Watch your 6: Right wing is going to dismantle your healthcare coverage!

[VOX]

This is **very** serious stuff, and it needs to be brought to light. If the right wing gets their way (again) on this issue, it could literally spell death to many.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-health31jan31,0,933948.story?coll=la-home-headlines
Los Angeles Times, January 31, 2005
Healthcare Overhaul Is Quietly Underway
By Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar
Times Staff Writer
WASHINGTON — Emboldened by their success at the polls, the Bush administration and Republican leaders in Congress believe they have a new opportunity to move the nation away from the system of employer-provided health insurance that has covered most working Americans for the last half-century.

In its place, they want to erect a system in which workers — instead of looking to employers for health insurance — would take personal responsibility for protecting themselves and their families: They would buy high-deductible "catastrophic" insurance policies to cover major medical needs, then pay routine costs with money set aside in tax-sheltered health savings accounts.

Elements of that approach have been on the conservative agenda for years, but what has suddenly put it on the fast track is GOP confidence that the political balance of power has changed.

With Democratic strength reduced, President Bush, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Thomas (R-Bakersfield) are pushing for action.
<snip>

EDITED BY ADMIN: COPYRIGHT

[Walt Starr]

1. Consider it a done deal

because the Democrats will roll over and play dead AS USUAL.

[rman]

23. After all, Dems have to find common ground,

which happens to be all the way over to the right.

[Willy Lee]

2. Damn- does this mean I can't take all those frivolous trips to the hosp.?

Supporters of the new approach, who see it as part of Bush's "ownership society," say workers and their families would become more careful users of healthcare if they had to pay the bills.

Vile, vile people. Hey Bush- we already pay the bills!

[VOX]

6. Exactly! Or, "Next time I get a deadly illness, I'll be sure to...

use my health care more wisely."

:grr: :grr: :grr:

[CrispyQ]

27. While I am not in support of this new approach, I do agree that

there is lots of abuse on the part of many workers/families. I know many people who take their kids & themselves to the doctor with every little ache or sniffle. A $20 co-pay & $10 Rx isn't much for these people. I know one couple who will not take time off from work & so they go to the emergency room when their child has a cough or a 99° temperature. The wife went in on a Sunday night for a urinary tract infection. Her health was not in any danger. That couldn't have waited until Monday morning? So, whereas I don't agree with Boosh's new plan, I do think that many people could be more responsible with their health plan.

[annabanana]

31. I know I can afford my next triple bypass...

can you?

[elemnopee]

32. the abuse is overrated

50 percent of people on healthcare only responsible for 3 percent of the cost.

10 percent of the people are responsible for 65 percent of the cost. Health care expenses are very concentrated and this new plan will have little effect on eliminating unnecessary visits. It could have just the oppposite effect, people wait too long to go and a condition easily fixed with an antibiotic now requires hospitilization.

[jackster]

3. This IS their plan and it's been whispered about now more frequently

this scares the living daylights out of me.

HEY NUMBNUTS, AMERICANS DON'T SAVE NOW! WHAT MAKES YOU THINK THEY'LL BE WILLING AND/OR ABLE TO SAVE FOR HEALTH CARE.

Face it, under this administration we're all toast!

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

4. This is already in place

Our company switched to this abominable plan at the end of the year.

As they were explaining it to us: $1250 deductible and a "Health Savings Account" where I had to put more money just to pay my goddamn prescriptions and doctor visits over the year, they kept saying "you're really going to see how much these prescriptions actually cost now."

I so had the urge to say "Could you at least try to NOT sound so damn happy about that?"

Edit for spelling and clarity.

[EVDebs]

13. See post #11, it's all about 'globalization' and don't let them tell you

differently. The CEOs all get rich off of this, which is why they do it, and the company gets tax breaks to offshore jobs and the profits. The US taxpayer gets the bill, and even poorer immigrants are forced to come to the US and make the situation even worse...in an endless vicious circle.

