Yes, Mama knows how desperately all of her little darlings have waited patiently, including baited breath, for her opinion. Mama wanted to take time before composing a brief entry on the subject.
One of Mama's precious little sweetums has asthma. Mama has Lupus. We manage to fall through the cracks. Coverage from employer is too high. Yet we make too much to take advantage of state insurance for the children. We will be getting a private policy for the sum of $350 a month to cover us, but Mama's two medicines won't be covered for a year.
Mama does believe the system needs reformation. Mama's mama, your grand nanny, is on Medicaide. Can you say, "Big honkin' joke!" Sure, Mama knew you could. She gets "three punches" on a card. She can use them for either medicine OR doctor's appointments. Grand nanny is schitzophrenic, diabetic, and has COPD. Grand nanny recently stopped smoking (yay for grand nanny!). Now, tell Mama what grand nanny should do. There are times when grand nanny can't get everything she needs. Mama and Uncle Baldy take care of it, but if the system is so excited and pleased to take care of the needy, tell Mama why they aren't doing it.
Additionally - if the public system is so fantastic...explain to Mama why our elected officials won't give up their private insurance.
Instead of pointing out flaws, and Mama could sit here all day and do that...but her precious little sweetums wants some fried chicken and a cake for Sunday dinner. So Mama came out with a solution. That's what Mamas are for!
What did we do to the tobacco companies (aside from sue)? We taxed the crap out of them. What did the money go toward? Supposedly the money went to education and smoking cessation programs. Did the tobacco companies go out of business? Nope.
Drug companies charge Americans significantly more money because, according to them, we can pay more. Countries like Mexico and Canada pay much less for the exact same drug. Mama aint talking about online Mexican or Canadian "pharmacies". Mama is talking prescription per prescription comparision. Why? The answer is that these countries can't afford to pay what we pay. So, essentially, it is not that the drug companies must charge these prices. It is that the drug companies know they can get that amount out of us.
Merck had an 83% profit margin last year. If it was an oil company we'd all cry out that we are being gouged.
Mama proposes that we sue the crap out of these big pharmaceutical companies. Once we get the difference in what we pay and what another North American country pays we use that money, invested wisely, to pay for a public option.
For all of you little darlings so excited about socialized medicine you can do one of two things. Go to Canada next time you need a bypass. You'll probably die while you wait. Another option is that you can go visit a reservation here in the good ole' U S of A. Native Americans have socialized, government ran medicine. What do you hear about reservation clinics on the news? Not enough money, tight budgets, no medicine, long waits, etc. The last big report Mama saw was about the "Indian Clinic" here in Oklahoma. More Native American children in Oklahoma are diagnosed with Diabetes than any other disease. Why? Some could say lack of exercise or some could say lack of proper nutrition. Well, who runs those programs for our true founders? The government. Do you really think government rations are healthy options? No. They're cheap.
The entire nation deserves better than government ran health care.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Healthcare Reform
Posted by the . recidivist at 10:02 AM
Labels: Canada, diabetes, health, health care, healthcare, indian, medicaid, Merck, Mexico, native americans, oklahoma, pharmacy, prescription
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6 comments:
My hubby's co-worker has an HMO through his work. He broke his ankle a month ago. Norman Regional hospital ER says it isn't broke. He follows up with his regular doctor. Regular doctor says it is broke, and starts the process to refer to surgeon to repair. HMO calls co-worker, says you didn't choose this doctor at the beginning of the year, you were auto assigned a different doctor, and we can't approve the surgery referral from your current doctor. As of 8-21-09 the ankle has been broken for a month.
And this is work insurance Blue Cross Blue Shield HMO!
This would be a very long, drawn out debate if we were to have it. Essentially, I'm all for privatization just about everything except the following: Healtcare, education, public utilities, mass transit. These are all areas in which the profit/free market motive fails to deliver on basic necessities. Even being someone who can afford private healthcare, I'll take a government bureaucracy being slow and inefficient to a company running on the profit motive when it comes to making decisions on my family's care.
