Rebutal to LAMEborn's recent mailer to CD5 constituents
or watch on MSNBC (full screen, hi def)
Interview with former Cigna Insurance Communications Director - Wendell Potter,
who blows the whistle on the big insurance corp's crimes
part 2:
Michael Moore trailer for "Sicko":
doctor admits lack of healthcare killed patient (Sicko):
British healthcare system from Sicko:
Rep. Conyers and Nurses association deliver Sicko to Congress:
303-277-8306
PO Box 280767, Lakewood, CO 80228-0767
Yahoo groups:
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/hc4ac/
Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=38226817322#/group.php?gid=38226817322
Colorado Springs chapter:
http://healthcareforallcolorado.org/?p=64
Medicare Birthday Party
Representative from district 17, Dennis Apuan, addresses
the crowd
Dianna Moore, practicing medical professional
Civil rights attorney, Bill Durland
The Colorado Springs July 30
celebration of Medicare's 44th birthday took place at 2 p.m. in
the Otis Park Community Center. Health Care for All Colorado cut
the cake and raised public-policy questions with State Rep.
from house district 17, Dennis Apuan, Springs chapter president,
Athena Roe, medical professional, Dianna Moore and civil rights lawyer,
Bill Durland.
Two single-payer bills are still making their way through Congress - HR 676 and S 703. A single-payer health system for seniors - Medicare - has survived 44 years with outstanding patient satisfaction scores. So why not single-payer for the rest of us?
For more information,
contact Tom Faudree at tomfaudree@q.com
By
T.R. Reid
Sunday, August 23, 2009
As Americans search for the cure to what ails our health-care system, we've overlooked an invaluable source of ideas and solutions: the rest of the world. All the other industrialized democracies have faced problems like ours, yet they've found ways to cover everybody -- and still spend far less than we do.
I've traveled the world from Oslo to Osaka to see how other developed democracies provide health care. Instead of dismissing these models as "socialist," we could adapt their solutions to fix our problems. To do that, we first have to dispel a few myths about health care abroad:
1. It's all socialized medicine out there.
Not so. Some countries, such as Britain, New Zealand and Cuba, do provide health care in government hospitals, with the government paying the bills. Others -- for instance, Canada and Taiwan -- rely on private-sector providers, paid for by government-run insurance. But many wealthy countries -- including Germany, the Netherlands, Japan and Switzerland -- provide universal coverage using private doctors, private hospitals and private insurance plans.
In some ways, health care is less "socialized" overseas than in the United States. Almost all Americans sign up for government insurance (Medicare) at age 65. In Germany, Switzerland and the Netherlands, seniors stick with private insurance plans for life. Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs is one of the planet's purest examples of government-run health care.
2. Overseas, care is rationed through limited choices or long lines.
Generally, no. Germans can sign up for any of the nation's 200 private health insurance plans -- a broader choice than any American has. If a German doesn't like her insurance company, she can switch to another, with no increase in premium. The Swiss, too, can choose any insurance plan in the country.
In France and Japan, you don't get a choice of insurance provider; you have to use the one designated for your company or your industry. But patients can go to any doctor, any hospital, any traditional healer. There are no U.S.-style limits such as "in-network" lists of doctors or "pre-authorization" for surgery. You pick any doctor, you get treatment -- and insurance has to pay.
Canadians have their choice of providers. In Austria and Germany, if a doctor diagnoses a person as "stressed," medical insurance pays for weekends at a health spa.
As for those notorious waiting lists, some countries are indeed plagued by them. Canada makes patients wait weeks or months for nonemergency care, as a way to keep costs down. But studies by the Commonwealth Fund and others report that many nations -- Germany, Britain, Austria -- outperform the United States on measures such as waiting times for appointments and for elective surgeries.
In Japan, waiting times are so short that most patients don't bother to make an appointment. One Thursday morning in Tokyo, I called the prestigious orthopedic clinic at Keio University Hospital to schedule a consultation about my aching shoulder. "Why don't you just drop by?" the receptionist said. That same afternoon, I was in the surgeon's office. Dr. Nakamichi recommended an operation. "When could we do it?" I asked. The doctor checked his computer and said, "Tomorrow would be pretty difficult. Perhaps some day next week?"
