Health News

President-elect Barack Obama reportedly plans to name Congressional Budget Office Director Peter Orszag as director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, the AP/Miami Herald reports (Taylor, AP/Miami Herald, 11/19).

As CBO director, Orszag "has focused on health policy since growing costs for Medicare and other federal programs are driving projections of unsustainable future budget deficits," but "with the economy in crisis, he has been dealing with economic stimulus proposals before Congress," according to the New York Times (Calmes, New York Times, 11/18). His health care "expertise could help Mr. Obama, who has promised to expand health care insurance to more Americans while containing costs," the Times reports.

During the Clinton administration, Orszag served as a staff economist for the Council of Economic Advisers and the White House National Economic Council. Orszag also has served as a senior economics fellow at the Brookings Institution, where he directed the Hamilton Project, and is a member of the Institute of Medicine at the National Academies of Sciences (Calmes, New York Times, 11/19).

Orszag "has been reluctant to leave Capitol Hill's budget agency in the middle of his four-year term, but Democratic aides said Tuesday that Orszag seems likely to accept the job if it is offered," as Orszag "would find it virtually impossible to turn down a request from Obama," according to the AP/Herald (AP/Miami Herald, 11/19). According to CongressDaily, possible replacements for Orszag include Doug Elmendorf, a former staff member at the Federal Reserve, the Department of Treasury, CEA and CBO (CongressDaily, 11/19).

Emanuel Cites Need To Support Health Insurance Expansion
At a business leaders conference on Tuesday, Rahm Emanuel, chief of staff to Obama, called for their support to expand health insurance to all U.S. residents, the Detroit Free Press reports. During the conference, sponsored by the Wall Street Journal, Emanuel said, "I'm challenging you today; we're going to have to do big, serious things." Emanuel also said that the Obama administration will make the enactment of an economic stimulus package the "first order of business" (Detroit Free Press, 11/18). In addition, he said that the Obama administration would take advantage of the current economic downturn to pass broad health care and other proposals (Weisman, Wall Street Journal, 11/19).

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