At least with a government, they will just adhere to the "rules", as slow, cumbersome, and inefficient as they can be (please fill out forms 101B, 9056C, and be sure to sign subsections 6, 7, and form J). Private insurers are more successful the more they deny and restrict treatment. They don't report to the general public or their customers, they report to their shareholders.
There are a few anecdotes about how Canadian, UK, French, Swiss, etc. care is lacking, but at least people who work paycheck to paycheck can get treatment that doesn't put them into bankruptcy. These countries have the same number of doctors and specialists per capita as the U.S. It takes longer to see the because they have more patients. They have more patients because poor people have coverage, and can see the doctor. In the US, these people sit around until everything becomes pneumonia, and go the emergency room. They leave things untreated, driving up the eventual treatment costs by a factor of 10.
The prescription drug side of health care is a scam within a scam. As you point out, they charge us what they do because they have decided that is what we can pay. A second practice that goes unnoticed is the listed of drugs covered under medicare and insurance. This is a true racket. An example, my mom was taking one prescription that worked well. All the sudden it was taken off the approved list, and the result was she needed two other prescriptions to make up for the one. Insurance paid it all, and the pay out for the two new drugs was almost 5x what the original drug cost. Who decided that it was a good deal to pull the original drug off the approved list? Someone got paid. None of these drugs are for anything highly specialized, they all deal with arthritis and pain management. So she takes two pills now instead of one. They don't work as well as the original, and medicare and tricare picks up the tab at a cost 5 times higher what the original cost.
Her doctor can't even explain it. It is a racket...know a good paralegal to look at the civil RICO avenue?....we could own all these companies with the treble penalties they would have to pay.
Great blog!!
Mike
I ran across your blog while researching Native American healthcare, so I'll comment on that first. Regarding your comment on children being diagnosed with diabetes, you are probably absolutely correct in your assessment of what leads to the diagnoses. However, your next sentence completely baffles me! "Well, who runs those programs for our true founders? The government." (The way you worded this, it sounds like you think the doctors cause the diabetes, but I know you don't, so I'll take the alternative approach to your logic - or lack thereof.) What does the administration of a healthcare system do with what a child has for breakfast? Do you phone your insurance company, press twelve buttons, get exasperated trying to reach a live person, and ask what to feed your child? I think not! Even if you did, if you lived on a reservation, chances are you wouldn't have enough money to purchase it. Do you know anything about Native Americans? Alcoholism is as high as 80% on some reservations, which is the cause of many of their diseases, such as diabetes, heart disease and liver cancer. Their doctors don't cause their diseases; however, their lifestyles put them at such great risk that they are an unhealthy population, which overtaxes their healthcare system moreso than a general population. (No, I am not Native American. I am upper-middle class caucasian.)
As for socialized medicine, the only socialized medicine we have in this country is Tricare (military), IHS (Indian) and the prison systems. Not even Medicare is run entirely by the government. Administration is contracted out (on a for-profit basis) to different companies regionally. My mother-in-law's claims are processed by Noridian; Cigna, BC/BS and others handle claims in other parts of the country.
Furthermore, no one has EVER proposed to "socialize" medicine - only insurance. Neither house of Congress has ever considered any bill with language relating to any doctor, hospital, long-term care facility or any other health professional being under the auspices of government control. Congress seeks only to provide the means for paying those professionals for the individuals who are not currently insured.
As for pharmaceutical companies, you are absolutely correct. That's free enterprise though, and most people sitting right of center will argue to the death that limits on profit margins are unfair - just as they argue that private insurance, no matter how badly they gouge the consumer, is the right way to go. I disagree with that argument, however.
Wow - isn't that the pot calling the kettle black? Have you ever lived or worked on a reservation? I said nothing about it having to do with doctors. I do know what the government provides to reservations and I do urge you to further your (obviously) unfinished research.
Thanks for posting, though. Mama always enjoys an alternate opinion.
No, I've never lived or worked on a reservation, but I have many friends who still live there.
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