3. Foreign health-care systems are inefficient, bloated bureaucracies.
Much less so than here. It may seem to Americans that U.S.-style free enterprise -- private-sector, for-profit health insurance -- is naturally the most cost-effective way to pay for health care. But in fact, all the other payment systems are more efficient than ours.
U.S. health insurance companies have the highest administrative costs in the world; they spend roughly 20 cents of every dollar for nonmedical costs, such as paperwork, reviewing claims and marketing. France's health insurance industry, in contrast, covers everybody and spends about 4 percent on administration. Canada's universal insurance system, run by government bureaucrats, spends 6 percent on administration. In Taiwan, a leaner version of the Canadian model has administrative costs of 1.5 percent; one year, this figure ballooned to 2 percent, and the opposition parties savaged the government for wasting money.
The world champion at controlling medical costs is Japan, even though its aging population is a profligate consumer of medical care. On average, the Japanese go to the doctor 15 times a year, three times the U.S. rate. They have twice as many MRI scans and X-rays. Quality is high; life expectancy and recovery rates for major diseases are better than in the United States. And yet Japan spends about $3,400 per person annually on health care; the United States spends more than $7,000.
4. Cost controls stifle innovation.
False. The United States is home to groundbreaking medical research, but so are other countries with much lower cost structures. Any American who's had a hip or knee replacement is standing on French innovation. Deep-brain stimulation to treat depression is a Canadian breakthrough. Many of the wonder drugs promoted endlessly on American television, including Viagra, come from British, Swiss or Japanese labs.
Overseas, strict cost controls actually drive innovation. In the United States, an MRI scan of the neck region costs about $1,500. In Japan, the identical scan costs $98. Under the pressure of cost controls, Japanese researchers found ways to perform the same diagnostic technique for one-fifteenth the American price. (And Japanese labs still make a profit.)
5. Health insurance has to be cruel.
Not really. American health insurance companies routinely reject applicants with a "preexisting condition" -- precisely the people most likely to need the insurers' service. They employ armies of adjusters to deny claims. If a customer is hit by a truck and faces big medical bills, the insurer's "rescission department" digs through the records looking for grounds to cancel the policy, often while the victim is still in the hospital. The companies say they have to do this stuff to survive in a tough business.
Foreign health insurance companies, in contrast, must accept all applicants, and they can't cancel as long as you pay your premiums. The plans are required to pay any claim submitted by a doctor or hospital (or health spa), usually within tight time limits. The big Swiss insurer Groupe Mutuel promises to pay all claims within five days. "Our customers love it," the group's chief executive told me. The corollary is that everyone is mandated to buy insurance, to give the plans an adequate pool of rate-payers.
The key difference is that foreign health insurance plans exist only to pay people's medical bills, not to make a profit. The United States is the only developed country that lets insurance companies profit from basic health coverage.
In many ways, foreign health-care models are not really "foreign" to America, because our crazy-quilt health-care system uses elements of all of them. For Native Americans or veterans, we're Britain: The government provides health care, funding it through general taxes, and patients get no bills. For people who get insurance through their jobs, we're Germany: Premiums are split between workers and employers, and private insurance plans pay private doctors and hospitals. For people over 65, we're Canada: Everyone pays premiums for an insurance plan run by the government, and the public plan pays private doctors and hospitals according to a set fee schedule. And for the tens of millions without insurance coverage, we're Burundi or Burma: In the world's poor nations, sick people pay out of pocket for medical care; those who can't pay stay sick or die.
This fragmentation is another reason that we spend more than anybody else and still leave millions without coverage. All the other developed countries have settled on one model for health-care delivery and finance; we've blended them all into a costly, confusing bureaucratic mess.
Which, in turn, punctures the most persistent myth of all: that America has "the finest health care" in the world. We don't. In terms of results, almost all advanced countries have better national health statistics than the United States does. In terms of finance, we force 700,000 Americans into bankruptcy each year because of medical bills. In France, the number of medical bankruptcies is zero. Britain: zero. Japan: zero. Germany: zero.
Given our remarkable medical assets -- the best-educated doctors and nurses, the most advanced hospitals, world-class research -- the United States could be, and should be, the best in the world. To get there, though, we have to be willing to learn some lessons about health-care administration from the other industrialized democracies.
