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ACS campaign on health insurance

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ACS campaign on health insurance

Cancer Society Focuses Its Ads on the Uninsured

By Kevin Sack
The New York Times
August 31, 2007

In a stark departure from past practice, the American Cancer Society plans to devote its entire $15 million advertising budget this year not to smoking cessation or colorectal screening but to the consequences of inadequate health coverage.

The campaign was born of the group’s frustration that cancer rates are not dropping as rapidly as hoped, and of recent research linking a lack of insurance to delays in detecting malignancies.

The two 60-second television commercials that form the spine of the campaign make that point.

One features images of uninsured cancer patients, appearing hollow and fearful. “This is what a health care crisis looks like to the American Cancer Society,” the narrator begins. “We’re making progress, but it’s not enough if people don’t have access to the care that could save their lives.”

The other commercial depicts a young mother whose family has gone into debt because her insurance did not fully cover her cancer treatment. “Is the choice between caring for yourself and caring for your family really a choice?” the narrator asks.

Census figures released this week show that the number and percentage of people in the United States without health insurance rose last year, to 47 million and 15.8 percent. A 2003 study estimated that one of every 10 cancer patients was uninsured.

Other surveys have found that one of every four families afflicted by cancer, which is projected to kill 560,000 Americans this year, is effectively impoverished by the fight, including one of every five with insurance.

John R. Seffrin, the chief executive of the cancer society, which is based here, said his organization had concluded that advances in prevention and research would have little lasting impact if Americans could not afford cancer screening and treatment.

“I believe, if we don’t fix the health care system, that lack of access will be a bigger cancer killer than tobacco,” Mr. Seffrin said in an interview. “The ultimate control of cancer is as much a public policy issue as it is a medical and scientific issue.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/31/us/31cancer.html?_r=2&hp=&oref=slogin&pagewanted=all

Comment:

By Don McCanne, MD

The message of the American Cancer Society is clear. The most important single measure that would improve access to care that could save lives would be to provide everyone with comprehensive health insurance.

Coverage alone is not enough. The growth in innovative private plans that compete based on the premium charged are rapidly expanding the rate of underinsurance, thereby creating financial hardship for those insured individuals who develop cancer (or other major diseases or injuries).

Reform proposals that build on our current system of financing care are dependent on a dramatic expansion in the use of these inadequate innovative plans. What a cruel policy recommendation. A mother should never have to let her cancer go untreated merely because feeding her children is a higher priority.

Good public policy, such a comprehensive national health insurance program, saves lives. Bad public policy, such as encouraging underinsurance in the private market, kills.

The dark side of healthcare reform

By Benjamin Day
The Boston Globe
August 30, 2007

AFTER EXTENDING healthcare coverage to more than 150,000 previously uninsured residents over the past year, Massachusetts health reform took a turn for the worse this month with the Patrick administration’s proposal to limit the state’s Free Care Pool.

The Free Care Pool exists to catch those who fall through the cracks of both private and public insurance programs, by reimbursing hospitals and health centers that treat the uninsured without any of the cost barriers — premiums, copayments, deductibles — that leave low-income patients with medical debt, or worse, untreated illnesses and conditions. The administration’s reforms would refuse eligibility for this safety net to everyone who is eligible for the state’s subsidized health plan, Commonwealth Care, along with anyone offered “affordable” insurance by their employer. The proposal would also, for the first time ever, impose cost sharing — deductibles and copayments — on many of the exclusively low-income patients who rely on the pool for medical care they can receive nowhere else.

In public hearings and consultative sessions hosted by the administration, not a single organization representing Massachusetts patients or residents agreed with this change. What rapidly emerged was a chorus of grassroots protest from legal advocates, patient support groups, labor, communities of faith, policy experts, doctors, hospitals, and health centers. It is easy to understand why Governor Patrick’s move to hobble the health safety net lacks a popular base of support: Last year, more than 450,000 people benefited from Free Care Pool coverage.

Why would Patrick, under the guise of a law designed to expand access to healthcare for everyone, cripple the state’s only program that guarantees that low-income, uninsured residents have a place to land when all else fails? The answer from administration officials is this: a safety net that is too effective at catching people when they fall through the cracks is incompatible with the the state’s new health plans. Almost all of those who have been added to the healthcare rolls under the reform law have come in under fully subsidized, free-coverage plans that don’t require premium payments. The partially subsidized plans, on the other hand, as well as those plans residents must purchase at full cost, haven’t exactly been flying off the shelves.

This is clear evidence that the standards for what people can afford to pay under the new law are wildly unrealistic. But state officials implementing the law argue that the existence of a working safety net may be discouraging enrollment. Commonwealth Care representatives have commented publicly that the Free Care Pool must be made less attractive.

