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EDITORIAL
ER crowding could get worse
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Obamacare -- the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act -- was enacted in March, though many of its provisions won't take effect till 2014.
(The exception are the taxes to fund the huge new bureaucracy, which kick in this September starting with a tanning salon tax and a beefed-up "1099" tax -- the latter expected to raise $17 billion over 10 years, all by itself.)
But it didn't take four years for indications to surface that Obamacare could actually make things worse.
"Emergency rooms, the only choice for patients who can't find care elsewhere, may grow even more crowded with longer wait times under the nation's new health law," The Associated Press reported this week.
"That might come as a surprise to those who thought getting 32 million more people covered by health insurance would ease ER crowding," writes The AP's Carla K. Johnson. "It would seem these patients would be able to get routine health care by visiting a doctor's office, as most of the insured do. But it's not that simple."
Contrary to popular perceptions, The AP found "People without insurance aren't the ones filling up the nation's emergency rooms," for one thing. Instead, the biggest users of emergency rooms, by far, are the beneficiaries of Medicaid, the tax-funded medical welfare program for the low-income and the disabled. The new health insurance law will increase their ranks by about 16 million, while "Many family doctors limit the number of Medicaid patients they take because of low government reimbursements," The AP reports.
Massachusetts passed an insurance mandate back in 2006, on which the pending federal scheme is largely modeled. Yet Massachusetts reports ER visits have continued to rise since the law passed.
"Just because we've insured people doesn't mean they now have access," said Dr. Elijah Berg, a Boston area ER doctor. "They're coming to the emergency department because they don't have access to alternatives."
No access? But weren't Obamacare and Romneycare both supposed to guarantee everyone "access"?
There are plenty of areas in American health care with no crowding or waiting -- plastic surgery comes to mind.
Plastic surgeons perform elective procedures, and are free to set profitable rates. ERs, in contrast, are seen as losers. The American Hospital Association reports a 10 percent decline in the number of U.S. emergency departments serving the public from 1991 to 2008, even as ER visits rose dramatically.
The obvious economic solution would be to raise rates, serving only those who can be trusted to pay in full.
Unfortunately, no matter how "progressive" and "altruistic" it may sound, the doctrine that health care is a "right" for which no one should have to pay -- a sacred precinct into which such Philistine undertakings as price-setting should never be allowed to intrude -- leads to less pleasant outcomes, as the Soviet Union spent 75 years demonstrating.
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Doctor Death has been granted a job by obama in the medicare medicaid serial killer.
SARAH Palin scores another TRUTH, DEATH PANELS
Start planning funerals for the senior citizens.
obama, reid, peeelooooosy could give a hoot they enough money to hire a private doctor and you don't, plus Congress, federal employees and unions have the private doctor plan and all you democrats & Republicans do not. A vote for reid is a Vote for death of anyone over the age of 50.
Yes, other socialist coutnries medical system is sooo wonderful, that is why their wealthy and government officials come here for medical care instead of using what they have availbale in their homeland.
They are all trying to get back to what we have and dump what Obamacare is. We are andwill be in the dark ages as far as other nations are concerend with our "enlightened" medical system that has been proven to be a failure in every nation it has been tried
Obamacare is designed to control distribution of medical care, not dispense it. Once the Government can determine who gets medical care and who does not, this will make for a great weapon against their enemies.
"The US stands alone in the modern world in terms of allowing shameless profiteering from health care."
They also stand alone in providing any medical procedure to anyone who wants to pay for it, regardless of age, condition, or use to society, and without having to wait until you're almost dead. They also stand at the top of list of countries with generous people who will donate their expertise, time, money, and resources if you can't afford it. Hooray for the USA.
"I had a friends father who was 57 and did not have medical insurance because his job did not offer it."
Okay stop right there. I'm 57, my job doesn't offer insurance. I can a. find a job that DOES provide insurance. b. Purchase my own insurance policy. c. Pay for the colonoscopy myself (about $675) d. keep working there, don't get insurance, and hope I don't get sick. e. none of the above, because Obama will take care of me.
The Federal Government should make monthly payments to dactors. We must not let our doctors and their families starve while tending the huddled masses.
Perhaps some of the top billionares and tv personas of this nation could donate a small stiphen to doctors instead of sending it all to Africa.
Lets not ignore the starving doctors in this country
The UK, Canada, Costa Rica and dozens of other countries prove you wrong every day. The US stands alone in the modern world in terms of allowing shameless profiteering from health care.
HERE IS OUR SOCIALIST HERO... HARRY REID
Drug lobby showers money on its hero Harry Reid
By: Timothy P. Carney, Washington Examiner
July 7, 2010
EDITED BY Common Sense 2
To read the full article go to Washington Examiner.
The drug lobby has begun a pro-Reid TV blitz in his home state of Nevada. One ad praises Reid for saving jobs and for understanding that "good jobs with good benefits [mean] a better future." The narrator then instructs viewers to "call Harry Reid today; tell him to keep fighting for Nevada families."
But "Nevada families" didn't pay for the ad. The drug lobby did. And while the TV spot makes only passing reference to the health care bill passed in March, there's no doubt this ad buy -- and the rest of the drug industry's generosity toward Harry Reid -- is a big thank you for the corporate-welfare "reform" bill that Reid shepherded through the Senate.
Beyond the PhRMA-funded sappy TV spots, there are plenty more signs of the industry's affection for Reid.
Right after Tauzin's July 22, 2009, West Wing visit, for instance, drug industry political action committees began pumping cash into Reid's endangered campaign.
Reid has received $154,000 from Pharma PACs as of May 30 [2010]... Reid is the only politician to get the maximum $10,000 contribution from PhRMA as of the end of May. He's also the only senator to get the max from Eli Lilly's PAC. The health sector is Reid's prime source of PAC funds: half a million dollars already -- and that doesn't count the TV buys.
Reid this fall will likely follow Obama's lead, and falsely paint himself as the scourge of the special interests -- all on the drug lobby's dime.
Timothy P. Carney, can be reached at tcarney@washingtonexaminer.com. He writes an op-ed column that appears on Friday.
Ouch. The truth hurts. Can we not talk about the truth? It might hurt Obummer's feelings and those of his right hand man, Harry.
They've worked so hard to cram government health care on us. So very hard, even when we didn't want it. But it was THEIR agenda, not ours, and they are the rulers. Just ask them.
GOODBYE HARRY
I had a friends father who was 57 and did not have medical insurance because his job did not offer it. He ended up going to the ER for abdominal pain. He had stage 4 colon cancer that spread to his liver. Had he been able to get a colonoscopy he would be alive today. Tell me how an ER gives primary medical care. You cannot go to the ER to get your yearly colonoscopy.