Health funding worse off than Social Security

[HuckleB]

Health funding worse off than Social Security

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/living/health/10662836.htm

"Social Security may top the Bush administration's domestic agenda, but Medicare's financial problems are more dire and Medicaid's are more immediate.

The Medicare trust fund, which pays inpatient hospital costs and short-term nursing-home stays for the program's nearly 42 million seniors, is slated to become insolvent in 2019, according to federal projections. Both of Social Security's insolvency date estimates are projected for more than 20 years after that date.

Funding problems for Medicaid -- a major concern for states, which pay roughly 40 percent of the program's costs -- are being felt. Medicaid provides vital health services for 52 million of the nation's poor, disabled and elderly. But states are cutting benefits and raising eligibility requirements to deal with rising Medicaid enrollments due to the sputtering job market.

Members of Congress, state lawmakers and health officials nationwide are bracing for probable White House plans to cap or cut federal Medicaid funding in order to trim the federal budget deficit.

..."

[Megahurtz]

1. Here we go again

der fuher is making the disabled go homeless.

[Ranec]

2. This shouldn't be news!

Everyone should already realize that B*'s SS "crisis" is the fourth or fifth most pressing economic issue.

Health care and medicare are so much more important and pressing.

And the deficit.

And energy........

[durablend]

3. He's got to wreck SS first...

Then he can start the fear campaign in motion to abolish Medicare/Medicaid...chimpy can only create so many horrific messes at a time.

[EVDebs]

4. ....in order to make the USofA truly a "Third World" nation that

can compete with other Third World nations. The Race to the Bottom is almost over and the US global corporations, along with their political allies--the Republicans, want us to finish dead last and rock bottom. Kevin Phillips' book "Wealth and Democracy" pretty much predicted this as a consequence of excessive concentration of wealth in the hands of an elite few.

[Telly Savalas]

12. Indeed.

SS is in the red over an infinite horizon to the same amount that general government spending is in the red for the next couple of decades or so. It is totally fucking insane that GWB can cry wolf for SS and not have our press corps and TV pundits calling bullshit on it.

[HuckleB]

13. Yes. It's like we're living in an alternative universe.

[HuckleB]

5. More: Patients not in crisis will lose coverage in Washington

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=184x3035

[damntexdem]

6. Yeah, but in health funding, the Bushistas can't see any way to ...

cream off a tidy little business opportunity for their supporters on Wall St.

[rodeodance]

7. the hospital industry is huge---surely Rove CAN think of something!!

[rodeodance]

8. on the other hand, bush already thinks he has reformed Medicare

with the drug coverage bill!! why would he mess with it again!!

onward and forward is his mantra!

[TahitiNut]

9. Aw c'mon ... there's no comparison!

Over 99% of OASDI funds flow directly to individuals.
Now, the "ownership" elite know damned well those funds should flow through a corporatist money laundry before they get to the individuals - so the profiteers can take their vigorish, of course.

But all of the HI (Medicare) funds go directly to some of the best money launderies on the planet: the "health care industry." Jeez, guys! Over 30% of those funds already go to the profiteers! Damn! Can't do much better than that, right?

:puke: :puke: :puke:

[BrotherBuzz]

10. Bush* thinks a pill will cure it!

Following is a portion of the White House transcript of The Washington Post's interview with President Bush, conducted by staff writers Michael A. Fletcher and Jim VandeHei Friday aboard Air Force One en route to Jacksonville, Fla.:

16 Jan 05
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A12570-2005Jan15.html

The Post: When you talk about Social Security, you talk about the crisis being now, given the demographic inevitabilities of the system and the financial strains. Is Medicare in crisis, given that it has the same exact demographic strains?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, the difference, of course, is that in Medicare, we began a reform system that hopefully will take some of the pressures off the unfunded liabilities, and that is providing, for example, a drug benefit, that will, hopefully, in cases, replace the need for surgery. I used to tell people a lot on the campaign trail that Medicare would pay for the heart surgery but not for the medicine that would prevent the heart surgery from being needed in the first place. Heart surgery costs nearly $100,000, and the medicine could be $1,000. And that's a reform that not only reflects the new nature of medicine, but it's a reform, hopefully, that has cost benefits for the long run.

Secondly, one of the things we did, we began to provide a market approach to Medicare, by allowing seniors choice. And the more choice consumers have, the more likely it is some costs will come under control. We've just begun the reform process in Medicare, and that hasn't been the case in Social Security.

The Post: Do you think it's in crisis, though? I mean, when you look at Medicare, do you see --

THE PRESIDENT: I think, definitely, we're going to have to make sure that in the long-run the baby boomer bulge is addressed in Medicare, as well. The difference is, is that we've started a reform process in Medicare, unlike Social Security.

[HuckleB]

11. Yup.

And he figured out how to give away billions of dollars with that drug plan, too. Amazing.