Add some sanity to YOUR health care debate
This post from Hugh Hewitt's readership is the inspiration for this post.
I urge everybody--EVERYBODY--to do the following in the next couple weeks:
Talk to YOUR Doctor. If you have one.
Talk to YOUR Health Care Insurer. If you have one.
And if you lack those resources, I encourage you to read the bill yourself. Seriously, this is that important, and you can find it by clicking here.
Ask that person/company the questions that will affect YOU the most, i.e. "Will I still be able to use you and ALL the services I've come to expect from you if the Health Care reform passes?" If you have an unfortunate family history, ask about the major procedures that have been used on your family members with an eye towards "will that be available to me in the future under this reform?"
In short, personalize the health care debate. Don't listen to a President who himself admits he doesn't know what the current legislation contains but who is more than willing to subscribe nefarious intentions to doctors performing surgeries; don't listen to a Speaker of the House who has seriously gone around the bend in her public demonization of the insurance companies. Don't listen to Washington, DC, PERIOD.
How this reform will affect the politicians should be of little concern to you. However, how this legislation will affect YOU and YOUR FAMILY should be of great concern to you.
So you better ask--bring the debate to your own kitchen table, if you will.
And I'm telling you this right now: if you can't have a good conversation with your doctor/company, you should seriously consider getting a new provider. This bill IS THEIR LIVELIHOOD, and if they are serious about their work they should be able to talk about this inside and out. If they aren't willing to talk to you about it, either they're fools or they don't want to be honest with you--either way, you can do better.
And if what the provider tells you things that you don't like hearing--WHICH SHOULD INCLUDE if they honestly can't tell you what the affects of this bill will mean on your care---then the next conversation you have should be with your Representative AND BOTH SENATORS, urging them to stop this health care reform attempt.
Every one of us needs to use what's available to us now--i.e. CHOICE--before it disappears.
I urge everybody--EVERYBODY--to do the following in the next couple weeks:
Talk to YOUR Doctor. If you have one.
Talk to YOUR Health Care Insurer. If you have one.
And if you lack those resources, I encourage you to read the bill yourself. Seriously, this is that important, and you can find it by clicking here.
Ask that person/company the questions that will affect YOU the most, i.e. "Will I still be able to use you and ALL the services I've come to expect from you if the Health Care reform passes?" If you have an unfortunate family history, ask about the major procedures that have been used on your family members with an eye towards "will that be available to me in the future under this reform?"
In short, personalize the health care debate. Don't listen to a President who himself admits he doesn't know what the current legislation contains but who is more than willing to subscribe nefarious intentions to doctors performing surgeries; don't listen to a Speaker of the House who has seriously gone around the bend in her public demonization of the insurance companies. Don't listen to Washington, DC, PERIOD.
How this reform will affect the politicians should be of little concern to you. However, how this legislation will affect YOU and YOUR FAMILY should be of great concern to you.
So you better ask--bring the debate to your own kitchen table, if you will.
And I'm telling you this right now: if you can't have a good conversation with your doctor/company, you should seriously consider getting a new provider. This bill IS THEIR LIVELIHOOD, and if they are serious about their work they should be able to talk about this inside and out. If they aren't willing to talk to you about it, either they're fools or they don't want to be honest with you--either way, you can do better.
And if what the provider tells you things that you don't like hearing--WHICH SHOULD INCLUDE if they honestly can't tell you what the affects of this bill will mean on your care---then the next conversation you have should be with your Representative AND BOTH SENATORS, urging them to stop this health care reform attempt.
Every one of us needs to use what's available to us now--i.e. CHOICE--before it disappears.
2 Comments:
You seem to be a rational opponent of health care reform. I'd be interested in your reaction to this table of health care comparisons of the USA vs the rest of the developed world. What I get from the table is that the US has slightly inferior care as measured by life expectancy and infant mortality, and the US has vastly higher costs that are not explained by malpractice. to me, that's the big argument for change.
In the table below, im = infant mortality and L = life expectancy. See http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0004393.html for mortality and life; see http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/46/33/38979719.pdf for costs.
United States -- im= 6.4, L= 78.0, cost $7290, 16.0% of GDP
Canada --------- im= 4.6, L= 80.3, cost $3895, 10.1% of GDP
Austria -------- im= 4.5, L= 79.2, cost $3763, 10.1% of GDP
United Kingdom -- im= 5.0, L= 78.7, cost $3895, 8.4% of GDP
Denmark ------ im= 4.5, L= 78.0, cost $3362, 10.4% of GDP
Finland ------- im= 3.5, L= 78.7, cost $2840, 8.2% of GDP
France -------- im= 4.2, L= 79.9, cost $4763, 11.0% of GDP
Germany ------ im= 4.1, L= 79.0, cost $3527, 10.4% of GDP
Greece -------- im= 5.3, L= 79.4, cost $2727, 9.6% of GDP
Italy ----------- im= 5.7, L= 79.9, cost $2686, 8.7% of GDP
Norway ------- im= 3.6, L= 79.7, cost $4763, 8.9% of GDP
Spain --------- im= 4.3, L= 79.8, cost $2671, 8.5% of GDP
Sweden ------- im= 2.8, L= 80.6, cost $3323, 9.1% of GDP
Switzerland --- im= 4.3, L= 80.6, cost $4417, 10.8% of GDP
USA has 36 days longer life expectancy than these two countries!
Ireland ------- im= 5.2, L= 77.9, cost $3424, 7.6% of GDP
Portugal ----- im= 4.9, L= 77.9, cost $2150, 9.9% of GDP
Some folks blame our high costs on malpractice insurance. But the numbers don't support that. Including legal fees, insurance costs, and payouts, the cost of the suits comes to less than 1.5 percent of health-care spending. See http://www.insurance-reform.org/pr/AIRhealthcosts.pdf and http://makethemaccountable.com/myth/RisingCostOfMedicalMalpracticeInsurance.htm Along those lines, it's interesting to note that a number of states already have "caps and tort reform" yet the insurance companies have not lowered the cost of malpractice insurance in those states.
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hi, new to the site, thanks.
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