Posted on 11/12/2018 7:19:42 AM PST by Kaslin
The 2018 midterms could someday be remembered as the beginning of the Democratic Party’s full embrace of creating a single-payer health care system in the United States. For the first time in American history, a large number of Democrats, many of whom identify as socialists, openly campaigned for the creation of a government-run health insurance model.
For instance, Democratic Socialists of America member Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who won 78 percent of the vote on Election Day, championed Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) “Medicare for All” proposal, calling it the “ethical, logical, and affordable path to ensuring no person goes without dignified healthcare.” According to Ocasio-Cortez, “Medicare for All will reduce the existing costs of healthcare (and make Medicare cheaper, too!) by allowing all people in the US to buy into a universal healthcare system.”
Ocasio-Cortez says she supports a universal system that would include “full vision, dental, and mental healthcare - because we know that true healthcare is about the whole self, not just your yearly physical.”
The cost of enacting such a radical program would be astronomical. Researchers at the Mercatus Center say Sen. Sanders’ plan would cost $32.6 trillion in its first decade, and they note that even if Congress were to double taxes paid by individuals and corporations, it wouldn’t be enough to pay for the program. That should terrify you, especially since the U.S. government’s deficit for the 2018 fiscal year was $782 billion and the national debt now stands at a $21.7 trillion.
But as shocking as the price tag for single-payer health care would be, it pales in comparison to the numerous health care-related problems that would be created by such a model. For starters, the government has an absolutely terrible record of providing health care. One example is the Veterans Health Administration, which is run by the federal government. It routinely suffers from underfunding and long wait times, which has forced the agency to allow veterans to go elsewhere to receive care. As the Military Times notes, “About one-third of all VA medical appointments today are … conducted by physicians outside the department’s system.”
The Washington Examiner reported in 2017, “VA documents also show there are currently 184,520 veterans across the nation waiting longer than 30 days for an appointment and more than 45,000 new veteran patients waiting more than 90 days. Internal VA documents also indicate 479,239 veterans nationwide are waiting for physician requested follow-up appointments over 30 days for the period July to September 2017.”
Many doctors, especially highly skilled specialists, refuse to take on patients with Medicaid coverage because of Medicaid’s low reimbursement rates. An important 2011 study found doctors are 35 percent less likely to accept a new patient enrolled in Medicaid than they are to accept a patient with private health insurance.
If the federal government can’t properly run the VA system or Medicaid—or even the Post Office—why does anyone think it could manage one of the largest industries in the United States today?
Even more troublin g is the danger posed to individual liberty by a single-payer health care system. In a world in which the government pays your health care bills, it has an incentive to reward and punish behavior. Why not tax overweight Americans more money under a single-payer scheme? Don’t they cost the system more? Why not force Americans to quit smoking tobacco or drinking alcohol? Aren’t those activities associated with numerous health dangers?
ingle-payer systems are also notorious for rationing care. In October, the Telegraph (U.K.) noted, “A report by Fertility Fairness reveals that local commissioners are imposing ‘arbitrary’ criteria such as male body mass index (BMI), as well as age, as a means of restricting access to IVF,” which is used to help couples struggling to have children.
In other words, the masterminds in England have determined some men are just too fat to have children.
This story comes on the heels of reports indicating the English National Health Service’s forthcoming 10-year plan will make group appointments with primary care doctors—which could include as many as 15 patients—the “default” option for patients with long-term health problems.
For these and countless other reasons, conservatives and other supporters of individual liberty need to begin mobilizing against some left-wing Democrats’ plan to introduce a single-payer system in the United States. If Democrats manage to gain even more power in 2020, they will almost certainly attempt to enact a single-payer plan similar to Sen. Sanders’ Medicare for All proposal. To save our republic (and lives), we must stop them.
You think they’ll stop with health care? They want everythin, including your soul.
Apparently the fact that it can’t be paid for won’t stop them.
They can’t have it. My soul belongs to the Lord
Everyone is entitled to service in the public system, but those who can afford it are free to pay for the private care which is usually much better and faster.
We would end up with the same two tier system here. The rich would still have their own private doctors and hospitals, while the rest of us middle class and below would end up in a clogged up public system where we wait 6 months for a doctor appointment, see whatever doctor is on duty that day, and are put on a list for hospital services.
Will the socialist liberals enjoy waiting seven months for a CT scan like I heard a Canadian physician say?
Canada had abolished the private system work-around but their Supreme Court eventually overturned that.
Correct. But I suspect that the Dems Socialized Medicine scheme would totally outlaw private insurance, like Canada. Trump was able to get private insurance available again, but only in 3 month increments and only in the states that Allow it. Right now in AZ, there is ‘Marketplace’ insurance (read Obamacare) and ONE insurer that offers private short term, insurance. The Dems have vowed to overturn that.....that is why their taking the House is so dangerous (well, at least ONE reason). I hope not enough squishy Republicans vote for this Bill and Trump can veto it, if the Senate also goes south.
I can guarantee you that we'll end up with government-run health care simply because this idiocy is unsustainable.
I also know there will be almost no political opposition to such a scheme because there's plenty of support for some of the most idiotic provisions of ObamaCare right here on FreeRepublic.
There are too many wealthy people in the U.S. for private healthcare to be outlawed. Further, hopefully such a ban on private enterprise would not pass Constitutional muster at the Supreme Court.
In any case, there are too many rich leftists who still want their private doctors.
I recommend that we test the single-payer health care system on government employees for five to ten years to see if it works prior to inflicting it on the rest of the country.
One other perverse legacy of WWI?
Western Governments learned they could finance wars and vast collectivist social-engineering programs with completely printed, fiat money and the massive debt it brings, courtesy of their national central banks.
And that’s why you will have single-payer health-care forced on you soon.
They won’t even rest after single payer healthcare. Until they overcome all of the inequities that the unjust God has startled this world with their work will never stop.
We won’t stop them if we don’t stop them from stealing elections.
Even WITHOUT private insurance outlawed here, and you have American doctors setting up shop in places like Costa Rica, Brazil, India and Singapore to serve a wealthy American clientele.
After 2010, private healthcare insurance was basically outllawed. You could only get it through your employer. If you were an entrepreneur or worked at a place that didn’t offer healthcare, you were forced to buy Obamacare, with a hefty ‘fine’ if you didn’t have any healthcare insurance. My brother, who lived right on the edge of financial failure, had to pay the fine a few times. Other years he was enough under the poverty line that he wasn’t fined. He was a Bernie supporter who wanted Government healthcare so he didn’t have to pay for it. He died relatively young as he never went to the doctor.
Actually, they won’t rest until most of us are dead, the rest in chains.
No, private healthcare insurance was not outlawed. What was passed into law was what the minimum amount of coverage had to be.
No longer could you offer just catastrophic care coverage. Your policies had to cover the entire laundry list of items in the unAffordable Care Act.
Democratic Party’s full embrace of creating socialized medical care guess they forgot how Obamacare worked out hard to find any doctor who will take it.
Democratic Party may want to take a trip to England they aren’t doing ant thing any way.
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