There is a long and unfortunate history to this line of thinking, which has led to the erosion and, at times, the vilification of our economic safety net institutions. From the Work Relief programs of the Great Depression through Welfare to Workfare, attempts to erode income security have been proposed as a way to corral the unemployed into the workforce. In the United States, the only developed nation without a national universal health plan, the health safety net is targeted as a means of corralling the uninsured into traditional insurance plans.

There is little evidence that eroding safety net programs actually helps improve participation in the labor market or the healthcare market. This does, however, succeed in punishing the poor, throwing low-income communities back on their own resources, and increasing the stigma upon safety net recipients. In the case of the new health law, this is a particularly meaningless and insulting exercise, as the law itself provides stiff financial penalties for any who are deemed able to afford health insurance but fail to enroll in a public or a private plan.

In 2008, the state penalty for being uninsured will be more than $1,000 per year, exceeding the fines for virtually all criminal violations on the books including violation of the child labor laws (a $50 fine) and domestic assault (a maximum $1,000 fine). And a person will still be uninsured after paying it.

The nation today is looking to Massachusetts. Are we as a society willing to use our neighbors’ health as an additional stick to punish them for deciding they can’t afford the state’s “affordable” premiums? I hope not.

Benjamin Day is executive director of Mass-Care: The Massachusetts Campaign for Single Payer Health Care.
(c) Copyright 2007 Globe Newspaper Company.

The moneylenders move in

Doctors Offering No-Interest Loans to Patients

By Milt Freudenheim
The New York Times
August 30, 2007

Zero-interest financing, a familiar sales incentive at car dealerships and furniture stores, has found its way to another big-ticket consumer market: doctors’ and dentists’ offices.

Of course, going into debt to pay for medical procedures is nothing new for many people.

But as the price of health care continues to rise and big lenders pursue new areas for growth, this type of medical financing has become one of the fastest-growing parts of consumer credit, led by lending giants like Capital One and Citigroup and the CareCredit unit of General Electric.

Big insurers, too, are devising new financing plans with various payback options. Upstart players have also aggressively cut deals with doctors.

The room for expansion looks ample, as rising deductibles, co-payments and other costs may force more of the nation’s 250 million people with health insurance to finance out-of-pocket expenses for even basic medical care.

“As more and more of the costs of care are shifted to consumers, people are going to need more credit,” said Red Gillen, a senior analyst at Celent, an insurance and banking research firm. “They are still going to need health care.”

The zero-interest plans are not for everyone. In fact, they are available only to the creditworthy — meaning they offer no help to those among the nation’s 47 million uninsured who are in difficult financial situations.

Even for those who can get credit approval, the plans make sense only if users are able to make payments on time and close the loan on schedule, typically within 12 months. Otherwise, the loans after defaults can carry interest rates of 20 percent or more — similar to the default penalty on a typical credit card.

Some consumer debt experts warn that as more people try to bridge widening gaps in their health insurance, paying for medical care on credit could plunge the unwary into a financial crisis. In recent years, the use of high-interest credit cards to pay big medical bills has become a leading cause of consumer bankruptcy.

Still, consumer credit companies and some insurers are now experimenting with financing plans meant specifically for medical costs.

For people who think they could not pay off a zero-interest loan within a year, most credit companies also offer longer-term medical financing deals with 12 percent to 13 percent interest payable over several years. Those plans, though, must be arranged at the outset of the medical expense; a zero-interest plan typically cannot be converted to the longer-term program if consumers find themselves unable to pay off the one-year loans.

Some insurers, including UnitedHealthcare, also have special credit plans available for insured members whose policies are linked to health savings accounts. Such policies combine high-deductible insurance with tax-sheltered savings accounts where money can roll over year to year until needed for medical expenses. But typically, the amounts of money being set aside do not go very far toward meeting even routine health expenses.

So far, among the 1.76 million health savings accounts in this country, the average balance is $1,327, according to a recent survey by Inside Consumer-Directed Care, a trade publication. To help people with health savings accounts meet the shortfall, the Exante Bank unit of UnitedHealth Group is trying out a card that extends credit at rates currently averaging about 10 percent to 13 percent, depending on the applicant’s credit history.

As for the zero-interest deals, the credit providers say that most of them end up being just that — interest-free. About 80 percent of the medical loans that CareCredit provides are paid off on schedule and incur no finance charges, according to the company’s president, Michael J. Testa.

That, the companies say, justifies the high default interest rates for late payments, since that is the way they recoup the costs of doing business. In fact, though, the credit companies make money even on the interest-free deals, because they are typically keeping 10 percent of the fee the doctor charges the patient. But for patients with low credit ratings, a (provider) eager to build a clientele might have to accept as little as 75 percent of the bill.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/30/business/30medloan.html?_r=2&hp=&oref=slogin&pagewanted=all

Comment:

By Don McCanne, MD

More rhetoric from the marketplace.

