Obamacare is a mess

PJ_Soul said:

I will never understand why any Americans stand against universal healthcare, given all the examples from other countries that they could model such a system after so that it suits America in particular, and given how it would prevent people from losing their shirts just because they get sick, and make it so people can go see doctors when they don't have any cash or credit. Are these pro-private-health-insurance people brainwashed or what? How can any right-minded human being be in favour of a system that allows private companies to profit from restricting coverage??? It just makes no sense to me.

They don't like it because they don't trust anything government run, and with somewhat good reason. Everything run by government is so innefecient. They picture the Dr office running like the DMV.
My brother just had back surgery last month. It has been an 18-month battle of constant pain for him because it was a worker's comp issue (state-run worker's comp).
his back doctor immediately said what needed to be done, but the state threw 18 months of delays and needless, cheaper procedures in his way. The state law allows 10 days to respond, but on multiple occasions it was over 90 days before recieving a response. The MO is to just deny everything and wait for you to appeal, stalling as much as they can along the way. Shortly into this process he had to hire an attorney to send threatening letters because they were violating the law at every turn, but didn't really help. The only thing it's going to help is a financial lawsuit for compensation after he's done.
But even after the surgery he was supposed to get in home nurse/therapy visits twice a week. No home visits were made for over 2 months.
Had this not had to go through workers comp, his surgery would have been within about 4-6 weeks of his accident. Instead he was bedridden and in constant pain for 18 months and his recovery is in jeopardy because everything has to go through the state. It breaks my heart because he has 4 kids from 1 year to 14 yrs, and he will have missed out on 2 years of their life all because some people working for the government don't want to do their job (or they see their primary job as saving money and not helping people).
Now I know that has nothing to do with Obamacare, but it is examples like that that make many think people will literally die waiting for care if the government is in charge.
The VA is another example where veterans did die awaiting care, and that is just government doing a small scale healthcare.
i for one think it could be done, and for a lot less than the current plans. But because of cases like this I know the fears are legitimate, and if it isn't put together correctly and run properly it would be just as bad as the VA or working with worker's comp.

mace1229 said:

PJ_Soul said:

I will never understand why any Americans stand against universal healthcare, given all the examples from other countries that they could model such a system after so that it suits America in particular, and given how it would prevent people from losing their shirts just because they get sick, and make it so people can go see doctors when they don't have any cash or credit. Are these pro-private-health-insurance people brainwashed or what? How can any right-minded human being be in favour of a system that allows private companies to profit from restricting coverage??? It just makes no sense to me.

They don't like it because they don't trust anything government run, and with somewhat good reason. Everything run by government is so innefecient. They picture the Dr office running like the DMV.
My brother just had back surgery last month. It has been an 18-month battle of constant pain for him because it was a worker's comp issue (state-run worker's comp).
his back doctor immediately said what needed to be done, but the state threw 18 months of delays and needless, cheaper procedures in his way. The state law allows 10 days to respond, but on multiple occasions it was over 90 days before recieving a response. The MO is to just deny everything and wait for you to appeal, stalling as much as they can along the way. Shortly into this process he had to hire an attorney to send threatening letters because they were violating the law at every turn, but didn't really help. The only thing it's going to help is a financial lawsuit for compensation after he's done.
But even after the surgery he was supposed to get in home nurse/therapy visits twice a week. No home visits were made for over 2 months.
Had this not had to go through workers comp, his surgery would have been within about 4-6 weeks of his accident. Instead he was bedridden and in constant pain for 18 months and his recovery is in jeopardy because everything has to go through the state. It breaks my heart because he has 4 kids from 1 year to 14 yrs, and he will have missed out on 2 years of their life all because some people working for the government don't want to do their job (or they see their primary job as saving money and not helping people).
Now I know that has nothing to do with Obamacare, but it is examples like that that make many think people will literally die waiting for care if the government is in charge.
The VA is another example where veterans did die awaiting care, and that is just government doing a small scale healthcare.
i for one think it could be done, and for a lot less than the current plans. But because of cases like this I know the fears are legitimate, and if it isn't put together correctly and run properly it would be just as bad as the VA or working with worker's comp.

yep, those are good points. I think a lot of people are for universal healthcare, but we may be too far deep into privatization to just up and go to single payer.  If we went to single payer, what happens to the ~500,000 employees from the big insurance firms? Do they get absorbed by the government? Only half absorbed and the rest laid off? Or are they all just laid off at the drop of a hat? I mean, that's a whole lot of people that could be out of a job. You think any administration (GOP or Dem) want's to be responsible for that kind of layoff? Not to mention the effects it could have on the markets if multi billion dollar companies just ceased to exist

If single payer is going to happen, it's going to be gradual and take years for it to come together. It may start with expanding Medicare slightly and covering more and more, but it's not an overnight thing.

