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The Feminist Case For Single Payer

The Feminist Case For Single Payer

It's time to take health care away from the power of bosses and spouses.

By Natalie Shure
Jacobin, December 8, 2017

In the spring of 1969, a dozen feminists gathered at a women’s conference in Boston and came to a sober conclusion: their encounters with the United States health-care system had been overwhelmingly negative. They felt unsettled by doctors, alienated from their bodies, grifted by fees, and altogether powerless to navigate an industry they believed objectified them just as popular culture did.

The conference launched a years-long project, with each participant delving into some aspect of anatomy, sexuality, or society related to women’s health. The result was a self-published volume of essays called Women and their Bodies, which the Boston Women’s Health Book Collective used to provide women with a resource produced from their own perspectives and experiences.

Within a few years, the landmark feminist booklet was re-dubbed Our Bodies, Ourselves, released by Simon and Schuester, and sold millions of copies. In 2012, the Library of Congress named it one of the most significant works in American history. In recent years, it has inspired Trans Bodies, Trans Selves, which similarly seeks to be a health-care guide “by and for” the transgender community.

While Our Bodies, Ourselves is remembered for its role in the history of women’s health and culture, less attention is paid to its political context. In the 1970s, the small collective became one of the first feminist organizations to demand a single-payer health-care system: “Suffice it to say that capitalism is incapable of providing good health care, both curative and preventive, for all people,” one entry read. “Cost-benefit analysis trades off the benefit to the people of collective public health in favor of the cost to the people of private, patch-up medical care. The capitalist medical care system can be no more dedicated to improving the people’s health than can General Motors become dedicated to improving the people’s public transportation.” In a subsequent edition, they expounded: “We believe that health care is a human right and that a society should provide free health care for itself . . . Health care cannot be adequate as long as it is conceived of as insurance.”

If the book’s then-radical content has so permeated mainstream culture that it would strike readers as obvious today, the same is not the case for its authors’ critique of American health care. In fact, nearly fifty years after the collective articulated its vision for a universal system, “feminist” arguments against single-payer pepper politics and the media.

In June, Planned Parenthood of California refused to endorse a bill for a statewide single-payer system, contending that it was critical to focus on defending the Affordable Care Act (ACA) against GOP attacks instead. Vice cast it as a job-crusher for the mostly women of color who work in healthcare administration. In 2016, presidential candidate Hillary Clinton — whose campaign foregrounded her feminist credentials — famously declared single-payer would “never, ever come to pass.” More recently, Senator Bernie Sanders’s release of an expansive Medicare for All bill has been met with skepticism by media personalities who backed Clinton for her feminist credentials. At the very least, it seems clear that single-payer health care is rarely framed as a feminist issue.

Some mainstream feminists knock single payer as a distraction from the fight to defend the ACA. But while the Affordable Care Act undeniably improved some women’s lives, it could not dismantle gendered barriers to care.

Of all systems, single-payer is capable of going furthest to eliminate them. That’s the vision that Our Bodies, Ourselves adopted nearly half a century ago, and it must be taken up again today.

The Double Bind

One of the pervasive ways women are disadvantaged under the ACA is its reliance on employer-based coverage. In the United States, World War II–era wage freezes helped entrench a system of employer-provided health insurance, a perk meant to attract workers in a squeezed labor market.

Eventually, Medicare and Medicaid were devised as a safety net for those shut out of private plans, and the ACA expanded that safety net. Still, job-based plans remain the bedrock on which our insurance system is built.

Under this system, it’s harder for women to get health insurance in the first place. The strains of childrearing and elder care make women more likely to seek more flexible employment, like part-time, remote, or freelance work. These forms of employment tend not only to pay less, but are less likely to include health insurance benefits.

Those that do provide inferior ones: companies with majority-female workforces tend to offer less generous health-care coverage than those that are majority male. And less than one-third of low-income workers receive any health insurance through work. Jobs paying at or around the minimum wage are most often occupied by women, the majority of whom are women of color. Trans women face even higher levels of poverty than cis women, and are frequently saddled with impossibly high out of pocket costs.

Then there are the 25 percent of non-elderly adult women insured as dependents of a working spouse, which weakens their control over both their insurance coverage and their relationship. Health insurance has been found to be a common reason for getting married — and for staying married when one would rather not — especially among low-income people. Upon the loss of a spouse’s coverage, it’s difficult and expensive to continue receiving the same care. COBRA coverage — a program that allows people who lose employer-based insurance to remain on it, so long as they pony up the amount formerly contributed by employers — is often the only way to maintain provider networks, but it’s wildly expensive and eventually expires. Ultimately, divorce leaves some sixty-five thousand women uninsured each year, with men being far more likely to maintain coverage after their marriages dissolve.

Women’s unpaid domestic work puts further pressure on the contradictory demands of home, work, and the need to access coverage. Women disproportionately shoulder the responsibility of caring for others, putting them in an impossible situation when it comes to child and elder care: in order to maintain health insurance, they can’t take too much time off work. As a result, they’re forced to spend a significant portion of their wages on private care for the hours they’re on the job. For low-income women who don’t qualify for insurance through employers, the problem can be severe, made worse still by right-wing efforts to impose higher copays and out-of-home work requirements on Medicaid recipients, or to defund programs like CHIP that help parents pay for their children’s health insurance.

During particularly urgent health episodes, like childbirth or a relative’s protracted illness, women opt to take unpaid time off instead of risking their jobs. Notoriously, the United States is one of only a handful of countries that doesn’t guarantee paid maternity leave, exacerbating the financial stress of an already pricey phase of life. The Labor Department has found that nearly one-third of women who take unpaid time off for their own or dependents’ health issues fall into serious credit card debt.

Our Health, Our Selves

None of this is to say that the Affordable Care Act was a total wash for women. The ACA’s Medicaid expansion provided public health insurance to anyone with income below 137 percent of the federal poverty line, and federal subsidies (however inadequate) to anyone making below 400 percent. Because of the gendered wage gap, the effect was to extend insurance to more women than men. The law also took on health discrimination, by mandating that men and women pay equal premiums, ending gatekeeping based on preexisting conditions or the ability to become pregnant, and requiring that plans sold on state exchanges cover maternity care and birth control.