Are these interest-free loans really free? Not when your complicit health care provider gives your cash discount of 10 percent to 25 percent to the moneylender, and you pay rack price. And it’s especially not free when one late payment throws you into an exorbitant default rate.

And if ever you had visions that the health insurers might be interested first and foremost in your welfare, and only secondarily in improving their business models, this should lay that thought to rest. Your billfolds and purses are no longer enough. They now want your bank accounts too.

Models of reform that build on our fragmented system dependent on private health plans will only further compound the problem of medical debt. The moneylenders will become yet one more powerful vested interest that will continue to block reform.

A couple thousand years ago, a very fine Gentleman turned over the tables of the moneylenders. Where is He now when we really need Him?

Poll shows more Californians favoring single-payer health care

Tom Chorneau
San Francisco Chronicle
Sacramento Bureau
Wednesday, August 22, 2007

(08-22) 04:00 PDT Sacramento — – As voter dissatisfaction with the state’s health care system grows, increasing interest is emerging in moving to a state-run, single-payer program, according to a Field Poll released today.

For years, a single-payer system had been the favorite of a small but loyal minority, but the new poll shows that 36 percent of California voters now favor replacing the current employer-based system with one operated by the state – a jump of 12 percent since December.

Meanwhile, the number of voters who want to make reforms within the framework of the current system has dropped from 52 percent in December to 33 percent in August.

“This is a clear signal that people want change,” said Anthony Wright, executive director of Health Access, a Sacramento consumer group that supports both a single-payer proposal and legislation aimed at reforming the current system.

“What you have here is two-thirds of California saying they want a major expansion of group coverage,” he said. “People are looking for reform, and they want the government to make the system fair.”

The poll findings were drawn from telephone interviews with 536 randomly selected registered voters during the 10-day period ending Aug. 12. It has a sampling error of plus or minus 41/2 percentage points.

Mark DiCamillo, director of the Field Poll, said there’s a strong relationship between voters being dissatisfied with the current system and their interest in alternatives.

“The message from the governor and legislators that the system is broken has sunk in,” he said. “Back in December, people had a mixed view of the system and were less interested in change.

“Now we have more people with a very negative viewpoint.”

In December, DiCamillo pointed out, the poll found 51 percent of voters were satisfied with the way health care worked in California, with 44 percent dissatisfied.

Today, only 28 percent said they are satisfied with health care in California and 69 percent are dissatisfied. He also noted that the number of voters who said they are very dissatisfied has more than doubled since December – from 20 percent to 42 percent.

While the numbers give supporters of single-payer a boost, advocates of less-drastic change said voters will not support a government-run system.

“There’s no question that people continue to be concerned about the high cost of health care and are worried about getting and keeping insurance,” said Vince Sollitto, spokesman for the California Chamber of Commerce. “But turning over health care to the same government that brought you the Department of Motor Vehicles and the post office isn’t the way to go, and most Californians agree with that.”

Chuck Idelson, spokesman for the California Nurses Association, which is a strong supporter of a single-payer system, said the Field Poll findings are similar to recent national polls that show growing support for single-payer.

“People want real reform, not phony reforms,” he said.

The Field Poll also found growing voter skepticism that the Legislature and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will come to an agreement on a health care overhaul this year – 58 percent said it was unlikely.

Schwarzenegger introduced a $12-billion plan in January aimed at covering all Californians, but he’s made little progress in selling it to the Legislature.

The governor’s plan relies on sharing the cost of coverage extensions to 6.5 million uninsured residents within the existing system – an approach that has lost support among voters since December, according to Field.

Schwarzenegger spokesman Aaron McLear said the poll numbers show that Californians overwhelmingly see the need for health care reform. “As we educate the public on the merits and problems of single-payer, we are confident that our proposal will be supported,” he said.

E-mail Tom Chorneau at tchorneau@sfchronicle.com.

Canadian care costs less, insures all citizens and could help cut U.S. poverty, crime rates

By David Karwacki
The Salt Lake Tribune
08/10/2007

(Editor, Salt Lake Tribune: The writer is addressing the question, “Should the U.S. use Canada as its model for health-care reform?”)

SASKATOON, Saskatchewan – Americans set their sights admirably high by seeking a Jeffersonian guarantee of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Advances in medical science and technology, especially diagnostics and pharmaceuticals, can certainly help them achieve those goals – if they can afford them. Many millions, unfortunately, find their life, liberty and happiness threatened because of illness and a lack of access to even basic, let alone advanced, medical care.

Access to universal medical coverage was introduced in my province of Saskatchewan in 1962 and was adopted by the federal government to apply to all Canadians in 1964.

