Posted on 11/11/2013 5:28:25 PM PST by xzins
There is nothing about ObamaCare that’s working. It took a pack of lies to sell ObamaCare – which passed in the Senate by a single vote.
But the ultimate problem that dooms ObamaCare is cost — the sticker shock of the monthly premiums people are experiencing right now who have been thrown into the ObamaCare exchanges. According to a 49-state study by the Manhattan Institute , ObamaCare is causing an average increase in premiums for individuals of 41 percent.
The primary reason this is happening is that the architects of ObamaCare confuse health insurance with health coverage.
The purpose of health insurance is to protect one from a financial catastrophe in the event of a serious accident or a catastrophic illness. If you want to keep your monthly premiums cheap, you accept a high deductible of $5,000.
That is, your insurance pays nothing unless your medical expenses exceed $5,000 in a year. Until you hit the $5,000 in expenses level, you pay your health care costs out of pocket.
You pay for your doctor visits, your check ups, your prescriptions, your flu shots, your colds and sniffles. You pay for your routine vision care and routine dental work — teeth cleanings, fillings, and the like.
I keep my car insurance premiums low with the exact same approach. I have a $2,000 deductible. More importantly, I don’t make insurance claims for fender benders. I pay for those of pocket.
But that’s not the ObamaCare product.
Instead, according to the list on HealthCare.gov, everyone’s health insurance plan must now include:
Contraception, including the abortion-inducing “morning after” pill and vasectomies;
Maternity and newborn care (even though I’ve a 55-year old male with kids out of the nest)
Mental health and substance abuse counseling and treatment
Prescription drugs
Pediatric services
Behavioral health treatment
Rehab treatment
Dental and vision care
Alcohol Misuse screening and counseling
Aspirin use to prevent cardiovascular disease for men and women of certain ages
Blood Pressure screening for all adults
Cholesterol screening for adults of certain ages or at higher risk
Colorectal Cancer screening for adults over 50
Depression screening for adults
Diabetes (Type 2) screening for adults with high blood pressure
Diet counseling for adults at higher risk for chronic disease
HIV screening for everyone ages 15 to 65, and other ages at increased risk
Immunization vaccines for adults–doses, recommended ages, and recommended populations vary: Hepatitis A, Hepatitis B, Herpes Zoster, Human Papillomavirus, Influenza (Flu Shot), Measles, Mumps, Rubella, Meningococcal, Pneumococcal, Tetanus, Diphtheria, Pertussi, Varicella
Obesity screening and counseling for all adults
Sexually Transmitted Infection (STI) prevention counseling for adults at higher risk
Syphilis screening for all adults at higher risk
Tobacco Use screening for all adults and cessation interventions for tobacco users
Anemia screening on a routine basis for pregnant women
Breast Cancer Genetic Test Counseling (BRCA)for women at higher risk for breast cancer
Breast Cancer Mammography screenings every 1 to 2 years for women over 40
Breast Cancer Chemoprevention counseling for women at higher risk
Breastfeeding comprehensive support and counseling from trained providers, and access to breastfeeding supplies, for pregnant and nursing women
Cervical Cancer screening for sexually active women
Chlamydia Infection screening for younger women and other women at higher risk
Contraception: Food and Drug Administration-approved contraceptive methods, sterilization procedures, and patient education and counseling, as prescribed by a health care provider for women with reproductive capacity.
Domestic and interpersonal violence screening and counseling for all women
Folic Acid supplements for women who may become pregnant
Gestational diabetes screening for women 24 to 28 weeks pregnant and those at high risk of developing gestational diabetes
Gonorrhea screening for all women at higher risk
Hepatitis B screening for pregnant women at their first prenatal visit
HIV screening and counseling for sexually active women
Human Papillomavirus (HPV) DNA Test every 3 years for women with normal cytology results who are 30 or older Osteoporosis screening for women over age 60 depending on risk factors
Rh Incompatibility screening for all pregnant women and follow-up testing for women at higher risk
Sexually Transmitted Infections counselingfor sexually active women
Syphilis screening for all pregnant women or other women at increased risk
Tobacco Use screening and interventions for all women, and expanded counseling for pregnant tobacco users
Urinary tract or other infection screening for pregnant women
Well-woman visits to get recommended services for women under 65
Autism screening for children at 18 and 24 months
Behavioral assessments for children at the following ages: 0 to 11 months, 1 to 4 years, 5 to 10 years, 11 to 14 years, 15 to 17 years.