We need to limit immigration AND institute Living Wages for all in the US, whether legal or illegal. That's the only way to end this Race to the Bottom. Also read Lou Dobbs' book 'Exporting America' for more on the greedy CEOs/corporations.

[ramapo]

5. Will people sleep through this issue also?

I wouldn't be surprised. These health savings accounts are quite a load of crap. It's just another way for the high-income people to cut their taxes. There's no way the average person could save enough to cover routine costs, the hugh deductables that make catastrophic insurance "affordable", and also pay their premiums. You have to have money to save before you can save it.

I've looked at high deductable plans. They're great as long as you have no medical expenses. You basically save premium, so instead of paying $15K/yr for coverage with a fairly low deductable, you pay half that with a $7-8k deductable.

[UdoKier]

7. Yay!

Then we can pay four times as much for the already expensive health insurance!

Oh, how jealous the folks who pay $100/mo. to cover a family of four in the countries with single-payer will be!

[AllegroRondo]

8. Bush's "Ownership Society"

big on "ownership"
zilch on "society"

[SammyWinstonJack]

9. Great! And will the Mepublican Leaders in Congress give up their

employer- provided health care insurance? Naw, didn't think so! :mad: I HATE REPUBLICANS AND EVERYTHING THEY STAND FOR!

[Blue_Tires]

10. these congressmen will squeeze the last penny out of us

all in the name of creating a bigger profit margin for the companies...and of course these pieces of shit don't care, because #1 they are already rich, and #2 as congress members, they already have access to taxpayer-funded healthcare (which is free, iirc)....

They are singlehandedly sidestepping all the advances unions have made over the last century...personally, I believe the auto industry is lobbying heavy for this because the big 2.5 in Detroit are paying BIG bucks for worker healthcare and pensions

[EVDebs]

11. All part of the 'globalization' strategy of corporations : See this

article "The Benefits Trap" by Businessweek www.businessweek.com/magazine/ content/04_29/b3892001_mz001.htm

The article gives away corporate strategy by saying: " Perhaps most important, in the global economy, long-established U.S. companies are competing against younger rivals here and abroad that pay little or nothing toward their workers' retirement, giving the older companies a huge incentive to dump their plans. "

So, in order to better 'compete' with themselves, global corporations are winning the Race to the Bottom, as Alan Tonelson's book shows us, by cutting pension and healthcare benefits to their US workers...how lovely. In addition to that, they've been laying off older workers or workers about to 'vest' in company pension and healthcare plans and hiring mostly new immigrants, see the Northeastern University study at http://www.nupr.neu.edu/01-04/immigration_jan.html
(titled "NATION’S IMMIGRANTS ACCOUNT FOR BULK OF LABOR FORCE GROWTH SINCE 2000 WHILE NATIVE-BORN WORKERS EXPERIENCE HEAVY DECLINES").

This is part and parcel of the globalization process people and any Democrat or progressive worth their salt will see that the only way out is to make these corporations (the 'Benedict Arnold corporations' as Kerry put it) pay for the social costs they are fobbing off onto the US taxpaying public ! You'll also want to read David Cay Johnston's book "Perfectly Legal: The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super Rich - and Cheat Everybody Else" to see exactly how these wealtiest corporations and individuals have rigged the tax system in order to promote excessive immigration (legal with H1Bs and L1s rife with fraud, and the patently illegal immigrants who are virtually guaranteed jobs)that keeps this whole scam going.

[ramapo]

12. Shift the problem?

The big problem is squarely with the employee. Employees have to pay ever increasing premiums for reduced coverage. Employees get less salary because employers are shelling out huge amounts for premiums. Employees are stuck at jobs because if they leave they might lose coverage altogether. Employees live in fear of being fired because that can mean the end of health coverage. Employees often get no choice of coverage and are at the mercy of their employer.

Just another outrage folks. Go back to watching the inane TV shows that suck the life out of our society.

