Health Professionals Tell Congress They Want Single-Payer »
Posted By bluetexasvalley 5 months, 3 weeks ago in Political NewsAt a long-awaited House subcommittee hearing on Wednesday, health care professionals made it clear that they believe a single-payer system to be the best and perhaps only workable option for health care reform.
"Single-payer is the only reform that can control health care costs," said Walter Tsou, a University of Pennsylvania professor and an adviser to Physicians for a National Health Program. The last 50 years of government policy have protected insurance industry profits at the expense of taxpayers, doctors and hospitals, he said.
"Our most famous radical document begins with the words, 'We the People.' Not 'We the Insurers,'" he said. "It is time for our own generation's revolution."
For the most part, the panelists testifying before the Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions Subcommittee agreed that spiraling costs are the greatest problem currently facing the medical community and its patients.
"Unless you can stop the insurance industry price gouging, we simply cannot make health care affordable, which means you either have price controls on the insurance industry or you take them out of the equation through single-payer reform," said Geri Jenkins, the co-president of the National Nurses Organizing Committee, which represents 86,000 registered nurses. "If we were to have a debate on containing costs, improving quality and universality, the single-payer advantage would be clear."
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I am a 60-plus widow, retired after almost 40 years in the newspaper business. My love of politics was learned, first, from my father, a ...
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bluetexasvalley5 months, 3 weeks ago
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FTA:
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"This is the most popular system in the minds of most Americans," he said of single-payer generally, citing polls and constituents' calls to his office. "If you take the most popular health care option and take it off the table, heaven knows what you're left with."
Four of the five panelists, including Conyers, spoke in favor of single-payer. The only person in opposition was Manhattan Institute fellow David Gratzer, a doctor born and trained in Canada, who said the Canadian national-health system struggles to provide care to its citizens. "Like the Soviet Union, everything is free, nothing is available," Gratzer said.
But as long as Congress adequately funds health care, the other panelists said, that won't be an issue. "If they were to put the same amount of money into their systems as we do into ours, there would be no waits," said Marcia Angell, a Harvard lecturer and former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine.-
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Candida5 months, 3 weeks ago
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"The only person in opposition was Manhattan Institute fellow David Gratzer, a doctor born and trained in Canada, who said the Canadian national-health system struggles to provide care to its citizens. "
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Every health care system struggles to provide care to its citizens, the question is who struggles more, the system or those who need the care. The population is aging, and there is no doubt that the Canadian system faces some challenges but it is coping. The important thing is that the people don't routinely face personal bankruptcy and house repossession when they come down with some serious illness.
' "Like the Soviet Union, everything is free, nothing is available," Gratzer said."'
Great slogan for those who are easily intimidated by the Soviet bogeyman, but it is an outright lie on both counts. It's not free and it's available.
Nothing is free, Canadians pay for their health care through taxes and various health care levies. The difference is that the fee doesn't depend on the health status of the person or family. That's what insurance is for, to spread the risk, especially for catastrophic illnesses.
Canadian health care is also available. No, it's not equally available everywhere, so if someone lives 500 km from the nearest town, it's not easy to get health care there, but I'm sure that's true in the US as well. Canadians like their system, the proof of which is that every time some conservative like David Gratzer proposes a US style system where you could buy your way to the front of the line, Canadians fight tooth and nail against it. Such systems have been proposed at least for the past 20 years, but they don't seem to take root. Why would Canadians fight for a system where care is unavailable? -
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cheif5 months, 3 weeks ago
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Your correct. Here, nothing is free, and everything is available - if you can pay for it.
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If I were a citizen that couldn't afford astronomical health premiums and then may not
get treated if they can find any excuse not to treat you, I would go all out for a single payer
system - at least you have a chance.
All the money we now pay to insurance companies (for profit), could go into a basket for
everyone and everyone could actually afford their health care...I still don't know why we
need insurance for health care - a single payer system should get rid of this trillion dollar
boondoggle...
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jordan115 months, 3 weeks ago
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Hmmm. Dr Gratzer is a member of the Manhattan Institute. A right wing think tank. Guess my prejudice is coming out, being gun shy over the shenanigans of right wingers all these years. I'll have to come back to this, when I can be more objective over his concerns of single payer.
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Candida5 months, 3 weeks ago
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automan9095 months, 3 weeks ago
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If he is a right winger then I know he is telling the truth.
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Watch out for those lying Left wingers though.
Obama is a perfect example.
He has lied ever since he lied his way into the White House.
Even his own Grandmother said he was born in Kenya.
She should know.
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Natureboy5 months, 3 weeks ago
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There's only one legitimate reason for heathcare providers to fear single payor, and they won't speak of it openly.
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Many if not most providers bill at least a little dirty. Whether it's upcoding, fudging the medical necessity, billing for unneeded services or otherwise gaming the system, it's ubiquitous.
