Pre-existing conditions coverage

[Andylusion]

This was originally a CONSERVATIVE idea (Heritage Foundation) -- that if you increased the size of the pool by making everyone buy coverage, then the insurance companies could take on pre-existing conditions.

Why do you say things that are obviously not true?

Hom Jay Dinshah is president and founder of American Vegan Society.

If Hom Jay Dinshah was to come out today and say "eating Chicken is great", would you consider that eating chicken is a Vegetarian ideal?

But Dinshah is a Vegan!

So?

Well Dinshah said chicken is good to eat!

So?

Well clearly eating chicken is a vegan idea!

... are you stupid?

Did you know that in the Soviet Union, 1/4th of all food came from private capitalist profit based farms? And that both Lenin and Stalin accepted and pushed this policy of allowing private capitalist profit based farming.

Well... I guess Capitalism is a Socialist ideal!.... it came from Lenin and Stalin! It was a policy in the Soviet Union! Clearly it must be a socialist idea!

.... to the point....

Whether or not the idea of forcing people to buy insurance came from the Heritage Foundation, is debatable. There have been suggestions that the idea exist long before then. However, even if it did originate with the Heritage Foundation, it was only as a better alternative to government run health care.

The Heritage Foundation was not pushing the idea by itself. Only as a better option than the terrible idea of government run health care.

But let's even suggest that maybe they did come up with the idea, and they did intend to push it as a great plan.

Does that make it a conservative idea? Does the fact it 'came from the Heritage Foundation" make it conservative?

Does eating chicken become a Vegetarian idea, if it came from Hom Jay Dinshah?

Is private capitalist profit driven farming, a Socialist idea because it came from Lenin, Stalin or the Soviet Union?

The answer to all of these is no. Private Capitalist farms are not 'socialist' because it came from the Soviet Union. Eating chicken is not a Vegan idea, just because Dinshah does it.

And mandating that people are forced to buy health insurance is not a conservative idea, just because the Heritage Foundation came up with it.

Conservative belief is that of less government, and less government control over our lives, and always has been, and always will be. That's a fundamental aspect of what Conservatism stands for.

Forcing people to buy insurance, is fundamentally opposed to what Conservatism stands for. Thus it doesn't matter where the idea of forcing people to buy insurance came from... it is absolutely NOT a conservative idea.

Lastly, regardless of anything else, no where that I can find even suggests that anyone at the Heritage Foundation, or anyone else, ever suggested that a mandate would allow insurance companies to cover pre-existing conditions. What you said there was false... and honestly ridiculous.

 

[Andylusion]

Before the ACA, the cost to us all of NOT covering preexisting conditions was extremely high -- as evidenced by the crowds at public hospital emergency rooms.

Insurance companies used to manufacture and redefine "Pre-existing" to get out of paying a claim.

Not true at all. Simply not true. You don't know what you are talking about.

Before the ACA, people did something incredible, called "paying the bill".

In fact, I am a living example of such. I walked into a hospital without insurance. I got treated. They sent me a bill. I paid the bill. How? With green paper and inked dead presidents on it.

Some people get charity to pay for treatment. Sometimes, the hospital simply cuts people who can't pay slack.

Others they send to collections, and the bill is paid from garnishment, or a lien on the house, or even sometimes the bill is paid with income tax returns. (this is rare, but does happen) So every year, any income tax return is confiscated and used to pay hospital bills in default.

So your absolute crap about "cost to us all" is just flat out wrong. You are wrong.

Further, companies did not just redefine "Pre-existing" to get out of paying a claims.

An insurance company can't just redefine signed contracts for service. Doing so would result in them being sued out of business, for a greater amount of money, than the cost of the treatment.

Pre-existing conditions, is a valid, and prudent clause for any insurance.

If *YOU* were the one directly paying for this, *YOU* would demand pre-existing condition clauses.

Say you and me, and everyone at my company decide "Screw the insurance companies, we're going to run our own health care pool".

So we all get together, and open a separate bank account, and have money deducted from our checks into the health-pool account.

This isn't all that far fetched by the way. I have heard of *A* small businesses that has done this.

So all the employees pay into the pool, and whenever anyone has an expense, they cut a check, and pay it.

Now say a new employee is hired on, and he refuses to join the pool... which is his right.... it's his rightfully earned money.

Then 12 months later, he gets cancer, and asked to join the pool. We allow him. Soon, $100,000 bills start rolling in, and the pool starts being drained.

We have to increase premiums on everyone in the company by several hundred per check, in order to pay for this guys cancer treatment. Then as soon as the treatment is finished, and he is well again, he drops out of the health care pool. Meanwhile, you still have to pay the much higher premiums to replenish the depleted Health-pool account.

*YOU* would be livid. This guy hasn't put so much as a penny into the health-pool for the last year, and now after he's sick, *YOU* end up being forced to pay hundreds more out of every check for this guy who got healed on your premiums, and now left the pool.

*YOU* would absolutely demand to have pre-existing condition clauses put in place.

The only difference between that situation, and the way things are, is that there is an insurance company between you and the guy who refuses to buy insurance until after he's sick.

Because there is a company between you and him, you want to pretend that the company can magically pay it, and that the only reason they don't is because they are "greedy" or some other nonsense.

