What Arizona proposes about Universal Health Care.

[N4mddissent]

Perhaps there should be a ballot initiative against mandatory car insurance as well?

Do you live in a state with an ad valorem tax on vehicles? Talk about a pain.

 

[Navy1960]

About the way health care is delivered in Arizona and the rest of the United States, one thing is certain: The system is broken.
More than 1.2 million Arizonans,
nearly 20 percent,
lack health insurance. Since 1999, the cost of premiums in the U.S. has risen four times faster than inflation.
Fewer businesses with fewer than 10 employees offered health insurance in 2007 than in 2000.
Against this backdrop comes Proposition 101, which would amend Arizona's Constitution to prohibit laws that restrict a person's freedom to choose private care, or to decline to be covered by any particular health system or plan.
The proposition is a bubbling petri dish of unforeseen consequences that will not improve our health care system and will hinder true reform. It should be rejected.
The broad sweep of the proposition leads many health care experts to believe it will result in endless litigation as attorneys haggle over its interpretation. Even Dr. Eric Novack,
one of two Phoenix surgeons pushing the plan, acknowledges that the right combination of attorneys and plaintiffs could result in lawsuits.
The head of Arizona's state Medicaid program says the proposal, if challenged in the courts, could force the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System
to switch to a fee-for-service model that would cost consumers $1 billion.
Professor Gene Schneller
of Arizona State University concludes,
"Lawyers will be the major beneficiaries."

Our Endorsement: 101 not what the doctor ordered | PROPOSITIONS: HEALTH CARE

. According to congressionally-commissioned research from the MTG Corporation, the annual cost to just the 24 counties along the border in Texas, New Mexico and California exceeds $200 million, and for Arizona's four border counties alone it's $32 million per year.

These unreimbursed costs, and other health-related issues, have put Arizona hospitals in a state of dire fiscal emergency. As a result, some have closed, or are in danger of having to close their emergency rooms and other services.

PHXnews.com | Illegal Aliens and the Cost to Arizona's Hospitals

When you use numbers like that Chris you need to look at them and understand especially here what those numbers include and why the cost of healthcare in Arizona has risen as well as the cost of education, and all other public services. The other thing to consider here about prop. 101 is this, the language of the prop. is only language that gives the people of Arizona the right to choose who they get that insurance from without a mandate from any govt. entity. I see no issue with that at all, unless you are a govt. agency that is vested in the delivery of health service to others if they want it or not.

Earlier this month, Arizona small business owners spoke up on four ballot initiatives of concern to them. Prop. 100, the Protect Our Homes initiative, is supported by 80 percent of NFIB members, opposed by 11 percent, with the rest were undecided. Prop. 101, the Medical Choice for Arizona ballot measure, received the support 83 percent support, 7 percent opposition, with the remaining undecided. Prop. 105, the Majority Rules initiative, is supported 62 percent of NFIB-member, small business owners, opposed by 21 percent of them, with 16 percent undecided. Only the so-called Homeowners' Bill of Rights ballot measure, Prop. 201, was rejected by mom-and-pop entrepreneurs, winning only 16 percent support; 69 percent opposed it, and 15 percent were undecided.

NFIB.com - Eight More Legislative Candidates Receive Big Election Endorsement

 

[Luissa]

By now we have all argued Universal Health Care till we are blue in the face. I don't see many minds changed, but I thought you all would like to see here in Arizona a Ballot proposal that is in place to block Universal Health Care.

Proposition 101, known by its supporters as Medical Choice for Arizona or the Freedom to Choose Act will be on the November 4, 2008 ballot in Arizona as a citizen-initiated constitutional amendment.
The supporters say their goal is to "prevent socialized medicine or further heavy regulation of medical care and health insurance" in the state. Titled "Arizona - Freedom of Choice in Health Care Act" and advanced by Medical Choice for Arizona, the measure aims to prevent "many of the abuses associated with socialized medicine and restricting its form to either residual welfare or a voucher system

Prohibits laws that: restrict person's choice of private health care systems or private plans; interfere with person's or entity's right to pay directly for lawful medical services; impose a penalty or fine for choosing to obtain or decline health care coverage or for participatin in any health care system or plan.

A "yes" vote shall have the effect of prohibiting laws that restrict a person's choice of private health care systems or private plans, interfere with a person or an entity's right to pay for lawful medical services, and impose a penalty or fine for choosing to obtain or decline health care coverage or for participation in any health care system or plan. Yes.

A "no" vote shall have the effect of retaining the current law regarding a person or entity's health care choices. No."


I have a feeling in several states you will see a divide begin to form if Barack Obama prevails on several issues where states will start taking paths like this.


Arizona Proposition 101 (2008 - Ballotpedia)

If it is like in my state, where many children are on state medical I think this is stupid and the ones who will really be hurt in the end are children!

 

[Navy1960]

If it is like in my state, where many children are on state medical I think this is stupid and the ones who will really be hurt in the end are children!

