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Cigna Express Scripts merger could be welcome medicine — for shareholders

Cigna’s $67 billion bid for pharmacy benefits manager Express Scripts could give the insurer better tools to manage patient healthcare and more clout to negotiate lower prices with drugmakers — but health economists caution that the main beneficiaries could be shareholders rather than patients. “In some sense, this was inevitable, with the other major insurance companies being integrated with a PBM — Cigna doesn’t want to be at a competitive disadvantage,” said Sam Richardson, a health economist at Boston College. Health economists predicted more consolidation after Aetna and CVS announced plans to merge last year.

The prospect of Amazon entering the pharmaceutical market, and the joint pledge from Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Warren Buffett and JPMorgan Chase chief Jamie Dimon to find ways to drive down healthcare costs, provide an imperative for players across the industry to contain costs and improve the quality of care patients receive. Cigna CEO David Cordani described the current healthcare market as “not sustainable” in a C interview on Thursday.”The market demands more affordability, the market demands more personalization,” he said.

By undergoing a vertical merger that brings an insurer and benefits manager under one umbrella, Cordani said patients as well as employers would benefit from better coordination and more efficiency in providing care.“”This combination accelerates our movement to deliver more value,” he said. Will Sneden, practice leader of U.S.

Health and Benefits at Aon, said the merger would give Cigna more data and better insight into the total scope of healthcare people get, reducing the fragmentation that can lead to less effective or duplicative care.“It gives a broader scope of capabilities for the organization.It could be another choice for more integrated medical and pharmaceutical solutions,” he said.

“I see this as a strategy for accelerating the accountable care space.By having an in-house PBM capability, it will make the data integration that much more readily available,” Sneden said. Exactly who will benefit from that value, though, remains to be seen.

“On one hand, there probably are going to be gains from coordinating care between the insurer and PBM… those will probably have benefits for employers and patients, but on the other hand, it changes the incentive structure for the entities,” said Matthew Eisenberg, an assistant professor of health policy and management at Johns Hopkins University.With a benefits manager in-house, Cigna might not negotiate as vigorously for lower drug prices, or might not pass savings along to patients. “The challenge is that, as the industry consolidates, [will it] have an effect on prices?” said health economist Jason Shafrin.

He pointed out that CVS is already experimenting with more flexible delivery models, such as a plan to improve costs and care for rheumatoid arthritis treatment. While this can lower insurer costs, though, Shafrin said the wrong incentive structure could sacrifice patient care, expressing concern that greater negotiating leverage could be wielded to restrict patient access to new or experimental treatments in pursuit of keeping costs down. And patients might not even see the results of those savings, Shafrin said.

“A question is, do those negotiated rebates get passed onto the consumer? In the past, the answer was largely no,” he said. If a marketplace develops where fewer, larger insurers extract better concessions from pharmaceutical companies but don’t pass those savings along, patients will suffer, especially those whose jobs offer high-deductible health plans that shift more of the cost to the employee. “Consumers would acutely feel these higher prices.

That’s the worry,” Eisenberg said. Source: NBC News.

Cigna Express Scripts merger could be welcome medicine — for shareholders was originally published on NewsVomit

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Parkland students prepare to confront memories as they return to school

For some students, going back to class at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, is like being forced to repeatedly board a downed airplane. “It’s just really hard to think about,” David Hogg, a senior who has become one of the more outspoken survivors, told on Tuesday.”Imagine getting in a plane crash and having to get back on the same plane again and again and again and being expected to learn and act like nothing’s wrong.” On Wednesday, the school will resume classes with a half-day schedule as Broward County attempts to return to normal.

Hogg says he feels sick heading back to class knowing the only change at his school since gunfire rattled the South Florida community on Valentine’s Day will be the 17 people who won’t be there when he returns. “It’s a disgusting idea to think about,” Hogg, 17, said of the lack of legislative action on school safety and gun control.“Literally nothing’s changed except that 17 people are dead.” Stoneman Douglas students are now joining the growing ranks of American schoolchildren who have had to learn how to cope with haunting memories after their campuses became the site of a national tragedy.

When it happened at Colorado’s Columbine High School in 1999, Austin Eubanks, now 36, struggled to return to any semblance of the normal life he knew before the shooting. Related: Parkland shooting victim Maddy Wilford speaks out following hospital release While inside Columbine’s library, Eubanks, who was 17 years old at the time, was shot in the hand and knee — and his best friend was killed right next to him. Eubanks said he later tried to return to the Columbine campus in his senior year but painful reminders of the massacre just months earlier surrounded him.

“My senior year I tried to go back, and I had just lost a best friend.I had been one of the students who was injured, and not only that, at the time they had not done the remodel on Columbine yet.All they did is take plywood and they made a wall where there used to be the entrance to the library,” Eubanks said.

Every time he passed the plywood, he was reminded that it masked “where, at the time, the worst school shooting in U.S.history occurred,” he said. Eubanks said he numbed himself from the pain of Columbine by taking drugs, which led to a years-long addiction he has since overcome.