In reality, insurance companies don't have a single penny, that doesn't come from the premium payers. That would be *YOU*. And when *YOU* demand that insurance companies pay pre-existing conditions, you are in effect demanding that *YOU* pay for people who don't want to pay premiums.

That's exactly what we are seeing right now. Premiums are drastically increasing, to coverage those who refuse to buy insurance until they are already sick.

This is exactly what happened in Massachusetts, when they instituted this policy. Prices did not decrease, they drastically increased. Thanks to Obama (and the absolute morons who voted for him), this failure of policy is now nation wide.

 

[Bfgrn]

Behold the tiny little pea of a brain who calls himself Androw

 

[dnsmith35]

Behold the tiny little pea of a brain who calls himself Androw

Behold, BFGullible, who wished he had a brain as big and smart as a pea! You keep forgetting, one should never throw stones at a glass house, the shards of glass may slice you to pieces.

 

[Bfgrn]

Behold the tiny little pea of a brain who calls himself Androw

Behold, BFGullible, who wished he had a brain as big and smart as a pea! You keep forgetting, one should never throw stones at a glass house, the shards of glass may slice you to pieces.

The Joint Committee on Internal Revenue Taxation explained at the time, the bottom 85% of the population received 59% of the benefits of JFK’s tax cut. The top 2.4% received 17.4% of the tax cut, and the top 0.4% received just 6% of it.

Behold Jethro Bodine, who uses ciphering instead of REAL math.

And who 'claims' a degree in psychology, but has ZERO understanding of human nature.

Ironic, gullible is a perfect description of your dogmatic mind. You have no innate intelligence. I wonder if you live on THIS planet...We already determined that tax cuts for the wealthy does not create jobs. It creates DEBT and it creates wealth inequality. The empirical proof is the last 30 some years since liberals lost power in this nation, and a conservative era took over, including your dogmatic worship of supply side economics that replaced Keynesian economics in America.

It has been the biggest failure in American history.

You like to preach about human nature, yet you have no understanding of it. No liberal would portray anyone who punches a clock as an 'elitist'. And union busting by your beloved right wingers like Reagan has lowered the swamp for ALL workers.

Your ignorantly claim that LAWS enacted have made the need for unions obsolete. First, you ignore the fact those laws came to being primarily because of union activism and brave workers who fought for those laws. And you are totally obtuse to the HUMAN element of union presence in the workplace. We have seen that 'right to work' states, a euphemism for union busting, has created by many measures, the quality of life is worse in states with so-called “right to work” (RTW) laws. Wages are lower, poverty and lack of insurance are higher, education is weaker, even infant mortality and the likelihood of being killed on the job are higher.

It is human nature that makes the need for unions an ever present reality. Laws are reactive, meaning the damage is already done. They can never bring back a dead worker, or repair the injury after the fact. Unions are proactive and can PREVENT the damage.

As we witnessed when 29 miners perished at the Upper Big Branch Mine in W. VA, laws and government agencies alone don't prevent disasters.

Massey Energy Co. sees the 'laws' as merely the cost of doing business. The U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration cited the mine for 1,342 safety violations from 2005 through 2010 for a total of $1.89 million in proposed fines, according to federal records. The company has contested 422 of those violations, totaling $742,830 in proposed penalties, according to federal officials.

A strong union could have prevented the death of those miners.

But ideology trumps human beings in your twisted right wing pea.

 

[HenryBHough]

Government Motors isn't selling enough new cars and old ones don't have all the latest safety gadgets.

Therefore you must be mandated to buy a new vehicle each year or pay a fine.

See how well that works?

 

[dnsmith35]

Before the ACA, the cost to us all of NOT covering preexisting conditions was extremely high -- as evidenced by the crowds at public hospital emergency rooms.

Insurance companies used to manufacture and redefine "Pre-existing" to get out of paying a claim.

Not true at all. Simply not true. You don't know what you are talking about.

Before the ACA, people did something incredible, called "paying the bill".

In fact, I am a living example of such. I walked into a hospital without insurance. I got treated. They sent me a bill. I paid the bill. How? With green paper and inked dead presidents on it.

Some people get charity to pay for treatment. Sometimes, the hospital simply cuts people who can't pay slack.

Others they send to collections, and the bill is paid from garnishment, or a lien on the house, or even sometimes the bill is paid with income tax returns. (this is rare, but does happen) So every year, any income tax return is confiscated and used to pay hospital bills in default.

So your absolute crap about "cost to us all" is just flat out wrong. You are wrong.

Further, companies did not just redefine "Pre-existing" to get out of paying a claims.

An insurance company can't just redefine signed contracts for service. Doing so would result in them being sued out of business, for a greater amount of money, than the cost of the treatment.

Pre-existing conditions, is a valid, and prudent clause for any insurance.

If *YOU* were the one directly paying for this, *YOU* would demand pre-existing condition clauses.

Say you and me, and everyone at my company decide "Screw the insurance companies, we're going to run our own health care pool".

So we all get together, and open a separate bank account, and have money deducted from our checks into the health-pool account.

This isn't all that far fetched by the way. I have heard of *A* small businesses that has done this.

So all the employees pay into the pool, and whenever anyone has an expense, they cut a check, and pay it.

Now say a new employee is hired on, and he refuses to join the pool... which is his right.... it's his rightfully earned money.

