On November 7, with a number of amendments from its original form, the health care reform bill was passed with a slim margin of victory. While it is an important step, a number of steps remain before the bill is signed into law. The amended form of the health care bill includes concessions to pro-life democratic congressmen, who would only pledge their signatures after the bill was amended to include no support for abortions under the government-run public option. The passed version of the bill only garnered one vote from a Republican.

The bill now faces an equally rough ride in the Senate. Republicans in the Senate can come up with a number of amendments for the bill and keep it tied up for weeks, a threat that severely impairs the end-of-year deadline set by President Obama. House Republicans have said that the bill would be “dead on arrival” to the Senate floor.

The Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid, is waiting to receive a cost estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office for the Senate version of the legislation before unveiling it. Once that estimate is in, Reid could use a procedural technique known as reconciliation to avoid a Republican filibuster and get the bill passed before the end-of-year deadline. To do so, however, may be politically explosive as it would signal an end to the bipartisan negotiations that President Obama has tried to foster throughout the health care reform debate.

You can read more on the most current developments at CBS News.

The Schwitzer Health News Blog recently published a post about journalistic integrity and responsibility in regards to online health news comments.  The blog referred to an incident with the New York Times’ online edition, where they published an article about how there were a lack of answers for men with prostate cancer.  The article received over 150 comments within a few days, some of which demanded answers from the journalist.  What are the responsibilities of electronic publishers and the journalists who write such articles?

Journalists usually try to respond to every relevant query about their article.  However, the easy access offered commenters by online mediums allows anyone on a lunch break to pop on the computer, make a passionate comment, and then merrily log off without a second thought as to whether or not their opinions will be heard.  Why should you answer comments when you don’t know if your answer will be read?

The editorial responsibility lies in two areas – to provide a method of communication for readers while keeping personnel capabilities in mind.  Perhaps one way to do this would be to have a check box present when a commenter makes a comment, asking whether or not they would like an answer to their query.  Either that, or a short sentence asking the commenter to e-mail the editorial department with their comment if they want to receive an answer.  That way, those who want an answer will make it clear.  In the case where an editor knows that they cannot commit resources, they can outline in this area that comments will not be treated as online comments only and will not be addressed by the editorial department.  Either way, they should make their policies clear in a place where commenters will read them, not just on the “legal terms” area of the website.

While this could be said to be true of all news sites, it is particularly important in health and medical news as commenters are more likely to take the lack of response to their comments more seriously.  These are very personal issues for the people commenting and therefore the kind of issues that may actually lead to legal intervention.  Keeping this in mind, any responses to commenters should be made by way of a private e-mail or other method of private communication, so as to protect the publishing organization and the journalist from any potential legal fallout.  If the publishing organization is large enough, a lawyer should be consulted as to the best way to approach this issue.  If it isn’t large enough, the answer is simple – make your policies extra clear and give a response of some kind, even if that response is that there will be no response at all.

What do you think?  When you read blogs that have online health news, do you expect a response if you leave comments?  What responsibility do blogs or websites, such as eMatchPhysicians.com, have when they publish health or medical news?

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