The ACA’s overhaul of the individual insurance market has helped somewhat to delink insurance from employment. Before the ACA, reproductive-age women faced considerable difficulties getting coverage on the individual market, since insurers were free to charge sky-high premiums to hedge against the possibility of having to shell out for maternity care. But even if premiums are more highly regulated, increased cost-sharing still means that patients pay stiff prices simply for getting the care they need: reproductive-aged women still spend over 60 percent more than men do in out-of-pocket health-care costs.

At the same time, while state ACA exchanges offer an alternative to employer-provided plans, the exchange plans remain inferior. Both tiers of insurance are plagued by narrowing provider networks, and ever-rising out of pocket costs – leading millions to forego insurance because it’s too unaffordable, or find themselves stuck with plans they can’t even afford to use. And that’s with the ACA.

In short, the dynamics that make the American health-care system so hostile to women remain largely unscathed after the ACA: the pervasive commodification of healthcare and dependent care in the United States, coupled with employment-based gatekeeping, engineers an impossible bind for women: they face more challenges accessing the health-care system and pay more for their care when they do, out of lower incomes that are further squeezed by child and elder care costs.

By removing power over health care from employers and spouses, and replacing unequal tiers with one unified insurance pool, we could fund our health-care system with progressive taxes. That way, we could guarantee everyone the care they need, and make it free at the point of service. Ability to pay, pre-existing conditions, employment status, and gender would cease to be barriers. Building Medicare for All — with robust guarantees for tougher-to-access services like abortion and gender affirming care — would force American society as a whole to address the care disparities women face.

https://www.jacobinmag.com…

For-profit financing of health care is bad for our nation’s health

By Marsha Fretwell, M.D.
Citizen Times (Asheville, N.C.), December 7, 2017

Over the last several months, we have been reading, almost daily, about the payment negotiation conflict between Mission Hospital and Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina. Now we are asked to feel gratitude and relief that this conflict is resolved and we are allowed to go back to “status quo.” But what is our “status quo” for health care in our country? What impact does this type of maneuvering for more profits have on the physical, emotional and spiritual health of our citizens?

Our true “status quo” for health care in the United States is that overall, as a country, we spend more money for poorer health outcomes. Providers of care at all levels are chronically stressed and choosing to leave their practices. We, the patients, have the ever increasing anxiety of obtaining and affording health care coverage in our current for-profit system. We have all of this anxiety, not mentioning, of course, the risk of financial bankruptcy even if one should have to use that insurance.

Humans have a very elaborate and effective physical and emotional system for dealing with life threatening stress which is known as the “Fright or Flight” response. The downside of this system is that when fear and anxiety become chronic and unrelenting, the chemicals produced begin to break down normal tissues and we are more likely to become ill, both physically and emotionally.

The result: The “status quo” profit driven financing of health care is literally causing our citizens physical and emotional illness, driving up the their need for services which they already know they cannot afford.

Finally, what about the spiritual health of our country? Recently, Terry Hash, a resident of Black Mountain who is a member of HealthCare for All WNC, wrote an excellent letter to the editor reviewing a recent presentation by a panel of faith leaders representing Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and Ethical Humanist traditions. All of them stated that caring for the sick, the poor and vulnerable were universally central to their moral tradition and practice.

I would suggest that just living in a country where the poor, sick and vulnerable are increasingly stressed for their survival is eroding the overall spiritual health of our country. History tells us that if we do not care for the vulnerable, we will become the vulnerable.

Polls indicate that a majority of citizens in the United States support a health care system in their country that is: affordable, excellent and supportive of patients and practitioners. Our current for-profit financing system has eroded all of these goals.

So, think systems change. Imagine a system where your dollars go to support excellent physical, emotional and spiritual health for yourselves, your families, your friends and for all citizens of the United States rather than the exorbitant profits for a company’s CEO and share holders.

Dr. Marsha Fretwell is a longtime member of Physicians for a National Health Program. Retired from active practice in geriatric medicine, she is now activity working with Healthcare for All of Western North Carolina seeking fundamental change in the financing of health care.

http://www.citizen-times.com…

National Health Expenditures for 2016

National Health Care Spending In 2016: Spending And Enrollment Growth Slow After Initial Coverage Expansions

By Micah Hartman, Anne B. Martin, Nathan Espinosa, Aaron Catlin, and The National Health Expenditure Accounts Team
Health Affairs, January 2018 (Online December 6, 2017)

Abstract

Total nominal US health care spending increased 4.3 percent and reached $3.3 trillion in 2016. Per capita spending on health care increased by $354, reaching $10,348. The share of gross domestic product devoted to health care spending was 17.9 percent in 2016, up from 17.7 percent in 2015. Health spending growth decelerated in 2016 following faster growth in 2014 and 2015 associated with coverage expansions under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and strong retail prescription drug spending growth. In 2016 the slowdown was broadly based, as spending for the largest categories by payer and by service decelerated. Enrollment trends drove the slowdown in Medicaid and private health insurance spending growth in 2016, while slower per enrollee spending growth influenced Medicare spending. Furthermore, spending for retail prescription drugs slowed, partly as a result of lower spending for drugs used to treat hepatitis C, while slower use and intensity of services drove the slowdown in hospital care and physician and clinical services.

Out-of-pocket Spending

Total out-of-pocket spending (which includes all direct consumer payments such as copayments, deductibles, coinsurance, and spending for noncovered services) increased 3.9 percent in 2016 — the fastest rate of growth since 2007 and higher than the average annual growth of 2.0 percent in 2008–15. In 2016, out-of-pocket spending continued to account for 11 percent of all health care spending, unchanged since 2012.