Then 12 months later, he gets cancer, and asked to join the pool. We allow him. Soon, $100,000 bills start rolling in, and the pool starts being drained.

We have to increase premiums on everyone in the company by several hundred per check, in order to pay for this guys cancer treatment. Then as soon as the treatment is finished, and he is well again, he drops out of the health care pool. Meanwhile, you still have to pay the much higher premiums to replenish the depleted Health-pool account.

*YOU* would be livid. This guy hasn't put so much as a penny into the health-pool for the last year, and now after he's sick, *YOU* end up being forced to pay hundreds more out of every check for this guy who got healed on your premiums, and now left the pool.

*YOU* would absolutely demand to have pre-existing condition clauses put in place.

The only difference between that situation, and the way things are, is that there is an insurance company between you and the guy who refuses to buy insurance until after he's sick.

Because there is a company between you and him, you want to pretend that the company can magically pay it, and that the only reason they don't is because they are "greedy" or some other nonsense.

In reality, insurance companies don't have a single penny, that doesn't come from the premium payers. That would be *YOU*. And when *YOU* demand that insurance companies pay pre-existing conditions, you are in effect demanding that *YOU* pay for people who don't want to pay premiums.

That's exactly what we are seeing right now. Premiums are drastically increasing, to coverage those who refuse to buy insurance until they are already sick.

This is exactly what happened in Massachusetts, when they instituted this policy. Prices did not decrease, they drastically increased. Thanks to Obama (and the absolute morons who voted for him), this failure of policy is now nation wide.

Unfortunately, the ACA has not reduced the premiums for those who have to buy insurance without public assistance. The costs of Emergency Room free care will never save us as much as the increase in premiums. That is a fairy tale.[/quote]A better way to give universal medical care at a much lower cost.

Give every uninsured person Medicaid. If they and their employers are profitable/sufficient wage, send a bill for the premium to the employer. If the employer chooses and the employ makes a wage over a given threshold, either pass to cost, share the cost or pay the cost for the employee. Eliminate ER visits not truly an emergency and have outpatient clinics at the County health unit which already exists.

 

[dnsmith35]

Behold the tiny little pea of a brain who calls himself Androw

Behold, BFGullible, who wished he had a brain as big and smart as a pea! You keep forgetting, one should never throw stones at a glass house, the shards of glass may slice you to pieces.

The Joint Committee on Internal Revenue Taxation explained at the time, the bottom 85% of the population received 59% of the benefits of JFK’s tax cut. The top 2.4% received 17.4% of the tax cut, and the top 0.4% received just 6% of it.

It was still a Supply Side cut because the rate of the top bracket was cut more than the rate on the lowest bracket. Considering that the top 2.4 %, which includes all over the 97.6% of the people actually got 23.4 Percent of the tax break. That is high in the top brackets for a demand side tax cut. Since 85% includes all of the top quintile and 1/4th of the second quintile that spread some of the goodies to those making in the top 25%, so year combine that with the bottom 75% of the people, even if their % was a lower rate, there were more people.

Behold Jethro Bodine, who uses ciphering instead of REAL math..

You are so right and couple that with your believing your left wing extremist propaganda, I doubt you will ever understand cyphering even as well as Jethro..

And who 'claims' a degree in psychology, but has ZERO understanding of human nature..

ROTFLMAO! Now that was a real gem of stupidity.

Ironic, gullible is a perfect description of your dogmatic mind. You have no innate intelligence. I wonder if you live on THIS planet...We already determined that tax cuts for the wealthy does not create jobs. It creates DEBT and it creates wealth inequality. The empirical proof is the last 30 some years since liberals lost power in this nation, and a conservative era took over, including your dogmatic worship of supply side economics that replaced Keynesian economics in America..[/quote]Actually it is a toss up, depending on the direction the business cycle, but apparently JFK thought would work as he cut the highest brackets by a larger % and also cut corporate tax rates. Straight Supply Side economic theory. You have failed once again to understand what those "facts" you post totally agree with my point of view.

It has been the biggest failure in American history..

ROTFLMAO!.

You like to preach about human nature, yet you have no understanding of it.

As a liberal AND a graduate Ed.S Psychologist, I have forgotten more about human behavior than you have ever understood. You like to think about what you believe, not the understanding of people with the education and years of experience. You fail at every level to understand people in general.

No liberal would portray anyone who punches a clock as an 'elitist'. And union busting by your beloved right wingers like Reagan has lowered the swamp for ALL workers..

I am a liberal, but I don't believe unionist labor deserves a raise before the less wealthy people get assistance..

Your ignorantly

(so much for your claim you do not insult)

claim that LAWS enacted have made the need for unions obsolete. First, you ignore the fact those laws came to being primarily because of union activism and brave workers who fought for those laws..

I actually accept that when unions were formed they were needed, and have never suggested they were not.

The fact of the matter, unions are passé and worker's rights are better protected by the government without the goon squads some unions turned out to be. .

And you are totally obtuse to the HUMAN element of union presence in the workplace. We have seen that 'right to work' states, a euphemism for union busting, has created by many measures, the quality of life is worse in states with so-called “right to work” (RTW) laws. Wages are lower, poverty and lack of insurance are higher, education is weaker, even infant mortality and the likelihood of being killed on the job are higher..

