Lies, Misrepresentations and Weasel Words from the White House FAQ on Health Insurance Reform, part 1
Here is my first post in a point by point breakdown of the White House FAQs on Health Insurance Reform
FAQ #1 Rationing
Health Insurance Reform will end current forms of rationing, not expand it.
Note the use of the weasel words “CURRENT FORMS”. This choice of words are EXACTLY why people do not trust the Federal Government. The only forms of rationing in the private sector right now are due to money. If you cannot afford to pay for a procedure and have no other means or programs then you self-ration due to lack of financial resources. both private and public (Medicaid and Medicare) alreadyIf you have insurance through a private payer, and you don’t like their service, you can walk away and go to another insurer. Its simple – the market will compete.
This First, there is widespread rationing in today’s system. Right now, decisions about what doctor you can see and what treatment you can receive are made by insurance companies, which routinely deny coverage because of cost or the insurance company rules. Health reform will do away with many of those rules that result in rationing today.
Now we see the tactic – CARE IS DENIED ROUTINELY by the insurance companies. Most people’s experience is that care is provided routinely, and insurance companies have publicly disclosed policies on medical care. Aetna, for example, publicly lists its medical policies HERE. These policies are neither capricious or arbitrary. They may not pay for the latest medical advances and delay moving “experimental” procedures into accepted practices. And you may not agree with them or like it, but in a free market you can choose not to do business with an insurer. We all lose once we go to a government run plan or government mandated benefits that all players in a so called “exchange” must offer. The reason is no one is accountable, and all players will have the same benefits and same rules. You have no chance of leveraging your purchasing power when this happens. Don’t buy into the demagoguery of the insurance companies – they’re not in business to give care away. but neither is the government.
Health Insurance Reform will prevent insurance companies from denying coverage because you have a pre-existing condition; prevent them for canceling coverage because you get sick; ban annual and lifetime limits on coverage, which often force people to pay huge sums out of pocket if they develop a serious illness; and prevent discrimination based on gender.
This will come to pass any future
With health insurance reform, we will also put treatment decisions back into the hands of doctors in consultation with their patients.
Unless we require step edits, prior authorizations or rationing of care like we do today in the Medicaid and Medicare program……
One of the reasons we spend too much on health care today is that our incentives are perverse: Doctors are paid by the procedure, rather than for quality. We want reform that rewards quality of care not quantity of procedures. Having dozens of procedures doesn’t necessarily make you better. In fact they can make you worse. Right now roughly 100,000 Americans die every year from medical errors, which, in many cases, were the result of treatments that were wrong for them. We want to reduce preventable hospital re-admissions that are frequently caused because patients are not getting the right care in the first place. We want to give doctors the ability to make the best treatment decisions for you and your family.
I’d much rather the number of procedures I need be MY DECISION rather than the governments. It is true that there are perverse incentives. What is more perverse is that the government “solution” to this lies not in empowering individuals to become more informed and involved about their health care purchasing, but rather to stick their big fat nose in and start telling you what is appropriate for your care.
NO THANK YOU!
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