Re: The State of the Union, Health care and more lies from the President

[George Z. Bush]

Oelewapper wrote:
> GWB: "A government-run health care system is the wrong prescription. By
> keeping costs under control, expanding access, and helping more Americans
> afford coverage, we will preserve the system of private medicine that makes
> America's health care the best in the world."
>
> - Any U.S. president who is caught saying this kind of lies, should either
> be in prison or in a mental health care institution.

Even worse than that was his own acknowledgement that, three years into his own
regime, there are now 4.3 million more Americans without health insurance than
there were when he was sworn in. What the hell was he doing about our health
care system during those three years other than letting it atrophy and die.
Maybe his daily PT regime used up all of his available time needed to solve that
little problem.

George Z.

[Steven P. McNicoll]

"George Z. Bush" > wrote in message
...
>
> Even worse than that was his own acknowledgement that, three years into
his own
> regime, there are now 4.3 million more Americans without health insurance
than
> there were when he was sworn in. What the hell was he doing about our
health
> care system during those three years other than letting it atrophy and
die.
>

What should he have been doing about our health care system during those
three years? Please show the Constitutional support for your answer.

[Kevin Brooks]

"George Z. Bush" > wrote in message
...
> Oelewapper wrote:
> > GWB: "A government-run health care system is the wrong prescription. By
> > keeping costs under control, expanding access, and helping more
Americans
> > afford coverage, we will preserve the system of private medicine that
makes
> > America's health care the best in the world."
> >
> > - Any U.S. president who is caught saying this kind of lies, should
either
> > be in prison or in a mental health care institution.
>
> Even worse than that was his own acknowledgement that, three years into
his own
> regime, there are now 4.3 million more Americans without health insurance
than
> there were when he was sworn in.

LOL! The population growth rate for the US in 2000-2001 was 1.2%. Given a
population of about 280 million, that is somewhere close to 3.4 million
residents per year of his presidency. Which means the US population grew by
some 10 million persons during that three years you are concerned with.
Let's see, if the population grew by 10 million and the number of persons
uninsured only grew by 4.3 million, what does that tell you?

What the hell was he doing about our health
> care system during those three years other than letting it atrophy and
die.

Oh, please... Let's see, when your hero Clinton took office in 1992, the
percentage of the population that was completely uninsured was 84.9%, and by
the time he left office in 2000 it had jumped to 85.7%. Where were your
screams of atrophy and death *then*? Between 2000 and the end of 2002 (the
last year data was available from the Census Bureau), that rate had climbed
a whopping...get this... .1%! Yep, it was at 85.8% (and I had to round the
calculation up to get *that* jump out of it). Which means that under Clinton
the rise was an average of about a tenth of a percent per year, and under
Bush it was half that. So I guess you will agree that Bush is doing better
in this regard than your hero did?

Source: http://www.census.gov/hhes/hlthins/historic/hihistt1.html

> Maybe his daily PT regime used up all of his available time needed to
solve that
> little problem.

Well according to the numbers he is doing pretty good--maybe your theory
should instead state, "Presidents who devote a portion of their time to PT
experience a smaller annual growth rate in the number of uninsured than do
Presidents who devote their time to their inters and cigars"?

Brooks

>
> George Z.
>
>

[Kevin Brooks]

"George Z. Bush" > wrote in message
...
> Oelewapper wrote:
> > GWB: "A government-run health care system is the wrong prescription. By
> > keeping costs under control, expanding access, and helping more
Americans
> > afford coverage, we will preserve the system of private medicine that
makes
> > America's health care the best in the world."
> >
> > - Any U.S. president who is caught saying this kind of lies, should
either
> > be in prison or in a mental health care institution.
>
> Even worse than that was his own acknowledgement that, three years into
his own
> regime, there are now 4.3 million more Americans without health insurance
than
> there were when he was sworn in.

LOL! The population growth rate for the US in 2000-2001 was 1.2%. Given a
population of about 280 million, that is somewhere close to 3.4 million
residents per year of his presidency. Which means the US population grew by
some 10 million persons during that three years you are concerned with.
Let's see, if the population grew by 10 million and the number of persons
uninsured only grew by 4.3 million, what does that tell you?

What the hell was he doing about our health
> care system during those three years other than letting it atrophy and
die.

