Pain.
And there are no liberal Hollywood scriptwriters to write a happy ending. Imagine walking out of the theatre after gorging on 4 buckets of popcorn and 4 diet cokes....but the bathroom is closed.
Medicare Says It Won’t Cover ‘Virtual’ Colonoscopies
Last update: 5/12/2009 6:10:29 PM
By Patrick Yoest
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
WASHINGTON (Dow Jones)—In a final decision released Tuesday afternoon, the federal agency that runs Medicare announced that it would not provide payments for so-called “virtual” colonoscopies.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, or CMS, said in a memo that it would not cover colon screenings with CT devices. The agency concluded that “the evidence is not sufficient to conclude that screening CT colonography improves health benefits for asymptomatic, average risk Medicare beneficiaries.”
The decision is a blow for medical-imaging companies such as General Electric Co. (GE) and Siemens AG (SI) that have developed technology to conduct the scans. The scans test for colorectal cancer, which kills roughly 50,000 Americans each year.
Supporters of virtual colonoscopies say that, because they are far less invasive than traditional colonoscopies, more patients are likely to take the test and thus the disease is more likely to be detected.
While the CMS memo called the virtual colonoscopies a “promising technology,” it said that more tests had to be conducted that focused on the segment of the U.S. population eligible for Medicare benefits.
When you turn 62 take it early or you may never get it. After all you did pay into it for 40 years or more.
This is all CAUSED by our irresponsible government. Both parties are to blame. Big government is destroying everything this country stands for and people just keep forking over money for them to do it with. States need to secede and take back their rights. It’s all crashing and only the people can stop it.
Look at what the illegals cost us? If it weren’t for them, and foreign aid to countries that hate us and use us, trying to feed the rest of the world, etc. we could easily take care of our own. ALL of them. It’s just all screwed up. I really just want to get out and move to a place where I can just enjoy living. I don’t see any hope for this country, I really don’t. Short of a full blown revolution or a miracle, the road back is too long.
Assuming Obama leaves office instead of becoming dictator for life, he’ll leave a fiscal crisis infinitely more dire than the one he allegedly inherited.
Both of these problems are easy to fix, although Medicare is harder than Social Security. For those that are not near retirement, just make the retirement age later. The younger the worker, the geater the adjustment should be. When FDR started Social Security, the average lifespan was about 65 years, and now it is well in excess of 70 years. For those workers less than 40 years old, make the retirement age whatever the average life expectancy is today (with no option for early retirement). For those that are 60 or older, make no change, For those in between, make a proportionate change.
Just remember, there is nothing in the so-called trust funds except government debt. Why should today’s young people pay for the healthcare and retirement of able-bodied seniors who can keep working and pay their own way. There is no reason except that some folks have relied on Social Security being there at an early age and have planned their financial affairs accordingly.
Someone forgot the laugh meter. Anyone mentioning entitlements and trust funds should draw an immediate and thundering laugh.
The pols haven’t dealt with these big government programs, despite knowing for decades that it was a trainwreck coming. Because this administration never wants to let a panic go to waste, it has a great excuse to continue the destruction of our nation.
They just dumped Trillions of our dollars into the international banks...Surely they can throw a measly few billion into Social Security...
“the giant trust fund”
There is no trust fund. Shoddy reporting and a huge misconception by the American people.
bttt
Medicare is now paying out more than it receives. Trustees of the programs said Tuesday that Social Security will start paying out more in benefits than it collects in taxes in 2016, one year sooner than projected last year, and the giant trust fund will be depleted by 2037, four years sooner. Medicare is in even worse shape. The trustees said the program for hospital expenses will pay out more in benefits than it collects this year and will be insolvent by 2017, two years earlier than the date projected in last year's report.So, the gov't can't even maintain and operate the alleged health care system and pension system it already has, and yet the Demwits claim even more needs to be done.
don’t worry, obama has a plan!
/sarcasm
And there are no liberal Hollywood scriptwriters to write a happy ending. Imagine walking out of the theatre after gorging on 4 buckets of popcorn and 4 diet cokes....but the bathroom is closed.
Just in time to see the Panzi scheme of so-so security hit the skids!
Snort! Trust fund? Does AP believe there's a giant piggy bank stuffed with cash somewhere in WV?
yet somehow “the One” is going to give us all trillion dollar health care ...
And they all lived happily ever after .... /s
Lets face it. The only “fix” for SS is to kill it.
Dead.
(oh yeah, ALL federal pensions outside the military get the same treatment. Fed employees, Congress etc.)
Then, admit it was just Senior Welfare, pay welfare benefits to those who need it, and the rest are just SOL. That will of course include me. But I’d rather not collect one penny, then have to try and continue funding this Ponzi scheme.