T.R. Reid, a former Washington Post reporter, is the author of "The Healing of America: A Global Quest for Better, Cheaper, and Fairer Health Care,"
Editor's
note (Opinions expressed below do NOT represent any of the
groups above):
We are witnessing a lynch mob of teabaggers and birthers at the Congressional Democrat's district town halls and will all through the August recess. The groups funding and promoting this, led by Conservatives for Patients' Rights CPR (exec Rick Scott, who hired Bonner and Associates -SwiftBoat Vets- who faked NAACP letters in the "clean" coal fight) , and Americans for Prosperity and FreedomWorks, led by Super-lobbyist Kurt Pfotenhauer, the former top lobbyist for right-wing corporate polluter Koch Industries and the current CEO and top lobbyist of the American Land Title Association, need to be exposed.
CPR spokesperson, Brian Burgess, admitted that CPR is emailing out 'town hall alert' flyers, and schedules of town hall meetings, to its mailing list. Fox Noise has been promoting this as hard as they can and spreading the LIES about "kill granny" euthanasia and every thing else false about "Obamacare".
The nation's $46 billion drug market at stake, so the pushers have plenty of cash, BUT the more than 133 million Americans living with chronic diseases and disabilities and their family caregivers are depending on us, along with our entire healthcare system and our health, so this is as big battle as we will ever see.
A look at those driving this campaign:
Kurt Pfotenhauer, heads the American Land Title Association, is a former top lobbyist and treasurer for the Mortgage Bankers Association, who spent years downplaying fears of a housing bubble, so his past and present clients are the real estate finance corporations that are at the center of the present financial crisis, whose predatory and deceptive lending practices in pursuit of irrational profit margins -in concert with hedge funds and investment banks who blew up toxic mortgages into towers of unregulated debt - have threatened the fiscal underpinnings of the global economy.For years, they worked in concert with the Bush administration to block, weaken, and delay regulatory reform by Congress, such as the Predatory Mortgage Lending Practices Reduction Act of 2007, which died in the Senate. Last year, Pfotenhauer testified before Congress against the Emergency Home Ownership and Mortgage Equity Protection Act, a bill that would have allowed judges to restructure toxic mortgages to allow people to keep their homes - and would have helped prevent the current financial meltdown and bailouts. From 2005 through 2007, the Mortgage Banking Association spent $7.8 million lobbying Congress and a raft of federal agencies, with Pfotenhauer as the lead lobbyist. During Kurt Pfotenhauer's tenure as their top representative in Washington, the mortgage industry grossly ballooned on predatory and deceptive practices - then careened into the disastrous collapse that has taken homes away from millions of Americans.
Kurt's wife is Nancy Mitchell Pfotenhauer, a senior adviser to GOP presidential nominee John McCain, and their connections to the GDop, neocons, Koch Industries, taliban churches, and rest are endless, but here's a chart. She was groomed and pushed for the VP slot with McCain on the ticket that eventually went to Palin. She's no idiot like Palin. She was on the transition team for George H.W. Bush, was chief in-house lobbyist for Koch industries, the largest privately owned business in America and one of the worst polluters on earth. ($30 million settlement with the federal government related to more than 300 oil spills from its pipelines and oil facilities in six states)
They are both on the board of dominionist Dunamis Ministries.
During the height of the debate over health care, obstructionist Senator Grassley pulled in $165,100 from health and insurance PACs. See the list here.
They
want to tell you the Canadian or British systems is what we're
talking about but NO bill, especially HR676 would establish either
system, or even close to it.
"The goal is choice and competition" among health insurance plans, spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters this morning."The preference is the public option."
The 57 members of the House who signed a letter saying they would not vote for a bill without a public option have added three more to their number -- Robert Wexler, Emanuel Cleaver and Gregorio Sablan.
Lie #1: President Obama wants to euthanize your grandma!!!
The
truth: These accusations—of "death panels" and forced euthanasia—are,
of course, flatly untrue. As an article from the Associated
Press puts it: "No 'death panel' in health care bill."4 What's
the real deal? Reform legislation includes a provision, supported
by the AARP, to offer senior citizens access to a professional
medical counselor who will provide them with information
on preparing a living will and other issues facing older Americans.
Lie #2: Democrats are going to outlaw private insurance and force you into a government plan!!!
The truth: With reform, choices will increase, not decrease. Obama's reform plans will create a health insurance exchange, a one-stop shopping marketplace for affordable, high-quality insurance options.6 Included in the exchange is the public health insurance option—a nationwide plan with a broad network of providers—that will operate alongside private insurance companies, injecting competition into the market to drive quality up and costs down.
