authorization to Empower We the Patients
Despite the much ballyhooed sticker shock of health insurance , unaffordability is not considered the biggest obstacle to getting medical care. According to a just-released KFF survey, the U.S. public considers prior authorization (PrAuth) the “greatest hurdle” to obtaining the care they need when they need it. PrAuth is a process that third-party payers use to decide if they will pay for care recommended by your doctor.
Solving The Healthcare Affordability Crisis
The constant headlines touting this quick fix or that instant solution to our healthcare affordability crisis call to mind a football metaphor, given the Super Bowl this coming weekend. It’s the fourth quarter. Your team is losing by one touchdown and inside the red zone. There are no timeouts remaining. The quarterback steps back to pass. Today, he has thrown ten consecutive incomplete passes and two interceptions.
Empowering Patients in a Broken System – The American Spectator | USA News and Politics
President Trump reentered the healthcare debate with The Great Healthcare Plan (GHP), as families confront another year of rising insurance costs. After expiration ofpandemic-era Obamacare subsidies, millions of Americans are seeing premiums and out-of-pocket costs rising sharply. The immediate response in Washington has been to debate whether those subsidies should be restored.
Santayana Was Right - Hitler Is Back!
Many on the left and of course the mainstream media have thrown around the name “Hitler” applying it repeatedly to President Trump. While this is obviously a gross mischaracterization, a Hitler-esque individual has arisen in American politics, one who holds the same views and has similar intentions as the original regarding people of the Jewish faith. The Hitler label clearly did not and does not apply to Trump. But does it correctly apply to Mamdani? What is the evidence?
How Medicaid Made a Billion-Dollar Crime Inevitable – The American Spectator | USA News and Politics
The Minnesota Medicaid embezzlement scam remains headline news because of its scope and because the culprits were part of a single immigrant group from Somalia. Officials estimate as much as $9 billion taxpayer dollars were stolen from 14 Medicaid programs primarily in Minnesota but also in Ohio and Maine. The FBI is investigating potential Minnesota connections with terrorist organizations in their home country.
Is Healthcare ‘Burning’ Yet? – The American Spectator | USA News and Politics
In July 1988, the Piper Alpha oil rig in the North Sea exploded into fire. A worker on the rig, Andy Mochan, had to make a choice: stay and certainly die, or jump off the platform and probably die from the 100-foot drop or hypothermia in the freezing water. The burning platform has become a useful metaphor in the management of change, referring to what it takes to make people accept change, to reject the status quo. (P.S. Mr. Mochan jumped and survived.) Is U.S. healthcare “burning” yet?
Playing ‘What If?’ at Thanksgiving dinner
As families gather to celebrate Thanksgiving, many worry about the impossibly high cost of health insurance. Let’s play a game of What If? (It will be fun, I promise.) What if healthcare dollars currently going to insurance companies were paid instead to the consumers themselves? Would good things result, or bad? This “what if” exercise was prompted by President Trump’s offhand to give ACA subsidies “directly to the people...[instead of]...BIG, BAD insurance companies”?
A Thanksgiving ‘What-If’ for American Healthcare – The American Spectator | USA News and Politics
As we gather to celebrate Thanksgiving, with many worrying about the impossibly high cost of health insurance, let’s play a game of What If? What if healthcare dollars currently going to insurance companies were paid instead to the consumers themselves? Would good things result, or bad? This “what if” exercise was prompted by President Trump’s offhand to give ACA subsidies “directly to the people … [instead of] … BIG, BAD insurance companies”?
Health Care Affordability Is Not Enough
Affordability is the new watchword for both parties, particularly with regard to healthcare. NPR warns, “Healthcare costs could soon skyrocket for millions.” Politico predicts, “The White House...[must] act on health care affordability.” An answer was suggested on November 7, 2025, but no one seems to take it seriously.
Subtext to Shutdown: Unaffordable Healthcare – The American Spectator | USA News and Politics
The government shutdown is ostensibly a battle over healthcare: what to do about the expense, healthcare’s unaffordability. Republicans want to focus limited resources on the truly needy and legally resident by cutting subsidies to and enrollment of Medicaid people who aren’t eligible and don’t need Medicaid. Democrats want to preserve Affordable Care Act subsidies to protect the coverage of millions added to Medicaid under Biden.
Putting Patients In Charge, Not In Line To Die
The current federal government shutdown is framed by Democrats as an attempt to “protect Medicaid” enrollees from “devastating” cuts in coverage by the Trump administration. Republicans argue that Medicaid should be focused on truly medically vulnerable citizens and should not be paying for illegal residents or healthy adults who have returned to work.
The #1 Waster of Healthcare Dollars and How to Stop It
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The #1 Waster of Healthcare Dollars and How to Stop It
As Democrats threaten government shut-down over Medicaid cuts; as Americans are bracing for another in their healthcare costs; and as patients wait an average maximum of 132 days to see a primary care doctor, Americans can’t seem to wake up from the nightmare called U.S. healthcare. The rise in insurance premium costs is estimated at 7–10 percent next year.
Ballooning Healthcare Industry Nothing To Celebrate - In Fact, It Might Be Killing Us
The U.S. economy is stalling. The latest August jobs report shows that total nonfarm payroll employment rose by just 22,000. The unemployment rate remained stuck at 4.3 percent, with 7.4 million Americans out of work. If that weren’t troubling enough, the annual benchmark revision just slashed previously reported job gains between March 2024 and March 2025 by 911,000 jobs — one of the steepest downward corrections in decades.
The answer to skyrocketing health insurance costs
Employers are bracing for the “biggest healthcare cost bump in a decade.” This “daunting” escalation in health insurance premiums is forcing cutbacks that negatively impact patients: reduced benefits, increased deductibles, and further restrictions of pharmacy options. In market terms, supply and demand don’t balance. In fact, they seesaw: as premiums costs go up, patient services go down. In any normal market, if you spend more, you should get more.