Instead of life liberty and the pursuit of happiness, Canada’s constitution stresses “peace, order and good government.” We believe that government can be a force for good and in some areas – public health care being one – and can actually do a better job than private corporate interests.

For more than 40 years Canada’s Medicare has improved the quality of life for tens of millions of people, liberated them from the threat of unaffordable medical bills and made it easier for them to pursue their own definition of happiness.

Our Medicare system isn’t perfect, but then neither is democracy. We don’t think that’s reason enough to get rid of them. Besides, there’s more than just a political “feel-good” reason for embracing universal health care. It’s good for business.

I’m the owner of a company in Canada and another in the United States that distribute fresh produce around the globe. My Canadian company has three corporate advantages over my U.S. company and our U.S. competitors: healthy workers, lower operating costs and better worker safety through social cohesion.

In my experience, healthy workers are more productive because they take less sick time than those who don’t, or can’t afford, to take care of their health. Lack of health-care access is a barrier to preventive care. Those who ignore early symptoms of an illness because their credit cards are maxed-out end up being less productive and may have to leave the work force. Then the employer faces the expense of training replacement workers.

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development estimates that total health expenditures in Canada amounted to 9.9 percent of GDP in 2004. In the United States it was 15.3 percent. And even though Americans spend more on health care, their life expectancy is, on average, two years less than Canadians.

Many U.S. companies enjoy a competitive edge in technology because of the R&D of the military industrial complex. In Canada it’s our single-insurer health-care system that provides us with a competitive advantage.

My U.S. company pays, on average, a premium of $9,300 per year for each employee to provide just basic medical insurance. My Canadian firm pays no premium. The costs are paid out of taxes and from resource royalties.

High health-care costs in the United States have been cited as one very big reason for what some people are calling “the outsourcing of America.” Witness the steady decline of the domestic auto-manufacturing sector.

Finally, I would argue that universal health care provides a social cohesion and increases our general security by helping to lift people out of poverty. A healthy population with access to health care is more likely to be productive and beneficial to the community. The rates of violent crime in Canada have yet to reach even a shadow of what is happening in America.

The economic reasons for universal medical coverage are clear. Just as important, however, is what Medicare says about our country and its people. We believe in the principle that everyone should have access to reasonable health care. That way life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness is for all of us – not just those who can afford it.

DAVID KARWACKI is the leader of the Liberal Party www.saskliberal.ca in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan and a distributor of fish and produce.

Middle-income losing coverage

Middle-Class Americans Join Ranks of Uninsured in 2006 as Private Coverage Shrinks

Physicians for a National Health Program
August 28, 2007

The U.S. Census Bureau released data today showing that the number of uninsured Americans jumped by 2.2 million in 2006 to 47.0 million people, with nearly all the increase (2.03 million) concentrated among middle-class Americans earning over $50,000 per year, according to an analysis by Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP). (The median household income in 2006 was $48,200).

“Middle-income Americans are now experiencing the human suffering that comes with being uninsured. It makes any illness a potential economic and social catastrophe,” said Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, co-founder of Physicians for a National Health Program and Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School.

Physicians for a National Health Program noted the following:

* The 2.18 million rise in the number of uninsured is the biggest jump reported by the Census Bureau since 1992.

* There are now more uninsured in the U.S. — 47.0 million — than at any time since passage of Medicare/Medicaid in the mid-1960’s.

* 93% of the increase is among middle and high income families:

Of the 2.18 million increase:

1.398 million (64% of the increase) was in >$75k family income
An additional 633,000 (29% of the increase) was among $50-$75k group

Among full time workers, the number of uninsured increased by 1.230 million (56.4% of the increase).

The doctors’ group said that the only solution to the rising number of uninsured and underinsured is a single-payer national health insurance program, publicly financed but delivered by private doctors and hospitals. Such a program could save more than $400 billion annually in administrative waste, enough to provide high-quality coverage to all and halt the erosion of the current private system.

https://pnhp.org/news/2007/august/middleclass_america.php

Comment:

By Don McCanne, MD

The public welfare programs continue to putter along. The dramatic decline in coverage has been primarily in employer-sponsored plans. Therefore it is no surprise that most of the 2 million plus individuals who lost coverage in 2006 were in the middle and upper-middle income sectors.

This Census Bureau study did not attempt to assess the explosion in the rate of underinsurance. The September issue of Consumer Reports states that “43 percent of people with insurance said they were ‘somewhat’ to ‘completely’ unprepared to cope with a costly medical emergency over the coming year.”

The health insurance crisis is no longer simply a welfare issue for low-income individuals. It is now a looming crisis for middle-income America, the majority of us.

We can provide comprehensive care to everyone without spending more than we already are. And the polls do indicate that there is a distinct trend towards greater recognition that a national health insurance program is precisely what we need.

