Politics
Okay, so you are one of those who wants nothing done about health care reform. You aren't a Republican Representative or Senator because they say we do need to do something but they haven't yet said what that might be. Well actually they have said that no plan should pass today without 80% of the Senators voting for it. It's gone from needing 51% to 60% and now the bar got raised even farther (too bad they didn't follow that one when they signed up for the tax cuts on the richest or the Iraqi war which are both still causing our budget so much trouble) Anyway, you are however one who thinks the current medical system is just fine; so what do you think about:
Insurance companies wanting 35% profits?
62% of the bankruptcies that were filed in 2007 were health care related okay with you?
What about denial of coverage due to pre-existing conditions like say cancer or high blood pressure?
Here's another one that was brought up in comments but I haven't heard much about in the public discussion. Too many physicians go into specialties that could make them big money, like say surgeons, but they don't want to go into general practice anymore or geriatric specialties because there isn't as much money in it. Should the government have a say in this since most doctors receive some help to get their education? Socialized medicine? When all you can pick from are specialists, will you consider that a problem?
If you think government intervention in health care is always bad, would you refuse to take the government's help if you lost your job and they offered (as they do under the Stimulus Bill) to pay 2/3 of the premium for Cobra? Is that socialized medicine?
Is the medical help Veterans receive socialized medicine? If not, why not? How about the elderly with Medicare?
Have you ever actually looked into how people feel about their coverage in those countries with medical care underwritten in some way by the government?
Where do you get most of your insurance reform information?
Those questions were to make you think, but my actual question is if you believe anything at all needs to be done, what would it be?
I know the Republican politicians have a plan. It's do nothing about this and cause Obama to lose popularity enough that they see our next president be Sarah Palin (their current favorite by a large margin to run for president) or maybe Tim Pawlenty who believes in creationism which means god has his finger in every pie. No problem is too big for his god.
These politicians in the Congress believe, egged on by the media, that there is blood on the water and like all good sharks, they are circling. The problems of American people with medical care isn't as important as making Obama lose the next election and getting a Republican majority in the House and Senate in 2010. They definitely have a plan all right. They want more of the eight glorious years they had under Bush the little.
Is that your plan also? Bring about Obama's loss as a way to get him out of office and forget the American people who are either under or un-insured? If that is so, I would bet you are currently insured and worried more about buying your next boat than how to pay for your kid's appendectomy. If I am wrong, please tell me what the country should be doing about the issues I raised above while keeping in mind that at the rate medical costs are rising, most Americans will have to pay 50% of their income for medical care. Most of you just don't know the true cost of what those costs are today because your employer has been paying it. When that stops, you will learn.
11 comments:
Very well put together statement. And you who are insured by your employer, have you tried to get medical care recently?
OK Rain. I accept your challenge. Here are my rapidly typed in thoughts to your questions. I tried to leave your questions and my answers but it is too large for Blogger to accept it.
Yes the system needs reform. I think most people agree with that. But most people do not want single payer and they do not want Congress intruding into their lives any more than is necessary. It is funny that the same people that do not want airlines to know our names or the FBI to listen to terrorist phone calls due to privacy concerns are now happy to have the government have access to their bank accounts and have their full medical history.
This is America if they make big profits then they pay big taxes. Let the insurance companies compete across state lines and those profit margins will go down. Let’s increase competition not decrease it.
Let’s really reform how much healthcare cost and look at Tort reform. Why can somebody that only values their own life at $35,000 because that is all the life insurance they carry suddenly think it is worth $3,000,000 when it is time to sue a doctor?
I agree completely that pre-existing conditions needs to be reformed. My boss has a 23-year-old son with high blood pressure and he cannot get insurance and my best friends daughter has some minor condition that getting coverage has been next to impossible.
Why isn’t there money in geriatric care? The nations population is aging; this should be a booming market. The reason is because Medicare has limited payments to the point that doctors are losing money by treating Medicare patients. This is what will happen for all doctors once we have a Medicare type national health system for all of us.
Cobra help is ok with me especially in these tough economic times. Cobra is very expensive. It is not socialized medicine because the doctor and patient still make the medical decisions, with cost containment input from the insurance company.
Veterans served their country and medical coverage is one of the benefits of that service. There are income cutoffs for benefits so it is just a safety net for the poorer veterans. If you serve you get some benefit. No complaint from me. Medicare is sort of like socialized medicine because the government gets involved in the decisions by controlling the checkbook.
I have read many articles from other countries.
I get information from talking to friends. Reading many sources on the Internet. Talking to the many nurses and doctors that I know. And of course by listening to radio and TV.
