Impeding changes to our Health Care system

[TheMercenary]

The elimination of a graduated premium, as contained in the House version, means that you cannot be charged more if you have a preexisting condition. Most say, GREAT! But in reality the costs will have to be the same across the board for everyone's premiums. Eventually even private insurance will have to do this. So what happens is they guy who is unhealthy gets to have his premium reduced, the guy who is healthy has his premium go up. Numerous organizations are attempting to figure out what that number is but no one knows for sure. One thing is for sure and that is that it will go up every year. Remember you will be mandated to buy insurance, so if you actually are lucky enough to make money were you get little to no help from the government, where does that money come from? Your pay. Current estimates are between 4 and 10% of your income. Most employer sponsored plans pay between 50-80% of your health insurance and you pay the rest. No one knows what is going to really happen with private insurance, but one thing is sure that in the House version they will pretty much have to offer what the public plan is offering 5 years out.

The bill as fashioned is to cover the under and uninsured. The problem is that it is not fashioned to cover all the people from businesses that may eventually dump their private insurance and tell people to get it on the public plan with employers paying the estimated 8% penalty as a cheaper option. Then costs for the public plan may soar out of control. There is no language in the bill which adresses reimbursement. So if the costs for the new plan goes up, and they cut all reimbursement to a Medicare/Medicaid rate many health care providers will go out of business. Malpractice rates continue to climb every year. Malpractice for an OB doc is between 80 and 120,000 dollars a year. If you run an office there is a lot of overhead. No one could survive the market if all rates were reduced to M/M standards. There are a lot of unanswered questions and left unanswered will lead to unintended consequences.

[glatt]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

So what happens is they guy who is unhealthy gets to have his premium reduced, the guy who is healthy has his premium go up.

Isn't that the whole point of insurance? You spread the costs of the sick people around to everyone. The advantage for the healthy person is that they know that if they get sick, there will be someone there to catch them when they fall.

I know I've paid a hell of a lot more into the system than I've gotten out of it. The only reason I have insurance is so that if I get sick, I don't lose my house.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by glatt

Isn't that the whole point of insurance? You spread the costs of the sick people around to everyone. The advantage for the healthy person is that they know that if they get sick, there will be someone there to catch them when they fall.

I know I've paid a hell of a lot more into the system than I've gotten out of it. The only reason I have insurance is so that if I get sick, I don't lose my house.

It is and I agree. But when the system does not allow for those with unhealthy habits or preexisting disease your heathly person/family premium will rise to cover the decrease in the other persons. It is the only way it will work. Right or wrong.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Do you really think it is going to change? All you are doing is exchanging one insurance provider for another under different rules. Rationing care is a part of every program of insurance, whether it is privately run or publically run.

I want it to be a rule that denying care doesn't profit anyone, and any rationing is based on necessity and triage. A public plan is closer to that ideal than the current system.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

I want it to be a rule that denying care doesn't profit anyone, and any rationing is based on necessity and triage. A public plan is closer to that ideal than the current system.

A public plan is still going to be administered by an insurance company. Your care will still be rationed.

[Happy Monkey]

Administered. They'll be paid to run it; they won't get to keep any health budget they don't spend.

Closer to the ideal. Not ideal.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

Administered. They'll be paid to run it; they won't get to keep any health budget they don't spend.

Closer to the ideal. Not ideal.

Think about it. You think that a private insurance company is going to do this for little to no income and reimbursement? They are going to make millions.

But people who will not have to pay for it really could care less, as long as they get their care it matters not to most who or how much the government pays them.

[Happy Monkey]

Whatever their income is, I don't want it to be increased if they deny coverage.

[TheMercenary]

With their health care plans in a holding pattern — and no George W. Bush to kick around anymore — Democrats are casting about for somebody to blame.


House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn says that Republicans have “perfected ‘just say no.’” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said insurance companies are chalking up “immoral profits.”


But even if they won’t acknowledge it publicly, most Democrats in Congress know the truth: It’s their own colleagues who are slowing down progress in both the House and the Senate

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0709/25494.html

[Happy Monkey]

This is good.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

This is good.

Those are nothing more than general goals of the Obama Admin. The Dems are wheeling and dealing with the lobbyists and there is no promise that any of that will actually come to fruition.

[TheMercenary]

Opinion bit from The WSJ.

GovernmentCare’s Assault on Seniors

By BY BETSY MCCAUGHEY
Since Medicare was established in 1965, access to care has enabled older Americans to avoid becoming disabled and to travel and live independently instead of languishing in nursing homes. But legislation now being rushed through Congress—H.R. 3200 and the Senate Health Committee Bill—will reduce access to care, pressure the elderly to end their lives prematurely, and doom baby boomers to painful later years.

The Congressional majority wants to pay for its $1 trillion to $1.6 trillion health bills with new taxes and a $500 billion cut to Medicare. This cut will come just as baby boomers turn 65 and increase Medicare enrollment by 30%. Less money and more patients will necessitate rationing. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that only 1% of Medicare cuts will come from eliminating fraud, waste and abuse.