Under single payor, that becomes fraud against the government. -
libsRfunnyComment removed: Hard Banned1 Reply
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canadianrancher575 months, 3 weeks ago
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So Dr. Gratzer is a right winger and he doesn't think that our system is working, well he could come out to the area where I live and maybe talk to some of the Conservative voting people here and try to sell the idea that maybe we should go to an insurance plan like is down in the states. When I talk of a conservative area we could run a duck as a candidate and it would be elected by a landslide since they are party faithful to the end. The doctor who delivered me and all of my kids was a very strong conservative and never once did I hear him put down our system but then again while he was growing up he was dirt poor and received his training courtesy of the Canadian government during WWII. He learned to live within the system and said that he did OK by it. The reason I mention this is because some doctors care about people, not money, not politics, but just people. To me the medical system is supposed to be about people, and as nobel as the insurance companies try to be, for them it is not really about people, it is about numbers, it is about odds, and it is in the end about money.
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Endoscopy5 months, 2 weeks ago
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What I read that was written by a Canadian doctor is that many people in Canada do not have a doctor and that many people with conditions that require immediate care do not get it. For example a woman with breast cancer had to wait 4 months to get her surgery. That was too late. Too many people die before getting the treatment. The long wait to get in to see a doctor is a major problem and the rationing of surgery is another problem. Where is that doctor wrong? How long do you have to wait after asking for an appointment to see a doctor? I can get in the same or next day if I have a problem.
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nostalgia5 months, 2 weeks ago
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Why did liberal MP Belinda Stronach vote against allowing any private medical insurance in Canada yet go to California for treatment of her breast cancer?
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She has money to escape the Canadian system and the peons are stuck with the system?
Is that how it is in Canada?
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Maybe15 months, 3 weeks ago
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I live in Texas. There is alot of wasteful spending with regards to healthcare. Many of the pregnant illegals come across the border and stay with family members, who are already here, and once they go into labor, go to the ER for free healthcare. They also jam our ER. Who do you think is paying for it? YOU. Also, should Obama get his healthcare reform passed, do you think that the congressmen will be using the same insurance that the general public is? NO. Their insurance is far superior. Why can't we the people have the same insurance that the legislators get? They are elitists.
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nostalgia5 months, 2 weeks ago
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How many years are you willing to go to school then how many hours a day are you willing to work to get the same pay as doctors?
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And of course it depends on which type of medicine you practice
They don't make as much as you think
Many of them would be paid more if they were one on Obama's czars!
Mean salaries US Doctors:
Family Doctor $133,187
Internal medicine $142,900
ER $172,723
General practice $119,296
Neurologist $157,070
Oncologist $201,279
Pediatrics $121,755
http://www.payscale.com/research/US/People_with_Jo...
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Charlson5 months, 2 weeks ago
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"Our most famous radical document begins with the words, 'We the People.' Not 'We the Insurers,'" he said. "It is time for our own generation's revolution."
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And this is what our heath care system needs - a revolution, where the people really get a say in what our government does. And when the majority of tax paying Americans says that if a system is broken for many, fix it and make single-payer an option to private insurers. -
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lloydm655 months, 2 weeks ago
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Thanks,but no thanks.I have had my insurance for over thirty years,it has become the secondary payer since I was put on medicare.I pay about twenty four hundred dollars annually.I also have a three hundred dollar deductable.I am tickled to have it.Now if I had stand alone medicare,I would be up that well known creek without a paddle.My insuarance affords a drug plan second only to congress.Medicare part D doesn't come close.If somehow,some way I could come close to this,at a lower price,of course chisled in stone I'd look at it.
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nostalgia5 months, 2 weeks ago
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The majority of people on Propeller don't have a clue why someone on Medicare needs a secondary insurance - after all they want a govt system like Medicare
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Tell them how much you would spend out of pocket every year if you just relied on the govt system
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lloydm655 months, 2 weeks ago
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Let us quit worrying about Obama's birth place,and get on with his departure from office while we still have a constitutional republic.He is slowly,but surely trying to dismantle it.We will soon have enough czars to form a football team.How fortunate for Bill Gates,Steve Jobs,and many who made their mark on America,while it was still America.Tomorrow will leave us with vivid memories of our beautiful country.The tragedy is our very young will never know what it was all about.The new state cannot allow our past history to remain public knowlege.
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nostalgia5 months, 2 weeks ago
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Czar who are responsible to no one but Obama
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This allows Obama to bypass any Congressional oversight
Obama is making Congress and the Federal agencies irrelevant
A committee in Congress was holding a hearing on the auto bailout and Rattner didn't even show up
Why do we need a border czar? We already have ICE and the Dept of Homeland Security
And why in the world do we need a Great Lakes Czar?
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dgoodii5 months, 2 weeks ago
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Until you address education and research cost/regulation compliance for equipment and medications, we are only addressing the billing issue of cost. Billing through a single payer system would be just as bad as the present system.