I think we need to allow more insurance competition by allowing them to cross state lines. I think we need tort reform. And I think we need to limit what insurance companies can do about pre-existing conditions. If we can make cell phone companies let you keep your number from company to company then we can make insurance companies take you. And we need to do something to provide coverage to the 20 million or so people that truly do not have coverage and want it.
In 1993 President Clinton said that medical costs would be 20% of GDP by 2000. Well it is up to 17% this year so it is rising, but do not always believe all the scare tactics on either side of an issue. And life is all about choices. I pay extra because I do not want an HMO. I want a good PPO insurance plan so I pay for it. And I know exactly what I pay and what my employer pays for health insurance.
Thank you, ingineer, for your thinking on real ideas. Often we have to agree to disagree.
Nobody currently is suggesting single payer. They are not suggesting that anybody have doctors who are government employees. If we got a public option, people could still choose their doctors, etc. Right now you cannot get just any care you want. That has to be okayed by most insurance plans.
I would have to think about the tort reform questions because the reason someone sues for more is because they feel wronged and it's how they punish the system. One solution would be to have the lawsuits but the profit does not go to the individual. If a doctor does something egregious, should he not pay some price for it? Lawsuits might currently get ridiculous and end up sympathy suits but that should not happen.
As for the gov't having personal info. You didn't mind when Bush wanted it for terrorism (with nno proof it was limited to terrorists). They could and have always been able to get into anybody's system right now. Suddenly it's threatening?
I always said you guys were giving away power and someday it might not be in your party's hands. Well someday is here.b43
b43 is apparently a typo, not a code word *s*
Nobody is suggesting single payer right now because they know it is not wanted, but Obama has said he was a single payer guy. So that is what worries me. And a lot of the big unions are for single payer and Obama has been in the unions pocket. The current Democrat plan is a step towards single payer. And yes they are saying it is an option, but there are 1200 pages of fine print that limits your options. And I do not trust the politicians with much of anything right now and certainly not my health.
Honestly I am not worried about listening to my phone calls or my medical records. I mean if Hillary can go through the FBI files of Republican donors as First Lady then there are probably not many things left that are secret.
I would favor single payer also but it's not going to happen and a public option will only give some control over costs. Without it, what will keep prices down?
The government has had the ability to spy on us since I was born and before. I don't remotely know why we'd worry about them seeing our medical records but they wouldn't as they'd be the payer, not the provider. We would pay a fee to them, as we currently do with Medicare and the doctor etc. would be who they have always been.
Insurance companies have had astronomical profits the last 8 years and what will keep that from growing if there is no stop on them? Competition doesn't do much for gasoline companies-- or is there any there today?
I also hear that even with our current system, to get into a specialist, like say a gastroenterologist, you can have to wait a year in many areas. We need to rethink how we get our doctors trained.
We currently do not have the best medical system in the world. The World Health Organization, in 2000, ranked the U.S. health care system as the highest in cost, first in responsiveness, 37th in overall performance, and 72nd by overall level of health (among 191 member nations included in the study). A 2008 report by the Commonwealth Fund ranked the United States last in the quality of health care among the 19 compared countries. The U.S. has a higher infant mortality rate than all other developed countries. This is the best system we can provide?
The infant mortality rate is astounding in this country. I believe it is mostly due to drug use. There are many programs to help expectant moms whether they can afford it or not. But if the mother is a crack whore, there is no amount of medical care or nutrition help that will cure them.
Are you saying that our infant mortality rate is so high because we are a more drugged up people than any other developed nation? Wouldn't that make you wonder what is wrong here or can you blame that all on environmentalists or liberals? I suspect we don't use more drugs than many other developed nations (although I don't really know) but we provide less help for the babies than they do... However if it's that we are more druggies than it might not be surprising that our nation is having the problems it is with a lot of things :(
And ingineer, thank you for the good discussion on this. We all benefit when differing viewpoints can be expressed without rudeness or insults. I recognize that's not always easy on either side of this debate.
No not blaming our horrible infant mortality rate on environmentalists. I do not know the exact causes I only know that it is terrible compared to the rest of the developed world. And I know there are a lot of programs for low and no income people to get help. The costs of neonatal intensive care are astronomical so preventive care is much cheaper.
I have not seen enough of the statistics to know for sure what the main causes are. But I do know that we have a lot of babies born with drug addiction because the mother was on drugs in the cities and rural areas and I know our inner cities are like 3rd world countries.
In looking around, I found this: Infant mortality. I don't really think drugs could be the main factor given the nations that excel over us. I do think prenatal care might be a major factor; and if you are working poor (but not poor enough to qualify for Medicaid), you probably don't get in for those visits. It is well known that taking folic acid helps with pregnancies and again, it's ignorance and dollars that probably make the difference.
Post a Comment