Wow, you really give credit to the 12% elitist work force. But you are right about one thing, your union auto makers make a higher wage package than our non union work force in right to work auto plants. The average pay package for a UAW member is over $73 an hour at a pay check level of about $40 an hour before the union dues are paid. Down here at our Hyandai, or Mercedes, Honda, Kia, and other plants, they only get $30 an hour with all of the benes but NO UNION DUES, and no strikes. .

It is human nature that makes the need for unions an ever present reality. Laws are reactive, meaning the damage is already done. They can never bring back a dead worker, or repair the injury after the fact. Unions are proactive and can PREVENT the damage..

Do you actually believe that unions protect workers from accidents? ROTFLMAO at your stupidity..

As we witnessed when 29 miners perished at the Upper Big Branch Mine in W. VA, laws and government agencies alone don't prevent disasters.

So you believe a union would have done a better job? ROTFLMAO!

Massey Energy Co. sees the 'laws' as merely the cost of doing business. The U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration cited the mine for 1,342 safety violations from 2005 through 2010 for a total of $1.89 million in proposed fines, according to federal records. The company has contested 422 of those violations, totaling $742,830 in proposed penalties, according to federal officials.

A strong union could have prevented the death of those miners.

ROTFLMAO!
But ideology trumps human beings in your twisted right wing pea.

It is not ideology, it is the failure of the government inspectors who have more power than any union who failed to get the mine problems corrected or SHUT IT DOWN.

Unions today are passé, and in more cases than you want to admit the union goon leaders compromise safety to a greater degree while lining their pockets. I have been a union member back in the 50's and observed their crookedness first hand.

 

[Andylusion]

Behold the tiny little pea of a brain who calls himself Androw

Behold, BFGullible, who wished he had a brain as big and smart as a pea! You keep forgetting, one should never throw stones at a glass house, the shards of glass may slice you to pieces.

Actually that quote right there, is the very best that BF has to say.

This is why the ignore function was created. Just ignore people like him.

 

[Andylusion]

Unfortunately, the ACA has not reduced the premiums for those who have to buy insurance without public assistance. The costs of Emergency Room free care will never save us as much as the increase in premiums. That is a fairy tale.

A better way to give universal medical care at a much lower cost.

Give every uninsured person Medicaid. If they and their employers are profitable/sufficient wage, send a bill for the premium to the employer. If the employer chooses and the employ makes a wage over a given threshold, either pass to cost, share the cost or pay the cost for the employee. Eliminate ER visits not truly an emergency and have outpatient clinics at the County health unit which already exists.

First off, the worst care in the country today, is Medicaid. A lot of people don't know this, but you are more likely to get better care being completely uninsured, than insured through medicaid.

Scott Gottlieb: Medicaid Is Worse Than No Coverage at All - WSJ.com

This is a well documented fact, and has been for literally decades. If two people go into a hospital, and one is covered by Medicaid, and the other has no insurance at all, the one with no insurance at all will get better care.

The reason for this is very simple. Health care treatment covered by the government, has a concrete limit on price. Meaning... how much they are paid for treating you, is set in stone.

A person who is not covered by insurance at all, but not covered by Medicaid.... the hospital can charge whatever they want.

So two people have a broken finger. One is uninsured, the other is on Medicaid.

The uninsured person, they fix the finger, and send a bill. They may not pay the entire bill, or they might. The hospital might garnish their wages. The hospital could get a lien on their property. Or perhaps the patient may get a charity organization to help pay for the treatment.

The medicaid patient on the other hand, the government says they will pay only so much for that particular problem. The hospital is not allowed to charge a penny more than how much the government pays them.

Thus, the price paid is much lower than the cost of fixing the broken finger. Instead a procedure that is cheaper, and thus practical given how little Medicaid pays, is done instead. Namely they amputate the finger, patch up the patient, and send them home.

People really don't know how normal that is in Medicaid, but it is a documented fact.

I would much much rather go to the hospital completely uninsured, than go to the hospital with medicaid. I can work and earn money to pay a hospital bill. Hard to do that when Medicaid causes them to cut off my hand.

As for lowering the price of premiums... anyone who believed that, was an idiot. Just a brainless moron.

How can anyone, without their head shoved so far up their politics they can't see.... possibly think that removing all cost saving measures (pre-existing condition clauses), while at the same time increasing mandated coverage... could possibly result in lower premiums? What Forest Gump retard, could possibly think that? Perhaps even Forest Gump would know better.

 

[dnsmith35]

Unfortunately, the ACA has not reduced the premiums for those who have to buy insurance without public assistance. The costs of Emergency Room free care will never save us as much as the increase in premiums. That is a fairy tale.

A better way to give universal medical care at a much lower cost.

Give every uninsured person Medicaid. If they and their employers are profitable/sufficient wage, send a bill for the premium to the employer. If the employer chooses and the employ makes a wage over a given threshold, either pass to cost, share the cost or pay the cost for the employee. Eliminate ER visits not truly an emergency and have outpatient clinics at the County health unit which already exists.

First off, the worst care in the country today, is Medicaid. A lot of people don't know this, but you are more likely to get better care being completely uninsured, than insured through medicaid.

