Posted on 09/20/2006 5:44:06 AM PDT by spintreebob
Well, here’s one way to spin bad news. The (IL) Auditor General releases a report that shows the I-SaveRx plan is an expensive mess and violates federal law and the governor issues a press release announcing that he’s expanding the program.
Here’s a couple of grafs from the guv’s press release:
Governor Rod R. Blagojevich today announced that the State of Illinois will expand its innovative I-SaveRx drug importation program to state employees and dependents. Currently, the program is available and intended for senior citizens and the uninsured, and covers the citizens of Illinois, Kansas, Wisconsin, Missouri and Vermont.
The announcement comes in the wake of a report released today by the Illinois Auditor General that the I-Save Rx program violates federal law. In a letter to FDA Acting Commissioner Andrew von Eschenbach, Blagojevich vowed to continue the importation program that helps senior citizens and the uninsured afford the medications prescribed by their doctors.
But that’s not all the Auditor General reported.
Check out the screen cap below. They spent a half million dollars in staff costs for a measly 17,575 prescriptions in 19 months, plus hundreds of thousands more in support costs.
So, the taxpayer overhead on this thing is roughly $50 per prescription filled by the program
http://thecapitolfaxblog.com/2006/09/06/question-of-the-day-updated-x1
Can we deport both candidates for governor and start over?
If stupidity were illegal, there would be chain link fence and barbed wire around every state capital building and Governor's mansion and Washington DC would be a penal colony.
Is that in US or Canadian dollars? ;)
This is unnecessary. The drug companies supply drugs free to those cannot afford them here and in Africa. The rest is demogogery.
PJ O'Rourke: "If you think healthcare is expensive now, just wait until it is free."
Well, except that free healthcare, in Canada anyway, is actually cheaper and gets better results, such as lower cancer deaths and higher life expectancy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_and_American_health_care_systems_compared
The OECD compares US spending on health, which is way higher than other developed countries, with the actual results lagging the average.
http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/29/52/36960035.pdf
re: "Well, except that free healthcare, in Canada"
First of all, Canada does not have free healthcare. Somebody is paying for it.
Secondly, after a minimum base is established, health and longevity has little to do with MEDICAL care. It has everything to do with lifestyle.
Compare the lifestyle choices of people in any developed country from Australia and Japan to Sweden and Norway. The obvious fact is that people who make good lifestyle choices live much longer than people who make poor lifestyle choices. People who make similar lifestyle choices have similar health and longevity, regardless of what MEDICAL care system or political system they live in.
Poor choices include promiscuous sex, smoking, gluttony, drug and alcohol abuse, etc.
Draw two curves on a graph. In the bottom left corner the MEDICAL care curve has a steep climb to a minimum/base level common to the civilized world. Beyond that base level, as the line is extended to the right, it can be seen that MEDICAL care has little additional impact on improving health or longevity.
Then draw a second line on the graph to plot lifestyle choices. That line also has a steep climb in the bottom left corner. But it continues to rise steeply and far above MEDICAL care in its impact on health and longevity.
Take infant deaths as an example. In the civilized world, infant deaths are due primarily to the lifestyle choices of the parents, and have little to do with the additional MEDICAL care that occurs after the minimum of a civilized society is reached.
Senior Citizens have the same experience. Additional MEDICAL care above the minimum can extend a Senior's longevity by a couple days. (Modern medicine was able to extend my mom's longevity by a couple days at a cost of a couple hundred thousand dollars.) But lifestyle choices can extend or shorten a person's life by decades.
Oh please.....
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