Healthcare Reform Thread II

[Koyaanisqatsi]

I do, however, wish people would stop treating it like the only two options are doing something stupid or delaying indefinitely.

[DaShi]

This from the guy who has the villain from Wall-e as his avatar.

[DanS]

I do, however, wish people would stop treating it like the only two options are doing something stupid or delaying indefinitely.

Let's put it this way. The last reform put forward was dumb and here we are more than 15 years later.

[Koyaanisqatsi]

This from the guy who has the villain from Wall-e as his avatar.

Hey, at least Buy n Large had a plan.

[Ramo]

The '93 proposal was probably better than the consensus proposal today. But the lesson the Democratic Party learned is that only incremental reform is possible. Anything that could threaten existing doctor-patient relationships is dead on arrival. The status quo is monumentally ****ed. Incremental reform would pretty much, by definition, be stupid. But it beats the alternative.

Reform ideally would fix aspects of the insurance market; current classes individuals, like those with pre-existing conditions, self-employed, small businesses, etc. are screwed. It would also impose long term fiscal discipline in the health sector (some available options are MedPac reform, the public option, changing the employer tax deduction, comparative effectiveness review, etc); cost growth is 6% annually. If the Republicans and conservative Dems succeed in obstructing the proposal, neither thing is likely to happen. What we would see is a coverage expansion (raise the income threshold for Medicaid, lower the age threshold for Medicare), funded by a surtax on the rich, passed through Reconciliation.

[Zkribbler]

We need Congress to realize that health insurance isn't the answer to America's health care crisis. Health insurance is the CAUSE of America's health care crisis.

Over 30% of American's healthcare dollar goes to administration. In comparison, the VA and Medicare run about 3%, the rest of the industrialized world pays between 5%-10%. We have a mind-boggling amount of waste!

If government took over the roll of health insurers, we could provide full health coverage to every American, and we'd still save a ton of money.

Such a plan passed the California Legislature last year and was set to save Californians $10 billion in the first year. Arnie vetoed it,of course, because in his eyes, anything that government does it wrong.

[Kuciwalker]

Over 30% of American's healthcare dollar goes to administration. In comparison, the VA and Medicare run about 3%, the rest of the industrialized world pays between 5%-10%. We have a mind-boggling amount of waste!

This is a bad statistic. It assumes that every $ spent on treatment is not wasteful.

[Zkribbler]

Over 30% of American's healthcare dollar goes to administration. In comparison, the VA and Medicare run about 3%, the rest of the industrialized world pays between 5%-10%. We have a mind-boggling amount of waste!

This is a bad statistic. It assumes that every $ spent on treatment is not wasteful.

There is no such assumption about waste in treatment. The focus of my statement is about the amount of waste in administration.

[Kuciwalker]

And by focusing solely on that you ignore the obvious - that extra $s 'wasted' on administration may reduce the number of $s wasted on inappropriate or too-expensive treatment.

In order to reach your conclusion:

If government took over the roll of health insurers, we could provide full health coverage to every American, and we'd still save a ton of money.

you have to show that private health insurance administration costs more than it saves.

[Dinner]

Has the generic versus name-brand drug problem been fixed yet?

JM

No and from what I've heard it is not going to mainly because big pharma has dumped massive amounts of cash onto Congressmen to insure citizens continue to get screwed. They still won't let medicare bargain for prices the way EVERY OTHER buyer does nor will they let medicare buy cheap generic medications and instead they're still insisting medicare pay full price for name brand drugs only.

That is exactly where the biggest cost savings can be found and it would be so easy to do but because big pharma has has bribed Congressmen the normal people will continue to get shafted. Just negotiate for prices as is normal and allow medicare to buy generics instead of name brands and we can cut medication costs by 30%-40% over night, maybe more.

[Dinner]

I am hugely in favor of reform. However, this seems to be heavily about more money to big pharm/etc.

It would be very expensive, and not actually acheive as much as it should.

JM

Yep.

[Dinner]

Over 30% of American's healthcare dollar goes to administration. In comparison, the VA and Medicare run about 3%, the rest of the industrialized world pays between 5%-10%. We have a mind-boggling amount of waste!

This is a bad statistic. It assumes that every $ spent on treatment is not wasteful.

I don't think he was actually comparing money spent on treatment and instead he was just looking at the difference in over head costs for administration.

[Sava]

I do, however, wish people would stop treating it like the only two options are doing something stupid or delaying indefinitely.

In America, that's what we get. You see, the good reform that we need is going to cost so big companies a lot of money. So the prostitut... I mean politicians that they've paid for "compromise" the hell out of legitimate reforms until they suck. Then they frame the debate between the sucky reform and doing nothing.

That's pretty much an analogy for the American political process as a whole.

[Guynemer]

And by focusing solely on that you ignore the obvious - that extra $s 'wasted' on administration may reduce the number of $s wasted on inappropriate or too-expensive treatment.

In order to reach your conclusion:

If government took over the roll of health insurers, we could provide full health coverage to every American, and we'd still save a ton of money.

you have to show that private health insurance administration costs more than it saves.

Kuci, I don't have the statistics on this at hand, but I can tell that antibiotic use alone is (needlessly) much, much higher here in the US than it is in other industrialized nations. We have giant assloads of waste that our 30% isn't doing a thing to stop.

[Guynemer]

In America, that's what we get. You see, the good reform that we need is going to cost so big companies a lot of money. So the prostitut... I mean politicians that they've paid for "compromise" the hell out of legitimate reforms until they suck. Then they frame the debate between the sucky reform and doing nothing.

That's pretty much an analogy for the American political process as a whole.

To say nothing of the similarity to the whole "we must do something NOW!" (as opposed to "we must do something right") meme that led to the PATRIOT Act, Iraq, rendition, etc. etc. etc.