EvanMadianosMD's blog

Group to offer $15.5 billion proposal for universal health care in Md.

By Laura Smitherman

November 12, 2008

Health care advocates plan to unveil today an ambitious $15.5 billion proposal for universal health care in Maryland that would increase payroll taxes to pay for coverage for low-income residents and create a quasi-governmental insurance pool.

The Maryland Citizens' Health Initiative, with health policy experts from the Johns Hopkins University and the University of Maryland, crafted the proposal.

The Top Ten Myths of American Health Care: A Citizen's Guide
By: Sally C. Pipes

Stopping Dr. Statism

By George F. Will
Sunday, October 26, 2008; B07

On Election Day, Arizonans can give the nation the gift of a good example. They can enact a measure that could shape the health-care debate that will arrest or accelerate the nation's slide into statism.

Proposition 101, the Freedom of Choice in Health Care Act, would put the following language into Arizona's Constitution:

"Because all people should have the right to make decisions about their health care, no law shall be passed that restricts a person's freedom of choice of private health care systems or private plans of any type.

No law shall interfere with a person's or entity's right to pay directly for lawful medical services, nor shall any law impose a penalty or fine, of any type, for choosing to obtain or decline health care coverage or for participation in any particular health care system or plan."

What do those people who oppose Proposition 101 favor?

Some support legislation sponsored by the Democratic leader in the state House of Representatives. It would establish a severe single-payer system, proscribing private health insurance in the state and requiring almost everyone not on Medicare to enroll in a state health-care program.

Under that program, a state commission would stipulate the menu of services and medications and could even decide which hospitals could add which technologies.

Arizona a Prime Example of Financial Ruin by Medicaid

"In 1987, ... just over 10 percent of the state's budget was dedicated to Medicare expenditures. By 1992 that percentage was 17.8, and by 2006 it was 22.2."

http://www.heartland.org/publications/health%20care/article.html?articleid=23723

Written By: Matthew Smith

Published In: Health Care News

Publisher: The Heartland Institute

---------------

"Medicaid is the primary culprit behind state and local governments' bleak financial outlook, according to an American Enterprise Institute (AEI) review of data recently released by the federal Government Accountability Office (GAO).

The financial security of local governments will "rapidly deteriorate in less than a decade," said Michael S. Greve, John G. Searle Scholar at AEI and coauthor of "As Arizona Goes, So Goes the Nation: How Medicaid Ruins the States' Fiscal Health."

Tripling of Costs

According to the report, released in mid-July, Arizona is facing a general fund budget shortfall of more than $1.3 billion in its $10.9 billion budget--a predicament largely caused by the state's expansion of its Medicaid programs, which have grown dramatically as a share of the state's overall expenditures.

In 1987, the report notes, just over 10 percent of the state's budget was dedicated to Medicare expenditures. By 1992 that percentage was 17.8, and by 2006 it was 22.2.

In fiscal year 2000, Arizona spent $463 million on Medicaid, and in FY 2009 that figure is projected to be $1.5 billion. That's "a threefold increase in less than a decade," the report notes.

Speeding Ticket Money

Doctor held liable for punitives for treating patient competently

From Point of Law.com

"I don't usually post about trial court decisions -- they have a high
variance, that is typically narrowed on appeal. They are often the
fodder for demagogic politicians of every stripe. I usually take them
with multiple grains of salt.

But this New Jersey Law Journal report is, I think, worthy of larger
notice. It describes a jury verdict from Hudson County, for $400,000,
against a physician who treated his patient competently.

His failing was to refuse to hire, at his own expense, an interpreter
so that he could adequately communicate with his deaf patient.

Why didn't the patient come with her own interpreter (hired at her
own expense)?

Because she doesn't have to, according to federal law
as interpreted by the courts. Her lack of verbal skills is a
disability that others must palliate at their expense.

More obscene still is that the defendant's malpractice liability
insurance does not usually cover such liability, because the care
actually given to the patient was quite appropriate.

The plaintiff claimed that she repeatedly asked her Jersey City
rheumatologist to hire an American Sign Language interpreter. The
doctor responded that as a solo practitioner, he couldn't afford the
estimated $150 to $200 per visit an interpreter would cost, given
that Medicare paid him $49 for each visit.

Affordable Health Care
by Walter Williams (October 22, 2008)

Excerpt:

"One of the campaign themes this election cycle is "affordable" health care. Shouldn't we ask ourselves whether we want the politicians who brought us the "affordable" housing, that created the current financial debacle, to now deliver us affordable health care?

Shouldn't we also ask how things turned out in countries where there is socialized medicine?

The Vancouver, British Columbia-based Fraser Institute's annual publication, "Waiting Your Turn," reports that Canada's median waiting times from a patient's referral by a general practitioner to treatment by a specialist, depending on the procedure, averages from five to 40 weeks. The wait for diagnostics, such as MRI or CT, ranges between four and 28 weeks.