If
you're happy with your coverage and doctors, you can keep them.8 But
the new public plan will expand choices to millions of businesses
or individuals who choose to opt into it, including many
who simply can't afford health care now.
Lie
#3: President Obama wants to implement Soviet-style rationing!!!
The
truth: Health care reform will expand access to high-quality health
insurance, and give individuals, families, and businesses more choices
for coverage. Right now, big corporations decide whether
to give you coverage, what doctors you get to see, and whether
a particular procedure or medicine is covered—that is
rationed care. And a big part of reform is to stop that.
Health
care reform will do away with some of the most nefarious aspects of
this rationing: discrimination for pre-existing conditions, insurers
that cancel coverage when you get sick, gender discrimination,
and lifetime and yearly limits on coverage.9 And
outside of that, as noted above, reform will increase insurance
options, not force anyone into a rationed situation.
Lie #4: Obama is secretly plotting to cut senior citizens' Medicare benefits!!!
The truth: Health care reform plans will not reduce Medicare benefits.10 Reform includes savings from Medicare that are unrelated to patient care—in fact, the savings comes from cutting billions of dollars in overpayments to insurance companies and eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse.
Lie #5: Obama's health care plan will bankrupt America!!!
The truth: We need health care reform now in order to prevent bankruptcy—to control spiraling costs that affect individuals, families, small businesses, and the American economy.
Right now, we spend more than $2 trillion dollars a year on health care.12 The average family premium is projected to rise to over $22,000 in the next decade13—and each year, nearly a million people face bankruptcy because of medical expenses.14 Reform, with an affordable, high-quality public option that can spur competition, is necessary to bring down skyrocketing costs. Also, President Obama's reform plans would be fully paid for over 10 years and not add a penny to the deficit.
Myth 1:
If the bill passes, approximately 114 million Americans are expected to leave private health insurance. Why? Their employers will drop the insurance because the taxpayer-subsidized plan will be 30 to 40 percent cheaper.
Fact: Employers will not be able to offer the public option exclusively. They will instead be able to buy into an exchange where they can offer employees more than one option, including the public option. This is what all Federal employees already have.
Source: Jacob S. Hacker: Co-director of the Center for Health, Economic, and Family Security at U.C. Berkeley; a fellow at the New America Foundation; and the editor of Health at Risk: America's Ailing Health System–and How to Heal It.
Myth 2:
The public option will eliminate private insurance and erode employer-sponsored coverage.
Fact: The House bill actually increases the number of people who receive coverage through their employer by 2 million (in 2019) and shifts most of the uninsured into private coverage.
Source: Congressional Budget Office, July 2009, Coverage Tables
Myth 3:
If you don’t have private insurance the year that this bill is passed, you can’t get that later on from your employer.
Fact: Section 311 of the tri-committee House health care reform bill allows employers to meet coverage requirements by offering employees “coverage under a qualified health benefits plan (or under a current employment-based health plan.
The bill defines a “qualified health benefits plan” as “a health benefits plan that meets the requirements for such a plan under title I and includes the public health insurance option.” Title I of the bill does not prohibit employers from enrolling employees in private plans.
Source: HR 3200, America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009
Myth 4:
The Public Option with Drive private insurance out of business.
Fact: The report by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the public option proposed by Democrats would not drive private insurers out of business and most people would still choose to get their medical coverage through employers. Republicans often Site the Lewin Group as a source to propagate this myth. Lewin Group, which is a wholly-owned subsidiary of UnitedHealthCare.
Any individual insurance policy (as opposed to a group insurance policy) that is in effect today will be permitted to remain in effect; however, any new [individual] policies issued after the law becomes effective will be required to comply with the standards set out in the section relating to policies offered via the new Health Insurance Exchange. It's grandfathering, not elimination. The report by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the public option proposed by Democrats would not drive private insurers out of business and most people would still choose to get their medical coverage through employers. Republicans often Site the Lewin Group as a source to propagate this myth. The Lewin Groupis a wholly-owned subsidiary of UnitedHealthCare.
Any individual insurance policy (as opposed to a group insurance policy) that is in effect today will be permitted to remain in effect; however, any new [individual] policies issued after the law becomes effective will be required to comply with the standards set out in the section relating to policies offered via the new Health Insurance Exchange. It’s grandfathering, not elimination.