Scott Gottlieb: Medicaid Is Worse Than No Coverage at All - WSJ.com

This is a well documented fact, and has been for literally decades. If two people go into a hospital, and one is covered by Medicaid, and the other has no insurance at all, the one with no insurance at all will get better care.

The reason for this is very simple. Health care treatment covered by the government, has a concrete limit on price. Meaning... how much they are paid for treating you, is set in stone.

A person who is not covered by insurance at all, but not covered by Medicaid.... the hospital can charge whatever they want.

So two people have a broken finger. One is uninsured, the other is on Medicaid.

The uninsured person, they fix the finger, and send a bill. They may not pay the entire bill, or they might. The hospital might garnish their wages. The hospital could get a lien on their property. Or perhaps the patient may get a charity organization to help pay for the treatment.

The medicaid patient on the other hand, the government says they will pay only so much for that particular problem. The hospital is not allowed to charge a penny more than how much the government pays them.

Thus, the price paid is much lower than the cost of fixing the broken finger. Instead a procedure that is cheaper, and thus practical given how little Medicaid pays, is done instead. Namely they amputate the finger, patch up the patient, and send them home.

People really don't know how normal that is in Medicaid, but it is a documented fact.

I would much much rather go to the hospital completely uninsured, than go to the hospital with medicaid. I can work and earn money to pay a hospital bill. Hard to do that when Medicaid causes them to cut off my hand.

As for lowering the price of premiums... anyone who believed that, was an idiot. Just a brainless moron.

How can anyone, without their head shoved so far up their politics they can't see.... possibly think that removing all cost saving measures (pre-existing condition clauses), while at the same time increasing mandated coverage... could possibly result in lower premiums? What Forest Gump retard, could possibly think that? Perhaps even Forest Gump would know better.

I did my internship for my Ed.S at the State of Alabama Rehabilitation Services. Most of my clients were on Medicaid. My experience with them is, they got reasonably good treatment at or county health units and prescription costs were only $1 copay at the time. Maybe it is our state, or because we have many more Medicaid qualified people than other states, but I would certainly rather go to a hospital with Medicaid than no insurance at all. In some places in the US, even Medicare gets pushed to the side or some providers will not accept it at all. Not true here. I think that problem can be addressed should we choose to go that route.

One other thing that will happen if those who can afford Medicaid premiums were charged for that coverage. Specifically, since as you noted, Medicaid is not the best coverage one can buy. Therefore, I believe the capable will quickly get better commercial coverage and pay for a good insurance instead of one which is not so good. (this is by no means an agreement that Medicaid is worse than no coverage)

 

[Andylusion]

Unfortunately, the ACA has not reduced the premiums for those who have to buy insurance without public assistance. The costs of Emergency Room free care will never save us as much as the increase in premiums. That is a fairy tale.

A better way to give universal medical care at a much lower cost.

Give every uninsured person Medicaid. If they and their employers are profitable/sufficient wage, send a bill for the premium to the employer. If the employer chooses and the employ makes a wage over a given threshold, either pass to cost, share the cost or pay the cost for the employee. Eliminate ER visits not truly an emergency and have outpatient clinics at the County health unit which already exists.

First off, the worst care in the country today, is Medicaid. A lot of people don't know this, but you are more likely to get better care being completely uninsured, than insured through medicaid.

Scott Gottlieb: Medicaid Is Worse Than No Coverage at All - WSJ.com

This is a well documented fact, and has been for literally decades. If two people go into a hospital, and one is covered by Medicaid, and the other has no insurance at all, the one with no insurance at all will get better care.

The reason for this is very simple. Health care treatment covered by the government, has a concrete limit on price. Meaning... how much they are paid for treating you, is set in stone.

A person who is not covered by insurance at all, but not covered by Medicaid.... the hospital can charge whatever they want.

So two people have a broken finger. One is uninsured, the other is on Medicaid.

The uninsured person, they fix the finger, and send a bill. They may not pay the entire bill, or they might. The hospital might garnish their wages. The hospital could get a lien on their property. Or perhaps the patient may get a charity organization to help pay for the treatment.

The medicaid patient on the other hand, the government says they will pay only so much for that particular problem. The hospital is not allowed to charge a penny more than how much the government pays them.

Thus, the price paid is much lower than the cost of fixing the broken finger. Instead a procedure that is cheaper, and thus practical given how little Medicaid pays, is done instead. Namely they amputate the finger, patch up the patient, and send them home.

People really don't know how normal that is in Medicaid, but it is a documented fact.

I would much much rather go to the hospital completely uninsured, than go to the hospital with medicaid. I can work and earn money to pay a hospital bill. Hard to do that when Medicaid causes them to cut off my hand.

As for lowering the price of premiums... anyone who believed that, was an idiot. Just a brainless moron.

How can anyone, without their head shoved so far up their politics they can't see.... possibly think that removing all cost saving measures (pre-existing condition clauses), while at the same time increasing mandated coverage... could possibly result in lower premiums? What Forest Gump retard, could possibly think that? Perhaps even Forest Gump would know better.

I did my internship for my Ed.S at the State of Alabama Rehabilitation Services. Most of my clients were on Medicaid. My experience with them is, they got reasonably good treatment at or county health units and prescription costs were only $1 copay at the time. Maybe it is our state, or because we have many more Medicaid qualified people than other states, but I would certainly rather go to a hospital with Medicaid than no insurance at all. In some places in the US, even Medicare gets pushed to the side or some providers will not accept it at all. Not true here. I think that problem can be addressed should we choose to go that route.