The assault against seniors began with the stimulus package in February. Slipped into the bill was substantial funding for comparative effectiveness research, which is generally code for limiting care based on the patient’s age. Economists are familiar with the formula, where the cost of a treatment is divided by the number of years (called QALYs, or quality-adjusted life years) that the patient is likely to benefit. In Britain, the formula leads to denying treatments for older patients who have fewer years to benefit from care than younger patients.

When comparative effectiveness research appeared in the stimulus bill, Rep. Charles Boustany Jr., (R., La.) a heart surgeon, warned that it would lead to “denying seniors and the disabled lifesaving care.” He and Sen. Jon Kyl (R., Ariz.) proposed amendments to no avail that would have barred the federal government from using the research to eliminate treatments for the elderly or deny care based on age.

In a letter this week to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, White House budget chief Peter Orszag urged Congress to delegate its authority over Medicare to a newly created body within the executive branch. This measure is designed to circumvent the democratic process and avoid accountability to the public for cuts in benefits.

Continues:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...050552730.html

[TheMercenary]

Folks, you are going to be hoodwinked by backdoor deals the Dems are making with lobbyists...

snip:

The roiling debate about health-care reform has been a boon to the political fortunes of Ross and 51 other members of the Blue Dog Coalition, who have become key brokers in shaping legislation in the House. Objections from the group resulted in a compromise bill announced this week that includes higher payments for rural providers and softens a public insurance option that industry groups object to. The deal also would allow states to set up nonprofit cooperatives to offer coverage, a Republican-generated idea that insurers favor as an alternative to a public insurance option.

At the same time, the group has set a record pace for fundraising this year through its political action committee, surpassing other congressional leadership PACs in collecting more than $1.1 million through June. More than half the money came from the health-care, insurance and financial services industries, marking a notable surge in donations from those sectors compared with earlier years, according to an analysis by the Center for Public Integrity.

A look at career contribution patterns also shows that typical Blue Dogs receive significantly more money -- about 25 percent -- from the health-care and insurance sectors than other Democrats, putting them closer to Republicans in attracting industry support.

Records of political fundraisers since 2008 compiled by the Sunlight Foundation, a Washington-based watchdog group, show a steady schedule of events for Ross sponsored by the health industry or lobbying firms that represent health-care companies. They include two "health-care lunches" at Capitol Hill restaurants in May 2008 and March 2009, as well as receptions sponsored by Patton Boggs and other major lobbying firms.

Overall, the typical Blue Dog has received $63,000 more in campaign contributions from the health-care sector than other House Democrats over the past two decades, according to the CRP analysis. The top three recipients were Rep. Earl Pomeroy (N.D.), with $1.5 million, and Tennessee Reps. Bart Gordon and John Tanner, both of whom collected over $1.2 million from the industry and its employees, according to the data.

David Donnelly, national campaigns director for the Public Campaign Action Fund, which favors public financing of political races, said the heavy industry contributions cast doubt on the Blue Dogs' motives.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...l?hpid=topnews

[TheMercenary]

How influence is directed to get what the industry wants in health care reform.

Sorry this is so big.

http://assets.sunlightfoundation.com...fc_health.html

[TheMercenary]

This is great. From the link above. How all the parties, dems, repubs, etc are in on making deals. It is in a Google Map format but with peoples names and their key positions, and the companies with a finger in the pie.

http://www.sunlightfoundation.com/pr...lex/#democrats

The map shows only ten of the thirteen committee Democrats, as OpenSecrets.org does not report any staffers turned health care lobbyists for Sens. Jay Rockefeller, Jeff Bingaman or Bill Nelson. These ten Democrats are connected to a total of 20 former staffers turned health care lobbyists. Sen. Baucus leads all of the committee Democrats with five health care lobbyist connections and Sen. Chuck Schumer and Tom Carper both have three connections.

These 20 staffers represent approximately 91 different organizations, often overlapping in the clients they handle. The overlap usually occurs when the health care lobbyists are employed at the same firm. This can be seen clearly with David Castagnetti, Sen. Baucus’ former chief of staff, and Kelly Bingel, Sen. Blanche Lincoln’s former chief of staff. Both Castagnetti and Bingel work for Mehlmen Vogel Castagnetti Inc. and handle nearly all the same clients.

The organizations represented by these 20 health care lobbyists include some of the biggest opponents to center piece of President Obama’s health care plan: the public option. These include the American Medical Association, the American Hospital Association, PhRMA, and various pharmaceutical, medical device and insurance companies. The Senate Finance Committee is seen as the biggest obstacle to the public option.

When it comes to money from the health care and insurance industries, [Sen. John Kerry, the 2004 Democratic nominee for president, leads the pack. For senators who have not run for the presidency, which requires raising exhorbitant amounts of money, Sen. Baucus is ahead of other committee Democrats with Sens. Schumer and Kent Conrad following close behind. See the table below:

In the interest of fairness:

The money from the health and insurance industries into Republican committee member campaigns is relatively high. The insurance industry is the top contributor to Sen. Grassley’s campaigns over his career. Pharmaceutical companies are the top contributors to Sen. Hatch’s campaigns. In fact, every Republican committee member has a health or insurance industry as their one or more of their top five career contributors.

Keep in mind that the Republickins control no committees, neither majority in Congress, nor any other area where they can control the outcome of legislation.