But where are the politicians? In an almost unified voice they have responded to this report by supporting insurance that would cover a portion of lower-income children (SCHIP). Covering more children is certainly a good thing, but isn’t that a pretty feeble response?

Kucinich is right on healthcare

By Derrick Z. Jackson
Boston Globe Columnist
August 29, 2007

DENNIS KUCINICH rarely gets much airtime in Democratic presidential debates. That was underscored recently when ABC’s George Stephanopoulos called on him in an Iowa forum to talk about God. Kucinich said, “George, I’ve been standing here for the last 45 minutes praying to God you were going to call on me.”

With poll numbers at 1 or 2 percent, the Ohio congressman is the nudge kicking at the knees of the Democratic Party to offer more than incremental change. He deserves more attention than he gets. On healthcare, he says what Americans believe, even as his rivals rake in contributions from the industry.

In a CNN poll this spring, 64 percent of respondents said the government should “provide a national insurance program for all Americans, even if this would require higher taxes,” and 73 percent approve of higher taxes to insure children under 18. Those results track New York Times and Gallup polls last year, in which about two-thirds of respondents said it is the federal government’s responsibility to guarantee health coverage to all Americans.

Such polls allow Kucinich to joke that, far from being in the loony left, “I’m in the center. Everyone else is to the right of me.” More seriously, in a recent visit to the Globe, he accused the other Democratic candidates of faking it on healthcare reform.

“One of the greatest hoaxes of this campaign — everyone’s for universal healthcare,” Kucinich said. “It’s like a mantra. But when you get into the details, you find out that all the other candidates are talking about maintaining the existing for-profit system.”

Kucinich quoted the 2003 study published by the New England Journal of Medicine that found that 31 percent of healthcare expenditures pay not for actual care but for administrative costs. That compares with only 16.7 percent in Canada. Administrative and clerical employees make up 27 percent of the healthcare workforce in the United States, compared with 19 percent in Canada.

“With 46 million Americans without any health insurance at all and another 50 million underinsured,” Kucinich said, “isn’t it really time to look at the other models that exist that are workable for all the other industrialized nations in the world? When you think about it, the only thing that’s stopping us is the hold that the private insurers have on our political system . . . corporate profits, stock options, executive salaries, advertising, marketing, the cost of paperwork. . .”

The hold of the healthcare industry on the top candidates is already apparent. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, the top recipient of campaign contributions so far from the pharmaceutical and health products industry is Republican Mitt Romney ($228,260). But the next two are Democrats Barack Obama ($161,124) and Hillary Clinton ($146,000). The top recipient of contributions from health professionals is Clinton ($990,611). Romney is second at $806,837, and Obama third at $748,637.

The top recipient of cash from the insurance industry, which includes health insurers, is another Democrat, Connecticut’s Christopher Dodd, at $605,950. Romney and Republican Rudolph Giuliani are second and third, with Clinton and Obama fourth and fifth. Even though Obama is in fifth place, he still has collected $269,750 from insurance companies.

In a category that is relatively small in money thus far, but huge in terms of healthcare morality, Democratic presidential candidates occupy four of the top six spots in receiving money from death-dealing tobacco companies. After Giuliani’s $69,500 from tobacco companies, Dodd has received $45,400, Clinton $32,300, Romney $31,400, Obama $7,885, and Democrat Joe Biden, $4,000.

When the top Democratic candidates take tobacco contributions, it is hard to see them truly believing, as Kucinich says, that healthcare “is the single-most important domestic issue. . . a defining issue in the presidential race.”

The top recipient from lobbyists by far is Clinton at $406,300. She is still so badly smoldering from the torching of her healthcare efforts as first lady that she recently asserted to the National Association of Black Journalists, “I have never advocated socialized medicine. That has been a right-wing attack on me for 15 years.”

The irony, as Kucinich critically points out, is that Americans are so burned from for-profit healthcare, that they want the government to guarantee coverage. “If people clearly understood that by going to vote on Election Day they would create conditions where they would have health coverage,” Kucinich said, “if you could communicate that message, you wouldn’t have to talk about anything else.”

'Profit equation': Health-care plan should not be financially motivated

Terry Gossard
The Charleston Gazette
August 28, 2007

The pursuit of profit has always been the principal motivating driver that sustains the American economy. Few would argue this because it strives to provide an economic lifestyle essential to America’s work force, small businesses and large corporations and the overall viability of local, state and federal government. However, the delivery of basic health care to all Americans should be removed from the “profit equation” at least as we relate it to the corporate bottom line.

Implementing a single-payer (universal) health-care system for all Americans is long overdue. It is a basic right of citizenship. Any attempt to hasten the dialogue in this regard has invoked the instant wrath of the universal health-care naysayers. Over the years, we have stood idly by and allowed the status quo barriers to become much more formidable than need be. The time is now to attack the real and imaginary barriers with fresh innovative thought as to how best achieve a viable single-payer system.

