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What Is The State of Today's Health Care?
I believe it is fair to say that everyone sees that there is a
problem with the current healthcare system in this country. I think
everyone believes that something must be done to control healthcare
costs, ensure the that everyone can obtain health insurance that
once it, and the doctors and hospitals get a fair payment for the
services that they render. The difficulty that we have today is that
the current healthcare legislation does nothing to fix healthcare.
The current legislation only attempts to transfer control and
operation of the healthcare industry to the federal government. I
think it is fair to say that the federal government does not have an
impressive record when it has attempted to regulate industries.
Let's take a look at some of the more infamous attempts by
the federal government to run a business:
Some Of The Governments Great Successes
The U.S. Post Service was established
in 1775. You have had 234 years to get it right and it is broke.
Social Security was established in
1935. You have had 74 years to get it right and it is broke.
Fannie Mae was established in 1938.
You have had 71 years to get it right and it is broke.
War on Poverty started in 1964. You
have had 45 years to get it right; $1 trillion of our money is
confiscated each year and transferred to "the poor" and they only
want more.
Medicare and Medicaid were
established in 1965. You have had 44 years to get it right and they
are broke.
Freddie Mac was established in 1970.
You have had 39 years to get it right and it is broke.
The Department of Energy was created
in 1977 to lessen our dependence on foreign oil. It has ballooned to
16,000 employees with a budget of $24 billion a year and we import
more oil than ever before. You had 32 years to get it right and it
is an abysmal failure.
So what are some of the problems with health care:
We can all see that healthcare costs are spiraling out of
control.
Some people that want healthcare can't afford healthcare.
Some people that want healthcare can't get health care because of
pre-existing conditions.
Some people don't have health care by choice and stiff the
hospitals when they must make use of their services. (Hospitals may
not refuse emergency service to anyone entering the hospital.)
The healthcare insurance bureaucracy has added billions of
dollars to the cost of healthcare.
Malpractice cases are brought against doctors that have done
nothing wrong.
Billions of dollars each year are spent in fraudulent insurance
claims in Medicare and Medicaid.
Medical mandates must be addressed (birth control, drug rehab).
Why are healthcare costs spiraling out of control?
We see it every year healthcare costs rising 20%, 30%, 40%, as if
there is no end. So you ask yourself why is that?
The Federal Government limits what it will pay to doctors for
Medicare & Medicaid patients.
Each year the federal government reduces the amount that they
will pay for services provided by doctors to Medicare and Medicaid
patients. Doctors have to make up the difference and they do so by
charging higher prices to all their non-Medicare and Medicaid
patients. These higher prices are used by insurance companies to
adjust their payment tables resulting in higher costs to each
insured person. The result is
that the insured, you, are paying more for your health care to make
up for what the government isn't paying - another hidden tax.
The cost of the insurance bureaucracy rises with the rate of
inflation
Each year the federal government's bureaucracy imposes additional
measures and regulation on doctors and insurance companies forcing
them to pay for additional services and processing patient medical
claim forms. I remember the days when I walked into my childhood
doctor's office and I was greeted by a single nurse in the front
office and went directly in to see the doctor. We paid five dollars
for that office visit and granted that was a long time ago but our
family doctor did not have the imposed regulatory bureaucracy that
he is required to maintain today in his office. Today when you walk
into a doctor's office there are appointment assistance, insurance
assistance, physicians assistants, practical nurses, lab nurses, the
physicians lawyer on speed dial, and finally the doctor. All this
bureaucracy is required to protect the doctor against failures in
patient care and regulatory oversight.
Imagine how less expensive it would be if you walk into a
doctor's office and was greeted by his nurse and were attended to by
the physician himself without any insurance paperwork, or
extraordinary bureaucracy required to protect the physician from the
insurance companies, the regulators, and lawsuit happy personal
injury attorneys.
Insuring those with pre-existing conditions
Everyone should be able to get health insurance with or without
pre-existing conditions. The question is what will they pay. If you
go to obtain life insurance and you're a smoker, or you're
overweight, or you are previous cancer patient you will have to pay
a higher premium for life insurance. There shouldn't be any
different for health insurance. The difference is you should be able
to obtain the insurance even if you must pay a higher premium.
Health insurance cannot be free and it is quite possible that
assistance programs can be developed to spread the cost of high risk
patients throughout a national group.
So How Do We Fix Health Care?
We certainly don't do it by rushing in and implementing a program
that will cost several trillion dollars over the next 10 years. We
certainly don't rush in and implement the program across the entire
United States without even knowing if it will work. So what's the
answer? There are a lot of different approaches that have been
suggested that we can try and test market was developed small
programs within the state or large city to test out a program and
see how it works. Work in partnership with the doctors, insurance
companies, and patients to develop programs that will meet the needs
of each of the group involved.
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