WHEN we are patients, we want our doctors to make recommendations that are in our best interests as individuals.

It's not news that the federal government has a serious issue with improper payments. During each of the last five years, agencies have doled out more than $100 billion in erroneous payments from various major benefit programs.

Six years ago, Rosa Acevedo left her daughter Moraina, 3, at home with her parents in Mexico so she could chase her American dream of earning $8.25 to $9.25 an hour picking grapes, strawberries and tomatoes in the San Joaquin Valley.

Health plan sign-ups in the first four days of Covered California's second season outpaced the early days of last year's maiden enrollment period by nearly four times, the state's Obamacare health insurance exchange said Thursday.

The federal government shelled out billions of dollars to get health insurance marketplaces going in the 14 states that opted to run their own.

The Obama administration took another step to close what many see as a health-law loophole that allows large employers to offer medical plans without hospital coverage and bars their workers from subsidies to buy their own insurance.