[Pantheist]

16. Health care is just a commodity to be bought and sold....

That's the real problem. These free-market worshiping politicians continue to believe that they can apply capitalistic principles to the distribution of health services: If you can't afford the service you don't get it; the same way if you can't afford a new television you can't get it. What would Jesus think of such a system? Not the nay-saying Jesus that the fudies have created, but the real one who hung out with the deadbeats of society and generously healed the sick for free.

[jojo54]

14. It's like * is building a flight of steps

for the "haves and have mores" that go up into the clouds. I guess he thinks if the steps get high enough, he'll rank up there with god. What a joke!

And as far as "workers and their families becoming more careful users of healthcare if they have to pay the bills".....my hub and I haven't had healthcare for 5 years. Guess what??? We're helping to put drs out of business because we can't afford to go now, just like the other 45 million!! We're 53 and 50 consecutively and heaven help us if either gets really, really sick!

BYW-I'm sending an email to Sen. Clinton asking her: Are you comfy cozy that your doctor bills are paid by the government after Bill's surgery and your fainting spell??? Why don't you share the wealth?

[5thGenDemocrat]

15. Hell

Who has health care coverage?
John
I've had two heart attacks and I don't have it. As a consequence, when I had my first one I walked (!) three blocks to Covenant Medical -- where they fixed me up just fine and, a week or two later, sent me a bill for $42,000 (give or take).
I made $11K last year. I know that bill is never going to be paid, the hospital knows it's never going to be paid and, well, someone's going to get stuck with it.
It's a crying shame we have a health care system wherein one is forced to wait until one is really, really deathly ill and then (some anonymous somebody -- the taxpayers, probably) pays beaucoup money to have the condition fixed. Seems to me with preventative medicine freely available to all, I could've gotten some advice and some Zocor, etc., and we'd all save money all the way around.
But we're "governed" by greedy idiots, so I know that's not going to happen.

[jojo54]

18. Know what you mean, 5th

I saw this coming years ago when corporate health was getting their talons around the neck of the nation. They could have prevented my daughter from having 3 knee surgeries, the last one major. If they had just paid for prosthetic shoe inserts from the very beginning, I wouldn't have had to pay $500 deductable per surgery, PLUS the $25 ded. per rehab, 3 x's weekly, each surgery. What ever happened to preventative care??

[EVDebs]

33. As an aside on this discussion, magnesium deficient US diet is

probably responsible for the higher rates of heart disease since the early 1900s. Highly refined foods and filtered drinking water are big culprits. Only reason I found out about this is my recurring kidney stones, which I was lucky enough to have had a company HMO plan help pay the bills on (my job was shipped out to Bangalore, India, and my COBRA has expired, so now I'm winging it). I found out that by supplements of magnesium along with B6 and drinking mineral water (with magnesium in it) and drinking lemonade I could keep from having stones form. Got ahold of the book below and found that magnesium is really an ignored factor in a lot of maladies !

Check out the book "The Magnesium Factor: How one simple nutrient can prevent, treat, and reverse- high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, and other chronic conditions" by Mildred S. Seelig, MD, MPH, Master American College of Nutrition and Anrdrea Rosanoff, PhD.

[5thGenDemocrat]

41. Thank you, Mister Debs

Don't know if I'll actually read the book, but if magnesium is good for heart conditions, I WILL start taking it.
John
Funny thing is -- I have chronically LOW blood pressure (like, at rest it's 88/60). I asked my doctor (Dr. Fattal, heh) if that was a problem and he said "Not as long as it doesn't drop to 0/0, no").

[LizW]

17. Am I understanding this right?

Catastrophic insurance only covers after a certain amount of expenses have been reached, say $2000 per year. Is that per person or per family? I've had deductibles that worked both ways.

Does this mean that if we're a fairly healthy family we will probably never get up to the level where the insurance pays anything? Instead we'll pay out of our health savings account, assuming we can afford to save anything? And if we can't save, we have to we scrape the money up whenever we have to see the doctor for this or that?

