WWSG Exclusive
Healthcare Policy Expert; Founder, Fire Arrow Consulting; Former Assistant to the President; Former Director of the Domestic Policy Council
Joseph Grogan is a healthcare expert with a unique blend of private sector and government experience spanning over two decades in the Washington, D.C. healthcare arena. He is also a policy thought leader who has played a key role in the health sector’s most consequential debates of the last decade.
The Future of Healthcare
Federation of American Hospitals Annual Meeting
Finding a Cure for the Cost of Durable Therapies
How can America avoid bankrupting itself on health care spending? Spending on major U.S. healthcare programs like Medicare, Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act as a share of non-interest payments is projected to increase from 28% in 2019 to 41% by 2051. Medicare spending alone will increase from $796 billion in 2019 to $1.7 trillion by 2031 and growing deficits are projected to drive federal debt held by the public to unprecedented levels over the next 30 years.
The dominant view in Washington, D.C. will remain that healthcare markets are irretrievably broken and that only the government can allocate care equitably and control costs. Even those who object to single payer approaches often provide as an alternative a technocratic approach to health care informed by a lack of faith in private sector solutions. But was the market ever given a chance?
In this speech, Joe discusses how policy experts and policymakers on both sides of the aisle fail to study and respect the power of health care markets to lower costs and provide access. Joe will describe why he thinks both Republicans and Democrats have gotten off course and lay out a balanced strategy to rethinking America’s health care approach, so that innovation and access can be balanced, resulting in lower costs.
How can the U.S. healthcare system accommodate innovation while providing equitable access? In every other area of the U.S. economy, innovation drives costs down. In healthcare, innovative services, devices, and pharmaceuticals are often treated with hostility by both policymakers and payers. However, legacy products are often protected by legislators.
In this talk, Joe calls upon his experiences at Gilead Sciences, Inc. during the blockbuster launch of a cure for Hepatitis C, his work at the Food and Drug Administration, the Office of Management and Budget, and in the West Wing of the White House to map a bipartisan approach to healthcare that focuses on the dignity of all patients, provides access for all, and allows American innovation to flourish.
Politics, Science, and Ethics: A Conversation With Joe Grogan and Dr. Robert Redfield
Few debates have roiled Washington, D.C. more in recent years than arguments about the role of politics in scientific pursuit and communication. Recent revelations about human genetics experiments and Gain-of-Function research paid for with U.S. taxpayer dollars and occurring all over the world have cracked open deep questions about the ethics of some scientific pursuits. How should scientists consider ethics and morality in what they choose to pursue? How should Congress and policymakers set scientific priorities about what should be funded? Should all scientific knowledge be published for public consumption or is it sometimes appropriate to conceal knowledge for the public good?
In this discussion, Joe Grogan sits down with Robert Redfield to discuss Dr. Redfield’s former research efforts as an active-duty US Army officer, co-founding the University of Maryland Institute of Human Virology, and his experience as Director of CDC. They discuss how Congress funds health research, how the executive branch sets research priority, and why both policymakers and the public need to debate and scrutinize these efforts more closely.
Why is the “Value Revolution” in health care always just around the corner? Will it ever arrive? What defines value in the context of health care? Who benefits from this value and how is it measured? What is often branded as “value” is a description of cost avoidance. While patient outcomes are sometimes improved, patients capture little of the savings discussed.
In this speech, Joe explains why the current approach to pursuing value in health care is off track, and provides insight about why it should be re-thought fundamentally, from the perspective of the patient.
Joe Grogan was a member of the White House’s COVID-19 Task Force, where he worked with Executive Branch officials to respond to the COVID-19 public health emergency. Joe is currently working with Covid Collaborative, an organization aimed at turning the tide on the pandemic by supporting federal, state, and local COVID-19 response efforts. America’s Covid response revealed deep flaws in the government’s public health system. In this presentation, Joe looks at both sides of the coin:
Joe Grogan has played a major role in some of the most significant healthcare policy fights and dramas that America has faced in recent memory. From running the Washington D.C. office of Gilead Sciences, Inc. during the launch of Sovaldi for Hepatitis C—the most lucrative and controversial drug launch in history—to serving on the White House Covid-19 task force during the first critical months of the pandemic, Joe brings a unique perspective as someone who has seen healthcare policy from both within corporations and as a policy maker.
In the George W. Bush Administration, he started his healthcare career at the Department of Health and Human services working on issues affecting the social determinants of health and economic empowerment. He went on to serve as Executive Director of the President’s Advisory Council on HIV and AIDS, where he first collaborated with many of the same scientists and companies who would play a such a pivotal role in the Covid-19 pandemic years later. Finally, he served at the Food and Drug Administration as a Senior Policy Advisor where he confronted major public health scares stemming from tainted medical products originating in China, as well as critical policy issues such as the reauthorization of the Prescription Drug User Fee Act.
After leaving the Bush Administration, he served as a consultant to Wall Street investors before joining Amgen and ultimately Gilead Sciences. In the Trump Administration, Grogan took a major role in shaping healthcare policy as Associate Director for Health Programs managing a budget of over 1.3 trillion domestic health spending. In his two years in this role, Grogan shaped every major regulation issued by the Department of Health and Human Services. Ultimately, he assumed the role of Assistant to President Trump and Director of the Domestic Policy Council where he is widely credited with reinvigorating the office and turning around an office that was in disarray. Upon leaving the White House in May, he has consulted for some of America’s most important health care companies. He is frequently called upon by corporate management as well as leaders on Capitol Hill. Joseph has been published in the WSJ, Newsweek, and many other widely read publications.
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