In 2014 and 2015, out-of-pocket spending grew just 1.5 percent and 2.8 percent, respectively. Growth in both years was affected by changes in health insurance coverage, as the number of uninsured people (who pay out of pocket for a majority of their health care costs) was reduced from 44.2 million in 2013 to 29.5 million in 2015. Concurrently, however, increased utilization resulting from enrollment expansion and an ongoing shift toward enrollment in high-deductible health plans led to more out-of-pocket spending. In 2016, 29 percent of covered workers were enrolled in these high-deductible plans, up from 24 percent in 2015 and 20 percent in 2014, making these plans a likely contributor to the faster growth in out-of-pocket spending in 2016. At the same time, average private health insurance deductibles for single coverage plans increased 12 percent in 2016, compared to 8 percent in 2015 and 7 percent in 2014.

Notably, hospital services experienced more rapid growth in out-of-pocket spending in 2016, with a 4.8 percent increase in such spending following declines of 5.1 percent and 2.8 percent in 2015 and 2014, respectively. This faster growth in 2016 was below the longer-term average annual growth rate of 6.8 percent in 2008–13. The decreases in out-of-pocket hospital spending in 2014 and 2015 were due in part to the expansion in health insurance coverage, while hospitals’ uncompensated care costs declined. In 2016, out-of-pocket spending grew the fastest for durable medical equipment (6.9 percent) and declined for retail prescription drugs (−1.0 percent).

Conclusion

Within the ten-year period 2007–16, the US experienced, among other events, the most severe economic recession since the Great Depression, followed by a mild economic recovery; medical price inflation that was at historic lows; and major changes to the health care system associated with the ACA. During these years, health care spending increased at the lowest rates in the history of the National Health Expenditure Accounts, but low economic growth led to an increase of 2.0 percentage points in the share of the economy devoted to health care, from 15.9 percent in 2007 to 17.9 percent in 2016. The resulting average increase of 0.2 percentage point per year is nearly equal to the historical annual average over the past half-century.

In 2016, as expected, health care spending growth slowed following the major expansion of health insurance coverage in 2014 and 2015, when the ACA expanded eligibility for the Medicaid program and provided access to private health insurance Marketplaces. The insured share of the population stabilized at 91 percent in 2016, the same as for 2015 but higher than the shares of 89 percent in 2014 and 86 percent in 2013. Not surprisingly, federal government spending grew more slowly in 2016, as the initial impacts of enrollment expansion were realized and Medicaid enrollment growth (particularly for the newly eligible) decelerated. At the same time, private health insurance spending growth slowed, as enrollment growth decelerated and the impact of new hepatitis C drugs lessened.

The slower growth in health care spending in 2016 was more in line with the average annual rate of growth during the period 2008–15 and was higher than growth for the overall economy. Because the unique factors that influenced the health sector over the past decade did not have as great an effect in 2016, this may be an initial indication that this year marks a return to the more typical relationship between annual rates of growth in health care spending and growth in nominal GDP. As a result, future health care expenditure trends are expected to be mostly influenced by changes in economic conditions and demographics, as has historically been the case.

https://www.healthaffairs.org…

CMS.gov – National Health Expenditure Accounts (NHEA):
https://www.cms.gov…

***

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

The numbers to remember for health care spending in 2016:

National Health Expenditures (NHE): $3.3 trillion
NHE per capita: $10,348
NHE as percent of GDP: 17.9%

The overall findings are pretty much as expected. We have moved past the Great Recession. The increase in spending due to the surge in enrollment in Medicaid and in the ACA exchanges has now leveled off. For pharmaceuticals, the surge in spending for hepatitis C drugs is leveling off. Our total national health expenditures continue to consume an ever greater part of our GDP – now about 18 percent (from 15.9 percent in 2007 to 17.9 percent in 2016).

One item of concern is the out-of-pocket spending. It “increased 3.9 percent in 2016 — the fastest rate of growth since 2007.”

Greater enrollment in high-deductible health plans led to more out-of-pocket spending. “In 2016, 29 percent of covered workers were enrolled in these high-deductible plans, up from 24 percent in 2015 and 20 percent in 2014, making these plans a likely contributor to the faster growth in out-of-pocket spending in 2016. At the same time, average private health insurance deductibles for single coverage plans increased 12 percent in 2016, compared to 8 percent in 2015 and 7 percent in 2014.”

Consumer-directed health care (high deductibles) is impairing the financial security of patients.

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Key Questions When Considering a State-Based, Single-Payer System

Introductory letter: Asking the important questions

By Sandra Hernandez, M.D., President and CEO
California Health Care Foundation, November 2017

California’s health care system has made great strides under the Affordable Care Act. Among many signs of progress, the state’s uninsured rate has been cut in half to 8.5%. Universal coverage in California is finally within reach, a goal that seemed like a long shot just five years ago.

Even with this progress, much work remains. Every Californian should be covered with a comprehensive set of benefits. We can and should do this while also ensuring that care is both affordable to California consumers and that the state’s health care budget does not crowd out other key state investments. Care must be easy to access, evidence based, and patient centered – regardless of a person’s place of residence, race or ethnicity, or type of health insurance.

Achieving universal coverage alone will not get us there, but the reforms needed to tackle costs, access, and quality are more likely to be successful when everyone is already included in the system.

There are many policy approaches to achieve universal coverage. Over the past year, mirroring growing national interest around a single payer system, there has been increasing momentum in California to create a state-based single-payer system. Our health care system affects tens of millions of lives, provides hundreds of thousands of jobs, and costs hundreds of billions of dollars each year. Any time major reforms to that system are proposed, a rigorous analysis is warranted.

The California Health Care Foundation (CHCF) commissioned this paper to provide a basic understanding of the core features of a state-based single-payer system as well as the major issues and values at play in the creation of such a system. The report does not take a stance, nor does it analyze specific single-payer legislation or proposals. Instead, it provides a baseline understanding of what a “single-payer” system is, what it isn’t, and what it might mean for California.

Like any policy, the feasibility and effectiveness of a state-based single-payer system in California ultimately depends on the problem it is attempting to solve. Different goals trigger different tradeoffs, as well as a variety of nuanced implementation choices. The paper surfaces what some of these tradeoffs might be. In doing so, it raises key questions that need to be answered about any single-payer proposal for California. Some of these questions are the same questions that should be asked about any major health care reform policy; others are more specific to implementation of a single-payer system.

It is our intention that this publication be a valuable resource across the political spectrum, as California’s Select Committee on Health Care Delivery Systems and Universal Coverage, and other key stakeholders, grapple with how to best move our health care system forward.