Rather than bow to naysayer resistance, it’s time for a full-court press. The longer we hesitate, the longer we continue to hesitate. To paraphrase Hedda Haning’s remarks in an Aug. 12 Sunday Gazette-Mail commentary, we as Americans are no less capable of developing a national health-care plan than the many other industrialized nations around the world who have already done so with a high degree of success.

A single-payer system would naturally be a quantum change in the way our health care is delivered, but not an impossible change. How would it work? How would it be managed? How do we bring the key parties to the table? How would it be funded? It would require a dramatic shift in the paradigm of health-care delivery and payment. The precedent has been established with the likes of Canada, France and Great Britain among others. Certainly we can find a way to model that which has performed well for those countries in their respective systems and improve upon those aspects which have not.

Opposition forces have thus far relied on rhetorical “scare tactics” to protect the status quo. The primary risk to the opposition would be any action taken that may result in a reduction of profit. For many of us who have experienced the denial of medical service or medication, or the unreasonable delay in providing timely medical decisions, or at the very least, health-care coverage that is less than satisfactory, do you really believe that our well-being is of paramount concern to those overseeing the full spectrum of insured services? How many of us (having any form of paid medical coverage today) can honestly say that we’re confident that our insurance company or third-party provider has our health-care interest at heart? Premiums, co-payments and deductibles continue to increase each year yet we must still fight for our medical needs. Unfortunately for many, waging these battles becomes far too exhausting or they’re simply not equipped to challenge the status quo.

Health-care decisions must be made solely by health-care professionals, pure and simple. Each and every insurance company and third party provider has a phalanx of front-line clerical personnel programmed with a checklist of “reasons” why your claim is to be denied or that the surgery ordered by your doctor is unnecessary or that medication “A” prescribed by your doctor is not right for you and that you should be using medication “B.” The fox has been in charge of the henhouse far too long.

We should not let allow inertia to be our albatross. A well-thought-out single-payer health-care system is well within our ability to define and implement. It won’t be an easy challenge; nor should it be. Yes, the barriers are formidable but not insurmountable. We deserve much better as a nation. As we approach the 2008 congressional and presidential election, we need to closely scrutinize the proposed health-care position put forth by each candidate and allow that to be a critical factor in guiding our voting decision. We must be persistent and vocal. Our voice will be heard at the ballot box.

There is a quote from the late Robert Kennedy that is perhaps befitting our challenge: “There are those who look at things the way they are and ask why … I dream of things that never were and ask why not?”

Gossard, of Charleston, is a retired supply chain manager from Union Carbide and Dow Chemical.

‘Profit equation’: Health-care plan should not be financially motivated

Terry Gossard
The Charleston Gazette
August 28, 2007

The pursuit of profit has always been the principal motivating driver that sustains the American economy. Few would argue this because it strives to provide an economic lifestyle essential to America’s work force, small businesses and large corporations and the overall viability of local, state and federal government. However, the delivery of basic health care to all Americans should be removed from the “profit equation” at least as we relate it to the corporate bottom line.

Implementing a single-payer (universal) health-care system for all Americans is long overdue. It is a basic right of citizenship. Any attempt to hasten the dialogue in this regard has invoked the instant wrath of the universal health-care naysayers. Over the years, we have stood idly by and allowed the status quo barriers to become much more formidable than need be. The time is now to attack the real and imaginary barriers with fresh innovative thought as to how best achieve a viable single-payer system.

Rather than bow to naysayer resistance, it’s time for a full-court press. The longer we hesitate, the longer we continue to hesitate. To paraphrase Hedda Haning’s remarks in an Aug. 12 Sunday Gazette-Mail commentary, we as Americans are no less capable of developing a national health-care plan than the many other industrialized nations around the world who have already done so with a high degree of success.

A single-payer system would naturally be a quantum change in the way our health care is delivered, but not an impossible change. How would it work? How would it be managed? How do we bring the key parties to the table? How would it be funded? It would require a dramatic shift in the paradigm of health-care delivery and payment. The precedent has been established with the likes of Canada, France and Great Britain among others. Certainly we can find a way to model that which has performed well for those countries in their respective systems and improve upon those aspects which have not.

Opposition forces have thus far relied on rhetorical “scare tactics” to protect the status quo. The primary risk to the opposition would be any action taken that may result in a reduction of profit. For many of us who have experienced the denial of medical service or medication, or the unreasonable delay in providing timely medical decisions, or at the very least, health-care coverage that is less than satisfactory, do you really believe that our well-being is of paramount concern to those overseeing the full spectrum of insured services? How many of us (having any form of paid medical coverage today) can honestly say that we’re confident that our insurance company or third-party provider has our health-care interest at heart? Premiums, co-payments and deductibles continue to increase each year yet we must still fight for our medical needs. Unfortunately for many, waging these battles becomes far too exhausting or they’re simply not equipped to challenge the status quo.