One other thing that will happen if those who can afford Medicaid premiums were charged for that coverage. Specifically, since as you noted, Medicaid is not the best coverage one can buy. Therefore, I believe the capable will quickly get better commercial coverage and pay for a good insurance instead of one which is not so good. (this is by no means an agreement that Medicaid is worse than no coverage)

It's the state. Alabama is in the lowest 15 cost-of-living states. The lower the cost of living, the more those Federal payouts stretch across more treatment.

Obviously if you give two hospitals the same $10K for treatment of Medicaid patients, one in New York, and the other in Birmingham, obviously the $10K is going to cover more in Birmingham, than NY.

The same is true even on a local level too. If you go to a Medicaid home in Columbus Ohio, you'll get far worse, or lower quality of care, than you can if you go to a Medicaid home in Youngstown, again because the cost of living is lower there. The same amount of money goes farther, when the costs of doing business are lower.

But overall, Medicaid is terrible.

Doctors Shun Patients Who Pay With Medicaid - Businessweek

About 46 percent of physicians accept Medicaid, according to a 15-city survey last year by staffing firm Merritt Hawkins. That’s down about 10 percent from four years before. To encourage primary-care doctors to take Medicaid patients, the Affordable Care Act has temporarily increased the program’s payments to doctors, matching Medicare’s higher rates through 2014. But the boost doesn’t apply to specialists such as cardiologists and oncologists. “What they pay doesn’t even come close to covering expenses,” says Pat Howery, the administrator at Colorado West Otolaryngologists, an ear, nose, and throat clinic in Grand Junction. For a basic office visit, Howery says, UnitedHealth Group (UNH) pays $119 and Medicare $73; Medicaid comes in at $52. “You can’t make this up in volume,” he says. In January the clinic began limiting each doctor to two Medicaid appointments a day.

And by the way, this is where the cost shift comes into play. That clinic MUST make a profit, or they would go out of business. So if Medicare and Medicaid are paying out less (by law), then guess who has to pay more? UnitedHealth has to be charged a higher price, to make up for the loss from Medicare and Medicaid. Of course those higher costs are passed right alone to premiums payers... you and me.

Robert F. Graboyes book “Medicaid and Health.”
Page 181

In 2010, the University of Virginia conducted a large-scale study that suggested that an individual without insurance has better health outcomes than an individual on Medicaid. Even after adjusting for risk factors, Medicaid patients had higher in-hospital mortality, longer hospital stays, and higher costs—compared with the uninsured, those on Medicare, and those on private insurance plans. A University of Pennsylvania study examined data on patients receiving surgery for colorectal cancer; Medicaid patients had higher mortality and surgical complications than uninsured patients.

Medicaid patients are generally worse off than the uninsured.

Yes in specific low-cost regions, Medicaid can do 'ok'. But as a whole... you would be far better off going to the hospital with zero insurance at all.

 

[dnsmith35]

First off, the worst care in the country today, is Medicaid. A lot of people don't know this, but you are more likely to get better care being completely uninsured, than insured through medicaid.

Scott Gottlieb: Medicaid Is Worse Than No Coverage at All - WSJ.com

This is a well documented fact, and has been for literally decades. If two people go into a hospital, and one is covered by Medicaid, and the other has no insurance at all, the one with no insurance at all will get better care.

The reason for this is very simple. Health care treatment covered by the government, has a concrete limit on price. Meaning... how much they are paid for treating you, is set in stone.

A person who is not covered by insurance at all, but not covered by Medicaid.... the hospital can charge whatever they want.

So two people have a broken finger. One is uninsured, the other is on Medicaid.

The uninsured person, they fix the finger, and send a bill. They may not pay the entire bill, or they might. The hospital might garnish their wages. The hospital could get a lien on their property. Or perhaps the patient may get a charity organization to help pay for the treatment.

The medicaid patient on the other hand, the government says they will pay only so much for that particular problem. The hospital is not allowed to charge a penny more than how much the government pays them.

Thus, the price paid is much lower than the cost of fixing the broken finger. Instead a procedure that is cheaper, and thus practical given how little Medicaid pays, is done instead. Namely they amputate the finger, patch up the patient, and send them home.

People really don't know how normal that is in Medicaid, but it is a documented fact.

I would much much rather go to the hospital completely uninsured, than go to the hospital with medicaid. I can work and earn money to pay a hospital bill. Hard to do that when Medicaid causes them to cut off my hand.

As for lowering the price of premiums... anyone who believed that, was an idiot. Just a brainless moron.

How can anyone, without their head shoved so far up their politics they can't see.... possibly think that removing all cost saving measures (pre-existing condition clauses), while at the same time increasing mandated coverage... could possibly result in lower premiums? What Forest Gump retard, could possibly think that? Perhaps even Forest Gump would know better.

I did my internship for my Ed.S at the State of Alabama Rehabilitation Services. Most of my clients were on Medicaid. My experience with them is, they got reasonably good treatment at or county health units and prescription costs were only $1 copay at the time. Maybe it is our state, or because we have many more Medicaid qualified people than other states, but I would certainly rather go to a hospital with Medicaid than no insurance at all. In some places in the US, even Medicare gets pushed to the side or some providers will not accept it at all. Not true here. I think that problem can be addressed should we choose to go that route.

