How Many Times Do We Need to Learn This Lesson?

This is, or was, Alisa Wilson. She could have been saved. She wasn't.

Here's the thing about health insurance companies: they're in the business of making money. Full stop. Finis. Done. That's it.

Health insurance companies are not in the business of keeping people healthy or saving lives or anything else other than making money. They take your money in the form of premiums and in order to keep that money, they have to pay as few claims as possible. By "claims", I mean "procedures or medicines that keep people healthy or alive."

That is the goal of a health insurance company, to pay for as few medicines or procedures that keep people healthy and/or alive as possible. From the perspective of profit, an organ transplant is a cost, a waste of money, less profits. Therefore, an organ transplant is, like all other "claims", something to be avoided at all costs. Including human life.

That's why tragedies like this happen:

It was this practice of frivolous denials that ended up costing Jacksonville, Florida woman Alisa Wilson her life. For months, Wilson, her family, and the surrounding community had been pleading with her HMO to approve coverage for a liver transplant. Although Wilson was enrolled in the state’s Medicaid program, she was not guaranteed care because she was “forced to join a private plan as part of a Gov. Jeb Bush-era experimental overhaul of the program,” meaning she had to deal with a private, for-profit insurance company to get her care, not a government agency accountable to the public.

Alisa Wilson died because allowing her to die maximized profits. She died for money. Morally, I really can't see the difference between what happened to Alisa Wilson and a person who kills their spouse for the insurance money. Either way, a person died so somebody else could have more money.

Death panels, indeed.

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Stupid or Insane

makes as much sense as conservative health care "reform"
health care, reform, poor, poverty, rationing, death, panels, shortages,conservative,

Are conservatives in this country stupid or insane? Seriously, it's got to one or the other. Anne, the Backyard Conservative (whatever that means) is pushing, like a lot of conservatives, the so-called Patient Centered Reform. Reading this, I have to ask, stupid or insane?

Right now, in this country, 50,000,000 people are uninsured, and even those with insurance are self rationing (why, yes, I do belong to that club):

In the new poll 59 percent said that the cost of their health care had increased more than their other expenses over the past two years. Fifty-one percent said they had faced difficult health care choices in the past year. The most common responses were putting off a doctor visit because of cost (28 percent), not being unable to afford medical bills or medication (25 percent), and putting off a medical procedure because of cost (22 percent).

Twenty-eight percent said they had lost or experienced cutbacks in their health care coverage in the past year. The greatest concerns about health care expressed by respondents were a major financial loss or setback from medical cost due to an illness or accident (73 percent), not being able to afford health care in the future (73 percent), necessary care being denied or rationed by health insurance companies (73 percent), and the prospect of rising costs forcing them to choose between health care and other necessities (64 percent).

So this is the conservative answer to the problem:

Begins with individual ownership of insurance policies. The tax deduction that allows employers to own your insurance should instead be given to the individual.

I can't afford my $1,000 deductible. I can't afford the $50 copay to see my specialists. I do without care, tests and medication because I can't afford it. Right now, I cannot afford it. A tax deduction means spending the money up front and getting it back a year, maybe 14 months later. If I can't afford $50 to see my doctor, what makes you think I can afford to pay for health insurance up front? Are you stupid or insane?



Leverages Health Savings Accounts (HSAs). HSAs empower individuals to monitor their health care costs and create incentives for individuals to use only those services that are necessary . See above.



Allows interstate purchasing of insurance. Policies in some states are more affordable because they include fewer bells and whistles, and consumers should be empowered to decide which benefits they need and what prices they are willing to pay. "Bells and whistles"? This sounds like in some states, insurers are covering cosmetic surgery and thorough frivolous tests and procedures. What they're calling "bells and whistles" are actually maternity care, pap smears and mammograms. If you, or anyone you care about, has a vagina, a uterus or breasts, these are not "bells and whistles", these are necessities. Are you stupid or insane?



Reduces the number of mandated benefits insurers are required to cover. Empowering consumers to choose which benefits they need is only effective if insurers are able to fill these needs. see above.



Eliminates unnecessary scope-of-practice laws and allows non-physician health care professionals practice to the extent of their education and training. Retail clinics have shown that increasing the provider pool safely increases competition and access to care and empowers the patient to decide from whom they receive their care. Yes, a physician's assistant is fine for a healthy person who has an ear infection. The concept of people seeing PA's as their primary health provider is horrifying. PA's do not have the necessary training to deal with chronic illnesses, or even to recognize most of the uncommon ones. This is a recipe for disaster. are you stupid, insane, or do you just enjoy disasters?



Reforms tort liability laws. Defensive medicine needlessly drives up medical costs and creates an adversarial relationship between doctors and patients . Yes, yes, yes, trial lawyers bad! Patients greedy! Limiting medical liability would amount to less than 0.5% of health care spending. Yeah! that'll solve all our problems! so, stupid, insane or incapable of understanding math?



Basically, the conservative answer to currently existing shortages, rationing and death panels are to make people who already can't afford health insurance pay more. I don't even know how to describe that, but it makes me sputter with rage. That's right, I'm sputtering right now.

Sarah Palin was for Death Panels

palin, sarah, death, panels, health care, obama, democrat, republican,
before she was against them.

Yesterday, Sarah Palin doubled down on death panels, claiming

“President Obama can try to gloss over the effects of government-authorized end-of-life consultations, but the views of one of his top health care advisers are clear enough,” Palin wrote. “It’s all just more evidence that the Democratic legislative proposals will lead to health care rationing and more evidence that the top-down plans of government bureaucrats will never result in real health care reform.”

In April of 2008, however, she introduced legislation that included- wait for it- death panels!

WHEREAS, Healthcare Decisions Day is designed to raise public awareness of the need to plan ahead for healthcare decisions, related to end of life care and medical decision-making whenever patients are unable to speak for themselves and to encourage the specific use of advance directives to communicate these important healthcare decisions. [...]

WHEREAS, one of the principal goals of Healthcare Decisions Day is to encourage hospitals, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, continuing care retirement communities, and hospices to participate in a statewide effort to provide clear and consistent information to the public about advance directives, as well as to encourage medical professionals and lawyers to volunteer their time and efforts to improve public knowledge and increase the number of Alaska’s citizens with advance directives.

WHEREAS, the Foundation for End of Life Care in Juneau, Alaska, and other organizations throughout the United States have endorsed this event and are committed to educating the public about the importance of discussing healthcare choices and executing advance directives.

That is exactly the same leglislation that Sarah Palin is now calling death panels. Apparently, one year and four months ago, end of life counseling was the Republican way, but today it's roving government death squads, seeking out grandparents and the disabled hidden in your attic.

What a difference a Democratic President makes.