Health-care decisions must be made solely by health-care professionals, pure and simple. Each and every insurance company and third party provider has a phalanx of front-line clerical personnel programmed with a checklist of “reasons” why your claim is to be denied or that the surgery ordered by your doctor is unnecessary or that medication “A” prescribed by your doctor is not right for you and that you should be using medication “B.” The fox has been in charge of the henhouse far too long.

We should not let allow inertia to be our albatross. A well-thought-out single-payer health-care system is well within our ability to define and implement. It won’t be an easy challenge; nor should it be. Yes, the barriers are formidable but not insurmountable. We deserve much better as a nation. As we approach the 2008 congressional and presidential election, we need to closely scrutinize the proposed health-care position put forth by each candidate and allow that to be a critical factor in guiding our voting decision. We must be persistent and vocal. Our voice will be heard at the ballot box.

There is a quote from the late Robert Kennedy that is perhaps befitting our challenge: “There are those who look at things the way they are and ask why … I dream of things that never were and ask why not?”

Gossard, of Charleston, is a retired supply chain manager from Union Carbide and Dow Chemical.

Census numbers of uninsured – only in America

Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2006

U.S. Census Bureau
Current Population Reports
Issued August 2007

This report presents data on income, poverty, and health insurance coverage in the United States based on information collected in the 2007 and earlier Annual Social and Economic Supplements (ASEC) to the Current Population Survey (CPS) conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau.

Health Insurance Coverage in the United States

* Both the percentage and the number of people without health insurance increased in 2006. The percentage without health insurance increased from 15.3 percent in 2005 to 15.8 percent in 2006, and the number of uninsured increased from 44.8 million to 47.0 million.

* The percentage of people covered by employment-based health insurance decreased to 59.7 percent in 2006, from 60.2 percent in 2005.

* The percentage of people covered by government health programs decreased to 27.0 percent in 2006, from 27.3 percent in 2005. The percentage and the number of people covered by Medicaid were statistically unchanged at 12.9 percent and 38.3 million, respectively, in 2006.

* The percentage and the number of children under 18 years old without health insurance increased to 11.7 percent and 8.7 million in 2006 (from 10.9 percent and 8.0 million, respectively, in 2005). With an uninsured rate in 2006 at 19.3 percent, children in poverty were more likely to be uninsured than all children.

* The percentage and the number of uninsured Blacks increased (from 19.0 percent and 7.0 million in 2005) to 20.5 percent and 7.6 million in 2006.

* The percentage and the number of uninsured Hispanics increased to 34.1 percent and 15.3 million in 2006.

http://www.census.gov/prod/2007pubs/p60-233.pdf

Comment:

By Don McCanne, MD

The numbers to commit to memory: for 2006, 47.0 million were uninsured, which is 15.8 percent of the population.

These are the standard numbers used by the policy community to express the magnitude of the problem of the uninsured.

Do not be led astray by the opponents of reform who will attempt to divert attention away from the fundamental problem of uninsurance by attacking the credibility of these numbers. Although the survey is designed to count the number of people who were uninsured for the entire year, it may include a few individuals who had forgotten that they were covered (in spite of “really, really” prompts) or a small number who declined to report their coverage. For that reason some suggest that this survey more closely approximates the number of people who were uninsured at a specific point in time during the year, rather than being uninsured for the entire year. But that undercounts those who were not included because they reported that they did have coverage at some time during the year, even if not the entire year.

These are highly credible numbers. Do not dismiss the numbers, but rather discredit and dismiss those who would divert the dialogue away from this intolerable problem.

One of the more disconcerting findings in this survey has to do with the numbers of children who were uninsured. Intensive efforts have been made in recent years to enroll more children in the SCHIP and Medicaid programs. In spite of those efforts, the number of uninsured children increased by over 600,000 in 2006. Our most effective incremental program of covering the uninsured, the SCHIP program, is failing us.

And yet the Bush administration wants to cut the SCHIP program back even more by insisting that states must enroll 95 percent of the lowest-income eligible children before more children could be added, a goal that all state administrators insist is impossible to achieve. Yes, impossible – an admission that these incremental programs can never achieve universal coverage.

And yet our policymakers insist that covering everyone under a national health insurance program is not feasible. Do they have squash rot for brains?!