As someone who has first-hand experience overcoming the trauma of school shootings, he urged the students of Stoneman Douglas to work through their pain rather than run from it. Related: Florida officer Scot Peterson defends response to Parkland shooting “Speak up about it,” Eubanks said.“That’s the most important part, because what happened for me is it was difficult, I didn’t want to do it so I detached.

I detached from community.I detached from connection and I didn’t go through the healing that I know a lot of the student body did in the senior year that I missed.” Eubanks has since become the chief operating officer of Foundry Treatment Center in Colorado, which deals with trauma and addiction.As the students of Stoneman Douglas return to campus, he says it’s important they do not disassociate from the events that occurred just two weeks ago.

Dr.Daniel S.Schechter, director of stress, trauma, and resilience in the Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at New York University Langone Health, agreed.

“It’s important to deal with the stress when they’re confronted with scene of the crime to be able to link themselves to present moment, which we use with people who have experienced bad things,” Schechter said, adding that grounding exercises are often used in situations where trauma has been experienced. Schechter said it’s impossible to know which students will or won’t be susceptible to post-traumatic stress disorder as they return to campus, but that it’s important for students to be present in the moment as they confront the memories at school. Related: FBI says it’s trying to rebuild trust after botched Parkland tip As students in Parkland prepared to confront the memories left on the Stoneman Douglas campus, Florida Gov.

Rick Scott announced on Tuesday a $500 million investment in school safety and mental health as part of an action plan announced last week. Stoneman Douglas students will return to campus starting at 7:40 a.m.ET and will be dismissed at 11:40 a.m.

ET.This schedule is currently projected to last until March 2, according to the Broward Schools website. While some students remain anxious about returning to the scene of the shooting, others students say they feel ready.

Daniel Duff, 14, a freshman, returned to Stoneman Douglas on Sunday for an orientation in his fourth-period drama class.He said being back on the campus and talking with teachers has reassured him. “I wasn’t too sure about going back,” he said, but added that orientation had made him “more ready.” Duff said teachers told him that students would initially take eight 20-minute classes and that each session would focus on discussing the incidents on Feb.

14 and healing.Duff said he was told classes would not immediately go back to the standard curriculum.I am grateful to the students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School for sharing their story with me today.

We had an important discussion about how to keep our kids and our schools safe.pic.twitter.com/s3w9KC4vwC Debbie Duff, Daniel’s mother, said she doesn’t feel anxious “at all” about her son returning to Stoneman Douglas, but said she anticipates it might be an emotional day for the students.She said the teachers and staff have worked hard to reach out to students through email and texts in the days they’ve been away and are continuing to make the transition as smooth as possible.

“I don’t have any worries about our school feeling unsafe,” Debbie Duff said.”I have overheard some people say they don’t want to go back because they don’t feel safe.That’s not my concern.” Source: NBC News.

Parkland students prepare to confront memories as they return to school was originally published on NewsVomit

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This talking robotic head will join astronauts on the ISS

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This talking robotic head will join astronauts on the ISS was originally published on NewsVomit

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Danish inventor called 'psychopathic' at murder trial

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Danish inventor called ‘psychopathic’ at murder trial was originally published on NewsVomit

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The network every woman needs to get ahead

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The network every woman needs to get ahead was originally published on NewsVomit

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Regular exercisers stay young

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Regular exercisers stay young was originally published on NewsVomit

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ESPN's new president has a tough, digital future ahead

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ESPN’s new president has a tough, digital future ahead was originally published on NewsVomit

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Idaho must allow trans people to change birth certificate sex, court rules

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Idaho must allow trans people to change birth certificate sex, court rules was originally published on NewsVomit

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Tillerson says US getting 'potentially positive signals' from North Korea -

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Tillerson says US getting ‘potentially positive signals’ from North Korea – was originally published on NewsVomit

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With Olympics over, Korean-American adoptee athletes search for birth families

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With Olympics over, Korean-American adoptee athletes search for birth families was originally published on NewsVomit

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Women's work: Meet the female pioneers thriving in once-male domains

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Women’s work: Meet the female pioneers thriving in once-male domains was originally published on NewsVomit

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No charges for agent accused of groping Terry Crews

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No charges for agent accused of groping Terry Crews was originally published on NewsVomit

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Women's work: Meet the female pioneers thriving in once-male domains -

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Women’s work: Meet the female pioneers thriving in once-male domains – was originally published on NewsVomit

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How Trump turned a minor election into a major referendum on himself

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How Trump turned a minor election into a major referendum on himself was originally published on NewsVomit

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First Read's Morning Clips: The top 10 House seats that could flip in the fall

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First Read’s Morning Clips: The top 10 House seats that could flip in the fall was originally published on NewsVomit

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Should you go paleo? The pros and cons of America's favorite diets

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Should you go paleo? The pros and cons of America’s favorite diets was originally published on NewsVomit

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New British private-members club aims to give women a room of their own

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New British private-members club aims to give women a room of their own was originally published on NewsVomit