Category Archives: Health care

Where will mothers deliver babies?

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If a woman gives birth in an Arkansas hospital, there’s a good chance it isn’t in her home county.

Only 22 of Arkansas’ 75 counties now have hospitals that deliver babies, according to the Arkansas Center for Health Improvement (ACHI). Thirty hospitals overall still do, including counties with more than one. Ten hospitals have closed their obstetrics units since 2019. The latest is National Park Medical Center in Hot Springs following the unexpected death of its only obstetrician-gynecologist. Another local hospital, CHI St. Vincent Hot Springs, will continue delivering babies.

Five of the 10 closed their units because of staffing shortages, while five did so for financial reasons, ACHI says. Labor and delivery units are expensive to operate and must be open 24-7, even in rural areas with low patient volumes.

The closures are part of a nationwide trend. The Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform recently reported that since the end of 2020, 146 rural hospitals have closed their units or announced plans to do so by the end of 2026.  Continue reading →

Westerman tries to engineer health care fix

Bruce Westerman Fair Care Act

Westerman

U.S. Rep. Bruce Westerman, R-Ark., an engineer before he was a congressman, is trying to redesign the American health care system through the Fair Care Act.

He’s been introducing versions of the FCA since 2019 to reform a system that composes 18% of gross domestic product but often doesn’t produce better results than other countries’ systems that cost much less.

“I kind of approach everything from an engineering mindset,” he said. “You go through the engineering, problem-solving methodology. And it’s identify the problem, come up with a plan to solve the problem, do the work to solve the problem, and present your answer.”

Westerman said he proposed the 434-page FCA as a bipartisan solution. It has ideas from both parties and has had Democratic co-sponsorship in the past. He said past one-party efforts – the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) and the unsuccessful Republican repeal effort in 2017 – haven’t worked. Continue reading →

Who will say no in health care?

By Steve Brawner, © 2025 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Arkansas Blue Cross and Blue Shield had a rough 2024 financially. In a recent appearance on Talk Business & Politics, President and CEO Curtis Barnett offered some reasons why.

The company lost $226.2 million in 2024 after earning $13.2 million in 2023, according to its filing with the Arkansas Insurance Department. It announced it was laying off 75 employees, or 2% of its workforce, in January. 

Barnett said other insurers are also struggling with high costs. He listed several factors. One is the Medicaid redetermination process in 2023. All recipients intentionally had been left in the program throughout the pandemic. Once the pandemic ended, the eligibility process resumed, and many recipients were removed from the program. That process disrupted the health insurance market in 2024, he said. Second, health providers want insurance companies to increase payment rates, which he said was understandable given their inflation challenges and workforce shortages. Third, he said patient utilization of services “skyrocketed” in 2024. Joint replacements were 37% higher than they were in 2019, which he attributed largely to pent-up demand coming out of the pandemic. Finally, he mentioned “high cost claimants” and pharmaceutical costs.  Continue reading →

Family losses from alcohol led Wood to Prohibition Party

By Steve Brawner, © 2024 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Why would Michael Wood, 66, a former head of an e-commerce company and married father of two, run for president as the nominee of the anti-alcohol Prohibition Party?

It’s partly because when he was a young man, one cousin drank himself to death at a college fraternity party, while another family member was injured by a drunk driver.

The Prohibition Party has existed since 1869, making it the nation’s oldest third party. It has fielded a presidential candidate in every election since 1872. It is best known historically for supporting a national ban on alcohol sales, a stance it does not take today. 

Wood will be one of five non-major party presidential candidates on the Arkansas ballot, including Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has dropped out of the race. The others are Chase Oliver with the Libertarian Party, Peter Sonski with the American Solidarity Party, and Jill Stein with the Green Party. Wood’s vice presidential running mate is John Pietrowski. Continue reading →

Is this the beginning of the pandemic’s end?

By Steve Brawner
© 2021 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

In early December, I quoted British Prime Minister Winston Churchill saying after a World War II victory in 1942, “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.”

That’s how things felt in early December regarding the pandemic. Now, it feels like this might be the beginning of the pandemic’s end.

On Wednesday, Gov. Asa Hutchinson released the latest COVID numbers: 803 new cases, 10 more deaths, 496 total hospitalized.

Those would be jaw-dropping numbers if they had occurred a year ago, but they’re a huge improvement over what we’ve experienced in the recent past. On Dec. 29, the state reported that the cumulative death toll had increased by 66 that day. The new year began Jan. 1 with 4,304 new cases and 1,185 people hospitalized.

So we’re still at war, but the tide is turning. Continue reading →