Oh, please... Let's see, when your hero Clinton took office in 1992, the
percentage of the population that was completely uninsured was 84.9%, and by
the time he left office in 2000 it had jumped to 85.7%. Where were your
screams of atrophy and death *then*? Between 2000 and the end of 2002 (the
last year data was available from the Census Bureau), that rate had climbed
a whopping...get this... .1%! Yep, it was at 85.8% (and I had to round the
calculation up to get *that* jump out of it). Which means that under Clinton
the rise was an average of about a tenth of a percent per year, and under
Bush it was half that. So I guess you will agree that Bush is doing better
in this regard than your hero did?

Source: http://www.census.gov/hhes/hlthins/historic/hihistt1.html

> Maybe his daily PT regime used up all of his available time needed to
solve that
> little problem.

Well according to the numbers he is doing pretty good--maybe your theory
should instead state, "Presidents who devote a portion of their time to PT
experience a smaller annual growth rate in the number of uninsured than do
Presidents who devote their time to their inters and cigars"?

Brooks

>
> George Z.
>
>

[George Z. Bush]

Steven P. McNicoll wrote:
> "George Z. Bush" > wrote in message
> ...
>>
>> Even worse than that was his own acknowledgement that, three years into his
>> own regime, there are now 4.3 million more Americans without health
>> insurance than there were when he was sworn in. What the hell was he doing
>> about our health care system during those three years other than letting it
>> atrophy and die.
>>
>
> What should he have been doing about our health care system during those
> three years? Please show the Constitutional support for your answer.

I'll take that as a you don't know.

[Tarver Engineering]

"George Z. Bush" > wrote in message
...
> Steven P. McNicoll wrote:
> > "George Z. Bush" > wrote in message
> > ...
> >>
> >> Even worse than that was his own acknowledgement that, three years into
his
> >> own regime, there are now 4.3 million more Americans without health
> >> insurance than there were when he was sworn in. What the hell was he
doing
> >> about our health care system during those three years other than
letting it
> >> atrophy and die.
> >>
> >
> > What should he have been doing about our health care system during those
> > three years? Please show the Constitutional support for your answer.
>
> I'll take that as a you don't know.

Steve knows it like any libertarian, by rote.

[Howard Berkowitz]

In article >, Go Fig >
wrote:

> In article >, Guy
> > wrote:
>
> > If this money could be saved, think of what the U.S. could do with it.
> > It
> > could be used to insure the estimated 40 million people presently
> > uninsured
>
third have an automatic dishwasher.
>
> Do you think any of those 41 million may have opted to roll the dice
> and have a new 42" Plasma TV versus paying for a health insurance
> policy ?

Some indeed may. But there are also some, such as myself, that were
slammed simultaneously by the tech crash and a financially messy
divorce, and are uninsurable through private plans due to preexisting
conditions.

A good deal of my work has been with healthcare, and I see cost shifting
and cherry picking as major problems with a profit-based health payment
system, especially one dependent on employers. There are several basic
economic problems with the current system.

First, there's no classic free market. In a classic free market, prices
come as a result of interaction between provider and consumer. In the
American system, however, the market interaction is between employers,
for which healthcare is a cost of business (dare I even suggest an
implicit tax), and third-party payors, who have multiple incentives to
cut their costs and prices: shareholder value, and price competition to
the employers.

Add to this unfunded mandates like EMTALA, and drastic differences in
what people pay to providers based on the payor negotiation. As a
personal example, my cardiac pacemaker had a "list price" of $24,000.
Between provider reimbursement and my co-pay, the hospital got $1600.
As an individual, I would have been charged the full $24K.

I am a diabetic, dependent for control on oral medications. The last
year was bad enough financially that I could not afford reasonable
laboratory monitoring. Now, I've run out of refills, and am scrambling
to get a discount plan in place so I can get prescriptions for a new
supply. Uncontrolled blood sugar is an invitation to even more expensive
complications. But unless I can get the discount soon, the options are
to wait three months for a clinic, and gamble I don't go into
complications that an emergency room WILL have to accept, even though
they won't be reimbursed.

Now, I'm not a general believer in uncontrolled self-prescribing, even
though that stings in my own case -- I have sufficient medical training
to know what to do and when to call for help. Last Friday, I tripped
and thoroughly banged my knee. The last time I did this (damaged the
knee worse, true, but was also in diabetic control), I wound up with
three weeks of a painful and expensive leg infection. Even now, I know
that a reasonable standard of practice might be to reduce the risk of
secondary infection with an inexpensive antibiotic (and, obviously, the
more expensive diabetic control drugs would help), but I can't get the
medication.