Source: HR 3200, America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009 and CBO Report, July 2009
Myth 5:
It will ban private health insurance for individuals. Those who currently have private individual coverage won't be able to change it. Nor will those who leave a company to work for themselves be free to buy individual plans from private carriers.
Fact: It doesn't outlaw private insurance. “There will be individual policies available, but people will buy those policies through the national health insurance exchange,” she said. The House bill allows for existing policies to be grandfathered in, so that people who currently have individual health insurance policies will not lose coverage. The line the editorial refers to is a clause that says the health insurance companies cannot enroll new people into the old plans.
Individual private health insurance means coverage that someone buys on his or her own from a private company. In other words, it's for people who can't get coverage through work or some other group, and the rates tend to be much higher.
Background: Page 16 defines what coverage will be
considered “grandfathered coverage”; that is, coverage in existence
today which would not be in compliance with new standards imposed
by the law.
What it says: Any individual insurance policy (as opposed
to a group insurance policy) that is in effect today will be
permitted to remain in effect; however, any new policies issued
after the law becomes effective will be required to comply
with the standards set out in the section relating to policies
offered via the new Health Insurance Exchange.
What it does: The purpose of the provision is to bring
policy offerings into line with the minimum benefit tiers
and provisions required under the new law
Source: HR 3200, America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009
Myth 6:
5.6 Million illegal immigrants will be covered by ObamaCare. In another form: All non-US citizens, illegal or not, will be provided with free healthcare services 5.6 Million illegal immigrants will be covered by ObamaCare. In another form: All non-US citizens, illegal or not, will be provided with free healthcare services
Fact: Illegal immigrants are specifically excluded from coverage. Of course, this means that they will be continue to get their healthcare from expensive emergency rooms, so that may not actually be a good thing.
The section on page 50 of HR 3200 aligns Health Insurance Exchange policies with other laws currently in effect, such as the Public Health Service Act, State law, and ERISA. Health care cannot trump other laws already in effect.
According to America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009, Page 143, Line 3, Section 246: “No Federal Payment for Undocumented Aliens. Nothing in this subtitle shall allow Federal payments for affordability credits on behalf of individuals who are not lawfully present in the United States.”
Source: HR 3200, America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009
Myth 7:
Some people won’t be covered.
Fact: All people will have the opportunity to be covered, either via employer-provided plans or via the Health Insurance Exchange, which includes the public option. Those who opt out of coverage will be required to pay a penalty, which will be deposited to the general fund maintained for the public option. The penalty is intended to offset the cost of “adverse selection”; that is, those who opt out when healthy and later opt in at the point of illness or diagnosed chronic conditions. (Page 167 of HR3200, Title IV, Subtitle A, Part I, Sec. 401). The only group excluded will be illegal aliens.
Source: HR 3200, America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009
Myth 8:
The Democrats propose “a government-controlled health care plan that will deprive roughly 120 million Americans of their current health care coverage. Two out of three Americans who get their health care through their employer would lose it under the House Democrat plan.
Fact: This report is from the Lewin Group, a health care consulting firm which is a wholly-owned subsidiary of UnitedHealthCare, an insurance company that obviously has a vested interest in suppressing a public option.. The report ran a number of scenarios, including what would happen if the government offered a public option that was a Medicare-style plan open to everyone. Their model found that 118 million people would choose to drop their private coverage in favor of cheaper public coverage.
In addition, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that about 11 million people will end up enrolling in the public option.
Source: Congressional Budget Office, July 2009, Coverage Tables
Myth 9:
The American healthcare system is the best in the world.
Fact: 1 in 10 Americans can't count on their healthcare coverage. America is ranked 37 in the world behind such countries As Columbia, Singapore and Morocco. France is rated at number one, followed by Italy.
Pew Research center did a study that said (among other things): Just 15% say health care in this country is the “best in the world,” while 23% rate it as “above average”; about six-in-ten (59%) view U.S. health care as either “average” (32%) or “below average” (27%).
Source: The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press’ May 2009
Myth 10:
Under Obamacare there will be rationing of healthcare, which we don't have now. or, in another form: YOUR HEALTHCARE IS RATIONED!!!
Fact: Healthcare is rationed now. Insurance companies determine what procedures they will cover, and at what price. They deny payment on certain procedures, which means thay patients either go without, or they pay themselves. This is how rationing works in a capitalistic system.