DEANE WALDMAN And VANCE GINN: Spend Right - Not More - On Healthcare
The Veterans Administration is once again in crisis. A just-released Inspector Generalreport found “severe occupational staffing shortages” across critical specialties, including primary care, anesthesiology, and mental health. Nearly 80 percent of VA facilities reported not having enough staff to meet veterans’ care needs. For many who served our nation, this means longer wait times, delayed treatment, or no care at all, especially mental health. We’ve seen this before.
Not Cutting or Unwinding, Trump is Refocusing Medicaid
Disinformation Democrats are loudly bemoaning Medicaid provisions in Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA): “Millions [will lose]...health insurance,” it “could strip health care from 10 million,” and it will be “devastating.” In fact, President Trump is taking small steps toward righting the Medicaid ship, which is foundering badly. To “right” a ship, one must first know the ship’s function. Submarines cannot launch aircraft, and aircraft carriers aren’t designed for stealth.
Where Have All Our Healthcare Dollars Gone? – The American Spectator | USA News and Politics
“Where have all the flowers gone, long time passing?” sang Pete Seeger in his 1960s protest ballad. If he were singing today, his question might be directed toward America’s healthcare system: “Where have all the care dollars gone, long time waiting?” The answer is as tragic as it is urgent. In 1965, healthcare spending in the U.S. was 5.6 percent of GDP. Today, it’s 17 percent — over $4.8 trillion a year. That’s more than the entire economy of Germany.
Happy Birthday USA: A Simple Fix for Healthcare Fraud, and Healthcare Too!
The DoJ just announced an historic bust of a $14.6 billion (with a “b”!) scam charging more than 300 hundred healthcare bureaucrats with multi-year fraud. Given the laxity of auditing and accountability in payments by Medicare and Medicaid, this comes as no surprise. There is an easy way to prevent healthcare fraud before it happens rather than prosecute embezzlement after the fact. Healthcare is the only industry in which a third party rather than the consumer pays for what is consumed.
Medicaid cuts could save thousands of lives
“A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes,” goes the well-known saying often attributed to Mark Twain. There is no better demonstration of this wisdom than today’s falsehoods about Medicaid cuts that are reported, repeated, reposted and retweeted, even as the truth gets but a few eyeballs.
Opinion - Medicaid cuts could save thousands of lives
“A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes,” goes the well-known saying often attributed to Mark Twain. There is no better demonstration of this wisdom than today’s falsehoods about Medicaid cuts that are reported, repeated, reposted and retweeted, even as the truth gets but a few eyeballs.
Opinion - Medicaid cuts could save thousands of lives
“A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes,” goes the well-known saying often attributed to Mark Twain. There is no better demonstration of this wisdom than today’s falsehoods about Medicaid cuts that are reported, repeated, reposted and retweeted, even as the truth gets but a few eyeballs.
DOGE Is Missing $2 Trillion in Healthcare Waste
When President Donald Trump formed the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), he chose Elon Musk to lead the charge. The mission: eliminate $2 trillion in federal waste to help balance the bloated budget. When Musk’s 134-day tenure ended, DOGE claimed to have found “hundreds of billions” in waste. NPR suggested that the number would be closer to $2 billion. The House of Representatives just passed a bill claiming $9.4 billion in DOGE savings.
Op-Ed: Empower patients, not bureaucrats Original
There are many domestic issues of sufficient magnitude to be honestly labelled crises. President Donald Trump has begun to address illegal immigration issues, the woke virus, and even the deep state. But the budget budget deficit and “entitlements” are still considered untouchable. Health care has been a crisis for more than 60 years, increasingly unaffordable and even harder to get medical care.
Medicaid Cuts Will Save-Not Kill-Americans
In recent years, Americans have learned a hard truth: “Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.” During COVID-19, we were told to trust the experts, obey mandates, and silence our dissent. Over time, the truth emerged—much of what we were sold was false, and the price we paid in lives, education, and finances from their false narrative scam was extreme. Now, many of those same voices are repeating another falsehood: that cutting Medicaid will cause Americans to die. Recently, Rep.
Will Trump's Drug Pricing Order Cut Out Greedy Middlemen? Original
We have all seen promotions like this: “Bring us any valid price offer lower than ours, and we will match it!” That is what President Donald Trump intends with his May 12 executive order to address the high price of pharmaceuticals in the U.S. American patients pay from three times to as much as ten times what other nations pay for medicinal drugs, even though most of the drugs were developed in the U.S. As Trump said, U.S. consumers “subsidize” the world with our innovation, intellectual...
OpEd: Medicaid cuts aren’t a crisis, they’re a lifeline
Cutting Medicaid will cost lives.” That’s the dire warning echoing through media headlines and political speeches as Congress and the Trump administration consider tightening eligibility and trimming the Medicaid program. U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders and others claim these cuts are heartless, as millions of people will lose coverage. kAmqFE E96 >65:2 – 2?5 >F49 @7 E96 A@=:E:42= =67E – 2C6 2G@:5:?8 C62=:EJ]k^Am k5:G :5lQE?4>D\C68:@?\2CE:4=60:?DE@CJ0E@AQ 4=2DDlQE?4>D\C68:@?
OpEd: Medicaid Cuts Aren’t a Crisis-They’re a Lifeline
That’s the dire warning echoing through media headlines and political speeches as Congress and the Trump administration consider tightening eligibility and trimming the Medicaid program. Senator Bernie Sanders and others claim these cuts are heartless, as millions of people will lose coverage. But the media—and much of the political left—are avoiding reality. Reducing Medicaid’s bloated rolls isn’t a death sentence.
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