Regardless of your views on single payer, we encourage you to ask the important questions and consider the opportunities and challenges they present. By taking that approach together, we can start to gain clarity about what we are ultimately trying to achieve with further health care reforms – and what it will take to get there. This will only strengthen California’s chances of success, no matter what path we ultimately take to achieve universal coverage.

Full report (28 pages):
http://www.chcf.org…

***

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

Although this paper was written for California, most of the questions posed apply to any state that is considering enactment of a single payer system. It is specifically targeted to the Select Committee on Health Care Delivery Systems and Universal Coverage established by Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon when he put on hold SB 562 – a single payer bill – because it was “woefully incomplete.”

Although the paper is not exciting reading for those well versed in single payer, its mere existence is of much greater significance. The California Health Care Foundation, which sponsored this report, was one of two foundations established when Blue Cross converted to a for-profit corporation and was required to return to Californians the tax benefits it had accrued as a nonprofit. The founding President and CEO, Mark Smith, had adamantly refused to cooperate with any consideration whatsoever of the single payer concept.

How far we have come. Sandra Hernandez, the current CHCF President and CEO acknowledges that much more must be done beyond the Affordable Care Act. By commissioning this paper on a state-based single payer system CHCF recognizes the need “to provide a basic understanding of the core features of a state-based single-payer system as well as the major issues and values at play in the creation of such a system.”

The report states, “A single-payer health care system in California could help the state meet a number of goals — universality of health care coverage, comprehensiveness of coverage, greater equity, greater access and quality, improved affordability, lower administrative costs, and slower growth in health care costs.” No other model of reform can meet those goals.

This is more evidence of the fact that single payer has now become politically feasible.

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‘Medicare for all’ proponents state their case

By Doug Hanneman
Litchfield (Minn.) Independent Review, Dec. 5, 2017

Nov. 1 was a day of relief for Gene Chrast. It was his 65th birthday, the first day he was entitled to Medicare benefits.

Retiring in 2009 after 38 years at 3M, Chrast, who lives in Meeker County, had been frustrated by his health insurance for too long. A couple years earlier, in an effort to shrug the tax impact of buying health coverage through MNsure, he turned to a broker, who found the only plan available to him on the open market. The down side: His doctor and the three nearest hospitals were out of network.

“I couldn’t come to Hutchinson, I couldn’t go to Glencoe, I couldn’t go to Litchfield,” Chrast told an audience attending a health care presentation Sunday at the Hutchinson Event Center.

“I could go to a clinic in Litchfield, and the doctor there told me, ‘Well, just call your insurance company and we’ll have your work done at the hospital there.’ He didn’t know they wouldn’t accept that.”

Chrast’s experience was familiar to the presentation’s hosts, Dr. Ken Engelhart and his wife, Carol, a registered nurse.

“People are happier and relieved when they get on Medicare,” Engelhart said. In all his years of practicing medicine, he noted, he never heard a patient wish to return to a private, employer-provided health plan.

The Engelharts, who have worked in rural and urban medical settings for more than 35 years, are part of Physicians for a National Health Program, which is pushing for single-payer national health insurance.

Under such a system, a tax would cover all or most health care expenses, every citizen would be covered, and delivery of care would largely remain in private hands. It would be similar to Medicare, but without the need for supplemental insurance. The approach is commonly called “Medicare for all.”

SINGLE-PAYER’S BENEFITS TOUTED

Under a single-payer system, Engelhart explained, “You aren’t restricted by networks where you can go. That’s the free market. What we have now is not the free market.”

The current situation — created by insurance companies and reinforced by Washington lobbyists and a reluctant Congress — are among the reasons Americans have the most expensive health care in the world, Engelhart said.

He offered numbers from various sources to back up the claim:

  • United States per capita health care spending, $9,024, is more than twice the average, $3,620, of other developed countries, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
  • National health expenditures consumed 17.8 percent of our nation’s gross domestic product in 2015, more than twice the rate in most other industrialized nations, according to the Centers Medicare and Medicaid Services.
  • At approximately $3 trillion a year, health care costs account for one-sixth of the American economy, a rate that’s expected to rise to one-fifth of the economy in the next seven years.
  • About 31 percent of that amount is spent on insurance administration, advertising, CEO/management salaries, profit making and other non-direct care costs that Engelhart described as “waste.” “That’s more money than we spend in this country on K-12 education,” he said.

Despite that high spending, Americans don’t realize the best health outcomes. Far from it, according to Engelhart:

  • Under the best circumstances, about 23 million Americans will remain uninsured in 2019, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
  • The U.S. life expectancy of 78 is ranked 30th highest in the world, right behind Costa Rica and ahead of Cuba.
  • A rate of 6.1 deaths per 1,000 infants gives the U.S. the world’s 26th lowest infant mortality rate.
  • Higher cost care doesn’t necessarily translate into more care. Americans, on average, see a doctor 4.2 times a year, while in Japan, where life expectancy is 83, patients see their doctor 13 times a year.
  • In terms of overall health care quality, France ranks No. 1, Australia ranks No. 2 and the U.S. trails at No. 19.

With lagging outcomes and high costs, more American businesses are wising up to the situation, according to a video the Engelharts showed to the 14 people in attendance. In the video, American business leaders, a retired insurance executive, physicians and others criticized the American system for its heavy rationing based on ability to pay, the plight of patients who defer needed care, and inefficiencies.

Businesses would fare better, according to the video’s speakers, if they could shift the burden of health care insurance to a single payer. They argue that through Medicare, Medicaid, the VA, public employees’ private health insurance coverage and other programs, government is already paying for 64 percent of all health care.

Under a single-payer system, according to the video, patients could see any doctor, visit any hospital, all costs would be covered, and nobody would be left out.

A handout distributed by the Engelharts estimated that if a single-payer program existed in Minnesota, an average business in 2014 would have saved $1,214 per employee annually. An average household would have saved $1,362 annually.