One other thing that will happen if those who can afford Medicaid premiums were charged for that coverage. Specifically, since as you noted, Medicaid is not the best coverage one can buy. Therefore, I believe the capable will quickly get better commercial coverage and pay for a good insurance instead of one which is not so good. (this is by no means an agreement that Medicaid is worse than no coverage)

It's the state. Alabama is in the lowest 15 cost-of-living states. The lower the cost of living, the more those Federal payouts stretch across more treatment.

Obviously if you give two hospitals the same $10K for treatment of Medicaid patients, one in New York, and the other in Birmingham, obviously the $10K is going to cover more in Birmingham, than NY.

The same is true even on a local level too. If you go to a Medicaid home in Columbus Ohio, you'll get far worse, or lower quality of care, than you can if you go to a Medicaid home in Youngstown, again because the cost of living is lower there. The same amount of money goes farther, when the costs of doing business are lower.

But overall, Medicaid is terrible.

Doctors Shun Patients Who Pay With Medicaid - Businessweek

About 46 percent of physicians accept Medicaid, according to a 15-city survey last year by staffing firm Merritt Hawkins. That’s down about 10 percent from four years before. To encourage primary-care doctors to take Medicaid patients, the Affordable Care Act has temporarily increased the program’s payments to doctors, matching Medicare’s higher rates through 2014. But the boost doesn’t apply to specialists such as cardiologists and oncologists. “What they pay doesn’t even come close to covering expenses,” says Pat Howery, the administrator at Colorado West Otolaryngologists, an ear, nose, and throat clinic in Grand Junction. For a basic office visit, Howery says, UnitedHealth Group (UNH) pays $119 and Medicare $73; Medicaid comes in at $52. “You can’t make this up in volume,” he says. In January the clinic began limiting each doctor to two Medicaid appointments a day.

And by the way, this is where the cost shift comes into play. That clinic MUST make a profit, or they would go out of business. So if Medicare and Medicaid are paying out less (by law), then guess who has to pay more? UnitedHealth has to be charged a higher price, to make up for the loss from Medicare and Medicaid. Of course those higher costs are passed right alone to premiums payers... you and me.

Robert F. Graboyes book “Medicaid and Health.”
Page 181

In 2010, the University of Virginia conducted a large-scale study that suggested that an individual without insurance has better health outcomes than an individual on Medicaid. Even after adjusting for risk factors, Medicaid patients had higher in-hospital mortality, longer hospital stays, and higher costs—compared with the uninsured, those on Medicare, and those on private insurance plans. A University of Pennsylvania study examined data on patients receiving surgery for colorectal cancer; Medicaid patients had higher mortality and surgical complications than uninsured patients.

Medicaid patients are generally worse off than the uninsured.

Yes in specific low-cost regions, Medicaid can do 'ok'. But as a whole... you would be far better off going to the hospital with zero insurance at all.

I don't agree. Medicaid offers basic care. I have seen it in operation. The people are not left with huge bills which they cannot pay.

What the studies you quoted don't take into consideration is, the overall health of the individual BEFORE a surgical procedure which could be the reason for the negative consequences.

 

[dnsmith35]

Maybe the solution is, if the MD does not take Medicaid he is ineligible to get reimbursement from ANY insurance in which the government is involved; to include practicing in Hospitals getting Hill-Burton funds.

 

[Andylusion]

I did my internship for my Ed.S at the State of Alabama Rehabilitation Services. Most of my clients were on Medicaid. My experience with them is, they got reasonably good treatment at or county health units and prescription costs were only $1 copay at the time. Maybe it is our state, or because we have many more Medicaid qualified people than other states, but I would certainly rather go to a hospital with Medicaid than no insurance at all. In some places in the US, even Medicare gets pushed to the side or some providers will not accept it at all. Not true here. I think that problem can be addressed should we choose to go that route.

One other thing that will happen if those who can afford Medicaid premiums were charged for that coverage. Specifically, since as you noted, Medicaid is not the best coverage one can buy. Therefore, I believe the capable will quickly get better commercial coverage and pay for a good insurance instead of one which is not so good. (this is by no means an agreement that Medicaid is worse than no coverage)

It's the state. Alabama is in the lowest 15 cost-of-living states. The lower the cost of living, the more those Federal payouts stretch across more treatment.

Obviously if you give two hospitals the same $10K for treatment of Medicaid patients, one in New York, and the other in Birmingham, obviously the $10K is going to cover more in Birmingham, than NY.

The same is true even on a local level too. If you go to a Medicaid home in Columbus Ohio, you'll get far worse, or lower quality of care, than you can if you go to a Medicaid home in Youngstown, again because the cost of living is lower there. The same amount of money goes farther, when the costs of doing business are lower.

But overall, Medicaid is terrible.

Doctors Shun Patients Who Pay With Medicaid - Businessweek



And by the way, this is where the cost shift comes into play. That clinic MUST make a profit, or they would go out of business. So if Medicare and Medicaid are paying out less (by law), then guess who has to pay more? UnitedHealth has to be charged a higher price, to make up for the loss from Medicare and Medicaid. Of course those higher costs are passed right alone to premiums payers... you and me.

