Julie Rovner

Julie Rovner is a health policy correspondent for NPR specializing in the politics of health care.

Reporting on all aspects of health policy and politics, Rovner covers the White House, Capitol Hill, the Department of Health and Human Services in addition to issues around the country. She served as NPR's lead correspondent covering the passage and implementation of the 2010 health overhaul bill, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

A noted expert on health policy issues, Rovner is the author of a critically-praised reference book Health Care Politics and Policy A-Z. Rovner is also co-author of the book Managed Care Strategies 1997, and has contributed to several other books, including two chapters in Intensive Care: How Congress Shapes Health Policy, edited by political scientists Norman Ornstein and Thomas Mann.

In 2005, Rovner was awarded the Everett McKinley Dirksen Award for distinguished reporting of Congress for her coverage of the passage of the Medicare prescription drug law and its aftermath.

Rovner has appeared on television on the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, CNN, C-Span, MSNBC, and NOW with Bill Moyers. Her articles have appeared in dozens of national newspapers and magazines, including The Washington Post, USA Today, Modern Maturity, and The Saturday Evening Post.

Prior to NPR, Rovner covered health and human services for the Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report, specializing in health care financing, abortion, welfare, and disability issues. Later she covered health reform for the Medical News Network, an interactive daily television news service for physicians, and provided analysis and commentary on the health reform debates in Congress for NPR. She has been a regular contributor to the British medical journal The Lancet. Her columns on patients' rights for the magazine Business and Health won her a share of the 1999 Jesse H. Neal National Business Journalism Award.

An honors graduate, Rovner has a degree in political science from University of Michigan-Ann Arbor.

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Shots - Health Blog
4:26 pm
Fri July 6, 2012

More Answers To Your Questions About The Health Care Law

Credit Adam Cole / NPR
The Affordable Care Act remains pretty much intact after its review by the Supreme Court. So what's in it anyway?

Originally published on Tue July 10, 2012 4:46 pm

Now that the Supreme Court has upheld almost all of the Affordable Care Act, many Americans are scrambling to remember — or learn for the first time – what's in the law and how it works.

We asked for questions from our audiences online and on air. Here's are some, edited for clarity and length, and the answers:

Q: Will the penalty for not having health insurance affect people at all income levels, or will low-income people be spared?

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Shots - Health Blog
2:32 pm
Tue July 3, 2012

True Or False? Elected Officials Interpret The Health Law

Credit Michael Conroy / AP
Louisiana Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal wants the administration's health care law repealed.

How well do you remember what's actually in the Affordable Care Act?

Last week's Supreme Court decision upholding President Obama's signature domestic achievement has thrust the measure back into the spotlight, where it's likely to remain through the presidential election.

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NPR Story
4:55 am
Tue July 3, 2012

Post Supreme Court: Let's Review Health Care Law

Originally published on Tue July 3, 2012 6:43 am

Last week's Supreme Court decision upholding the Affordable Care Act has brought the 2010 law back into the news. If you've forgotten all the things that are in the massive measure, never fear. Morning Edition has this refresher course.

Shots - Health Blog
6:28 pm
Fri June 29, 2012

The Day After A Health Care Crescendo, Each Side Plays A Familiar Refrain

Credit David Goldman / AP
Joy Reynolds of San Diego, Calif., looks over Friday's front pages on display at the Newseum in Washington, the day after the Supreme Court ruling on President Barack Obama's health care law.

Originally published on Fri June 29, 2012 10:26 pm

On the day after the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of President Obama's health care law, Washington returned to business as usual.

In other words, supporters of the law were busy praising its virtues, and opponents calling for its demise.

Over at Georgetown University Law Center, several health law experts got together to dissect the court's ruling and what it might mean down the line.

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Shots - Health Blog
11:13 pm
Thu June 28, 2012

High Court Health Care Ruling Shifts Action To States

Credit Kevin Dietsch / UPI /Landov
Protesters and supporters of President Obama's health care law await the Supreme Court's ruling Thursday. The court ruled to uphold the law. The focus now shifts to the states, which are responsible for the lion's share of getting people without insurance covered.

Originally published on Fri June 29, 2012 9:27 pm

The Supreme Court's decision to uphold nearly all of the Affordable Care Act may move the debate to the presidential campaign trail. But it shifts much of the burden of implementing the law to the states.

States are actually responsible for the lion's share of getting people without insurance covered under the health law.

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Shots - Health Blog
5:01 pm
Wed June 27, 2012

Medicaid Expansion Goes Overlooked In Supreme Court Anticipation

Credit Adam Cole / NPR
When the U.S. Supreme Court rules Thursday on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act, it will also rule on whether the expansion of Medicaid is an unconstitutional infringement of states' rights.