Middle-Class Americans Join Ranks of Uninsured in 2006 as Private Coverage Shrinks

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 28, 2007

Contacts:
Steffie Woolhandler, M.D. (617) 312-2766
Quentin Young, MD (312) 782-6006
Don McCanne, M.D. (949) 493-3714

Number of Uninsured Swells 2.2 Million to 47 Million

15,000 Doctors: “Single Payer National Health Insurance is the Only Solution”

CHICAGO — The U.S. Census Bureau released data today showing that the number of uninsured Americans jumped by 2.2 million in 2006 to 47.0 million people, with nearly all the increase (2.03 million) concentrated among middle-class Americans earning over $50,000 per year, according to an analysis by Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP). Strikingly, 1.4 million of the newly uninsured were in families making over $75,000 per year. An additional 600,000 were in families earning $50,000 to $75,000 per year. (The median household income in 2006 was $48,200).

“Middle income Americans are now experiencing the human suffering that comes with being uninsured. It makes any illness a potential economic and social catastrophe,” said Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, co-founder of Physicians for a National Health Program and Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School.

Physicians for a National Health Program also noted the following:

1- The 2.18 million rise in the number of uninsured is the biggest jump reported by the Census Bureau since 1992.

2 – There are now more uninsured in the U.S. — 47.0 million — than at any time since passage of Medicare/Medicaid in the mid-1960’s.

3 – 93% of the increase is among middle and high income families:

Of the 2.18 million increase:

* 1.398 million (64% of the increase) was in >$75k family income
* An additional 633,000 (29% of the increase) was among $50-$75k group

Among full time workers, the number of uninsured increased by 1.230 million (56.4% of the increase).

4 – In Massachusetts, often cited as a model for health reform, the number of uninsured increased from 583,000 in 2005 (9.2 percent) to 657,000 in 2006 (10.4 percent of the population).

5 – The divergence between poverty and uninsurance is relatively new and striking. Until recently, as poverty went down uninsurance fell. That has changed.

6 – The number of uninsured children has fallen only 17 percent since SCHIP was enacted in 1997 from 10.74 million (adjusted to be comparable to current figures) to 8.66 million. The number of uninsured children rose by 611,000 between 2005 and 2006.

The doctors’ group said that the only solution to the rising number of uninsured and underinsured is a single-payer national health insurance program, publicly financed but delivered by private doctors and hospitals. Such a program could save more than $400 billion annually in administrative waste, enough to provide high-quality coverage to all and halt the erosion of the current private system.

“We can no longer afford the waste and inefficiency, the high overhead and outrageous executive salaries of the private insurance industry” said Dr. Don McCanne, senior health policy fellow for PNHP. “Only reforms that end our reliance on defective private coverage and assure guaranteed coverage for all will work.”

“The experience of other industrialized nations teaches us that high-quality, comprehensive care can be provided to all our citizens,” said Dr. Quentin Young, National Coordinator of Physicians for a National Health Program. “A single-payer national health insurance system has emerged as only solution to the nation’s health system debacle.”

###

Physicians for a National Health Program is an organization of 15,000 American physicians advocating for non-profit national health insurance. PNHP has chapters and spokespersons across the country. For local or national contacts, call (312) 782-6006.

Will COBRA be there when you need it?

No health insurance from First Magnus

By Tim Steller and Christie Smythe
Arizona Daily Star
August 25, 2007

Mortgage-lender First Magnus laid off most of its more than 5,000 workers nationwide last week after abruptly halting its loan business.

An e-mail sent to employees said the Tucson-based mortgage lender canceled its health insurance because, after its bankruptcy filing on Tuesday, it can no longer pay for the plan.

“As a result of this termination, COBRA will not be available to any current or former First Magnus employees,” the e-mail says.

Under the federal law establishing COBRA, many employees who leave a job — voluntarily or not — are eligible to buy the health insurance offered by the employer for up to 18 months.

But the catch for former First Magnus workers is, the employer’s plan must still exist in order for the former employee to buy it.

http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/related/198102.php

Comment:

By Don McCanne, MD

Another incremental improvement in health care coverage was the introduction of the COBRA regulations which allowed an individual to continue to purchase prior employer-sponsored coverage during limited transitional periods of unemployment.

One problem with the program is that many unemployed individuals simply are not able to pay the insurance premium and consequently lose their coverage. Also, when the qualification period ends, the individual might not be ale to meet underwriting standards in the individual market. State-sponsored high risk pools frequently are not an answer because of high costs, waiting lists, poor benefits, and the fact that many states have not even established such pools.

The former employees of First Magnus have now discovered yet another potential problem with COBRA: they are unable to purchase COBRA coverage from a plan that no longer exists because it was terminated.

Haven’t we had enough of these incremental steps to improve health care coverage? All parameters are worse (except children under SCHIP, but that now is also under threat).

It would be so simple to make health program enrollment automatic and permanent for everyone, by establishing our own equitably-funded universal risk pool. What is there about simplicity and equity that we don’t understand?