Last week, USA Today reported that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was to begin testing new iris-scanning technology that stores digital images of people's eyes in a database. The two-week test of the new technology is to be conducted on immigrants that officers from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency encounter at the border. Iris-scanning technology conjures fears of Big Brother totalitarianism, brings to mind science-fiction films like Minority Report, and has drawn the ire of civil liberties groups. American Civil Liberties Union lawyer Christopher Calabrese tells USA Today that many fear that the iris-scanning cameras could be used covertly. "If you can identify any individual at a distance and without their knowledge, you literally allow the physical tracking of a person anywhere there's a camera and access to the Internet."

Originally published on September 22, 2010 in Health Care and Tennessee Voices.

As I sit beside my 92-year-old father in his hospital bed in Kingsport, Tennessee, there are reminders all around me of why I left my job in the insurance industry to become an advocate for health-care reform — and why all Americans have reasons to be grateful that many provisions of the reform bill that became law six months ago are taking effect now.

To begin with, there is my dad himself. He must take costly medications every day. This year he and millions of other older Americans fell into the Medicare Part D "doughnut hole." They have to spend thousands of dollars for medicines they need before their drug benefit will kick back in. The new law has already begun to reduce their pharmacy expenses.

CMD's Senior Fellow on Health Care, Wendell Potter, appeared on the Ed Show (MSNBC) to talk about the "charm offensive" insurance companies have put on by saying that they will allow parents to keep their kids covered up to age 26, while in truth they are declaring war on children in the U.S. A new provision of the health care reform legislation becomes active on September 23 which would make it illegal to drop insurance coverage for children with pre-existing conditions. In advance of the provision coming into effect, though, insurance companies in at least four states are refusing to write policies on children altogether. Wendell says the insurance industry is "dominated by a cartel of big insurance companies that are more beholden to Wall Street than to the children of the United States." The bottom line, Wendell says, is that we cannot trust these companies. "Do not believe anything they are saying ... We have a very evil system. These companies really cannot do the right thing." Here's the link to the video of Wendell on MSNBC.