I have built hospital information systems where we had to maintain 400
different contract prices for the same procedure, obviously meaning that
the hospital had had to do 400 negotiations with different providers.
How that makes for administrative efficiency is beyond my ken
>
> I think a 100% tax deduction for a catastrophic coverage is a very good
> idea, as well and a true Medical tax free savings account.
>

[Dick Locke]

On 22 Jan 2004 06:19:10 -0800, (Pat Norton)
wrote:

>nobody wrote
>>Why then does a country such as Cuba have significantly
>>higher life expectancy ?
>
>www.who.int/health-systems-performance/whr2000.htm
>Life expectancy (years)
>81.9 Japan
>81.2 Monaco
>80.6 San Marino
>80.6 Switzerland
>80.4 Australia
>80.4 Sweden
>80.3 Andorra
>80.1 Iceland
>79.8 Canada
>79.7 France
>79.7 Italy
>79.6 Singapore
>79.6 Spain
>79.4 Austria
>79.4 Israel
>79.1 Norway
>78.9 New Zealand
>78.8 Luxembourg
>78.7 Germany
>78.6 Netherlands
>78.4 Belgium
>78.4 Greece
>78.2 Finland
>78.2 United Kingdom
>78.1 Malta
>77.3 Cyprus
>77.3 United States of America
>77.2 Denmark
>77.1 Costa Rica
>77.1 Cuba


Interesting. I've lived in Japan and by US standards their health care
practice has some appalling aspects. I wonder though, to what extent
the low US life expectancy reflects the health care system and to what
extent it reflects a higher chance of dying young due to violence.
Does WHO have any stats, say, on the life expectancy of 40 yr olds in
various countries? That would reduce the violent-death factor.

[devil]

On Thu, 22 Jan 2004 15:45:08 +0000, Dick Locke wrote:

> On 22 Jan 2004 06:19:10 -0800, (Pat Norton)
> wrote:
>
>
> Interesting. I've lived in Japan and by US standards their health care
> practice has some appalling aspects. I wonder though, to what extent
> the low US life expectancy reflects the health care system and to what
> extent it reflects a higher chance of dying young due to violence.
> Does WHO have any stats, say, on the life expectancy of 40 yr olds in
> various countries? That would reduce the violent-death factor.

Infant mortality which is I believe high in the US has a significant
contribution to these figures.

So does diet.

[Jarg]

"Dick Locke" > wrote in message
...
>
> Interesting. I've lived in Japan and by US standards their health care
> practice has some appalling aspects. I wonder though, to what extent
> the low US life expectancy reflects the health care system and to what
> extent it reflects a higher chance of dying young due to violence.
>

Personally I don't consider 77.3 years that low!

Jarg

[Pat Norton]

devil wrote
>Infant mortality which is I believe high in the US has a
>significant contribution to these figures.

http://www.oecd.org/document/16/0,2340,en_2825_495642_2085200_1_1_1_1,00.html
Infant mortality - Deaths per 1000 live births (year 2000)
3.0 Iceland
3.2 Japan
3.4 Sweden
3.8 Finland
3.8 Norway
3.9 Spain
4.1 Czech Republic
4.4 Germany
4.5 Italy
4.6 France
4.8 Austria
4.8 Belgium
4.9 Switzerland
5.1 Luxembourg
5.1 Netherlands
5.2 Australia
5.3 Denmark
5.3 Canada
5.5 Portugal
5.6 United Kingdom
6.1 Greece
6.2 Ireland
6.9 United States
8.1 Poland
8.6 Slovak Republic

[[email protected]]

In rec.food.cooking Steven P. McNicoll > wrote:

> It's the other way round. Free market competition keeps cost down and
> service up.

Not always. One of the biggest problems with the private health care
system in the states is that the overhead for preparing insurance forms
and paperwork is staggering. I just spoke with a tech at a blood lab
in my neighborhood and she said they spend hours every day just doing
paperwork after the doors close at night. My sister who's a psychologist
in private practice also echoed the same concern to me on several occassions,
the she spends hours doing insurance paperwork, which could better be
spent treating patients.

