“Thats right, the U.S. House of Representatives voted late Wednesday evening to pass President Barack Obama’s stimulus package of federal tax cuts and spending worth $819 billion, with more than $100 billion earmarked for healthcare—designating an additional $87 billion to existing state Medicaid budgets and approximately $20 billion for healthcare IT.
The Senate Appropriations committee offered a few amendments to the bill, including provisions to ensure that long-term care facilities are eligible for funding and to provide hospitals that have already made a healthcare IT investment with loans if they meet federal privacy and compatibility standards, according to Government Health IT. The bill also included a provision to have the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) initiate a strategy to ensure healthcare providers do not receive funding through both Medicaid and Medicare.”
I reckon with 20 billion, the entire field of healthcare IT is set to evolve real fast in 2009 🙂
BinaryHealthCare (BNHC) 