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The legal or Tort side of the problem is also in need of updating. Loser or false claims should be forced to pay fees, more lawyers need to be reviewed and disbarred for scamming the system. Doctors insurance companies often settle even when they are the victim of fraud, juries don't always rule with the law.
Procedures performed to limit liability or increase revenue from insurance or government plans, when not medically needed, who wouldn't do it to protect themselves from law suits.
Increasingly, we the people using emergency room for non life threatening issues. Going to the doctor for band-aids, ice packs and aspirin, the insurance system is not the only cause of cost.
The cost of health care and insurance has far more layers then they are willing to look at right now. They are focused on the payment system and nothing else, this could change the health care of the world if done wrong. -
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truthiness5 months, 2 weeks ago
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let's make this clear for those of you on the right who (correctly) fear a socialized medical system. this will not be government controlled medical research or government controlled medical practice.
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what this would be is government controlled payment system. Which means we all pay into a single pool of money from which medical bills are paid. Currently workers/taxpayers are paying into private insurance as well as 9 different government plans for medicare, politicians, civil servants, etc.. does that really seem right to you?
a single payer means a more logical system, with more equal sharing of the burden. and lower cost because we have reduced beuracracy (a conservative favorite) and removed the profit margin (a liberal favorite) from our expenses, as well as increasing the number of people paying. -
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jimdoze5 months, 2 weeks ago
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Health Care Costs are not the same thing as Health Care Prices. Health Care Prices have, except for very limited parts of the spectrum of goods and services, remained at or below the overall inflation rate for about the last 10 years. Those goods and services that have inflated faster are at the cutting edge, i.e. NEW life saving (or quality of life enhancing) goods and techniques that did not exist in the past. Techniques that fall into that category are not patentable and disseminate quickly producing a cost leveling effect. Goods that fall into that category (drugs and technology) are invented with an eye for profit. Eventually those items come off patent and their prices revert. If the profitability is squashed by the system, nothing new will be invented. Of course, we the people will not know the difference because what might have been invented is only speculation.
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Costs = Price x Quantity
The rise in Cost of health care is due the increase in Quantity of goods and services consumed... think aging Baby Boom Demographic Bubble.
If Costs are "contained", it is simple economics that Goods and Services will be "contained". Think limitations and constraints in availability. However, it is my bet that Costs will not be contained. They will merely be re-distributed by the government, which to this point has no profit, loss or break-even constraints, rather than by private insurance companies who are bound by profit, loss or break-even constraints.
If anyone thinks that the executive salaries of private insurance companies will prove to be anything more than an ant in comparison to the elephant of government bloat and waste that is sure to result, they are whistling Dixie.-
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nostalgia5 months, 2 weeks ago
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"Goods that fall into that category (drugs and technology) are invented with an eye for profit"
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Not always
Laparoscopic gall bladder removal is an outpatient procedure instead of requiring days in the hospital and a large incision
Endoscopes have allowed the examination of the gastrointestinal tract and early ID of problems - colon cancer, ulcers and esophageal cancer
Mammograms are able to detect breast cancer in the early stages
Drugs to lower cholesterol and LDL levels have prevented heart attacks
Better medication to lower BP has prevented heart attacks and strokes
Pulmonary vein ablation to stop atrial fibrillation - prevents a lifetime of being medicated with cardiac drugs and anticoagulants and all of the problems associated with atrial fibrillation
In the 1980's 60% of people who made it to the hospital alive after a heart attack had a chance of surviving - the other 40% died. Now the number is 95%+ because of new procedures like stents and bypass surgery
Which technology/drugs would you eliminate?
These may be expensive at first but over time are really cost effective
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dxxy4u5 months, 2 weeks ago
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With Over 12 million and growing people without ANY kind of Health Insurance, I don't believe we're having this Conversation. Some of you people are just down right nasty. And to make matters worse, you don't have health insurance yourself. Suppose you get an illness, what are you going to do,call Rush Limbaugh to help you out?
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Natureboy5 months, 2 weeks ago
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Many are missing the fact that while single payer is optimal, it doesn't necessarily have to happen at the National level. There are some good bills out there which would enact single payor heath coverage at the state level, such as the Heath Security Act for New Mexicans.
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http://www.nmhealthsecurity.org/
One thing which is essential is to make sure the dilute, BS "reform" being concocted at the national level does not preclude individual states from going single payor if they choose. -
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rhyannon385 months, 2 weeks ago
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I've got it,let's just go back to the same healthcare system of the 1950's,when full family coverage cost only $5 a week.That was only about 1% of the average weekly income instead of 10 to 20% today.Doctors made money, hospitals made money and lawyers made money without suing the crap out of everybody.
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pekiren425 months ago
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we advocate nothing less than a single payer health care system. We are not supporting mandated insurance, subsidized insurance or any other system which includes insurance companies. Our representatives in Washington are not listening to us. We have gotten organized and are taking action to remedy this.
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http://the-aarp-homeowners-insurance.blogspot.com/
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