[Werner J. Severin]

In article >, wrote:

> In rec.food.cooking Steven P. McNicoll >
wrote:
>
> > It's the other way round. Free market competition keeps cost down and
> > service up.
>
> Not always. One of the biggest problems with the private health care
> system in the states is that the overhead for preparing insurance forms
> and paperwork is staggering. I just spoke with a tech at a blood lab
> in my neighborhood and she said they spend hours every day just doing
> paperwork after the doors close at night. My sister who's a psychologist
> in private practice also echoed the same concern to me on several occassions,
> the she spends hours doing insurance paperwork, which could better be
> spent treating patients.


Medicare administrative costs: 2%

Average administrative costs of H.M.O.'s 15%

New York Times, January 28, 2004, page A 25 (National Edition)

[Go Fig]

In article
>
, Werner J. Severin > wrote:

> In article >, wrote:
>
> > In rec.food.cooking Steven P. McNicoll >
> wrote:
> >
> > > It's the other way round. Free market competition keeps cost down and
> > > service up.
> >
> > Not always. One of the biggest problems with the private health care
> > system in the states is that the overhead for preparing insurance forms
> > and paperwork is staggering. I just spoke with a tech at a blood lab
> > in my neighborhood and she said they spend hours every day just doing
> > paperwork after the doors close at night. My sister who's a psychologist
> > in private practice also echoed the same concern to me on several
> > occassions,
> > the she spends hours doing insurance paperwork, which could better be
> > spent treating patients.
>
>
> Medicare administrative costs: 2%
>
> Average administrative costs of H.M.O.'s 15%
>
> New York Times, January 28, 2004, page A 25 (National Edition)

Are you saying a doctors billing costs are included in the HMOs
overhead ?

Did the article compare fraud costs ?

jay
Tue Feb 03, 2004

[Bill]

In article >, Go Fig >
wrote:

> > > > It's the other way round. Free market competition keeps cost down and
> > > > service up.
> > >
> > > Not always. One of the biggest problems with the private health care
> > > system in the states is that the overhead for preparing insurance forms
> > > and paperwork is staggering. I just spoke with a tech at a blood lab
> > > in my neighborhood and she said they spend hours every day just doing
> > > paperwork after the doors close at night. My sister who's a psychologist
> > > in private practice also echoed the same concern to me on several
> > > occassions,
> > > the she spends hours doing insurance paperwork, which could better be
> > > spent treating patients.
> >
> >
> > Medicare administrative costs: 2%
> >
> > Average administrative costs of H.M.O.'s 15%
> >
> > New York Times, January 28, 2004, page A 25 (National Edition)
>
> Are you saying a doctors billing costs are included in the HMOs
> overhead ?
>
> Did the article compare fraud costs ?

Please continue this discussion in an appropriate newsgroup.

[Howard Berkowitz]

In article >, Pan Ohco
> wrote:

> On Sun, 25 Jan 2004 17:59:18 GMT, (Werner J.
> Severin) wrote:
>
>
> >http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=1623
> >*
> >Public Citizen * Physicians for a National Health Program*
> >
> >Jan. 14, 2004
> >
> >Study Shows National Health Insurance Could Save $286 Billion on Health
> >Care Paperwork:
> >
> >Authors Say Medicare Drug Bill Will Increase Bureaucratic Costs, Reward
> >Insurers and the AARP
> >
> >A study by researchers at Harvard Medical School and Public Citizen to be
> >published in Friday¹s International Journal of Health Services finds that
> >health care bureaucracy last year cost the United States $399.4 billion.
> >The study estimates that national health insurance (NHI) could save at
> >least $286 billion annually on paperwork, enough to cover all of the
> >uninsured and to provide full prescription drug coverage for everyone in
> >the United States.
>
> You actually expect the government to have less bureaucratic cost?
> Pan Ohco

No one said "bureaucratic" cost. They said "paperwork," or perhaps
"administrative" cost.

Administrative cost in the current system involves separate negotiation
between each hospital and each insurance company. Typically, that means
pricing at least 400 line items (i.e., CPT (Current Procedural Terms)
codes plus drug codes). Individual clinicians usually refuse to
negotiate that many times, so they won't take many insurance plans.

Also in this are some very hefty profit numbers. Healthcare executives
do very, very well in the annual executive compensation surveys.

The current system also doesn't do well with the cost, in some cases
mandated (e.g., by the federal EMTALA laws that require emergency rooms
to take patients), of uninsured patients. That cost gets shifted to the
insured and self-pay.