WHAT OPPONENTS SAY

Nobody attending the presentation spoke against the single-payer system. But opposition remains strong. Common arguments against it include long waiting times for specialized surgeries and other procedures, limitations in coverage for benefits such as mental care and prescription drugs, and public policies that ignore growth and innovation. Opponents also argue single-payers systems run the risk of fostering fraud, and because the government controls payments to providers, fewer people will want to become doctors, especially specialists.

Despite those objections, nationwide support appears to be growing. Kaiser Family Foundation Polls show 53 percent of poll respondents in June 2017 favored a single-payer program, while 43 percent opposed it. That contrasts with 40 percent support and 53 percent opposition in 2000.

“We’re gaining momentum now that people are seeing it’s wrecking our economy,” Engelhart said.

Chrast is among those who support it. Between dropping his first retirement insurance plan and enrolling in Medicare, he couldn’t afford to see his longtime doctor in Hutchinson.

“He was telling me, ‘Why aren’t you coming in? With your high blood pressure, you’re really due for a checkup.’ I said, “I’m sorry, you’re out of network.’ … I was willing to die before putting my family in jeopardy and losing everything I worked for all my life. I wouldn’t go to the doctor. I know people that have cancer who won’t go to the doctor until they hit the Medicare age.”

http://www.crowrivermedia.com…

Gallup: ‘Support for Government-Run Health System Edges Up’

By Frank Newport
Gallup News, December 1, 2017

Americans’ preferences for a government-run healthcare system versus a system based on private insurance are now divided. This marks a significant shift in attitudes from earlier this decade, when Americans consistently preferred the private insurance option.

Since 2010, Gallup updates have shown as much as a 27-percentage-point gap in favor of the private insurance system versus one run by the government. That gap shrank to 10 points last year and essentially disappeared in this year’s survey, conducted Nov. 2-8, with 48% preferring the private health insurance system and 47% preferring the government-run system.

Two-thirds of Democrats and independents who lean Democratic favor a government-run system. Three-quarters of Republicans and independents who lean Republican favor a system based on private insurance.

Predictable and Large Partisan Gap in Views on Government-Run Versus Private Insurance-Based Health System

Favor government-run system
22% – Republicans/Leaners
67% – Democrats/Leaners

Favor system based on private insurance
76% – Republicans/Leaners
29% – Democrats/Leaners

Although the 22% of Republicans who support a government-run system is low on an absolute basis, it is the highest in Gallup’s seven-year trend. Republicans’ shift in attitudes accounts for most of the overall increase in support for the government system in this year’s update.

Majority Doesn’t Know Enough to Have Opinion on “Medicare for All,” Single-Payer Health System

Question asked: As you may know, some senators have proposed a “Medicare-for-all,” single-payer health insurance program that would be administered by the federal government and financed through taxes. Please tell me if you favor or oppose this proposal, or if you don’t know enough to say?

17% – Favor
21% – Oppose
61% – Don’t know enough to say

http://news.gallup.com…

***

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

Although other polls suggest that there is about 60 percent support for single payer, the wording of this Gallup poll indicates that the nation is split between its preference for a “government-run system” versus a “system based on private insurance.” This is consistent with trends in other polls since it represents a significant shift in the results of Gallup polls away from a clear preference for private insurance to a point now where opinion is evenly divided (with this specific wording).

An important observation is that most of the change is due to an increase in support amongst Republicans and those leaning Republican, even though still a distinct minority. We should keep in mind that Republicans and independents need to be a targeted audience for the single payer message.

Another important result is that 61 percent of those polled “don’t know enough to say” whether they favor or oppose “a ‘Medicare-for-all,’ single-payer health insurance program that would be administered by the federal government and financed through taxes” that “some senators have proposed.” Although this may reflect the fact that people have not heard enough about the Sanders bill specifically, it does suggest that we have to make a greater effort to see that “single payer” becomes a meme that everyone understands and automatically supports.

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CVS purchase of Aetna may be even more ominous than it seems

CVS to Buy Aetna for $69 Billion in a Deal That May Reshape the Health Industry

By Michael J. de la Merced and Reed Abelson
The New York Times, December 3, 2017

CVS Health said on Sunday that it had agreed to buy Aetna for about $69 billion in a deal that would combine the drugstore giant with one of the biggest health insurers in the United States and has the potential to reshape the nation’s health care industry.

The transaction, one of the largest of the year, reflects the increasingly blurred lines between the traditionally separate spheres of a rapidly changing industry.

A combined CVS-Aetna could position itself as a formidable figure in this changing landscape. CVS operates a chain of pharmacies and retail clinics that could be used by Aetna to provide care directly to patients, while the merged company could be better able to offer employers one-stop shopping for health insurance for their workers.

But critics worry that customers could also find their choices sharply limited. The deal risks leaving patients with less choice of where to get care or fill a prescription if those with Aetna insurance are forced to go to CVS for much of their care.

The merger would establish a new way of delivering care, with nurses, pharmacists and others available to counsel people about their diabetes or do the lab work necessary to diagnose a condition, said (CVS Health’s chief executive, Larry J. Merlo). “We know we can make health care more affordable and less expensive.”

Mark T. Bertolini, Aetna’s chief executive, said that by using CVS’s locations, the company can provide people with a better way of accessing medical care.

The hope would be that consumers would not only be able to see savings by going to a retail store to treat a sore throat but also have better oversight of a chronic illness, such as diabetes or heart disease. They could get advice on how to lose weight, or undergo tests to monitor their health.

“If they can drive the adoption of the care delivery model, that’s a big deal,” said Ana Gupte, a senior health care analyst for Leerink Partners.

David A. Balto, an antitrust lawyer who has been sharply critical of combinations among insurers and pharmacy benefit managers, said that he was wary of having retailers in charge of people’s health. He argued that doctors may be in a better position to treat illness than retail executives.

“Who do you want to run the health care system?” he said.

https://www.nytimes.com…

***

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

When two for-profit mega-corporations merge, you can be sure that it is about the money, making more of it, much more. Although they may promise greater efficiency and lower costs through integration of services, the record so far suggests that such mergers provide greater market leverage and thus higher prices. That should certainly have us concerned, but there is something potentially much more ominous here.

