Phillip Longman recently wrote an interesting article for the Washington Monthly about Obama’s Stimulus Bill and its impact to the implementation of FOSS in the American health care system.
Titled “Code Red – How software companies could screw up Obama’s health care reform” he gives introductorily a short overview about the drawbacks of the current health care system and the idea behind Obama’s Stimulous Bill aka American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).
He subsequently provides detailed insights about Electronic Medical Record (EMR) implementations across the U.S. in which the adoption of FOSS has considerably increased the quality of care and reduced costs in contrast to proprietary EMR solutions.
His actual point is that the bill and the thereby provided money (about $ 20 billion) is about to be restricted only to proprietary EMR software companies in case their lobbying succeeds.