Also: Referencing Pg 29, HR 3200, from Viral Emails Page 29 refers to co-payments and caps on out-of-pocket expenses as part of the minimum benefits package. It is not addressing treatment or approvals or anything of the sort.
“Private insurance companies ration care to Americans every single day. They reject applications based on pre-existing conditions and family history. They rescind coverage after an illness has been diagnosed. Their premiums and deductibles are so high that millions of Americans are forced to delay care or declare bankruptcy due to high costs: - Media Matters Fact Check
Ezra Klein of the Los Angeles Times points out on his blog: “If you look at waiting times, you'll see that relatively few Americans wait more than four months for surgery, which helps folks claim that America doesn't ration care, and makes our system look pretty good on the waiting times metric. Here's what they don't tell you: When you look at who foregoes care, the international comparisons reverse themselves. About 23% of Americans report that they didn’t receive care, or get a test due to cost. In Canada, that number is 5.5%.”
Rather Than Waiting In Line, Americans Simply Do Not Get Care. As Ezra Klein argues in the Los Angeles Times, “although Britain and Canada have decided that no one will go without, even if some must occasionally wait, the U.S. has decided that most of us who can't afford care simply won't get it.
Source: HR 3200, America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009, Media Matters Fact Check, Los Angeles Times, April 2009
Myth 11:
We will have long wait times for healthcare services if we end up with a public option.
Fact: This doesn't even make sense. Are we suddenly going to have a shortage of doctors? Is everyone going to make a mad rush to the physician's office? This is usually tied to an anecdotal report from Canada. The reality is that wait times vary from area to area, as well as from service to service in Canada, but it's rarely as bad as reported. The most recent GOP claims of waits in Canada for treatment of life-threatening illnesses have been debunked as well. An Aetna executive admitted in his 2007 report to investors that average wait times in the US to see a provider are 70 days, and up to 4 weeks for life-threatening conditions.
Source: Deborah Burger, RN, co-President of America's RN Union, July 11, 2007
Myth 12:
Democrats are proposing a government controlled health insurance system, which will control care, treatments, medicines and even what doctors a patient may see.
Fact: Insurance companies already control
treatments, medicines and what doctors a patient may see. The
current healthcare bill prevents insurance companies from denying
coverage or treatments because of pre-existing conditions.
Health Care Reform is attempting to cover those who are being
denied coverage under the current system, This is what is already
happening with our current Health Care system. Republican Congressman
Tim Murphy (PA) agrees:
MURPHY: Yeah and that brings up the point here that with
regard to one of our big frustrations with insurance companies
is they control the market place, they control what's done,
a lot of times doctors not making the decisions here. And you
recognize the frustration.
Source: C-Span's Washington Journal, Jul y 17th, 2009
Myth 13:
There will be a Government Committee that decides what treatments and benefits you get.
Fact: Referencing Pg 30, Sec 123 of HR 3200- This section refers to the creation of an advisory panel for purposes of determining standards for the minimum, intermediate, and premium benefits packages. One of the most common myths out there is that benefits/treatments/etc will somehow be “rationed” by the government. In fact, the idea behind this commission is to bring together the different actors who are involved in provision of treatments and benefits to determine what should be deemed a “basic” benefit and what should fall into other tiers. Again, this section simply creates a panel who gives recommendations to the Secretary of HHS.
Source: HR 3200, America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009
Myth 14:
There will be a Government Committee that decides what treatments and benefits you get.
Fact: Referencing Pg 30, Sec 123 of HR 3200, This section refers to the creation of an advisory panel for purposes of determining standards for the minimum, intermediate, and premium benefits packages. One of the most common myths out there is that benefits/treatments/etc will somehow be “rationed” by the government. In fact, the idea behind this commission is to bring together the different actors who are involved in provision of treatments and benefits to determine what should be deemed a “basic” benefit and what should fall into other tiers. Again, this section simply creates a panel who gives recommendations to the Secretary of HHS.
Source: HR 3200, America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009
Myth 15:
Health Care Reform will hurt Small Business
Fact: The current draft bills also include a tax credit for small businesses that provide health care coverage for their workers. This benefit will make it easier for small businesses to provide coverage. Together with the exchange, these reforms will help small firms' bottom line, allowing them to focus more of their attention on running their business and creating jobs.
