House Democrats unveiled a sweeping health care reform bill last Thursday built on shared responsibility.
Individuals would have to buy health insurance for themselves and their families.
Taxpayers would subsidize coverage for those unable to afford it on their own.
Employers would have…

For a guy who focused so relentlessly on health care as a candidate, Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon has been remarkably quiet of late.
At a time when health care dominates the national debate, Mr. Nixon is one of just six Democratic…

About 75 percent of Americans who work part-time can’t get health insurance through their jobs. Missouri lawmakers are part of the fortunate 25 percent. The part-time lawmakers, whose five-month legislative session ended Friday, not only can buy coverage for themselves —…

Legislators throw paper copies of bills into the air at the close of the 2006 session.

Chiseled in stone on the state capitol in Jefferson City is a Latin phrase that translates as “Let the welfare of the people be the supreme…

Among the winners.

With the Missouri Legislature, you have take adequacy when it happens, even when the news is not as good as it should have been.

So let’s hear one hand clapping for the legislators who managed to set ideology aside…

Republican lawmakers in Missouri have a problem: They’d like to reduce the number of uninsured Missourians. But they don’t want to admit that their 2005 Medicaid cuts were a mistake — or hand Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon a political victory.
Mr.…

Sherri Cook gets a kiss from her son, Chance Roth.

“Columbus said the world is round?
Don’t you believe a word of that.
For I’ve been down to the edge of the world,
Sat on the edge where the wild wind whirled,
Peeked over the…

About 344,000 people in Missouri were uninsured in 1999. About 815,000 have no coverage now — an increase of roughly 137 percent.

You might expect that staggering growth to inspire a sense of urgency in Jefferson City. Instead, legislators spent the…

House Budget Committee Chairman Allen Icet, R-Wildwood

Missouri lawmakers should not let ideology stand in the way of health care for the working poor.

Gov. Jay Nixon and the Missouri Hospital Association have come up with a plan to extend health insurance to…

American taxpayers already have spent more than $2 trillion bailing out banks and insurance companies. Can we afford to reform health care, too?
It’s an understandable question, one that will be at center stage today when the White House hosts a…

If $4.3 billion of federal money falls into the hands of Missouri legislators, will they be smart enough to take full advantage of it?
The answer, unfortunately, may be no. Even after hearing details of the unexpected windfall in federal stimulus money —…

Smokers and Medicaid recipients in Missouri

This map shows Missouri Medicaid enrollment and smoking rates by county. The darker the color, the greater the percentage of people in Medicaid. Counties with cross-hatching have the highest smoking rates, followed by those with…

The House of Representatives on Wednesday approved an $819 billion economic stimulus plan that contains the most sweeping expansion of Medicaid in more than a decade.

For the first time, millions of unemployed Americans and their families would become eligible —…

Lucky Jay Nixon

It’s far too early to say whether Jay Nixon will be a good governor, but Missouri’s new chief executive has one thing going for him: Timing.

Like his two immediate predecessors, Democrat Bob Holden and Republican Matt Blunt, Mr.…

The state of Missouri has two words for Medicaid patients who need to use a bedpan, commode chair or urinal: Ask first.
Indelicate though it sounds, the equipment necessary for elderly and disabled people to relieve themselves now is subject to…

People with spotty Medicaid eligibility — coverage that starts and stops and starts again — are nearly four times more like to end up in the hospitals with conditions like asthma and diabetes than people with continuous coverage, a new…

In Missouri, you can live in poverty but still not be poor enough to qualify for Medicaid. Adults have to earn less than about 25 percent of the federal income poverty level — roughly $3,700 a year for a single…

Barack Obama serves lunch to a patient during a visit to Barnes-Jewish Hospital in June.

A few days before the historic election that swept him into the presidency, Barack Obama was asked to name his top priorities for 2009. They were,…

As a candidate for Missouri governor, Attorney General Jay Nixon told anyone who’d listen about his plans to restore Medicaid coverage to the more than 100,000 poor, elderly and disabled people who lost it in 2005.
On Tuesday, voters responded, sweeping…

When pollsters asked Missouri voters to name the most important issues last month, the economy was first, with health care right behind it.

In fact, the two issues are one and the same.

Skyrocketing health costs and the lack of affordable health…