So if we're fairly healthy, the effect of this is just like going without any health insurance at all, except that we have to come up with the premium for the catastrophic coverage.

If I'm right about that, then I can see why the business community and the health insurance industry love this idea. It's the best of both worlds, they get to cut people off and make them foot more of the bills AND make them pay for catastrophic coverage that they CLAIM will be cheap. (Although with a family history of cancer, I'll bet mine won't be that cheap.)

And another thing, remember what happens when people have to pay for routine physicals and pap smears and mammograms out of pocket? They don't get them. They put that stuff off until something really goes wrong. Preventative medicine goes out the window and people die unnecessarily.

[Cleita]

19. Newtie again?

Doesn't he have lifetime platinum health coverage from the taxpayers? Isn't it time to get an ammendment to cut these clowns off benefits once they are no longer serving in government? Maybe then they might get a hint when they find themselves sick and old with no health care.

[leftofthedial]

20. what do you mean "going to"?

50 million of us already have no health care

even WITH insurance, I can't afford anything but an occasional visit.

[jojo54]

21. The "healthcare savings account" was started for children

at a company I worked for about 6 years ago. It seemed to work for some people, but the downside was you had to be very careful about selecting the amount that went into your account on a weekly basis. If you let the corp asses take out too much and you didn't use it by the years end....you guessed it - you LOST it!!

[Cleita]

22. All those little RW schemes are set up with the intent

of you "losing" it. We need single payer universal health care for all.

[SammyWinstonJack]

28. Looks like we are going in the opposite direction from SPUHC

for all. Looks like it's gonna be, only those who can afford health care on their own will have health care. The rest of us better pray for life long health. Where's that pic of Cheney's granddaughter dressed as the Grim Reaper? As I recall, he and his wife were saying that the costume represented Kerry's health care plan for Americans, I think he must have been confused as too whose health care plan he was speaking of. And shouldn't these republican leaders be forced to give up their employer-provided health care insurance. Isn't it about time the taxpayers stop paying for what these Mepublicans are unwilling to provide for each and every American citizen?

[Cleita]

37. Lifelong health does not mean you will die in your sleep healthy.

You will get a disease that will finish you off. For many it's years of treatment and drugs. Very seldom do you just get the big one and die after a lifetime of health.

I think what these neo-cons are doing to destroy our safety nets is not only criminal it is murder by omission.

[elemnopee]

30. that's a flexible spending account

it's different but just as atrocious.

HSA funds roll over every year, and are in a tax sheltered account that can be invested.

Tax breaks for wealthy,healthy people

[Johonny]

38. That law is being changed

I believe starting this year you aren't suppose to lose it.

[MadHound]

24. This proposal is beyond stupid in so many ways,

It just boggles the mind.

First off, one of the advantages of employer paid healthcare is that under such a plan, everybody gets the monetary breaks that come with buying in bulk. In an "ownership society" plan, nobody would get the group discount, thus people's premiums will be higher than what they paid under the employer program.

Then there is the issue of higher deductibles. How many families can really afford to shell out 1200 plus for a deductible? Not many, and with that, the whole concept of preventative medicine will go out the window. Thus more people will get sick, more people will wind up in the emergency rooms, more people will die.

And I find it beyond ironic that the Republican party, the party that never saw a deficit they didn't like, is lecturing the American people about the need to be more careful users of healthcare.

This plan is simply another of the corporatistas' wet dreams, and I really hope that the Democrats put up a fight on this one. Sad to say, they'll probably roll over on this like the have on most other Bush plans.

Geez, it is amazing how quickly we're dropping from the ranks of first world countries, all because of corporate greed. Sometimes a bit of revolution, in that good old French tradition, looks mighty appealling.