I wouldn't say brainwashed. I mean, what example of anything government run is moving smoothly? Education is a mess, DMV is a nightmare to deal with. And the VA scandal to top everything off has taken away much of the confidence in running anything health related.
so I wouldn't say brainwashed as much as our own government hasn't given any good reason to have confidence in executing it properly.  They picture dieing the the ER while waiting to be seen for a heart attack since it takes 3-4 hours to apply for a license at the DMV or a marriage certificate at the records office. Why would health care be the one thing the government can do right?
i personally don't think it would be that bad and that we would be better than what we currently have, but can't blame others who do because of experiences like that. They've been given no reason to believe otherwise, everything slows down when the government is involved.

mace1229 said:

PJ_Soul said:

I will never understand why any Americans stand against universal healthcare, given all the examples from other countries that they could model such a system after so that it suits America in particular, and given how it would prevent people from losing their shirts just because they get sick, and make it so people can go see doctors when they don't have any cash or credit. Are these pro-private-health-insurance people brainwashed or what? How can any right-minded human being be in favour of a system that allows private companies to profit from restricting coverage??? It just makes no sense to me.

They don't like it because they don't trust anything government run, and with somewhat good reason. Everything run by government is so innefecient. They picture the Dr office running like the DMV.
My brother just had back surgery last month. It has been an 18-month battle of constant pain for him because it was a worker's comp issue (state-run worker's comp).
his back doctor immediately said what needed to be done, but the state threw 18 months of delays and needless, cheaper procedures in his way. The state law allows 10 days to respond, but on multiple occasions it was over 90 days before recieving a response. The MO is to just deny everything and wait for you to appeal, stalling as much as they can along the way. Shortly into this process he had to hire an attorney to send threatening letters because they were violating the law at every turn, but didn't really help. The only thing it's going to help is a financial lawsuit for compensation after he's done.
But even after the surgery he was supposed to get in home nurse/therapy visits twice a week. No home visits were made for over 2 months.
Had this not had to go through workers comp, his surgery would have been within about 4-6 weeks of his accident. Instead he was bedridden and in constant pain for 18 months and his recovery is in jeopardy because everything has to go through the state. It breaks my heart because he has 4 kids from 1 year to 14 yrs, and he will have missed out on 2 years of their life all because some people working for the government don't want to do their job (or they see their primary job as saving money and not helping people).
Now I know that has nothing to do with Obamacare, but it is examples like that that make many think people will literally die waiting for care if the government is in charge.
The VA is another example where veterans did die awaiting care, and that is just government doing a small scale healthcare.
i for one think it could be done, and for a lot less than the current plans. But because of cases like this I know the fears are legitimate, and if it isn't put together correctly and run properly it would be just as bad as the VA or working with worker's comp.

this story has ZERO to do with health insurance, and ZERO to do with medicare and ZERO to do with the federal government. this has do do with state government and the workman's compensation rules that are set by the individual state for state employees. sounds like state of illinois. state of illinois workman's compensation is the absolute biggest piece of shit "insurance" i have ever had to deal with in my 19 year career. they approve nothing, and pay pennies on the dollar for what is billed, and they ALWAYS delay, delay, delay treatment. with the way the law is, if an injury occurs at work it has to go through workman's compensation because private health insurance will not pay for something that happens on the job. the law needs to be changed so that the worker gets the option to have their private insurance cover the cost, but that won't happen because the insurance companies don't want to pay for work related injuries.

employers never admit fault and never want to compensate the employee, because that is an admission of liability and they can be sued by the worker, and then fined heavily by OSHA if found liable for unsafe working conditions. there are ALWAYS lawyers involved, and nobody in health care wants to deal with that shit. 

