The President’s press secretary set March 18 as the deadline for Congress to enact general health care reform according to the Washington Post. That’s just two weeks from today for the House to pass the Senate bill and for both bodies to pass a set of modifications to the Senate bill using budget reconciliation. That’s also a tall order.

The Secretary of Health and Human Services and the President met with chief executives from five health insurance companies to complain about health insurance rate increases.  Secretary “Sebelius asked the executives to post proposed rate increases and actuarial data supporting them online.” The White House blog speaks about putting the American people ahead of insurance companies.  The insurance executives tried to look on the bright side according to Modern Healthcare.  Rhetorial question — when will the healthcare executives be called on the carpet for fueling the health insurance premium increases?

Asparity Decisions Solutions, Inc., announced its Plan SmartChoice awards for the 2010 FEHBP open season.