The Senate’s HELP Bill also addressed this issue.
From the July -09 version:
Choice of public and private plan, for uninsured, small
businesses with less than 25 employees, and those with a premium
share over 12.5% of their income.
Small Business Credits - employers with 50 or fewer full-time workers who pay 60 percent or more of their employees- health insurance premiums will be permitted to receive tax credits for subsidizing coverage. Credit amounts are based on the type of employee coverage, the size of the employer, and the proportion of time the employer paid employee health insurance expenses, and are available for up to 3 consecutive years.
Self-employed individuals who do not receive credits for purchasing coverage through the Gateway are eligible.
Small Business Program Credits. Beginning in 2010, eligible. Employers required to pay 60% of premiums or be assessed $750 for each full-time employee not covered and $375 for each part-time employee not covered.
Source: HR 3200, America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009, Senate HELP Committee Legislation
Myth 16:
Health Care reform will pressure the elderly to end their lives prematurely. Or in another form: It will allow for legalized physician-assisted suicide.
Fact: The section of the bill this myth is referring to is SEC. 1233. ADVANCE CARE PLANNING CONSULTATION: It amends the Medicare Act to allow coverage for patients to receive counseling about end-of-life care options every five years if they so choose. Moreover, prominent medical societies have supported such counseling. Here is an analysis of this portion of the bill: Provides coverage for consultation between enrollees and practitioners to discuss orders for life-sustaining treatment. Instructs CMS to modify "Medicare & You" handbook to incorporate information on end-of-life planning resources and to incorporate measures on advance care planning into the physician's quality reporting initiative.
The section of HR 3200 will require that doctors ask patients their preferences when it comes to end-of-life and critical emergency care situations. You get to choose whether you want doctors to perform life-saving treatments, or whether you want a Do-Not-Resuscitate order, or whether you want only palliative treatments and hospice. Under no circumstances would you be forced to sign away your rights or even answer when asked about your preferences, and under no circumstances would you be denied life-saving treatment if you wanted it.
Source: HR 3200, America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009, CMA Analysis
"Most breakthrough research is already publicly financed through the National Institutes of Health (NIH). In fact, according to the NIH website of the last 30 Americans to win the Nobel Prize in Medicine, 28 were funded directly by the NIH. (The other two were funded by a nonprofit research center in England a single-payer country).
Many of the most important advances in medicine have come from single-payer nations. Often, private firms enter the picture only after the public has paid for the development and clinical trials of new treatments. The HIV drug AZT is one example.
On average, drug companies spend more than half of their revenue on marketing, administration and profits, compared with 13 percent on research and development. Negotiation lower prices will allow Americans to afford drugs without hurting research."
They say: "About 18% of the drug industry's research budget goes to basic research for breakthrough drugs. About 82% goes to derivative innovations on existing drugs and to testing."
NIH: "Drug companies claim to spend 17% of domestic sales on R&D, but more objective data reports they spend only 10% (National Science Foundation 2003). Thus, only 1.8% of sales goes to research for breakthrough new drugs (18% x 10%) (Love 2003)."
Taxpayers pay for most research costs, and many clinical
trials as well. In 2000, for example, industry claimed it spent 18%
of its $13 billion for R&D on basic research, or $2.3 billion
in gross costs (National Science Foundation 2003). All of that
money was subsidized by taxpayers through deductions and tax credits.
Taxpayers also paid for all $18 billion in NIH funds, as well
as for R&D funds in the Department of Defense and other public
budgets. Most of that money went for basic research to discover breakthrough
drugs, and public money also supports more than 5000 clinical
trials (Bassand, Martin, Ryden et al. 2002). Taxpayer contributions
are similar in more recent years, only larger.
The
NIH document shows how crucial taxpayer-funded research is to
the development of top-selling drugs. According to the NIH, U.S.
taxpayer-funded scientists conducted at least 55 percent of the
research projects that led to the discovery and development of the
five top-selling drugs in 1995.
http://opa.faseb.org/pdf/2008/nih_research_benefits.pdf
Complete study in 2000 of the roll of NIH in medicine:
http://opa.faseb.org/pdf/2008/nih_research_benefits.pdf
NIH pays for 36% of all biomedical research in the country.
And don't forget, there is also the drug research done by the French, Germans, British, Australians, Canadians and the rest of the public funding around the world.