Insurers today not only serve an intermediary role of processing claims, they also want to manage care. They benefit not only by selling us superfluous administrative services through higher insurance premiums, but also they game the system to increase profits, and they reduce patient access to beneficial health care services, allowing their insurance products to be more competitive.

But look at what is happening here. CVS not only has a huge pharmacy business, but they also have incorporated into their system Caremark, one of the nation’s largest pharmacy benefit managers – the middlemen that seem to be a major contributor to escalating drug costs. They also operate 1,100 retail health care clinics. What is particularly disconcerting is that they intend not only to provide walk-in and preventive services, they now want to provide oversight of chronic illnesses such as diabetes or heart disease. Chronic care is playing a much greater role in health care delivery, and CVS/Aetna wants in on the action. Care would be provided by nurses, pharmacists, and others (presumably lower-wage assistants – physicians have not been mentioned in the news reports).

Now add Aetna. Although the surviving organization will be CVS Health Corp., the Aetna division will remain intact with current Aetna executives, including Mark Bertolini, serving on the CVS board. Look at the package they will offer: insurance services, care management, bread and butter clinical services including the rapidly expanding field of chronic care, pharmaceutical services with their high prices and pharmacy benefit management, and a retail department of home health products.

This package is so complete that they could exclude everything else from their networks. Since some people will need highly specialized services or care in full-fledged emergency departments or in hospitals, the Aetna division could sell catastrophic plans as part of their deluxe package.

Aetna and CVS are not the only ones in this game. Other players or potential players include UnitedHealth with its surgery centers, urgent care clinics, and Optum pharmacy benefit manager, Anthem which is now forming its own pharmacy benefit manager, maybe Humana and Cigna, and now even Amazon is expected to move into the arena big time.

But what about physicians in their offices out in the community? Don’t need them. The primary care physicians could provide direct care or concierge care though they would have to rely on more affluent cash paying patients since the insurers would limit their networks to their own clinics staffed with lower cost professionals. And how many cash practices do you think could be supported in an economy with stagnant wages? Some of the specialists might survive as hospital employees, working in their outpatient clinics to see the really complicated cases referred by CVS-type retail clinics.

Can the for-profit corporate world really take over? To a great extent, it already has. With the pending tax legislation, the public seems to be accepting an even greater transfer of wealth to the top. How is this development in health care any different?

But if we really care, we could throw out the plutocrats and establish our own single payer national health program with free choice of our health care professionals and institutions, in a system that all of us could afford. If we care.

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Sen. Rubio explicitly confirms strategy to cut Medicare and Social Security

Playbook Interview: Sen. Marco Rubio

Politico, November 29, 2017

Jake Sherman: Let’s circle back to taxes for a second ’cause that’s what you guys in the Senate are going over this week. There’s concerns about deficits…it’s like Whack-a-Mole…you try to solve one problem and someone else has another issue. Besides the child tax credit, do you have any lingering concerns on the package you’re going to vote on, presumably this week?

Sen. Marco Rubio: Yah, except I analyze it very differently. People look at…Okay…Here’s…The argument would be that we can’t cut taxes because it would drive up the deficit. That assumes that somehow we could fix the deficit through higher taxes, and we can’t. The only way you’re going to deal with the debt is you have to do two things. You can’t do one; you’ve got to do both. You’ve got to…you’ve got to generate economic growth because growth generates revenue. But you also have to bring spending under control, and not discretionary spending, that isn’t the driver of our debt. The driver of our debt is the structure of Social Security and Medicare for future beneficiaries. We still have time, not just to save those programs, but responsibly structure them in a way that doesn’t impact current retirees, or people about to retire, but in a way that would probably impact it for me and people younger than me in ways that, quite frankly you really wouldn’t notice and you really wouldn’t object to, because it’s reasonable. And if we did that in combination with growth you could begin to bring the trajectory of the debt to a responsible and acceptable level. That is the only way forward. So I view tax reform as the economic growth component of it. That’s what will ultimately help to generate more revenue. You have more people working, you have more taxpayers. You have more taxpayers, you have more revenue. That’s the first part, but that alone won’t be enough. If you just do that, and you don’t do the other piece, you’re going to have a debt problem. That’s a fact, and we gotta do both. In the absence of that, we’re gonna to continue to be in the cycle, one way or another.

https://www.politico.com…

***

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

We’ve heard it many times. To eliminate the deficit, first we have to stimulate the economy by reducing taxes (for the rich), and then we need to reduce the driver of our debt, Social Security and Medicare.

One version of the tax legislation has already passed in the House, and, as of today, the Republicans have the votes to pass the other version in the Senate. Ironing out the differences in Joint Conference will not be much more than a formality. Then the first cuts in Medicare will soon follow automatically because of existing PayGo requirements.

It should be a great secular Christmas for the billionaires. Maybe we should join the celebration…with a hundred million person march on Washington. Don’t forget your placards.

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We Are Here to Help All the Lindas

By Brad Cotton, M.D.
Emergency Medicine News, December 2017

Linda couldn’t afford the gallbladder ultrasound her hometown doc recommended. Six months later, she is in my ED. She has cholecystitis, a fever, and an elevated WBC. She can afford even less hospitalization and unscheduled surgery now.

“I can’t pay for this!” she told me.

But Linda’s family told her they needed her to be well. “I need you, Mom,” Linda’s teenaged daughter Jenny says. Like many in southern Ohio, Linda is attended by six family members. Family is a strength of the Appalachian culture.

Linda is the foundation of her family. She works nights cleaning offices and restaurants in her small town. She has no health insurance. Linda is often paid in cash under the table. Her husband Bob fixes cars in his garage, and he offers to work on mine to work off my bill. There are no good jobs in their town.

“You can throw the bills away,” I said, gesturing toward Linda’s two teens, “but you do need this gallbladder out now.”

I have seen thousands upon thousands of Lindas. An ACEP survey found that 80 percent of us report seeing patients who have not had diagnostic tests, skipped meds, and suffered medical consequences due to their inability to afford care. (http://bit.ly/2fApz9w) I submit that the 20 percent not reporting seeing such patients either work in unusually affluent neighborhoods or just don’t connect the dots, misdiagnosing Linda’s real problem. Cholecystitis is Linda’s symptom. Linda’s pathology, which is also our nation’s pathology, is the absence of universal health care.

