Governor Set On Universal Care (NM-Richardson health plan, blasts greedy Doctors)

The Albuquerque Journal ^ | January 16, 2008 | Winthrop Quigley

[CedarDave]

SANTA FE— Gov. Bill Richardson launched his personal campaign for universal health care Tuesday.

Some of his key arguments, advanced in an in-depth interview with the Journal:

* Health care is a basic human right.

* Universal health care is doable this year and it won't break the bank.

* Physicians are too greedy and need to give a little.

* A so-called single-payer system is out of the question.

* New Mexico has been historically cautious; now is the time to move boldly to make sure every resident of this state has health insurance.

Richardson, fresh off his abandoned presidential campaign, appeared ready to jump back into the fray in Santa Fe. He said the state has the money and lawmakers have the time to enact universal health care coverage in their 30-day session.

Richardson said covering the state's 400,000 uninsured people is both a human rights issue and an economic development program. And it's good politics, he said.

The governor said he would not support new taxes to pay for universal coverage and they aren't needed.

The plan developed by administration staff says that new spending on public coverage programs would be offset by increased economic activity in the health care sector, by funds collected from employers who don't pay employees' health insurance, and through more premium tax collections as more people buy insurance.

The governor said legislators have told him his Health Solutions plan is too expensive and that an election year is no time to consider universal coverage.

He discounted those arguments. "That was their objection to everything," ... he said.

~~snip~~

The governor called health "a human right of every citizen" and access to care similar to a citizen's right to public education. "Everybody deserves the best possible health care," he said.

[Mamzelle]

Retiring early is also bowing to the inevitable. It is tragic, watching all this experience forced unwillingly into early retirement. Not only do patients lose out, but younger doctors. It is not a good career anymore—better to go into one of the other medical technical fields.

[Mamzelle]

re: “Oh yeah, that guy. He doesn’t bust my nuts, takes care of himself, and is responsible. Let’s help him out ASAP.” Conversely,I don’t care if you pay me in gold bullion: If you are a Troll/Troglodyte who specializes in making everyone around you miserable, or are irresponsible about medications/appointment, you’ll get “next available.”)))

I hope you trust your office help. If she's married to you, treat her well, because this kind of behavior (which I personally don't condemn at all) can get you scrutinized by all those regulators out there.

But I disagree that the biggest problem is a lack of primary care docs. I believe that our biggest problem is a lack of specialty surgeons who will take hospital call. It is getting tough to retain hospital docs who'll be available for car wrecks, other emergency care. The orthos all have their own outpatient hospitals and just don't want to have hospital privileges, so the leverage that hospitals used to have is gone.

[Mamzelle]

It was Hillary who was instrumental in the closing down of medical schools during the Clinton admin. She thought that medical care was expensive because there were too many doctors, so she decided to make them scarce and lower expenses. This is what you get from the Ivy League.

That also caused a lot of medical students to gravitate to primary care. As a result, we've got a lot of FPs forced to compete with PAs and not enough general and specialist surgeons.

The other factor is the "feminizing" of medicine. Half of all new docs are women, and they often avoid the more physically demanding of practices (surgery), despite what you see on Grey's Anatomy. Female medical grads like FP, Internal Medicine, Opthal, Radiology and maybe Oncology, but generally not the other surgeries--

Women restrict their practices to accomodate families. It all points to a slow drain on MDs, and surgical MDs most of all.

[Alberta's Child]

Good post, but I'm no fan of mandatory insurance laws. They basically require a form of involuntary servitude by forcing people to enter into contractual relationships regardless of whether or not they want to.

The scenario in which people either pay for their own insurance or pay cash for their medical care has merit, though. If you decide to forego insurance and then face exorbitant medical bills and can't afford to pay them -- well, that's just tough luck. Not much different than someone who pays $100,000 cash for a luxury automobile and then refuses to buy insurance for it, in my opinion.

[okie01]

You New Mexico folks look like you're in for a real treat.

Your governor is going to GIVE you FREE health care.

And that's even before you've finished paying for HIS railroad...

[CedarDave]

Yes, indeedy! Excellent observation and post!