end-of-life care news stories on Newser

Dems Quickly Pull Plug on 'Death Panels'

John Johnson — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 12:22:39 CST

The end-of-life counseling derided as "death panels" that was originally part of health care reform, then taken out, then put back in , is back out again. For now. The Obama administration has reversed itself and removed references to the counseling from new Medicare regulations that quietly went into effect at...

'Death Panels' Return: Obama Enacts End-of-Life Planning

Mark Russell — Sun, 26 Dec 2010 07:03:00 CST

Sarah Palin's "death panels" are back. The brouhaha surrounding end-of-life counseling forced Democrats to cut it from health care reform, but now President Obama is quietly adding the same policy to Medicare by rewriting regulations, reports the New York Times . Under the new policy, beginning Jan. 1 the government will...

Germany OKs Assisted Suicide in Some Cases

Kevin Spak — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 11:15:00 CDT

A German court made a landmark ruling in favor of euthanasia today, overturning the conviction of a lawyer who’d advised a family to cut a comatose relation’s feeding tube. The patient, 71-year-old Erika Kuellmer, had made it clear she didn’t want to be kept alive if she ever fell into...

Lie of the Year: 'Death Panels'

Rob Quinn — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 05:21:09 CST

Sarah Palin's claim that health care reform would institute "death panels" to decide whether the elderly and disabled are worthy of treatment has been deemed the biggest lie of 2009 by the editors of PolitiFact . Palin appears to have coined the term in a July Facebook posting, and it swiftly...

America Needs to Embrace Death

Drew Nelles — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 13:26:00 CDT

Nobody wants to talk about rationing health care, but “the need to spend less money on the elderly at the end of life is the elephant in the room in the health-reform debate,” Evan Thomas writes in Newsweek . To expand coverage and lower costs, Americans must overcome their urge to...

Sorry, Glenn Beck: Senate Confirms Sunstein

Matt Cantor — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 09:50:25 CDT

Cass Sunstein, President Obama’s nominee for a bureaucratic White House post, has been confirmed in a 57-40 Senate vote largely along party lines, Politico reports. Sunstein, who will monitor federal regulations as director of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, has been under attack by conservatives over...

Inside the Real World of End-of-Life Care

Matt Cantor — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 17:49:51 CDT

With so many up in arms about “death panel” rumors, the New York Times paints a picture of real-life palliative care providers, or end-of-life consultants. The Times follows one specialist in a field that requires its doctors to be “part psychoanalyst, part detective,” writes Anemona Hartocollis: He’s fine-tuned to take...

GOP Backed 'Death Panels' ...in 2003

Matt Cantor — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 14:10:38 CDT

They’re up in arms against it now, but Republicans voted for a measure providing end-of-life counseling in 2003, Amy Sullivan writes for Time. That year’s Medicare prescription drug bill, which boasted support from 204 GOP representatives and 42 senators, offered funding for “counseling the beneficiary with respect to end-of-life issues...

GOP Sen. Slams Prez's Town Hall 'Shout-Out'

Matt Cantor — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 10:00:00 CDT

At yesterday's town hall, President Obama cited health care reform backing from a Republican senator—giving a shout-out to Georgia's Johnny Isakson—and the lawmaker is none too pleased, Politico reports. Obama said Isakson sponsored voluntary end-of-life counseling measures, prompting Isakson’s office to assert that he “vehemently opposes the House...