Why does Linda not have access to health care? Here is where our political and ideological biases, every bit as destructive of accurate cognition as the much-studied anchoring and confirmation biases, blind us to the failures of and solutions for our dysfunctional health care system. Some would say that is because we have not allowed the market to work in health care. Others say the market has not and cannot ever work for health care. I am of the latter school.

The Commonwealth Fund compared costs, outcomes, access to care, and equity (how fair the system is) among Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States. (The Commonwealth Fund. July 14, 2017; http://bit.ly/2x2IB2q) The United States ranked last or near last on overall cost, access to care, affordability of care, and equity as well as overall outcomes. The United States spends about twice as much per capita as other nations, yet ranked last on life expectancy after age 60, infant mortality, and survival after MI, CVA, and cancer diagnoses.

The United States ranked worst on patients reporting avoiding medical or dental care due to costs, high out-of-pocket barriers, insurance shortfalls, and problem paying bills, like my patient Linda. Sadly, the United States also comes in last on equity when higher versus lower incomes are taken into account regarding access and affordability concerns.

The United States is the only one of these 11 nations that treats health care as a free market commodity. True, Germany, France, Switzerland, and others use private insurers, but they are tightly regulated. Their premiums and offerings are guaranteed by the state, so much so that it is a misnomer to call them market-based. The United Kingdom, ranking very high on many parameters is like our VA—all docs and hospitals are run directly by the government. Canada and Australia are like our Medicare: Payment is government-guaranteed, while docs and hospitals remain independent. All other systems perform better than ours.

Emergency medicine requires that we objectively evaluate the facts. The Commonwealth Fund report bears further consideration, as do these two centrist volumes: America’s Bitter Pill, Money, Politics, Backroom Deals, and the Fight to Fix Our Broken Healthcare System by Steven Brill, and An American Sickness, How Healthcare Became Big Business and How You Can Take it Back by Elisabeth Rosenthal, MD. Information at Physicians for a National Health Program is always well-researched with integrity and thoroughness to a policy-wonk fault. (www.pnhp.org)

We have seen the Democrats’ ineffectual attempt to tame the market with the Affordable Care Act (ACA). We have seen the Congressional Budget Office estimating that the Republican proposals to repeal the ACA and allow the health care market to do as markets do will result in perhaps 30 million more Americans harmed like my patient Linda. Perhaps the experience of these other nations from the Commonwealth Fund report is factual data we should critically evaluate.

The practice of emergency medicine is more than just rescuing drowning swimmers as the river brings them to our doors. Just as we advise our patients to wear seat belts, go to AA and NA meetings, vaccinate their kids, and get out of abusive relationships, we need to protect them from whatever is throwing them in the river in the first place.

http://journals.lww.com…

Value-Based Payment Modifier worsens health care disparities

The Value-Based Payment Modifier: Program Outcomes and Implications for Disparities

By Eric T. Roberts, PhD; Alan M. Zaslavsky, PhD; J. Michael McWilliams, MD, PhD
Annals of Internal Medicine, November 28, 2017

Abstract

Background:
When risk adjustment is inadequate and incentives are weak, pay-for-performance programs, such as the Value-Based Payment Modifier (Value Modifier [VM]) implemented by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, may contribute to health care disparities without improving performance on average.

Objective:
To estimate the association between VM exposure and performance on quality and spending measures and to assess the effects of adjusting for additional patient characteristics on performance differences between practices serving higher-risk and those serving lower-risk patients.

Design:
Exploiting the phase-in of the VM on the basis of practice size, regression discontinuity analysis and 2014 Medicare claims were used to estimate differences in practice performance associated with exposure of practices with 100 or more clinicians to full VM incentives (bonuses and penalties) and exposure of practices with 10 or more clinicians to partial incentives (bonuses only). Analyses were repeated with 2015 claims to estimate performance differences associated with a second year of exposure above the threshold of 100 or more clinicians. Performance differences were assessed between practices serving higher- and those serving lower-risk patients after standard Medicare adjustments versus adjustment for additional patient characteristics.

Setting:
Fee-for-service Medicare.

Patients:
Random 20% sample of beneficiaries.

Measurements:
Hospitalization for ambulatory care–sensitive conditions, all-cause 30-day readmissions, Medicare spending, and mortality.

Results:
No statistically significant discontinuities were found at the threshold of 10 or more or 100 or more clinicians in the relationship between practice size and performance on quality or spending measures in either year. Adjustment for additional patient characteristics narrowed performance differences by 9.2% to 67.9% between practices in the highest and those in the lowest quartile of Medicaid patients and Hierarchical Condition Category scores.

Limitation:
Observational design and administrative data.

Conclusion:
The VM was not associated with differences in performance on program measures. Performance differences between practices serving higher- and those serving lower-risk patients were affected considerably by additional adjustments, suggesting a potential for Medicare’s pay-for-performance programs to exacerbate health care disparities.

http://annals.org…

***

Practices with high-risk patients are vulnerable to value-based payment penalties

By Maria Castellucci
Modern Healthcare, November 29, 2017

The use of pay-for-performance payment models could drive providers to turn away low-income patients with complex care needs, a new study suggests.

The report, published this week in Annals of Internal Medicine, found practices that cared for high-risk patients were more likely to receive financial penalties under the CMS’ Value-based Payment Modifier program because their patients had higher rates of hospitalization, mortality and Medicare spending.

The mandatory program penalized or rewarded physicians based on their quality outcomes and cost of care. The program was a precursor to and was replaced by the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA).

“These penalties are disproportionately affecting practices serving sicker and poorer patients,” said Eric Roberts, an author of the study and assistant professor of health policy and management at the University of Pittsburgh. “This could send providers the wrong signal that if they want to avoid penalties, treating more complex patients isn’t advantageous for them.”

The study also found that outcomes didn’t improve among practices after the program went into effect even though they were financially penalized if their performance didn’t improve.