Luissa, are those children on that state medical care because they are mandated to be on it? Or is because of economic issues their parents have had to put their children on it?

 

[Luissa]

Luissa, are those children on that state medical care because they are mandated to be on it? Or is because of economic issues their parents have had to put their children on it?

I get the point of the law, it refers to HMO's but isn't it a way to not have socialized medicine!
And if you are state here only three companies I believe participate in the program, so it is alittle of both. So is it trying to get rid of state medical?

 

[Navy1960]

I get the point of the law, it refers to HMO's but isn't it a way to not have socialized medicine!
And if you are state here only three companies I believe participate in the program, so it is alittle of both. So is it trying to get rid of state medical?

No, what I honestly think it is, it is a preemptive strike at any attempt by the Federal Government to impose a Universal mandated health care plan. It's not to get rid of state medical programs but what I think it is attempting to accomplish Luissa is to leave open the option for people to make their own choices in healthcare.

 

[Care4all]

No, what I honestly think it is, it is a preemptive strike at any attempt by the Federal Government to impose a Universal mandated health care plan. It's not to get rid of state medical programs but what I think it is attempting to accomplish Luissa is to leave open the option for people to make their own choices in healthcare.

How would it open it any more than it is now?

 

[Navy1960]

How would it open it any more than it is now?

It wouldn't Care, the point I was making is that this is more or less to give people the freedom to choose if they want to have health insurance and who they get it from.

 

[Chris]

Like I said......no free healthcare for veterans or little children.

Healthcare is for the rich!

 

[Care4all]

It wouldn't Care, the point I was making is that this is more or less to give people the freedom to choose if they want to have health insurance and who they get it from.

i guess i would like to know what choices they are making now regarding their healthcare other than going or not going with who their employer has chosen for them?

this measure is wrong.... it sidelines the real issues, of how the state can help in providing the rules, regs and measures that gives their citizens the ability to get healthcare without going bankrupt...this measure distracts from your states uninsured and does not address any real life, healthcare issues its citizens are facing now...it's a sham, smoke and mirrors that distracts from your state's real healthcare issues....

YOU, should reconsider your stance and hold your state accountable in handling the healthcare issues your state really has, and not settle by supporting this silly partisan amendment that does nothing but rally the republican troops.... let ''them'' know...that your ''on to them'' and their wasteful games....

if the federal gvt ever instituted a universal healthcare plan, your state citizens would have federal taxes taken from them to pay for universal care and would have no ability to get any healthcare in return for the taxes they were forced to pay is the way it appears to me...though i could be wrong?

either way, things like this are just trying to game the system and are uncalled for tactics that do nothing to solve your states problems with healthcare, as i have already said....i wouldn't let them, the powers to be, play me that way...make them address healthcare conditions in your state, then play around with some dreamy constitutional amendment...

but heh! don't let the PUSHY side of me influence you in any way....unless you think i made a wee bit of sense! lol

care

 

[Luissa]

No, what I honestly think it is, it is a preemptive strike at any attempt by the Federal Government to impose a Universal mandated health care plan. It's not to get rid of state medical programs but what I think it is attempting to accomplish Luissa is to leave open the option for people to make their own choices in healthcare.

If that is the case then I can see the point of the law but I still see a need for state medical and as long as they still have a program or can to provide insurance for children. As I have told you my child is on state medical and right now it is all I can get him since I am in school and working part time. And for anyone who might make a comment on that, I only plan on having him on state medical until I am done with college and get a "grown up" job!

 

[Navy1960]

I don't think , that my comments here should be misunderstood to mean that I think that anyone would should be denied access to medical care. I do think however, that people should be allowed to make that choice on their own, be it a government sponsored program or a private one and not have someone that you elect tell you what you will or won't have for healthcare. IMO they have a job to do and that job is to regulate the costs of medical insurance and health care which they have been been dismal at. Of course you make sense, Care, and I don't think your pushy at all, but I've got lots more experience into being talked into the things trust me. lol Luissa, you make a decision that best suits your needs for the moment, you have no need to apologize to anyone for doing whats best for yourself and your family ever.

 

[Chris]

I don't think , that my comments here should be misunderstood to mean that I think that anyone would should be denied access to medical care. I do think however, that people should be allowed to make that choice on their own, be it a government sponsored program or a private one and not have someone that you elect tell you what you will or won't have for healthcare. IMO they have a job to do and that job is to regulate the costs of medical insurance and health care which they have been been dismal at. Of course you make sense, Care, and I don't think your pushy at all, but I've got lots more experience into being talked into the things trust me. lol Luissa, you make a decision that best suits your needs for the moment, you have no need to apologize to anyone for doing whats best for yourself and your family ever.

Everyone in America can get free healthcare. It's called the emergency room. So since everyone can get free healthcare the question becomes, How do we pay for it? Do we have a bloated, expensive, and inefficient system where insurance companies, liability lawyers, and Big Pharma feast on the sick, or do we have a single payer system which has been shown to be HALF as expensive per capita? Most Republicans want to continue to pay huge premiums to bloated insurance companies because they have been brainwashed by corporate lobbyists. Meanwhile, the rest of the world laughs at us and our stupidity.