[Johonny]

39. In Bushes world

He thinks that what will be created are buying houses that will replace employers as the bulk buyer. You will buy into a buying house that will in turn shop in bulk. Of course this is what companies already are. The current system breaks down when the company is too small to shop effectively. Will these places really start up to replace employers? If they are why aren't they out there now in great numbers helping out small businesses? And if they are out there why do we neeed to change the system?

The high deductable is suppose to be taken care of by tax differed money. Will it? Right now if you don't spend it you lose it. Though that's suppose to change.

To me the major problem is that

A) Many Americans will not get health insurance if left to shop themselves. This is particularly true of the young. The number of uninsured will most likely go up not down.

B) The burden of insurance on the individual makes individual responsible. How is my company going to feel when each person takes work time off to fight with their insurance company. Imagine the lost hours.

C) Current system can pay twice. My dad had heart surgery. His insurance paid and then my moms insurance paid. Greatly reducing the 20 % left to pay. Under Bushs plan double coverage by multiple plans would pretty much end. I mean who would think to buy two insurance plans?

Personally I have no problem with high deductable insurance as long as castrophic injury is paid out at 100 %

[Dark]

25. Your kidding, right? Please god, tell me youre kidding, pretty please?

Pretty please with sugar on top?

[OneBlueSky]

26. worst idea since the Edsel . . . n/t

.

[Vinca]

29. Finally . . . an issue I don't have to worry about.

I've already thrown in the towel because I can't afford health insurance. Maybe if all of a sudden the entire country has to get private health insurance rates will return to the realm of affordability. Keep in mind, I'm NOT advocating Dubya's plan. It's nothing more than a scheme to put bucks in investment brokers' pockets . . . like the social security "fix." We need universal care. Way back when, the Clintons were on the right track. If the Republicans had gone along, we wouldn't be in this mess.

[Bluebear]

34. KICK!!!!!!

[Moderator]

35. KrazyKat

Per DU copyright rules
please post only four
paragraphs from the
copyrighted news source.


Thank you.


DU Moderator

[sw04ca]

36. See, now this...

...is scary stuff. I've discussed this with a friend of mine who works PsyOps for the Army, and is about as doctrinaire a Republican as you might find. The one thing he could never explain is how the working poor, whom this is supposed to help with their insurance woes, are going to find money for their HSAs, to say nothing about this 'catastrophic insurance'.

At any rate, I think it's clear that some sort of balance must be found in health care. Obviously the US cannot adopt Canadian-style health care, but a Japanese-style public/private blended system would be feasible.

[Hotler]

40. Dear Bill Frist,

In light of your view toward ending employer-provided health insurance (owner-ship society) I suggest that you set an example to the rest of the country and put forth an amendment to end ALL insurance benefits to members of the senate. Show us how it's done and how great it works by removing you and your family from the governments insurance program. Think about it Bill. When you peel back the wrapper of your tax payer paid insurance package it's just another entitlement program and we all know how much you and your cronies hate them. So show some balls and step up and step off the employer-provided insurance. Set a f*#king example you ass-wipe.

[Sgent]

42. HSA's don't *Have* to be bad

Some (many?) employers implementing them don't make the employee come up with the money.

You might have a 3000 dollar deductible, but the employer may place 2500 per year into your HSA -- net effect, 500 deductible a worst, and possibly less. At least in my area, any insurance with a 500 deductible is a GOOD DEAL.

If you don't use it, they you keep it in the account, and any excess can be used for things like glassess, dental care, etc.

At the end of the year, YOU DO NOT lose anything, but roll the account into the next year. Eventually, if you have anything left in the account you can use it towards retirement.

Not all companies are doing it this way, but probably about half are.

[Rockerdem]

43. This is coming & hard

Large deductibles are the name of the game. Even in health care provided by companies, including those considered progressive. My brother is a medium-size company manager, and over the years his coverage has crashed even though premiums are skyrocketing. Hes the one responsible for selecting the plan and he cant even save anything decent for himself. It would sink the company.