medicare is a successful program. i work with a surgeon and we love medicare for 2 reasons. 1. they always pay. maybe not the amount that we bill, but we always get paid. 2.  they are easy to deal with. most surgeries that we need to do on medicare patients are paid for with very little need for precertification or predetermination. medicare sets the billing standards, and it sets what other insurance companies pay for the same service. what medicare pays for a certain service is call the allowable. all insurance companies are mandated to pay no less than the medicare allowable. most of them pay what medicare pays for the same service. some pay more, but most pay the allowable.

sorry that happened to your brother and i hope he recovers. his gripe is not with the federal government. it is with the workers compensation system in his state. if he is going to be angry, it helps to know who to be angry at.

mace1229 said:

gimmesometruth27 said:

mace1229 said:

PJ_Soul said:

I will never understand why any Americans stand against universal healthcare, given all the examples from other countries that they could model such a system after so that it suits America in particular, and given how it would prevent people from losing their shirts just because they get sick, and make it so people can go see doctors when they don't have any cash or credit. Are these pro-private-health-insurance people brainwashed or what? How can any right-minded human being be in favour of a system that allows private companies to profit from restricting coverage??? It just makes no sense to me.

They don't like it because they don't trust anything government run, and with somewhat good reason. Everything run by government is so innefecient. They picture the Dr office running like the DMV.
My brother just had back surgery last month. It has been an 18-month battle of constant pain for him because it was a worker's comp issue (state-run worker's comp).
his back doctor immediately said what needed to be done, but the state threw 18 months of delays and needless, cheaper procedures in his way. The state law allows 10 days to respond, but on multiple occasions it was over 90 days before recieving a response. The MO is to just deny everything and wait for you to appeal, stalling as much as they can along the way. Shortly into this process he had to hire an attorney to send threatening letters because they were violating the law at every turn, but didn't really help. The only thing it's going to help is a financial lawsuit for compensation after he's done.
But even after the surgery he was supposed to get in home nurse/therapy visits twice a week. No home visits were made for over 2 months.
Had this not had to go through workers comp, his surgery would have been within about 4-6 weeks of his accident. Instead he was bedridden and in constant pain for 18 months and his recovery is in jeopardy because everything has to go through the state. It breaks my heart because he has 4 kids from 1 year to 14 yrs, and he will have missed out on 2 years of their life all because some people working for the government don't want to do their job (or they see their primary job as saving money and not helping people).
Now I know that has nothing to do with Obamacare, but it is examples like that that make many think people will literally die waiting for care if the government is in charge.
The VA is another example where veterans did die awaiting care, and that is just government doing a small scale healthcare.
i for one think it could be done, and for a lot less than the current plans. But because of cases like this I know the fears are legitimate, and if it isn't put together correctly and run properly it would be just as bad as the VA or working with worker's comp.

this story has ZERO to do with health insurance, and ZERO to do with medicare and ZERO to do with the federal government. this has do do with state government and the workman's compensation rules that are set by the individual state for state employees. sounds like state of illinois. state of illinois workman's compensation is the absolute biggest piece of shit "insurance" i have ever had to deal with in my 19 year career. they approve nothing, and pay pennies on the dollar for what is billed, and they ALWAYS delay, delay, delay treatment. with the way the law is, if an injury occurs at work it has to go through workman's compensation because private health insurance will not pay for something that happens on the job. the law needs to be changed so that the worker gets the option to have their private insurance cover the cost, but that won't happen because the insurance companies don't want to pay for work related injuries.

employers never admit fault and never want to compensate the employee, because that is an admission of liability and they can be sued by the worker, and then fined heavily by OSHA if found liable for unsafe working conditions. there are ALWAYS lawyers involved, and nobody in health care wants to deal with that shit. 

medicare is a successful program. i work with a surgeon and we love medicare for 2 reasons. 1. they always pay. maybe not the amount that we bill, but we always get paid. 2.  they are easy to deal with. most surgeries that we need to do on medicare patients are paid for with very little need for precertification or predetermination. medicare sets the billing standards, and it sets what other insurance companies pay for the same service. what medicare pays for a certain service is call the allowable. all insurance companies are mandated to pay no less than the medicare allowable. most of them pay what medicare pays for the same service. some pay more, but most pay the allowable.

sorry that happened to your brother and i hope he recovers. his gripe is not with the federal government. it is with the workers compensation system in his state. if he is going to be angry, it helps to know who to be angry at.

