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Last month, as Republican leaders were preoccupied with another unsuccessful attempt to replace Obamacare, a senior Trump administration official issued a warning about a different major medical program, Medicare. The official, Seema Verma, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, wrote in The Wall Street Journal that Medicare was facing a fiscal crisis. She announced that she was asking the agency’s innovation center for ideas to address it, and that part of the answer was to give consumers “incentives to be cost-conscious.” This has some Democrats worried that she’s trying to move Medicare toward something called premium support, which would be a huge change for consumers. (Austin Frakt, 10/30)

One of the major problems facing our country is the high cost of Medicare and Medicaid — and healthcare in general. The hope of everyone is to live a long healthy life, but why should it cost two to three times as much in our country than in any other wealthy nation? (Sheldon B. Lubar and Timothy L. Smunt, 10/27)

Former Gov. Terry Branstad was an avid Donald Trump supporter leading up to the 2016 presidential election. Gov. Kim Reynolds was glued to his side with an approving smile. Voters in this state ultimately helped send Trump to the White House. What did this political support earn Iowans? Nothing, when it came to helping Iowa shore up its individual health insurance market. Perhaps worse than nothing. (10/27)

On Thursday President Donald Trump declared war on the opiate crisis. That same day congressional Republicans effectively raised the white flag in that war by advancing Trump’s budget. To quote the Wizard of Oz, “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.” The budget would decimate funding for Medicaid. According to nonpartisan analysis, cuts are more than $1 trillion for Medicaid over a decade’s time and $473 billion for Medicare. They’re almost certainly worse, as additional “savings” from safety net programs is undefined. (Brendan Williams, 10/30)