MASSACHUSETTS: Officials to Create Public Health Web Site
Massachusetts Gov. Paul Cellucci (R) and Attorney General Thomas Reilly (D) will join forces to create a Web site devoted to informing the public about trends in the health care industry, the Boston Herald reports. Project aides said that "key indicators" of the health care industry such as the uninsurance rate, will be tracked over time. The information will be used to develop an "early warning system" that can detect problems in the industry such as the financial troubles that plagued Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Inc. earlier this year. Reilly said, "This [health care] system is changing at an increasing speed and it's going to continue to change at a speed we haven't seen before. The challenge is how do we manage that change." The partnership resulted from subcommittee recommendations that Massachusetts increase its HMO regulation by collecting more detailed information on managed care companies and requiring HMOs to meet minimum financial standards (Powell, 9/19).
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