Never claimed it was related to current health insurance. It was my response as to why so many don't trust that a government run health plan is a good thing.
I believe it explains why so many are distrusting of anything run by the government. Federal or state, people don't trust government running things because they are so often inefficient.
i ended by saying I don't agree, but when so many people have an experience like that it is easy for me to see why they think government in control of health care wouldnt be any different than the experiences that had.
i do believe government ran HC it would be ran differently than workers comp or the VA. But my only reasoning behind that is because it'd have to be or it'd collapse. Others who base it of past experiences believe differently.
yes, current HC sucks, and government ran would probably be an improvement. But can you name a single government program than runs so well that makes you sit back and think "I'd love for them to run healthcare too!"

i know you weren't saying that. i was throwing all of that out there so others can see the difference between federally run medicare and state run work comp.

medicare is extremely popular and well run. it is one of the most popular government run programs in american history. why do you think the narrative from the old people on the right during the obamacare debate was "keep your government hands off of my medicare!!!"? the irony was that those protesters did not know the federal government was managing their health insurance via medicare.

PJ_Soul said:

Alright, so where we land is that, while the best part of the US healthcare system seems to be Medicare, which is run by the government, too many Americans don't trust the government to run their healthcare system, and think that private for-profit insurance companies are more trustworthy as far as ensuring that they get decent healthcare, while people die and/or go broke because their private coverage isn't adequate. Gotcha. Not brainwashed? I beg to differ.

Depending on how the question is asked, about 50% want the government to ensure health insurance coverage.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/186782/say-gov-ensure-healthcare-coverage.aspx

mace1229 said:

I wouldn't say brainwashed. I mean, what example of anything government run is moving smoothly? Education is a mess, DMV is a nightmare to deal with. And the VA scandal to top everything off has taken away much of the confidence in running anything health related.
so I wouldn't say brainwashed as much as our own government hasn't given any good reason to have confidence in executing it properly.  They picture dieing the the ER while waiting to be seen for a heart attack since it takes 3-4 hours to apply for a license at the DMV or a marriage certificate at the records office. Why would health care be the one thing the government can do right?
i personally don't think it would be that bad and that we would be better than what we currently have, but can't blame others who do because of experiences like that. They've been given no reason to believe otherwise, everything slows down when the government is involved.

The DMV would be a nightmare if a private company as well.  I would argue it would be worse because a profit factor would be built in.

As a small business owner that deals with the IRS and IDR (Indiana Dept of Revenue) on a very regular basis I can tell you that the IRS is much more efficient than the IDR.  I can also tell you that the IRS is much more accountable (and efficient) than private corporations like AT&T and Comcast.  

Large corporations are just as bureaucratic as the government.  Insurance companies are large corporations.

Rand Paul was doing an interview recently regarding health care where he kept pushing the fact that when people join "groups" they can lower their health care costs substantially.  The interviewer finally asked "Aren't you making a case for universal coverage?" since that puts us all in one group.

It's as simple as that.  

brianlux said:

For the millionth time, I'll never understand the outrageous costs related to medical care.  I had a biopsy done on what turned out to be a basal cell carcinoma and the costs for things like "sterilized tray"... shit!  I could have bought new car for that much money!  Yes, an exaggeration, but anyone here in the US knows what I mean.  Go to the hospital and pay big bucks for a gauze pad.  Whatever.  Freakin' ridiculous.  Until this kind of massive medical rip-off ceases, the problems with health coverage here will continue.  Good God this subject gets me in knots!

yep....and I don't know about your area but around here the new hospitals are fucking Taj Mahals.  

If you haven't seen Michael Moore's Sicko I would recommend it.  

brianlux said:

Gern Blansten said:

brianlux said:

For the millionth time, I'll never understand the outrageous costs related to medical care.  I had a biopsy done on what turned out to be a basal cell carcinoma and the costs for things like "sterilized tray"... shit!  I could have bought new car for that much money!  Yes, an exaggeration, but anyone here in the US knows what I mean.  Go to the hospital and pay big bucks for a gauze pad.  Whatever.  Freakin' ridiculous.  Until this kind of massive medical rip-off ceases, the problems with health coverage here will continue.  Good God this subject gets me in knots!

yep....and I don't know about your area but around here the new hospitals are fucking Taj Mahals.  

If you haven't seen Michael Moore's Sicko I would recommend it.  

I wanted to see that and totally spaced it out.  Will do and thanks for the reminder!

It's a few years old but it gives real good examples of health care in England, France, Canada, etc.