Originally published on Wed June 27, 2012 6:20 pm

When the Supreme Court announces its long-anticipated decision on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act on Thursday, all eyes will be on the so-called individual mandate. That's the section of the law that requires most Americans to either have health insurance or pay a penalty starting in 2014.

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Shots - Health Blog
6:04 am
Sun June 24, 2012

Countdown To The Supreme Court's Ruling On Health Care

Credit Alex Wong / Getty Images
People wait outside the Supreme Court last week for word on the fate of the federal health overhaul law.

Originally published on Thu June 28, 2012 8:46 am

Anticipation has reached a fever pitch, and the waiting is almost over.

This week, the Supreme Court is almost certain to issue its decision on the constitutionality of President Obama's health care law. The decision could have far-reaching implications for the legal landscape, the nation's health care system and even the Supreme Court's legacy.

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Shots - Health Blog
3:04 am
Fri June 22, 2012

Why Many Young Adults Might Lose Coverage If Health Law Falls

Credit Courtesy of June Blender
Jackson Cahn, who graduated from Whitman College in Walla Walla, Wash., is one of the 3 million young adults the Obama administration says would have risked going without insurance if the health care law hadn't allowed them to stay on their parents' policies. Because of the law, his mother, June Blender, was able to add him to her insurance.

Originally published on Thu June 28, 2012 9:39 am

When it comes to health care, even the seemingly easy things become hard.

Take coverage for young adults under the Affordable Care Act.

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Shots - Health Blog
6:15 pm
Tue June 19, 2012

How Opponents Won The Health Care Messaging War

OK, so it's not exactly news that the Obama administration hasn't done the best job in the world selling the Affordable Care Act to the American public.

But now the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism has some statistics to demonstrate just how sorry that job has been. And it suggests that the media gets at least some of the blame.

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It's All Politics
4:30 pm
Mon June 18, 2012

A Horse Is A Horse, Unless Of Course It's Ann Romney's Dressage Champ

Originally published on Mon June 18, 2012 7:26 pm

Shots - Health Blog
12:09 pm
Fri June 15, 2012

Insurers Wait For Verdict On Health Care Law And Their Bottom Line

Credit John Rose / NPR
Demonstrators both for and against the health care law turned out on the steps of the Supreme Court on March 27, the second day of oral arguments before the court.

Originally published on Fri June 15, 2012 6:25 pm

All eyes these days are trained on the U.S. Supreme Court, which is expected to rule sometime this month on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act.

But some people are waiting more anxiously for the court to rule than others. Among them are those with a major financial stake in whether the law goes forward or not and if so, in what form.

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Shots - Health Blog
5:00 pm
Thu June 7, 2012

Abortion-Rights Advocates Pin Hopes On Defense Bill

Credit Alex Wong / Getty Images
U.S. Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), center, speaks as Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), right, and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) at a April news conference on Capitol Hill.

Since Republicans took back the U.S. House in the 2010 elections, abortion has been a fairly constant theme. The House took eight separate abortion-related votes in 2011 — the most in a decade, according to NARAL Pro-Choice America.

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Shots - Health Blog
7:08 pm
Tue June 5, 2012

Romney's Health Care Prescription Gives Some Conservatives Heartburn

Credit Charles Dharapak / AP
Mitt Romney (right), at the time the governor of Massachusetts, greets then-Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt during a National Governors Association forum in February 2006. Romney reportedly has tapped Leavitt to head his presidential transition team.

Originally published on Wed June 6, 2012 8:33 am

GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney insists that when it comes to health care, his first priority is the full repeal of the 2010 Affordable Care Act.

But some of his actions of the past few days have conservatives scratching their heads.

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Shots - Health Blog
3:27 pm
Fri May 25, 2012

Backers Of Cost-Free Coverage For Birth Control Fault Legal Challenges

Credit Andrew Shaw / iStockphoto.com

You know all those lawsuits now pending around the country charging that the Obama administration's rule requiring most health insurance plans to offer no-cost contraception is a violation of religious freedom?

Well, a whole bunch of supporters of the rule are chiming in now to say that argument has no legal merit.

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Shots - Health Blog
5:27 pm
Wed May 23, 2012

By Putting Patients First, Hospital Tries To Make Care More Personal

Originally published on Wed May 23, 2012 7:22 pm

No one likes to go to the hospital.

But some hospitals around the nation are trying to make their patients' stays a little less unpleasant.

They're members of an organization called Planetree, which was founded by a patient named Angelica Thieriot, who had a not-so-good hospital experience back in the 1970s.

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