Posted on 03/14/2010 10:45:45 AM PDT by John Semmens
In the seemingly endless parade of final pushes for his healthcare legislation President Barack Obama attempted to explain why the bill is needed to fight fraud and waste in the governments Medicare program.
Right now, unscrupulous doctors are over billing the government for services that were never rendered, Obama admitted. Theoretically, we could make efforts to crack down on this without passing the healthcare bill. However, there are several key arguments against doing that.
First, calling attention to this fraud at this time would raise doubts about the proposed reform, Obama said. Many will think that if we have such a huge problem with fraud under existing government health programs, why wouldnt these problems continue under the new legislation? A campaign to fight fraud now would tend to feed these negative thoughts and imperil the chances of getting the new legislation passed.
Second, if we make our efforts against fraud conditional upon passage of the new bill that will give fiscally-minded members of congress an incentive to support my bill, Obama continued. If my Administration were to combat this fraud before passage of my bill, their incentive to vote for it would be diluted.
Finally, a large part of the waste comes from investing scarce resources in perpetuating the longevity of persons with severe health problems, Obama added. My new bill forcefully addresses this waste by establishing government oversight of treatment protocols. This will relieve physicians of the responsibility for making the kind of life-and-death decisions that are more properly made in a social context.
(Excerpt) Read more at azconservative.org ...
Finally, a large part of the waste comes from investing scarce resources in perpetuating the longevity of persons with severe health problems, Obama added. My new bill forcefully addresses this waste by establishing government oversight of treatment protocols. This will relieve physicians of the responsibility for making the kind of life-and-death decisions that are more properly made in a social context.
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Not that far from the truth. Obama doesn’t tell us that under this monstrosity, the undesirables will, one way or the other, be eliminated.
>> My new bill forcefully addresses this waste by establishing government oversight of treatment protocols. This will relieve physicians of the responsibility for making the kind of life-and-death decisions that are more properly made in a social context. <<
In other words: government “death panels”,
Translation from Obamaese:
Fraud is a good thing when we can use it to further our agenda.
My daughter told me that they plan to hire a lot of family practice and outpatient doctors to “assist” in the coming days to “streamline the process”. (I always wondered what Seibelius meant when she talked about this).
Streamlining the process would consist of hiring more doctors to the staff so that the digital medical records can be shared. Utilizing the digital medical records would assure that there is no duplication of tests or prevent duplication of tests.
Currently the Medical Center duplicates each test because they sometimes do not get the records, or “tests are not done prior to”. If they would take another doctor’s word about test results then there wouldn’t be a duplication, but I understand the need for a hospital to make sure they have the necessary information.
The doctors would use same electronic medical system which would RAISE insurance cost since doctors can bargain for MORE money for each service. Doctors can bill for more services because it is streamlined - they INCREASE the amount they bill for each service.
These doctors then end up on the payroll of the Medical Center and are eligible for ....you guessed it.... the system which is the Public Employee Retirement System—— the pension system.
Maybe I am reading this incorrectly but my thoughts are:
So it appears as though they are streamlining the process and utilizing digital medical records to save on costs, when really the costs will INCREASE because doctors will charge more for the services and the ULTIMATE objective is to get more doctors on the state rolls...and possibly in the unions.
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