One of the biggest selling points of the healthcare reform legislation -- a reason why we are supposed to just accept the massive concessions to the insurance industry and drug companies -- has been the promise that the private insurers would finally be banned from the disgraceful practices of denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions.
For anyone not interested in slogging through the debate on the 500-odd amendments to the Baucus bill, it has become increasingly and painfully apparent that the healthcare legislation soon to emerge from at least the Senate will fall far short in reigning in out of control health care costs.
That lapse is especially ironic in that "affordability" is perhaps the only goal that seems to top everyone's to do list, from President Obama to the "keep the government hands off my (government-financed) Medicare" crowd.
But as long as our policy makers refuse to throw the elephant out of the room, the insurance company pirates and their predatory pricing practices, all their subsidies and tweaking will amount to little more than an umbrella in a hurricane.
It's time to stop talking about make believe death panels, and talk about the real ones.
Six of California's biggest insurance companies have rejected more than one in five claims the past seven years -- according to data the insurance giants, Blue Cross, PacifiCare, Kaiser Permanente, Health Net, Cigna, and Aetna report to the state Department of Managed Care.
Thousands of people are lined up in front of a sports arena waiting to receive the health care they desperately need from a nonprofit that specializes in treating patients from the developing world. Some of their grateful patients stand outside hours past sunset waiting to be treated. Basic dental work for working mothers, glasses for young children, infections left to linger, procedures delayed because the cost of treatment is too great.
No, I'm not recalling an incident from the years I volunteered for the Peace Corps in rural Ethiopia treating small pox. I'm talking about the Remote Area Medical Volunteer Corp's weeklong clinic in Inglewood, a community near Los Angeles. For the first time in their 25 year history, they are offering their worthy service in a major metropolitan U.S. city. Where did we go wrong?
Nothing better symbolizes the corruption of the debate about healthcare reform than the rhetoric about "government-run" healthcare. Or, for that matter, the related argument that we need a "uniquely American" solution which precludes a public system like Medicare for all.
Two reports that notably received scant coverage from either the media or even those advocating the public plan "option" in Congress, reveal the seldom told truth.
Medicare is a "uniquely American" solution, and it works.
Before you start celebrating the pending passage of a healthcare bill in Congress, you might want to make sure you have enough savings to offset the huge out of pocket costs coming your way.
Enough already on the handwringing over the plan to start taxing employee healthcare benefits.
The tax is not a threat to the type of reform plan expected to emerge from Congress. It's a central element -- to pay for the massive public bailout of the health insurance industry and as a backdoor way to cut costs by discouraging people from seeking medical care.
In this effort, every voice must be heard. Every idea must be considered. Every option must be on the table." -- President Obama, opening the White House health care summit.
Except one idea, apparently. The one reform that will actually contain health care costs, cited by the President as his main goal, and, as a bonus, solve the healthcare crisis -- single payer, or expanding and upgrading Medicare to cover everyone.
In the weeks leading up to the summit, the White House made sure all the people it wanted in the room were there. The insurers, drug companies, corporate lobbyists, and those consumer and advocacy groups willing to play by the script.
One segment, however, was conspicuously absent, advocates of single payer reform. Who happen to include, nurses and doctors, the people who have the most daily experience with the collapsing health care system and who by large margins support single payer.
(I've been wanting to write something about this for a long time, but here's an informed opinion from a former legislator. In my view, this bottleneck is designed to vest power in the leadership - if they wanted more time for the process, maybe the Assembly wouldn't have taken a month off just a month ago! - and ought to be a part of any reform agenda to make California even moderately governable. - promoted by David Dayen)
This article written by: Former Assemblymember, Hannah- Beth Jackson of Speak Out California
There is little doubt that watching legislation work its way through the process is much like watching sausage being made. The bottom line is: You don't want to watch. Although theoretically it is interesting, informative and exciting to see the democratic process of law-making take form, in reality there is so much push-and-pull, give-and-take and last minute backroom dealing that it's impossible to follow. It's often impossible to understand.
So when the Speaker of the Assembly asks his members to "read the bill" when debating the frenetically altered and re-altered health care reform measure, AB8, it's asking for a logical response to an impossible situation. How can one read a bill that comes to your desk literally "hot off the press", so hot that you can warm your hands on the paper? How can you understand what's there when it deals with a convoluted system in a convoluted way---with no opportunity to vet the latest in a series of compromises, re-writes and reformulated policy?
Granted, the efforts are the result of hard-fought and truly late-night negotiations, but there has been little time to analyze the possible impacts and "unintended consequences" of legislating at the 11th hour, with dozens of special interest groups hovering over the negotiations and dozens of people trying to craft language that fits the proverbial square peg into a round hole. That's exactly what the end of session looks like on a good day. But here we've got what is billed as a major overhaul of the healthcare system in California, a measure that will lead the nation in healthcare reform. Really? Has anyone read the entire bill in its final form? Highly unlikely.
As I mentioned yesterday, nyceve has been doing incredible work looking into the crisis of healthcare nationwide. Today, she highlights a disturbing LA Times story about how insurers in California pretty much refuse to cover potential consumers unless they're Jack LaLane (and even then, Jack had better not have a pre-existing condition).
(Bumped from the diaries. Minor edits and title change. - promoted by SFBrianCL)
There is a scandal brewing over insurance regulation and blackmail in the coming California election. California Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi, who is now a candidate for Lt. Governor has called in the California Attorney General and the FBI to investigate a blackmail and extortion charge. The insurance companies have threatened Garamendi over a proposed regulation that would save California consumers millions of dollars on their auto insurance. They said if he backs off the regulation they will hold off from spending millions on attack ads smearing him. The only word for this is extortion.
