Health care policy project

Miller Center resources examine the history of domestic and global health care challenges

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Photo: Harry S. Truman Presidential Library

Recent events

'Lessons from the Covid War': The report from the Covid Crisis Group

What went right and wrong in our nation's response to the pandemic? What can we do to avoid the next one? The nonpartisan Covid Crisis Group offers crucial recommendations to prepare for the inevitable next public health crisis

'Hospital City, Health Care Nation'

A new assessment of American hospitals by Miller Center Associate Professor Guian McKee, co-director of the Center's Health Care Policy Project

Building the CDC that America needs

The COVID-19 pandemic exposed significant weaknesses in U.S. global health security policy and infrastructure. Three years into the pandemic, experts discuss how to improve the CDC’s performance and restore the trust and confidence of the American people

Roe v. Dobbs: The future of reproductive health

What does the historic U.S. Supreme Court 5–4 ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade, mean for the future of reproductive health and the future direction of the U.S. Supreme Court?

Health policy in presidential oral histories

Since 1981, the Miller Center’s Presidential Oral History Program has conducted extensive interviews with the top 100 leaders of every presidential administration. Many of these interviews address health care policy, all of which are indexed here.

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Medicare and Medicaid

Prescription for success

Health Care Policy Project co-director Guian McKee lays out lessons from Lyndon Johnson's passage of Medicare and Medicaid

The birth of Medicare

The story of Medicare's passage, with key presidential recordings

The prescription drug benefit

December 8, 2003: George W. Bush announced his signing of the $400 billion Medicare Prescription Drug Modernization Act

Medicare winners and losers

Gail Wilensky, a former advisor to President George H. W. Bush, analyzes the politics of health care during the 2004 election cycle

Left

Responding to the threat of a pandemic influenza

In December 2005, UVA's Frederick Church, an expert in viral respiratory infections, visited the Miller Center to discuss what he deemed an “inevitable” pandemic. Though specifically discussing the influenza virus, not coronavirus, the session offers striking insights into the COVID-19 challenge and reminds us that global health security is an ongoing concern.

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Past events

National Discussion Series: Health Care

On April 9, 2008, the National Discussion and Debate Series debated the right to universal health care at Boston's historic Faneuil Hall

Progressivism's holy grail: Obama and health care reform

Brown University's James Morone discusses how presidents acted and what motivated them in the post New Deal history of health care

The future of U.S. health care

In December 2013 experts looked at the health care system three years after the passage of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) as part of the series Historical Perspectives on the Health Care Crisis

The conservative case for universal health care

Avik Roy, a policy researcher, journalist, and advisor, explores the conservative case for moving toward a bipartisan, universal health care plan in conversation with the Miller Center's Guian McKee

Health care policy project