First Edition: March 2, 2012

Today's headlines include reports about the Senate's vote to reject an effort to expand exemptions to the Obama administration's birth control coverage rule. 

Kaiser Health News: The Parent Trap
This story, written by Kaiser Health News' Marilyn Werber Serafini in collaboration with Bethesda Magazine, features members of the sandwich generation: raising children, dealing with elderly parents and the care they need -; and sometimes feeling like they've bitten off more than they can chew (3/1). Watch the related video.

Kaiser Health News: State GOP Pushes For 'Abortion Free' Mississippi
Mississippi Public Broadcasting's Jeffrey Hess, working in partnership with Kaiser Health News and NPR, reports: "The 2012 Mississippi legislature is considering nearly two dozen bills and constitutional amendments all aimed at limiting abortion in a state that already has one of the lowest abortion rates in the country and just one abortion clinic" (Hess, 3/1).

The New York Times: Senate Rejects Step Targeting Coverage Of Contraception
The Senate on Thursday upheld President Obama's birth control policy, voting to kill a Republican effort to let employers and health insurance companies deny coverage for contraceptives and other items they object to on religious or moral grounds (Pear, 3/1).

The Washington Post: Birth Control Exemption Bill, The 'Blunt Amendment,' Killed In Senate
The measure, an amendment proposed by Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) to a highway funding bill, would have allowed not only religious groups but any employer with moral objections to opt out of the coverage requirement. And it would have allowed such employers to do so in the case of not only contraception but any health service required by the 2010 health-care law (Aizenman and Helderman, 3/1).

The Wall Street Journal: Senate Turns Away Birth-Control Measure
The Senate voted 51-48 Thursday to set aside a measure that would have allowed employers to omit insurance coverage for health services they find morally objectionable, the latest step in a fiery debate that has pushed its way into the presidential race and congressional campaigning (Bendavid, 3/1).

The Associated Press/Washington Post: Republicans Fail To Overturn Obama Mandate For Birth Control Coverage; Tight Vote In Senate
The Senate vote aside, the debate "won't be over until the administration figures out how to accommodate people's religious views as it relates to these mandates," said the measure's sponsor, Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo. ... Such cultural issues have been prominent in this presidential election year, with Republican presidential candidates casting Obama's health care law as government overreach into the most personal types of medical decisions. The contraception policy in particular touches on religious and women's rights important to the activists at the core of each party (3/1).

Politico: GOP Mulls Contraception Strategy
Fresh off their defeat on the Senate floor Thursday, congressional Republicans pledged to move forward with their efforts to broaden the exemptions from the Obama administration's contraception coverage rule. But they were left without a clear strategy for moving ahead, and the fight seemed to have energized Democrats, who welcomed the debate as a chance to win over independent women during an election year (Haberkorn, 3/2).

The Associated Press/Washington Post: Santorum Seeks To Exploit Romney Weakness As Contraception Issue Roils GOP Presidential Race 
Seizing an opportunity to instill doubts about Mitt Romney's conservative credentials, Rick Santorum on Thursday said his presidential rival's gut reaction to a Senate measure that would have repealed mandatory health coverage for contraceptives shows the former Massachusetts governor is not conservative "at the core" (3/1).

The Washington Post: Rick Santorum Stumps In Newt Gingrich's Territory: Georgia
After promising on Wednesday to talk more about the economy, Santorum criticized Romney on Thursday as insufficiently conservative, contrasting his own record as a foot soldier in the culture wars with the former Massachusetts governor's recent statements about the Blunt amendment. ... Romney has since said that he supported the Blunt amendment, which was defeated in the Senate. His campaign hit Santorum back, saying that the former senator's "gut reaction" is to "take one for the team," a reference to Santorum's vote on the No Child Left Behind education legislation (Henderson and Rucker, 3/1).

The New York Times: Beth Israel To Pay $13 Million For Inflating Medicare Fees
Beth Israel Medical Center has admitted that it fraudulently inflated its fees for services to Medicare patients, deliberately deceiving the federal government into paying many millions of dollars more than their treatments actually cost (Bernstein, 3/1).

The Associated Press/Wall Street Journal: NYC Hospital Admits To Fraudulent Medicare Fees
The complaint says the fraudulent practice, known as "turbocharging," went on at Beth Israel from 1998 through 2003. The complaint says the hospital deceived the Medicare program into believing that the costs associated with inpatient medical care were higher than they actually were (3/1).

The New York Times: Poll Finds Divisions Over Requiring Coverage
The close divide in a Senate vote Thursday over whether employers can refuse insurance coverage for contraception mirrors a sharp partisan divide among the public, according to a national poll and interviews with women around the country (Eckholm, 3/1).

The Wall Street Journal's Health Blog: Kaiser Poll Finds Opinions On Medicare Are 'Malleable'
The latest poll from the Kaiser Family Foundation finds most people want to keep Medicare's basic benefit structure as it is today -; though those on both side of the argument can potentially be swayed (Hobson, 3/1).

The Wall Street Journal's Corruption Currents: Pharma Code Revamp Follows US Industry Sweep
The Geneva-based International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations said Thursday it expanded its practice code to cover all interactions with health-care professionals, medical institutions and patient organizations, including a ban on doctors from receiving payments to attend conferences (Rubenfeld, 3/1).