The study adds to a growing debate among health policy experts regarding the value of pay-for-performance payment models. Concerns have been raised that such models don’t motivate providers to improve and financially penalize providers who treat low-income patients.

In an editorial in response to the Annals study, Dr. Ashish Jha, a professor of health policy and management at the Harvard School of Public Health, along with other colleagues wrote, “It is high-time to abandon (the standalone pay-for-performance) model.”

Although it will take a few more years before the impact of MIPS can be evaluated, the program probably also disproportionately penalizes safety-net providers just like the Value-based Payment Modifier Program because it’s set-up similarly, Roberts said.

http://www.modernhealthcare.com…

***

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

This study provides confirmation that not only does a value-based payment modifier (P4P) fail to improve performance, it also exacerbates health care disparities. Although this study was done on the earlier CMS Value-Based Payment Modifier, the results with the MIPS program under MACRA are expected to be the same because of a similar set-up. This suggests that we would be better off by eliminating the MIPS program.

This does not mean that we should ignore quality. A single payer system is an ideal vehicle in which to achieve quality improvement. The following link is to a classic paper by Gordon Schiff, et al, describing a better-quality alternative under single payer:

https://pnhp.org…

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Forum On Single-Payer Healthcare System Packs House

By Karen B. Hunter
The Falmouth (Mass.) Enterprise, November 30, 2017

Massachusetts state Senator James B. Eldridge from the Middlesex and Worcester District has authored Senate Bill No. 619: An Act Establishing Medicare for All in Massachusetts.

On Wednesday evening, November 29, people eager to know more about the bill attended a forum sponsored by the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Falmouth.

Three guest speakers—Dr. Gordon D. Schiff, associate director of Brigham and Women’s Center for Patient Safety Research and Practice, associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, and quality and safety director for the HMS Center for Primary Care; Dr. Robert J. McGowen, chief primary care services, Wareham Region; and Sen. Eldridge—spoke to a full house at the church off Sandwich Road.

A one-page summary of the bill, which is 38 pages long, was handed to people as they arrived.

“Access to health care is not currently a right in Massachusetts,” the summary stated. “A single-payer system would save an estimated 15.75 percent of our current spending on health care…and guarantee access to quality, affordable health care as a right for all residents of the Commonwealth.”

The summary stated that Massachusetts has the highest per-capita healthcare costs in the country, that they rise every year and that the commonwealth cannot afford to extend good healthcare coverage to all residents under the current health insurance system.

“Something is changing in the country,” Dr. Schiff said. “The majority of the country now favors universal health care, and I am hopeful about this sea change,” he said.

Dr. Schiff opened the forum by asking people to give their opinions about health care in Massachusetts.

Comments from the audience included that the current system is “dreadfully unfair and that many people cannot afford insurance”; that a single-payer system would be “more just”; that there should be “fairness and equal availability” within the system; that we need “realistic billing” and paperwork that are “honest and transparent”; and that costs should be “fair” and not just what the market can bear.

“It is shameful to be one of the wealthiest countries in the world and not provide universal health care,” one person said.

Dr. Schiff pointed out that the 25 wealthiest countries in the world all have universal health care, except the United States.

Speaking with a PowerPoint presentation, Dr. Schiff said the bill would create health care that is affordable for everyone; doctors and services that are available to everyone; the ability to choose one’s own doctor; continuity of care; a user-friendly, error-free, harm-free system where patients are treated with dignity and healthcare providers are not suffering from “burnout.”

“A single-payer system would put everyone in the same boat to share the costs; it would put an envelope around the entire population. It would be the embodiment of caring values, such as fairness, inclusion, cooperation, and caring,” Dr. Schiff said.

Dr. Schiff said the number of people dying for lack of health insurance is growing, as is the number of people who are under-insured. For many families, he said, even those with health insurance, any major illness can wipe out a family’s savings, making it impossible to pay the mortgage, to fix the car, for example. Unpaid medical bills are the most common reason for calls by collection agencies, he said.

“We have a broken healthcare system,” Sen. Eldridge said, noting that in many cases, the state Legislature has to pass legislation to protect citizens’ right to basic medical support and resources.

“The way our system is structured is flawed,” Dr. McGowen said. He has been a primary care physician for some 30 years. “It feels more and more that the profit motive drives care in the United States. We are reaching a tipping point where we are spending more and more and getting less,” he said.

“Thousands of Massachusetts residents still lack health insurance coverage of any sort and most residents are under-insured,” Senate Bill 619 states on page four. “Many people have little or no coverage for dental care, behavioral health, eye glasses, hearing aids, home health care, nursing home care, and other important needs,” it says.

This proposed single-payer healthcare system for Massachusetts would function for residents under the age of 65 much as Medicare does for residents 65 and older, but without premiums and co-payments.

The state’s healthcare system is currently controlled by for-profit corporations, accountable mainly to shareholders, and nonprofit companies with little accountability to patients or the public, Senate Bill 619 states.

To achieve the goal of universal access to quality, affordable health care, the bill proposes establishing a Massachusetts Health Care Trust, which would be the single-payer body responsible for the collection and disbursement of funds required to provide health care to every resident of Massachusetts.

The bill would replace current employer and employee premium payments with an employer and employee payroll tax.

Sen. Eldridge said that the passage of Senate Bill 619 would create a huge change in the healthcare system, and while he admitted that he does not have all the answers yet, he said that momentum toward a single-payer system is building.

He is hearing from an increasing number of doctors, he said, who say they are tired of the current system in which administrative work takes up much of their time, and they now support a single-payer system.

“Half of primary care physicians are seriously burned out,” Dr. Schiff said, citing billing requirements and production pressure as key reasons. “There is a loss of joy in the work. Doctors used to have relationships with their patients,” he said.

Every other country in the world that has achieved universal healthcare coverage and controlled costs has relied on a single-payer system to get there, the bill summary states.

“Most Americans agree that it is the responsibility of the federal government to ensure that all citizens are medically covered,” Dr. Schiff said.

When audience members asked what they could do to help, Sen. Eldridge urged them to encourage their elected officials to support Senate Bill No. 619.

“We have the expertise,” Mr. Eldridge said. “We just need the political will.”

https://www.capenews.net…