Blood Pressure screening for children at the following ages: 0 to 11 months, 1 to 4 years , 5 to 10 years, 11 to 14 years, 15 to 17 years.
Cervical Dysplasia screening for sexually active females
Depression screening for adolescents
Developmental screening for children under age 3
Dyslipidemia screening for children at higher risk of lipid disorders at the following ages: 1 to 4 years, 5 to 10 years, 11 to 14 years, 15 to 17 years.
Fluoride Chemoprevention supplements for children without fluoride in their water source
Gonorrhea preventive medication for the eyes of all newborns
Hearing screening for all newborns
Height, Weight and Body Mass Index measurements for children at the following ages: 0 to 11 months, 1 to 4 years, 5 to 10 years,11 to 14 years, 15 to 17 years.
Hematocrit or Hemoglobin screening for children
Hemoglobinopathies or sickle cell screening for newborns
HIV screening for adolescents at higher risk
Hypothyroidism screening for newborns
Immunization vaccines for children from birth to age 18 —doses, recommended ages, and recommended populations vary: Diphtheria, Tetanus, Pertussis, Haemophilus influenzae type b, Hepatitis A, Hepatitis B, Human Papillomavirus, Inactivated Poliovirus, Influenza (Flu Shot), Measles, Mumps, Rubella, Meningococcal, Pneumococcal, Rotavirus, Varicella
Iron supplements for children ages 6 to 12 months at risk for anemia
Lead screening for children at risk of exposure
Medical History for all children throughout development at the following ages: 0 to 11 months, 1 to 4 years, 5 to 10 years, 11 to 14 years, 15 to 17 years.
Obesity screening and counseling
Oral Health risk assessment for young children Ages: 0 to 11 months, 1 to 4 years, 5 to 10 years.
Phenylketonuria (PKU) screening for this genetic disorder in newborns
Sexually Transmitted Infection (STI) prevention counseling and screening for adolescents at higher risk Tuberculin testing for children at higher risk of tuberculosis at the following ages: 0 to 11 months, 1 to 4 years, 5 to 10 years, 11 to 14 years, 15 to 17 years.
Vision screening for all children.
This is not a joke or satire. I copied and pasted all this directly from the healthcare.gov website.
All this cumulatively is very expensive.
Obama must think we are all living in the doctor’s office. We don’t need or want all this crap. Most people don’t need most of the items on this list.
I’ve never had a flu shot. I don’t plan on ever getting one. I pay for my own eyeglasses, teeth cleanings, and annual physical exams.
When and if we need some of these items, most of us can pay for these kinds of routine items out of pocket, which would be even easier with tax-free health care savings accounts.
How expensive is a condom?
Is that what we really need health insurance to cover? Should I really be required to pay for someone else’s STD screenings?
Insurance is always a bad bet — which is why you want as little insurance as possible. Insurance companies make a good profit by betting on your continued good health. I don’t think this makes them evil.
You should follow the example of the insurance companies and bet on your own good health. You only need insurance to protect yourself from a true disaster.
And, of course, anything and everything the government gets involved in gets more expensive. usually exponentially.
But, you might ask, what about people pre-existing conditions?
That’s an easy fix.
They can be put in a high-risk pool and subsidized. But let’s not include self-inflicted illnesses (such as alcoholism, drug abuse, and obesity) in the pre-existing condition category.
But what about the elderly?
We have Medicare. Without ObamaCare, we could restore the $716 BILLION that Obama stole from Medicare to pay for ObamaCare.
What about the poor?
We have Medicaid.
So there was no need at all for anything like ObamaCare.
Yes, the old system needed some reforms — some tweaks here and there.
My Nine Tweaks that Would Have Fixed Most of the Flaws in America’s Health Care System
After we repeal ObamaCare, here would be my nine-point plan (tweaks) to fix the old U.S. health care system, which was the best in the world:
1) If really needed, expand Medicaid to address the uncovered poor (easy to expand an existing, well-established program).
2) Make health insurance tax-deductible for individuals (like it is for businesses).
