Laura Knoy

A recent national study of how much hospitals charge Medicare showed giant disparities among different facilities, even for the same procedures and within the same city!  The research comes as policymakers intensify their focus on costs.  We’ll explore why these huge variations exist, and efforts to reduce the price tag at hospitals in the Granite State.

Guests

Michael Green – President and CEO of Concord Hospital

Ned Helms –Director of the New Hampshire Institute for Health Policy and Practice at UNH

A recent national study of how much hospitals charge Medicare showed giant disparities among different facilities, even for the same procedures and within the same city!  The research comes as policymakers intensify their focus on costs.  We’ll explore why these huge variations exist, and efforts to reduce the price tag at hospitals in the Granite State.

Guests

Michael Green – President and CEO of Concord Hospital

Ned Helms –Director of the New Hampshire Institute for Health Policy and Practice at UNH

A recent national study of how much hospitals charge Medicare showed giant disparities among different facilities, even for the same procedures and within the same city!  The research comes as policymakers intensify their focus on costs.  We’ll explore why these huge variations exist, and efforts to reduce the price tag at hospitals in the Granite State.

Guests

Michael Green – President and CEO of Concord Hospital

Ned Helms –Director of the New Hampshire Institute for Health Policy and Practice at UNH

A recent national study of how much hospitals charge Medicare showed giant disparities among different facilities, even for the same procedures and within the same city!  The research comes as policymakers intensify their focus on costs.  We’ll explore why these huge variations exist, and efforts to reduce the price tag at hospitals in the Granite State.

Guests

Michael Green – President and CEO of Concord Hospital

Ned Helms –Director of the New Hampshire Institute for Health Policy and Practice at UNH

With lots of proposals on the table right now, from biomass to wind to hydropower, efforts are underway once again to develop a statewide plan and judge these projects with that broader frame of reference in mind.   But it’s not an easy process, taking into account various concerns from the environment to property values to energy costs.  

Guests

New Hampshire is among some forty states to adopt this more rigorous set of standards for math and language arts in public schools. But just as this bi-partisan effort becomes reality, the system is facing some backlash from both the right and left. We’ll find out more about Common Core and the challenges it faces getting off the ground.

Guests:

A pivotal vote in the House this week on expanded gambling as a super-committee advises the full house to vote “no”.  Also, how big is that budget hole?  Depends on who you ask: the State Senate says more than $160 million.  And, yes, it’s early, but there’s already a plethora of presidential polls for 2016. 

Guests

Started in 2009, Stay Work Play is an initiative aimed at attracting and retaining young adults in the Granite State.  But New Hampshire’s demographic is still among the oldest in the nation.We’ll look at this effort and how it’s going, also what obstacles those who want to “stay, work, and play” face, from high housing costs to lack of nightlife. 

Guests

A recent report by the Center for Disease Control shows a huge jump in the number of American kids with food and skin allergies. Some are so severe, they’re life-threatening.  There are several theories about why this is happening, including the proliferation of anti-bacterial soaps.  We’ll talk about that, and why advances in treatment has been so frustratingly slow. 

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Following the Boston Marathon bombings many Muslims in New England said they felt under scrutiny once again as reports of the attackers links to extreme Islamic ideology emerged. We’ll talk with Muslims here in New Hampshire about what kind of conversations are going on within their own communities, as well as the perceptions they encounter from others.

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As the national economic mood picks up will New Hampshire join the party?  U.S. unemployment is tracking downward, the stock market is going up, and housing trends look strong in many parts of the country. Meanwhile, here in the Granite State, the recovery’s been steady but lackluster. We’ll look at where the economic promise and perils may be found, moving forward.  

Guests:

Today on The Exchange, it's our Friday New Hampshire News Roundup. We're looking at some of the top stories of the week, from the one public hearing held on the state Senate's budget, to the House's hard look at the Senate casino bill, and the removal of "grow your own" policy from the medical marijuana bill.

Guests:

Kevin Landrigan - Longtime political reporter for the Telegraph of Nashua.

This week, U.S. concerns over the civil war in Syria escalated with talk of chemical weapons and the real fear that the conflict could spill over in the broader Middle East including Israel.  Now there’s debate in Washington about how this country should respond what the so-called “red-line is” and whether the Americans public is willing to cross it. 

Guests

Social In-security!  President Obama has said he’s willing to make changes in the nation’s safety-net system for the elderly…as part of overall efforts to reduce the debt.  But he’s getting lots of criticism for it…especially from his liberal base.  We’ll examine the President’s ideas….including a controversial proposal to use a new measure of inflation called “chained CPI”.

Guests:

Our founding fathers established this right to be “secure against unreasonable search and seizure” but how far should that right extend?   In the age of terrorism, how broad should police surveillance powers be...in the interest of public safety?  And how do past debates shape our understanding of this amendment today?

Guests: