Single-Payer Health Care Is The Only Right Answer For Ohio
The only real solution to the health care crisis is the single-payer plan, which covers every American regardless of income, age, or prior medical condition. Under single-payer, physicians and patients make decisions about medical care, not government or corporate bureaucracies, and everyone can choose his or her own health care provider.
As GAO and Congressional Budget Office studies have shown in the past, single-payer will save billions in health care spending, because it eliminates the administrative costs, waste, and high CEO salaries of for-profit health insurance.
Single-payer could be Congress' gift to working people and businesses alike. Single-payer will boost the economy by relieving businesses large and small of the costly burden of providing health benefits.
That's why I support the Health Care for All Ohioans Act. We need to bring cost-cutting and affordable single-payer health care to Ohio!
How about banning all health insurance and making citizens pay for the services they receive? Is that not the "true" single payer system?
Quote from: Rick Rowlands on April 14, 2010, 08:49:40 AM
How about banning all health insurance and making citizens pay for the services they receive? Is that not the "true" single payer system?
rr aslong it is affordable for all ohioans.
In my world health care would be priced so that it was within the reach of everyone. Those prices would be the result of competition in the marketplace. But lets face it not all health care services would be affordable to everyone. Certainly a doctors visit, getting a bone set, getting X rays and most tests should be priced cheap enough where any one of us could pay out of pocket. (doctors and labs would compete for customers just as every other industry does) But other services such as surgeries, transplants, cancer treatment etc. would be much more expensive as they require more specialized facilities and doctors. Certainly there would be a place for insurance policies to insure against those catastrophic illnesses. (wait a minute, I just described our health care system prior to government meddling. Go figure!) The system we have now is not insurance. Insurance only works when the thing you are insuring against is a rare event. Fire, flood, car accidents, etc. are rare events and happen infrequently enough that the insurance companies have a chance to pool several policyholders' premiums together to pay for each big claim. Nobody buys health insurance hoping they will never need it. Everyone knows they will need it, so its really just a prepayment plan. Its more like enrolling in the budget program for you gas bill, where you pay $50.00 per month all year long instead of paying $5.00 in the summer and $500.00/mo. in the winter for gas. All health insurance does is provide you with a budget plan for a service that you know you'll need.
What Dennis is proposing with single payer health care (a misnomer, its actually taxpayer healthcare) is the same as saying we should have single payer fuel. No gas bills, no electric bills, nothing. Its all free. Just pull up to the gas station and fill up and magically someone else pays the bill. Of course that someone else would be the government, who would force those 53% who pay taxes to foot the bill. At one time that statement would have been recognized as an absurdity. But more and more I am finding that a growing number of people in this country feel that they are owed something from someone else, and really do not have any respect for the property of others. I see it in many of the posts on this forum. What ever happened to having a basic respect for your fellow citizens? Whatever happened to respecting their hard work and the rewards that come from that work? No respect, just take take take. I want blah blah, and since Joe Schmo next door has a better job than me I will have my government take from him to give me the blah blah that I want. This thinking is not American, its a perversion of the ideals that propelled this country to become the land of plenty that it is. If you want and need your blah blah, you should either work harder and make the money needed to buy it for yourself or do without it. Yes I know that you may think this is appalling, but you really have no moral or ethical right to the fruits of your neighbors' labor.
I think someone should try to figure out why medical costs are skyrocketing, and find ways to reduce
the costs to the point where everyday Americans can somewhat afford them. Free market competition
has done little to nothing to bring down the costs associated with health care - the hospitals, the doctors
and the insurance companies have no need to compete for our business because they all know that we
cannot do without health care.
It's not like buying a toaster oven at Walmart versus Target, etc. When was the last time you scheduled
a routine surgery (ie: non life threatening) and were able to get an estimate of the real cost ahead of time?
You don't. Most people have no idea what the bill for a hospital stay will be, until they actually receive it.
There are all kinds of charges for this and that, etc. The big insurance companies are making billions of
dollars, and wasting a lot of our insurance premiums on administrator salaries, etc.
Somehow, we must figure out a way to bring down the cost of medical insurance - not necessarily
through a "single-payer" system, but somehow. I do agree that insurance coverage should not be denied
to those with pre-existing conditions - but I cannot say that I am in favor of a single-payer system that
is designed like the current system.
Insurance is the reason that you don't know what the cost of routine services are. Competition has not worked because it is absent from health care! You don't care what the cost of a medical procedure is, all you care about is "what is my co-pay" or "what is my deductible?" Why should you care if the procedure costs $2,000 or $3,000 if you only have to worry about a $300 deductible? You are more than willing to let the insurer pay that extra $1,000. Why should you care, doesn't cost you anything.
Your argument that we cannot do without health care doesn't really make sense, since we cannot do without housing, cannot do without food, and cannot do without clothing. Yet there is plenty of competition in the marketplace for those products. Why is that? Well you buy those items directly. You the consumer, buys directly from the retailer without some third party acting as an intermediary. You haggle on price and you get the best deal. Really, think about it and you will see that it is the perversion of health insurance from something meant to cover catastrophic illness to something that covers everything has caused 90% of the problems with health care.
Oh, and health insurance for pre existing conditions... Please, that is the same thing as buying flood insurance after your basement has six feet of water in it! The entitlement mentality has reached new lows when people think that pre existing medical conditions should be covered and at the same price as those who are healthy! With a pre existing condition, it would be foolish for an insurer to issue a policy since there is a 100% chance that the insurer will have to pay out on that policy. That is not how real insurance works, but that is not what is being sought. These people are not looking for real insurance, they are looking for someone else to pay their bills! But there are solutions in that, high risk pools, perhaps subsidized by state governments, can step in and handle those people.
The only real solution to this problem is abolition of health insurance with exception of catastrophic coverage. It is the only "sustainable" solution.
OK Rick,
What is your solution to providing health care to those who are already ill?
Let them just get sick and die?
Survival of the fittest and to hell with anyone else?
Your comparison regarding health insurance for pre-existing conditions to that of a
flooded basement is erroneous - flooded basements don't cause people to die, whereas
having a serious illness and being unable to get treatment can and does cause people to die.
Let's hear some of your ideas on a solution....
Allan,
I already gave my ideas. Re-read my last post again, did you miss the last sentence in the third paragraph? Could be a possible solution.
My comparison between pre existing conditions and floods has nothing to do with people dying. The comparison was addressing the notion of purchasing an insurance policy AFTER THE INSURABLE EVENT HAS ALREADY TAKEN PLACE! In that case it is not insurance you are buying, you are defrauding the system and perverting the very meaning of what insurance is.
"Insurance involves pooling funds from many insured entities (known as exposures) in order to pay for relatively uncommon but severely devastating losses which can occur to these entities. The insured entities are therefore protected from risk for a fee, with the fee being dependent upon the frequency and severity of the event occurring." That is a basic definition for insurance. Now how can covering pre existing conditions possibly work in a standard insurance model? The fee would necessarily have to rise on all members of the pool to do that.
Ricky's solution is that ALL AMERICANS PAY HIGH HEALTH INSURANCE RATES THROUGH THE NOSE!!!!!!
I give up! Its not worth it.
How many of you that disagree with the health care bill work in the health field? How many ask anyone in the health care field what really goes on?
I'm tired of those people that are on Medicare/ Veteran's insurance/ and any other insurance plan that is paid for and run by the federal government to keep THEIR plan going but don't let Joe Shmoe get the same thing.
Let me tell you-Medicare is a government run health care system. The physicians must get tests approved for you. Most of the time, they know what tests will and won't get approved(ditto for hospitals, clinics, etc) and don't mention the tests if they know what will not be approved and you will have to pay out of pocket. Medicaid is the same. Veterans can be admitted to the local hospital but if a bed opens up in a veterans' hospital, and the closest one is Wade Park near Cleveland, and you don't go, unless you have other insurance, you must go. You pay out of pocket if you don't. All the "free" care is paid by someone and right now that is the taxpayer. The people working are paying for you, you paid for the previous generation, and that is why Medicare will probably not be there when I am ready for it. There will not be enough taxpayers to cary all of the baby boomers, the next generation and the people on Medicaid.
I agree about "fit" people on Medicaid-make them work to do whatever they can. My son will be working in the county MCBBD workshops for his paycheck and cover what he can for his Medicaid. If he can do it, with MR, then so can other people.
It's the "self-pay" people-those who don't want insurance or can't afford it that is drowning the system.
They get HCAP and other things to help with the bill but guess what? Who pays for that reduction? The taxpayer because HCAP is a govt supported system to help hospitals and clinics get some money to help these people and the hospitals eat the rest of the cost. But they must make up the money somehow to stay open-guess who pays?
I'm sorry Connie but you have a problem. Veterans have earned their health care benefits. What little they actually have. And they pay for what they get depending upon their income. Unless they are Retired military as i am, in which case we were promised Free health care for life, and that was taken away from us by our beloved congress.
Also, most of us have paid into the medicare system our entire adult lives, and Medicare isn't free even then you still pay a premium for Medicare.
I have spoken with several Medical professionals, and haven't found one yet that thinks this new health care bill is a good thing. Fact is I may have to find a new family Doctor as mine may retire early because of it.
At any rate, you are wrong. You and Joe Shmoe can go out and earn your way like the majority of us have.
Obamacare.....We can't afford it.
I never said you never earned it. But when you say vets pay on a sliding scale based on their income, who pays for the balance? Where does the Veterans Administration get their money?
What exactly in the bill is causing your doctor to retire?
I understand your anger about being promised lifetime health care. Maybe someone should have told you not to expect anyone to take of you, you must take care of yourself. My father told me that, and he fought in WWII in Africa, Italy and Germany.
I work full time since I was done with school and will continue to work until I am old enough to retire. I have money saved for my retirement and don't expect to live off the government or any pension plan. Nice that you think that I don't.
Good for you, then don't talk trash about people who have worked and earned the health care benefits that they have. Veterans earned theirs and Medicare recipients have earned theirs. And as I stated you still pay premiums for medicare coverage even after you are retired and are on medicare. And by the way the medical care that I receive is part of what I earned in the 22 years I spent in uniform.
I am not mad about losing what was promised to me (and hundreds of thousands of others) When you are around the Government as long as some of us you grow to expect it. I do get mad when anyone criticizes the rights of Veterans who are the only reason we are free today.
So I should just shut up and work for your health care?
Read my other comment "I never said you never earned it"
I never talked trash. I stated the facts of healthcare and where monies come from. You don't know those facts. What do you know about HCAP? How about where monies come from for those who don't have insurance right now? Maybe you have an answer for that question.
Social security started out paying for those already 65 and over. Those people never paid into the system. The workers at that time paid for the elderly. Average age of life expectancy was under 65. Life expectancy now+advanced healthcare and that price tag+less workers= a damaged system.
It's easier for you to call me names and degrade me than answer my questions.
Glad to see Sarge is an Equal Oppoertunity Insulter~~~~
Thanks Irishbob.
I can hold my own but it's nice to know that someone backs me up.
He can't answer questions, just gives the same drumbeating.
Excuse me? I called you names? I suggest you work on your reading comprehension skills. And Dennis no one asked for your stupidity.
I would also suggest that instead of complaining about free veteran health care, (There is no such thing) that instead you go out and thank a vet.
In fact make sure you attend one of the many services that will be held in Cemeteries around the area on memorial Day. They are there to honor those Veterans who no longer need health care.
And Connie you don't work for my health care. I worked for my health care.
Still haven't answered my questions.
Again you put words in my mouth, so to speak.
So I put them in yours, the implication was there, whether the words were said(or written) or not.
Yes, I say a prayer and visit my father's grave and help place flags at the vets' graves.
You're the one implying I'm not patriotic.
My father is the one who taught me to stand up for myself.
Who pays to support the Verteran's Adm.?
Last I looked it was a federal agency and supported by taxpayers.
Oh, and calling IBC "stupid" doesn't help your cause.
I will repeat--you still haven't answered my questions.
Stop the nonsense and answer the questions.
Are you complaining about paying for medicaid? I have no problem helping those who cannot help themselves. I do have a problem when someone attacks veterans care. That is the only reason I even responded. Now any other questions you have I probably don't care about or don't know enough about to respond to.
Presently my son is paying for his diabetes supplies and medications out of his unemployment check. I will probably pay for his next doctors visit. He will not ask for any other help unless he runs out of all other options.
I never said that.
One of my questions was-who pays for the uninsured right now?
I've had to pay out of pocket for my son's treatment since he was 3 years old for autism. It is not covered under any insurance. It will be interesting to see if you support HB 8 or not-look it up. Lobbyists have stopped it repeatedly. IBC and I both know about autism and fighting the system for our children. We fight it on all fronts-insurance, schooling, treatments, psychiatrists, doctors, the "looks" from other people, families, church, MCBDD, etc. He's now 19 and I will have to fight for him the rest of my life. And see myself going further in debt to care for him. With the bill, I can keep him on my insurance for his non-autism health issues until he's 26.
I have no issue with supporting those who cannot support themselves and support paying for Medicaid/Medicare/unemployment/ any other support.
I have problems with people that think they "deserve" a handout because they made wrong life choices. Or, like my husband's ex-lived in govt housing, on medicaid, took every handout she could, then got upset that someone reported her for operating a business out of that govt housing. She said her neighbors told her how to take advantage of the system. Or the people living on the Southside(or Northside, or Eastside) that walk up and down the street with blue and purple hair, pants down to their knees and claiming they have a disability and can't work. Girls having multiple children and not knowing where these children are, crying when the children are killed by the boyfriend or arrested for whatever.
See, when it all comes down to it we pretty much agree. I don't know much about HB8, But I don't see any reason not to pass it, if I understood the summary correctly. I don't speak legalese very well.
Quote from: sfc_oliver on April 17, 2010, 04:33:56 PM
See, when it all comes down to it we pretty much agree. I don't know much about HB8, But I don't see any reason not to pass it, if I understood the summary correctly. I don't speak legalese very well.
The lobbyists working against HB8 are working for the insurance companies. Care for autism runs in the 5 digit range yearly. They don't want to pay for it. It gets labeled a pre-existing condition or a mental disorder(listed in DSM-IV along with depression, anxiety, schizophrenia, etc) and if it does get paid by insurance companies it gets paid under "mental disorders", usually 25-50% of the cost. In my case way back when, they paid for the diagnosis, but nothing else because it was "a chronic condition, never to improve." At that time, my son didn't talk and didn't interact within 2 years of that label, he was talking. I learned a lot from the therapists.
The reason it costs so much is because of the doctors, physical, occupational, and speech therapists and if you're lucky and can afford it, music, animal and other therapists. Take into account the possibility of security systems to alert you if the child opens the door when you're asleep,and other safety items, it becomes very expensive.
I have a 37 year old nephew who is sort of stuck at about the 11 or 12 year level. He gets SBI I think. Not sure if he gets Medicaid.
Single Payer FAQ
http://www.pnhp.org/facts/single-payer-faq
IBC, I like that link.
I saw Chris Rock a TV a few weeks ago. He described both of his parents having life threatening issues requiring hospitalization. His father's occurred when Chris Rock was still unknown and the family was poor. His mother was after. His father died and his mother lived. He described the treatment and care for his mother as outstanding and the rooms as good as the finest hotel. The hospital workers went out of their way.His father had a standard room and treatment was under Medicaid. He couldn't believe there was "two hospital systems".
One point of order- a Bill is a proposed law that is working its way through Congress. Once the Bill is passed and signed by the President it becomes a Law. So discussing the health care bill is a misnomer, it is the health care law.
You may now return to your regularly scheduled bickering.