U.S. Health Care

President Barack Obama tacked to the right with appeals for tax cuts for small business and new investments in off-shore oil drilling and nuclear power. Also, he tacked to the left with renewed vows to let gays serve in the military and to get U.S. troops out of Iraq and to shift them to Afganistan!

He sounded at times like a Bill Clinton-style centrist, at others like a bank-bashing populist. He taunted Republicans, and also presented himself as a lonely tribune of cooperation and bipartisan civility in Washington.

Obama came into office promising to shatter expectations of what was possible in Washington. The talk then was of a presidential “big bang” — health care, global warming, and financial reform legislation all in one year — and chief of staff Rahm Emanuel boasted that his motto was to “never let a serious crisis go to waste.”

Health care, the consuming issue of the year 2009 and the only one on which Obama aides insisted they should be judged, did not show up until more than halfway through.

Even then, it was on a notably defensive note. He confirmed that domestic proposal went south, adding that, “I take my share of the blame for not explaining it more clearly to the American people.” Despite a year of presidential speeches and legislative maneuvering, he said, many people are asking themselves, “What’s in it for me?”

With health care costs skyrocketing, many public and private insurers have required patients to pay more out-of-pocket when they seek care. The new study confirms what many policymakers had feared: cost-shifting moves can backfire.

“Patients may defer needed care and may wind up with a serious health event that might put them in the hospital. That’s not good for the patients, not good for society, not good for anybody,” said Dr. Tim Carey, who heads the University of North Carolina’s Sheps Center for Health Services Research.

For every 100 people enrolled in plans that raised copays, there were 20 fewer doctor visits, 2 additional hospital admissions and 13 more days spent in the hospital in the year after the increase compared to those in plans whose copays did not change, researchers found.

Some folks are againts Obama’s Health Care Bill, but in fact some european countries have that kind of a system, and people there are paying less money. Because, you pay your country for your health, and if everybody are paying, then the cost for your health plan is cheaper. It’s all in the economics. More consumers, cheapers the product. So, I have to ask myself, why would anyone be against paying less?

Filed Under: My Theory