According to Michael Tanner's "The Grass Is Not Always Greener," in Cato Institute's Policy Analysis (March 18, 2008), the Mayo Clinic treats more than 7,000 foreign patients a year, the Cleveland Clinic 5,000, Johns Hopkins Hospital treats 6,000, and one out of three Canadian physicians send a patient to the U.S. for treatment each year.

If socialized medicine is so great, why do Canadian physicians send patients to the U.S. and the Canadian government spends over $1 billion each year on health care in our country?.."

Full Article: http://www.CapMag.com/article.asp?ID=5326

Q: Who would provide charity care if the government didn' t fund it through forced taxation and government -adminstered entitlement programs like Medicaid and Medicare ?

A: ".... As to the question of how those who cannot afford medical care will receive it, we must bear in mind that government is not taking care of them now and is logically incapable of ever doing so, for the simple reason that government does not and cannot produce goods or services.

Insofar as people who cannot afford medical care are receiving it, the care is being provided by productive American citizens, doctors, and hospitals. And we must bear in mind that, in the words of Philosopher Leonard Peikoff, Americans who cannot afford medical care "are necessarily a small minority in a free or even semi-free country.

If they were the majority, the country would be an utter bankrupt and could not even think of a national medical program."

Those unable to afford any particular medical services would have to rely on voluntary charity, not on the empty promises of government.

Individually, Americans are the most generous people in the world, and they have always been so.

For example, American individuals, corporations, and foundations gave $1.5 billion to aid victims of the December 26, 2004, Sumatra earthquake and tsunami, more than double the amount any government provided, including the United States.64

Quoting Dr. Peikoff again:

And such charity, I may say, was always forthcoming in the past in America. The advocates of Medicaid and Medicare under LBJ did not claim that the poor or old in the '60s got bad care; they claimed that it was an affront for anyone to have to depend on charity.

The Grass Is Not Always Greener: A Look at National Health Care Systems Around the World

by Michael D. Tanner

Summary

"Critics of the U.S. health care system frequently point to other countries as models for reform. They point out that many countries spend far less on health care than the United States yet seem to enjoy better health outcomes. The United States should follow the lead of those countries, the critics say, and adopt a government- run, national health care system.

However, a closer look shows that nearly all health care systems worldwide are wrestling with problems of rising costs and lack of access to care. There is no single international model for national health care, of course. Countries vary dramatically in the degree of central control, regulation, and cost sharing they impose, and in the role of private insurance. Still, overall trends from national health care systems around the world suggest the following:

Health insurance does not mean universal access to health care. In practice, many countries promise universal coverage but ration care or have long waiting lists for treatment.

What is Charity ? What is Self-Sacrifice ?

Many physicians - and in fact many people in general- experience a sense of compassion and a desire to help when they see a person in need in society struggling to make ends meet or be self-sufficient , but who has not quite yet achieved this goal through no fault of his or her own or thru temporary set-backs, catastrophe or misfortune.

Voluntarily providing such assistance when one has the means and ability often provides one with a strong feeling of personal satisfaction and benevolence- the personal emotional reward experienced by the giver when the gift is voluntary - especially when one sees that it is being put to good use and actually furthering another's life.

This generally assumes that the charity one is offering comes out of his or her _own_ pocket - rather than dishonestly being taken from someone else' s pocket-  and that the charitable value being offered is modest - and within one's means- rather than representing a significant sacrifice of one's time, money , or values.

In contrast, when one perceives the potential "recipient in need" as being in some way directly responsible for his or her condition- through willful negligence and defiantly irresponsible behavior, drugs or alcohol , complete lack of regards for others, criminal behavior, lack of initiative or just plain laziness and refusal to exert any effort to support his or her own life, this sense of benevolence frequently vanishes. A person such as this is often viewed as manipulative- or even parasitic on others.

"National Health Care: Prescription for a Fool's Paradise,"

-By Dr. Salvatore J. Durante with Dianne L. Durante. April 1991.

A description for laymen of why socialized medicine is wrong in theory and disastrous in practice.

"Suppose I promise you health-care like you've never had before. When you visit a doctor or a hospital, all you'll have to do is show a card, and someone else will foot the bill. You'll never have to fill out another insurance form or wait for another reimbursement to come in. And, I promise, you'll get the same quality of care you get now, and won't have to pay more taxes for it.

Would you vote for me? Most people would. Would you get what I promised? No, because it's impossible to deliver. This is the promise of those who advocate "national health-care" or "universal health insurance" (on either the state or national level). In either case, what is involved is extensive or complete government control of health-care: control of who pays for services, who provides them, and who receives them.

We have, before our eyes, an example of a very similar system that has been operating now for 26 years: Medicare. We aim to demonstrate here, by a detailed look at Medicare, that such government interference in health-care is harmful from the first to buyers and providers of health-care, and in the long run is disastrous. Government medicine, on the national or the state level, is a prescription for a fool's paradise.

To understand the economic principles involved in government intervention in medicine, let us look at something less emotionally charged than medicine. Hats, for instance.

Basic Economic Lessons