George Halvorson

The health care reform law is changing the way care is delivered in the United States--for the better. And as those changes take hold, unit-based teams are a big plus for Kaiser Permanente, says George Halvorson, chairman and CEO of Kaiser Foundation Hospitals and Kaiser Foundation Health Plan. Watch highlights of George's recent conversation with senior LMP VP Barb Grimm. (Interested in learning even more? View Halvorson's slide deck from the 2011 Union Delegates Conference.)

Where are you going to get the likes of KP CEO George Halvorson, John Sweeney, AFL-CIO president emeritus, the LMP’s Barb Grimm, John August of the Union Coalition, Darth Vader, Spider Man and a small cast of cuckoos in one place? Hollywood, that’s where! The 2010 Union Delegate Conference was held at the Hollywood Renaissance Hotel in the heart of La La Land.

“We are proving to the world it can be done,” George Halvorson, chief executive officer  and president of Kaiser Health Plan and Hospitals, told the delegates in the opening plenary session this morning (March 13). Proving, that is, that quality health care can be delivered at lower costs.

More than 600 delegates opened their annual conference on March 12 with a tribute to John Sweeney, president emeritus of the AFL-CIO.   Before the event got under way, Union Coalition Executive Director John August caught up with Sweeney, who played a pivotal role in launching the Partnership in 1997. The two chatted about where the Partnership has come and where we're headed.