3) Allow insurers to compete across state lines (competition always brings costs down, improves quality and choices)
4) Expand Health Care Savings Accounts (Tax-deferred, like-IRAs)
5) Cap Medical malpractice lawsuit awards (a big upward driver of health care costs)
6) Subsidize those with expensive pre-existing conditions. This could probably be done through Medicaid.
7) Those who show up at an Emergency Room without health insurance would be treated, but then sanctioned criminally. Probably pay a fine or do community service. Multiple offenders risk jail time (like deadbeat dads). That takes care of the Emergency Room problem. It’s a requirement that everyone have some kind of health insurance done the right way.
8) Medical costs and doctor visits should be tax-deductible to encourage illness prevention.
9) Restore the $716 billion that was stolen from Medicare to pay for ObamaCare.
I actually think Medicare was a pretty good idea. Our parents and grandparents should not be bankrupted for the getting old, or not treated when they get cancer or other fatal or debilitating illness through no fault of their own. Getting old is beyond the scope of what we can expect private insurance to cover. But we certainly don’t need Medicare for all, including the healthy who are producing income. The private insurance market most certainly can cover the young and healthy.
These reforms could fit on a single sheet of paper — in contrast to the 2,700-page ObamaCare law, plus 15,000 pages of ObamaCare regulations.
There.
Health care insurance problems fixed.
We bring overall health care costs down by phasing out third-party payment systems as much as possible (including employer-provided insurance) and by making individuals responsible for the lion’s share of their own health care coverage. Then watch health care costs drop.
Flat screen TVs, personal computers, and cell phones used to be prohibitively expensive for most people. Now almost everyone can afford them, even people on welfare. A flat screen TV used to cost $20,000 when they first hit the market. Now they cost $600 — for a good one.
When the market is allowed to operate freely, without a lot of government interference and mandates, costs always come down — often to almost nothing.
This is how human progress occurs. This is how free-market capitalism helps everyone become better off, including the poor — as even oneof my favorite rockers Bono admits .
We then take care of the elderly with Medicare (when health care really can become prohibitively costly). And we provide for the poor with Medicaid. All this was happening under the pre-ObamaCare system.
We had a mostly good health care system. It just needed a few tweaks, some minor adjustments.
There was no need to completely reorganize 18 percent of the U.S. economy with ObamaCare.
“Domestic and interpersonal violence screening and counseling for all women”
Does this include telling them to stop hitting or attacking men?
I agree; there’s a huge difference between a child and an auto being covered. (Some overlap in terrible auto accidents, but that’s not the point here.)
However, a catastrophic plan generally is a matter of the out-of-pocket cost before one receives coverage and is not a matter of the type of illness covered. They probably write policies based on particular illnesses, but I’d think a family would be more interested in the budgetary approach rather than trying to guess the illness that might accost their family at some point.
I have a friend whose policy from work is 7,000 out of his pocket first. It’s not an 80/20 or 70/30 until he reaches 7,000. It’s a flat 7,000, and after that EVERYTHING is covered up to a very high maximum. His employer gives them something like 3,000 of that 7,000 in a medical account that they can accumulate year to year. So, if they don’t use it, they’d have 9000 in it after 3 years, and by the time they got finished with that 9,000, their 7full coverage would have kicked in.
If a kid breaks a leg, they’ll probably get by on that 3,000 bucks. For the first year, they risk 4,000; for the 2nd year, as low as 1,000.
What is the insurance company saying? Surprisingly, that it’s the low level costs that really represent their expense. They are gambling that most people don’t come up with some really big ticket item. It’s the bottles of aspirins, the silly visits to the doc that end up with you being sent home with a bottle of Tylenol, the xrays because your wrist aches. The insurance companies were saying they were nickeled and dimed to death.
THIS is what will make the cradle-to-grave big brother state go broke, too. All the stupid emergency room visits won’t decrease; they’ll increase. The Tylenol visits to the doc will increase for those who are subsidized by the government, so rather than the poor being provided coverage the way others have had it, the formerly covered, but now unsubsidized will not be able to get an appointment. The subsidized will have nothing holding them back from going for the most minor complaints.
“Well-woman visits to get recommended services for women under 65”
This seems I appropriately discriminatory.
