We Should All Stand Up For Insurance Companies

After all, Michigan Rep. Dave Camp is standing up for insurance companies and, along with fellow Republicans, has "mounted a ferocious defense of the market's right to continue burning through taxpayer dollars."

Camp is also standing up for the pharmaceutical/health products/health professionals industries that donated money to his campaign committee for 2009-2010 and 2007-2008.

If Camp is standing up for insurance companies, we should too. As this PSA relates, insurance company CEOs have the right to their American dream just like the rest of us. They've looked out for our best interests for so long and now we should look out for theirs.

Besides, what's so American about competition?




(Cross-posted at Blogging for MI.)

The GOP is trying to privatize Medicare

It appears Congressman Dave Camp is rubber stamping the Bush administration by calling for the private sector to take a greater role in health care. From the AFL-CIO Blog:

Two years after the American people rejected the Bush administration’s plan to privatize Social Security, the White House now is trying quietly to privatize Medicare.

Here’s how: The Republican Congress gave big insurance companies that provide Medicare insurance what amounts to a huge subsidy under the so-called “Medicare Advantage” program. These private insurers were supposed to introduce competition into the Medicare system and reduce costs.

But after the private insurers got their hands into the cookie jar, they began taking more than their share. Instead of reducing costs, the new plan means the federal government, on average, is paying private plans 12 percent more than it costs to treat people on traditional Medicare, according to the Congressional Budget Office and the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission.

This year alone, according to the Alliance for Retired Americans, the federal government will overpay the insurance industry $7.5 billion this year and an estimated $160 billion over the next 10 years. [...] [emphasis mine]

As Edward Coyle, executive director of the Alliance, which represents 3 million retirees and seniors, told a Capitol Hill press conference:

Medicare Advantage threatens the solvency of the Medicare Trust Fund. As the Bush administration continues to sound alarms bells about the Trust Fund, they ought to start by ending these egregious subsidies to the insurance industry.

The outrageous waste and abuse in the Medicare Advantage program is part of our larger, misguided privatization of Medicare. We’ve turned too much of Medicare over to Wall Street at the expense of the people who need help on Main Street.

Coyle goes on to point out how that $160 billion overpayment could go a long way toward eliminating the donut hole. Further, by reining in those payments, the federal government could improve benefits for lower-income families and provide coverage to millions of uninsured low-income children.

The Bush administration and Congressman Dave Camp should be concerned about our senior citizens and millions of uninsured instead of the private sector. As Coyle says:

Something is very wrong with our Medicare program—the big drug and insurance companies keep getting more, and retirees keep getting less. It is time to change this. It is time to end the corporate welfare subsidies in the Medicare Advantage program.

It's also time for the Republican Party to back up their "values" claim with action. In case they need their memories refreshed about the definition of values, Michael Moore explains in the DetNews how his Catholic boyhood helped shape the core values that are on display in "Sicko" [emphasis mine]:

"This film comes from a spiritual place," Moore says, "so I wanted to go to the headquarters of the sisters who taught me in my early years. They had a profound impact on me."

The idea that it's about "the we, not the me," came from the nuns. "Instead of calling it 'socialized medicine,' it should be called 'Christianized medicine.'"

"This was one of the ground rules that was laid down by Jesus. He said, 'I'm going to ask you a bunch of questions when you get to the pearly gates. When I was hungry did you feed me? When I was homeless, did you give me shelter? When I was sick, did you take care of me? And if you didn't do these things, and you didn't do these for the least of my people, then I'm going to have to say that you can't come in the big house.'"

Dave Camp on universal health care: Woof-woof

It looks like the 72 percent of Americans who want universal health coverage - and the 63 percent who support universal health coverage even if it requires tax increases - will be ignored again (just like they were about Iraq) if Michigan Congressman Dave Camp (R) is any indication.

According to a link at MI Liberal, Camp believes the solutions to our health care problems lie in the private sector and not in more government programs. From The Hill:

I firmly believe we can and should solve America’s healthcare crisis in an American way. History is a great teacher, and if we choose to go down the path that Western Europe or Canada has, it will be no surprise when we come to the same destination — a universal healthcare system that leaves your family dog with better coverage and care than you get. As the Canadian Supreme Court once opined, “access to a waiting list is not access to care.” [emphasis added]

Really? Then how does Camp explain this recent study:

Health outcomes for patients in Canada are as good as or better than in the United States, even though per capita spending is higher south of the border, suggest Canadian and U.S. researchers who crunched data from 38 studies. [...] [emphasis added]

"In looking at patients in Canada with a specific diagnosis compared to Americans with the same diagnosis, in Canada patients had at least as good an outcome as their American counterparts – and in many situations, a better health outcome," said one of the 17 authors, Dr. P.J. Devereaux, a cardiologist and clinical epidemiologist at McMaster University in Hamilton.

