Friday, April 30, 2010

Health care...a commodity

Okay, our current health system has many problems that definitely need addressed i.e. unable to get insurance due to having a chronic/lifelong ailment, but lets fix the problem instead of creating a new plan loaded with problems of it's own like penalizing the small business man when he starts to expand past 25 employees.
From my stand point...Obama's health plan... It 's a failed system that shortchanges doctors and interferes with the private contract between the doctor and the patient. This is a good summary of an article in one of the ENT magazines I was sent...
As it is currently...
...If you treat a Medicare patient, and the patient says, "times are tough, can you forget the copay, you can't do that," he said. "That's illegal because it's considered fraud. Also, if the patient wants to give you $20 more because the payment for your services is not adequate, you can't accept it. They kick you our of the Medicare system for two years. Wen you tell the public that, they say, "You gotta be kidding me! Why should there be coercion?"
So we should...Allow the purchase of health insurance across state lines. you allow tax credits-Whenever you pay for your insurance comes back to you as a credit, not a deduction. You allow private contracting between patients and physicians without penalty. You allow individual ownership of a policy and enhanced medical savings accounts. Get people off of Medicaid. Get rid of the program. Give Medicaid recipients a voucher and allow them to buy health insurance just like the people in the federal employees' health benefit program.
Anyway, food for thought.
Oh, I was chatting with a fellow resident who went to capital hill to hear all the latest...
If Obama sticks around, in 15 years we'll have a single payer system where everyone will be on the government insurance. Yes, a repeat of all the rest of the world. I say, if you love it that much Mr. Obama, put yourself on the system with the rest of your comrades. I just can't wait till my gas is free.

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