Robert F. Graboyes book “Medicaid and Health.”
Page 181

In 2010, the University of Virginia conducted a large-scale study that suggested that an individual without insurance has better health outcomes than an individual on Medicaid. Even after adjusting for risk factors, Medicaid patients had higher in-hospital mortality, longer hospital stays, and higher costs—compared with the uninsured, those on Medicare, and those on private insurance plans. A University of Pennsylvania study examined data on patients receiving surgery for colorectal cancer; Medicaid patients had higher mortality and surgical complications than uninsured patients.

Medicaid patients are generally worse off than the uninsured.

Yes in specific low-cost regions, Medicaid can do 'ok'. But as a whole... you would be far better off going to the hospital with zero insurance at all.

I don't agree. Medicaid offers basic care. I have seen it in operation. The people are not left with huge bills which they cannot pay.

What the studies you quoted don't take into consideration is, the overall health of the individual BEFORE a surgical procedure which could be the reason for the negative consequences.

Um, no that is incorrect. Notice the bold "Even after adjusting for risk factors". They adjusted for differences in conditions leading to hospitalization.

Please. I'm not some newb to the forum. I would have caught something that obvious. If not me, then at a minimum when the research was peer reviewed someone would have caught it.

Yes, they are in fact not left with any hospital bills they can not pay, and they are more likely to be dead, reducing the need to worry about bills.

 

[Andylusion]

Maybe the solution is, if the MD does not take Medicaid he is ineligible to get reimbursement from ANY insurance in which the government is involved; to include practicing in Hospitals getting Hill-Burton funds.

I think that's already the rule. Any MD that turns down Medicaid or Medicare, is ineligible for any government reimbursement.

And I know for certain that any hospital or clinic that turns down, is completely locked out of the system, I believe for a specified amount of time. (which I can't remember what the span is maybe 2 years or something).

Regardless, this isn't a loss. You miss the point. Doctors are LOSING money on government patients. Hospitals are LOSING money on government patients.

When you are losing money, and the government threatens to cut you off from losing money..... is that really a bad thing?

Remember the Mayo Clinic?
Mayo Clinic Makes Medicare, Medicaid Cuts | Heartlander Magazine

Mayo Center is Arizona is not going to accept Medicare in Arizona because they don’t pay enough.

The clinic will continue to accept Medicare patients at the facility for primary care treatment, but only if they pay cash.

The Mayo Clinic that Obama visited, where he said it was a model for health care across the nation, that clinic has completely opted out of Medicare and Medicaid.

Apparently losing government backing isn't a loss. It's a gain. Because they were LOSING on government patients.

 

[dnsmith35]

Maybe the solution is, if the MD does not take Medicaid he is ineligible to get reimbursement from ANY insurance in which the government is involved; to include practicing in Hospitals getting Hill-Burton funds.

I think that's already the rule. Any MD that turns down Medicaid or Medicare, is ineligible for any government reimbursement.

And I know for certain that any hospital or clinic that turns down, is completely locked out of the system, I believe for a specified amount of time. (which I can't remember what the span is maybe 2 years or something).

Regardless, this isn't a loss. You miss the point. Doctors are LOSING money on government patients. Hospitals are LOSING money on government patients.

When you are losing money, and the government threatens to cut you off from losing money..... is that really a bad thing?

Remember the Mayo Clinic?
Mayo Clinic Makes Medicare, Medicaid Cuts | Heartlander Magazine

Mayo Center is Arizona is not going to accept Medicare in Arizona because they don’t pay enough.

The clinic will continue to accept Medicare patients at the facility for primary care treatment, but only if they pay cash.

The Mayo Clinic that Obama visited, where he said it was a model for health care across the nation, that clinic has completely opted out of Medicare and Medicaid.

Apparently losing government backing isn't a loss. It's a gain. Because they were LOSING on government patients.

The doctors and hospitals and clinics all over the south would fold without Medicare and Medicaid.


BTW, I am posting this here as a bet to myself that George Phillips does not know that the reason Chomsky does not believe the USSR was socialist was because it was a dictatorship. Yet that is one of the absolute necessities for socialism to last beyond a short time, and as even George posted, after a short time when Lenin realized the SOCIALIST aspect of the USSR was in danger very quickly so he took over the absolute reins of power for the party. That the dictatorial government owned production, distribution and pricing and what is produced; and that the Commissars/leaders got most of the prosperity.

 

[Unkotare]

This is one of the most popular provisions in an otherwise despised law, Obamacare. It polls consistently well. And it sounds good: Insirance companies cannot deny coverage for pre existing conditions. Right?
But why would they deny coverage to begin with?
When they are forced to issue policies to people with pre existing conditions, who pays for the higher risk the company incurs by insuring them?
I realize these are beyond Stage One questions so the leftists here wont have a clue what I mean. But maybe some of the more informed posters can chime in.

I was aging before obamacare kicked in. Will they pay to correct this condition? I'm also a terrible golfer. Is there some obamaclinic I go to for that? I understand this affliction is very important to the President.

 

[francoHFW]

737- Mainly because the USSR was communist, not socialist, cold war dinosaur...

 

[Political Junky]

Those who are unconcerned about pre-existing conditions, might be very surprised when their insurance company decides not to pay. I guess that's a thing of the past now.