 

[Luissa]

I don't think , that my comments here should be misunderstood to mean that I think that anyone would should be denied access to medical care. I do think however, that people should be allowed to make that choice on their own, be it a government sponsored program or a private one and not have someone that you elect tell you what you will or won't have for healthcare. IMO they have a job to do and that job is to regulate the costs of medical insurance and health care which they have been been dismal at. Of course you make sense, Care, and I don't think your pushy at all, but I've got lots more experience into being talked into the things trust me. lol Luissa, you make a decision that best suits your needs for the moment, you have no need to apologize to anyone for doing whats best for yourself and your family ever.

SOme on here make you feel like if you get anything from the state you are a low life!
And I agree with you, they need to regulate these insurance companies more and not health insurance. I am dealing with an insurance company right now and what a bunch of crooks!

 

[Care4all]

SOme on here make you feel like if you get anything from the state you are a low life!
And I agree with you, they need to regulate these insurance companies more and not health insurance. I am dealing with an insurance company right now and what a bunch of crooks!

so am i!!! the sob insurance company, which the policy for matt and i is $900 a month, refused to pay the bill for the ONE and only visit to the doctor last year made by me out of the two of us....they rejected it, and the hospital is billing us $1800 dollars for the one visit and lab tests....been fighting this for a year now....

it makes me so angry i can't begin to tell ya!

care

 

[Diuretic]

so am i!!! the sob insurance company, which the policy for matt and i is $900 a month, refused to pay the bill for the ONE and only visit to the doctor last year made by me out of the two of us....they rejected it, and the hospital is billing us $1800 dollars for the one visit and lab tests....been fighting this for a year now....

it makes me so angry i can't begin to tell ya!

care

I'm stunned that Americans put up up with that crap. But that's how insurance companies behave, they don't like paying out because they lose money.

I mean, why do you put up with it? Stubborness? Ignorance? Fear? Ideology?

It just doesn't make sense.

 

[Care4all]

I'm stunned that Americans put up up with that crap. But that's how insurance companies behave, they don't like paying out because they lose money.

I mean, why do you put up with it? Stubborness? Ignorance? Fear? Ideology?

It just doesn't make sense.

there is nothing we can do about it...insurance companies lobby congress with boocoos of money/donations and congress just puts in or refrain from putting in... laws and rules that benefit them....

lobbying of the big rich in money corps is a major problem in our country...

even obama's health care reforms proposed, INCLUDE the big donor health insurance companies....

 

[Navy1960]

Another issue that has gotten away from the regulation business. Inurance companies need to be in the insurance business and Doctors need to be in the medical business. When someone signs up for medical insurance, it would make sense to me that an insurance company should be required to disclose those things they will cover and what they won't cover and allow the person that purcahses the policy the ability to shop for choices that they deem fit their individual lifestyles. At no time should an insurance company be dictating to a medical professional what treatment should be offered. This relationship is a regulatory one, and the primary reason this has gotten out of control is because, yes there us a lot of money in congress that keeps some looking the other way, and still others don't want to do anything as long as it provides them with an election issue that keeps their seat. Again it points to a congress that has had for many years their own self interest above those of the people that elect them and this includes democrats and republicans.

 

[Luissa]

so am i!!! the sob insurance company, which the policy for matt and i is $900 a month, refused to pay the bill for the ONE and only visit to the doctor last year made by me out of the two of us....they rejected it, and the hospital is billing us $1800 dollars for the one visit and lab tests....been fighting this for a year now....

it makes me so angry i can't begin to tell ya!

care

You might want to look into the state helping you pay the bill. I know one of the options when you have to fill out paper work to apply for state programs in my state they ask you if you have unpaid medical bills and they can help you pay them.
And what you are talking about is one of the reason we either need universal health care or regulations on health care providers. Before I had my son and was working somewhere else I had a form of health care where I paid like $40 dollars a month and it didn't cover shit, it was cheaper to buy prescriptions at Walmart with no insurance then use my prescription card.

 

[Diuretic]

there is nothing we can do about it...insurance companies lobby congress with boocoos of money/donations and congress just puts in or refrain from putting in... laws and rules that benefit them....

lobbying of the big rich in money corps is a major problem in our country...

even obama's health care reforms proposed, INCLUDE the big donor health insurance companies....

You're not orphans when it comes to the insidious lobbyists, it's just that your governance is a damn sight more transparent than others - especially here in Australia. Our governmental system at all levels is opaque when it comes to lobbying and that's our fault, letting it happen like that. We need to smack ourselves that we let it happen.

But back to the point. I wonder about the fierce ideological (apparently) opposition to universal health care which is expressed in this and other forums. It's as if some people have been convinced to vote against their own interests. Heck of a trick that one. Mind you, as I say, your're not orphans in that either. One thing our politicians did get right is the basis of our health care system (although the original has been watere down by ideological bastards over the years it's still there).