Nope, that would be the part that enrolls them in hand-to-hand combat with trainer Demi Moore, who as you know played a Seal in the movies, thereby proving that a woman can beat up any man.
This sounds like a death panel decision to me. 66 appears to be the cutoff for when they need to have their palms greased to keep your loved one alive.
“Well-woman visits to get recommended services for women under 65”
This seems inappropriately discriminatory.
I was just agreeing with you all three times. :)
I know where the author is going with this, but he really needs to revise this point. It's not showing up "without health insurance" that would be the problem, it's showing up "without the ability to pay". With the latter, you include health insurance but also leave open the possibility of someone paying their own bill without insurance.
I do agree if that you are a deadbeat case, there needs to be some form of restitution to prevent "free riders" from taking advantage of the system.
“Those 72 items (demands) are specifically included, to drive private insurance companies out of the pool of health care insurers.
You can’t provide all that and stay in business. You’ll have to raise your rates so high, most folks will have to drop out, you will be unable to sell your policies and single payer becomes the only thing left.”
This is it, plain and simple.
GOP is too stupid to think for themselves. They go along to get along in the elite world.
The problem is, the monthly premiums are very NON-affordable, but once you get sick, the cost for care is manageable for most people. What is upsetting to many Americans are the very high premiums, which will have a devastating effect on many peoples’ budgets. These unaffordable premiums are ironically the cost of providing all that “affordable care” mandated by the law.
Yeah unless there is an enforcer entity in the ER I don’t see hospitals doing this. Not just because it goes against their mission of healthcare but it would cost them too much to monitor that component.
I join you in saying, "Doom on this crap and it's handlers."
I was reading an article the other day that said the government employees just for the Executive branch exceed the entire population of the US in 1776. This isn’t a government anymore - It’s its own country with the sole purpose to oppress the people of the United states.
There’s no menu option. All or nothing.”””
More of Obama’s ONE SIZE FITS ALL attitude.
We have a growing problem with “Roundabouts” where I live.
We don’t need them here in N Nevada, and they are a downright hazard for the truck/trailer/trail ‘triples’ combinations that are common here on our roads.
There’s no menu option. All or nothing.”””
More of Obama’s ONE SIZE FITS ALL attitude.
We have a growing problem with “Roundabouts” where I live.
We don’t need them here in N Nevada, and they are a downright hazard for the truck/trailer/trailer ‘triples’ combinations that are common here on our roads.
Libs are insane! Period!
Why shouldn't honest people in the middle class be forced to pay for a bunch of liars who lie their way to free health care ... and not just those who need the help?
Isn't that the essence of the democrat lowlife underclass? I've got a James O'Keefe video of Navigators in Texas telling people to lie to get ObamaCare paid for by some honest person.
From LINK:
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/363699/truth-about-navigators-john-fund
“..........The events of O’Keefe’s video of a Texas navigator site run by the National Urban League are a familiar sight to viewers of his past efforts exposing Medicaid and voter fraud. Government-paid workers supposedly trained to uphold the law advise clients on how to lie on government forms, evade legal requirements, and ignore proper procedures.
“You lie because your premiums will be higher,” one navigator advises an investigator for O’Keefe’s Project Veritas, who tells the worker he sometimes smokes. “Don’t tell them that. Don’t tell ’em.”
The investigator then poses as a low-income worker at a university who has unreported cash income on the side, worrying about how that might affect his premium subsidies. That’s no problem for a navigator, who says, “Don’t get yourself in trouble by declaring it now.”
“Yeah, it didn’t happen,” another navigator says. One more chimes in: “Never report it.”
Records show that the National Urban League was paid $376,000 by the federal government for its Obamacare outreach in Texas.
O’Keefe’s cameras then visit Enroll America, a nationwide nonprofit group that has launched a multi-state grassroots campaign to help millions of Americans sign up for health coverage. Daniel Clayton of Enroll America says the group is “purely nonprofit. It’s not partisan, non-political.” But when Brian Pendleton of Enroll America is introduced at a speaking engagement, Enroll America is described as “the official group for the DNC [Democratic National Committee].”
Enroll America, O’Keefe reports, appears to be sharing data and working directly with an explicitly political group called Battleground Texas, activities that he notes “are prohibited unless certain conditions are met..........”
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