"And that is important because in the United States, they're currently spending a little over $7,100 per individual on health care annually, whereas in Canada we're spending a little over $2,900 per individual annually," he said in a telephone interview from Brantford, Ont.[...]

Researchers began by asking the question: Are there differences in health outcomes (mortality or morbidity) in patients suffering from similar medical conditions treated in Canada versus those treated in the United States?

"Overall, Canada did better, and in fact we found a statistically significant five per cent mortality advantage to people with diagnoses in Canada compared to their counterparts in the United States," Devereaux said.

Or how about these statistics from the Fort Wayne News Sentinel?

France, Germany, Japan and Switzerland have less centralized systems, which provide much better results. They combine universal coverage with easy access to medical care. According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, none of these countries have waiting-list problems. Access to medical care tends to be easier in those countries than it is in the United States. [...] [emphasis added]

It is inaccurate to assume that we have the best high-tech care. Japan, which has universal care, has more CT scanners and MRIs per person than the United States. Germany and Switzerland are on a par with us. [...]

Victor Rodwin of New York University finds that on a per-capita basis, the French get more physician office visits and more drugs than their counterparts here.

Heck, even Cuba (gasp!) delivers good health care according to AlterNet:

They [Cubans] live longer than almost anyone in Latin America. Far fewer babies die. Almost everyone has been vaccinated, and such scourges of the poor as parasites, TB, malaria, even HIV/AIDS are rare or non-existent. Anyone can see a doctor, at low cost, right in the neighborhood.

The Cuban health care system is producing a population that is as healthy as those of the world's wealthiest countries at a fraction of the cost. And now Cuba has begun exporting its system to under-served communities around the world -- including the United States. [...]

Many elements of the health care system Cuba is exporting around the world are common-sense practices. Everyone has access to doctors, nurses, specialists, and medications. There is a doctor and nurse team in every neighborhood... If someone doesn't like their neighborhood doctor, they can choose another one.

House calls are routine, in part because it's the responsibility of the doctor and nurse team to understand you and your health issues in the context of your family, home, and neighborhood. This is key to the system. By catching diseases and health hazards before they get big, the Cuban medical system can spend a little on prevention rather than a lot later on to cure diseases, stop outbreaks, or cope with long-term disabilities. [...]

For health issues beyond the capacity of the neighborhood doctor, polyclinics provide specialists, outpatient operations, physical therapy, rehabilitation, and labs. Those who need inpatient treatment can go to hospitals; at the end of their stay, their neighborhood medical team helps make the transition home.[...]

I don't know how dogs fare in Cuba, but the article did say Castro provided scholarships to 90 poor Americans with the understanding that they have to agree to go back and serve their poor communities after graduation. Why the big investment in health?

Even more revolutionary than the right to health care for all is the idea that an investment in health -- or in clean water, adequate food or housing -- could be more powerful, more effective at building security than bombers and aircraft carriers.

That concept is lost on lawmakers like Camp who continue to support the war and their corporate buddies. Building bombs and aircraft carriers is a lucrative business for private contractors in Washington. According to Jim Hightower, government contracting has grown 86% under Bush's Republican administration and now totals nearly $400 BILLION dollars a year. It's no wonder Camp believes the private sector should play a role in health care reform (and get a piece of the pie):

"Too much government-provided healthcare limits private sector opportunities. We should be expanding access in the private sector, not crowding it out."

Never mind the fact that the public gets screwed (think donut holes, Katrina, Walter Reed): Medicare Is Defrauding Seniors

In 2005 alone, taxpayers lost $2.7 billion in overpayments [while i]nsurance companies that sell Medicare Advantage plans are substantially overpaid to market their plans...

And never mind the fact that corporate America is leaning in the same direction as most Americans:

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., AT&T Inc., Intel Corp. and Kelly Services Inc. joined forces with two labor unions in calling for an overhaul of the U.S. health-care system that would guarantee universal coverage by 2012.

I suspect Wal-Mart understands the economics behind universal health care because their business approach is similar. By pooling all Americans (vendors) together in the same pool, the government (Wal-Mart) can use its massive market share to bargain down prices and advocate for their interests.

On the other hand, I suspect Congressman Camp only advocates for the interests of the insurance industries and lobbyists who stand to benefit from expanding private health care.