Elderly Get Practice For Obamacare Death Panels
by Big Dog on Dec 2, 2009 at 04:37 Political
The idea of death panels made the liberals laugh at Sarah Palin. She suggested that the Obamacare plan would create an environment where care would be rationed and the elderly would not get the care they needed. She likened those who would make those decisions to death panels and the left ridiculed her for it.
They ridiculed even though there is no doubt that there will be rationing of care. Forcing people to have health insurance and then adding millions more people to the mix will mean that care must be rationed for two very simple reasons.
The first is that there will not be enough health care providers.
The second is that the plan will cost so much money (two or three times what they say) so care will be rationed based on cost and the number of years a person has on this Earth. Young people work (when Obama has not caused unemployment to rise) and they pay taxes. The elderly consume about two-thirds of the health care dollars spent in this country so they will be allowed to die off for the sake of efficiency and cost savings. Obama did tell them they might be better off just taking a pill.
The elderly are already finding out what rationing will be like and they are finding out because of the Swine Flu vaccine. The elderly cannot get it. They are being denied the vaccine because of shortages. There are plenty of elderly that have underlying diseases who should be vaccinated but the vaccines are being rationed to children, young people with underlying medical conditions, pregnant women and health care workers. The elderly, left out in the cold:
But as grateful as he is, the 74-year-old Anter admits one thing will be bugging him during the holidays.
“The truth is,” the retired paper sales executive said last week, “when I think about not being able to get a swine flu shot, I get real pissed off.”
Two months after H1N1 flu vaccine was first distributed to public health districts around the country, people 65 and older with serious medical conditions still can’t get vaccinated.
Anter’s doctors at Stanford University Hospital, where he received his transplant, tell him he has a compromised immune system and “the H1N1 flu could do me in.”
He takes at least nine prescription medications daily to stay alive.
“But when I try to get a shot, I’m told I’m too old ” he said as he sat in the study of his Peccole Ranch home.
“I feel that they see me and other older people as garbage and are just waiting for the trucks to come pick us up,” Anter said.
“I served my country. I enlisted during the Korean War. You don’t treat people this way just because they’re older.” Review Journal
I am well aware of the statistics of who is more likely to get the Swine Flu and the young appear to be more susceptible than the elderly but this assumes the elderly who are in relatively good health. Those with serious medical conditions, especially conditions that compromise their immune systems, should be immunized.
They should be in the group of people who get the vaccine first but since they are old they are not getting it.
What other possible reason could there be for denying the vaccination to old people with compromised immune systems?
The sad reality is that they are not as productive and do not have as many years left as the younger folks so they are not getting the vaccine. Sure, those in good health have no reason to worry but the elderly with medical conditions that put them more at risk should be vaccinated.
This is a foreshadowing of the death panel. Care is being rationed because the government could not fulfill its promise to have a vaccination for every citizen who wants one. Since the vaccine must be rationed the elderly with health problems are the ones who are denied.
The senior citizens in this country are getting a preview of Obamacare. You folks better get busy and let the people who represent you in Congress know to kill this bill.
What will happen when they decide that the elderly should not have costly blood pressure medication, clot busting drugs for myocardial infarction, antineoplastic drugs for cancer treatment, or joint replacement surgery all because of age?
Well, at least Obama will give you a pill instead.
It will probably be a cyanide capsule.
[tip]If you enjoy what you read consider signing up to receive email notification of new posts. There are several options in the sidebar and I am sure you can find one that suits you. If you prefer, consider adding this site to your favorite feed reader. If you receive emails and wish to stop them follow the instructions included in the email.[/tip]
Tags: death panels, Democrats, lies, Obama, obamacare, rationing, sarah palin
You act like vaccine rationing has never happened before or that there isn’t health care rationing in our current system. You of all people know this is wrong but you’re so opposed to this bill that you’ll spread lies I guess.
Or maybe it just upsets you that the poor (codeword for those you consider to have not earned health care) would have the same opportunity to get preventative health care as the rich (codeword for those you consider to have earned health care)?
I have never seen anyone turned away because they could not pay. In fact, the law said we could not ask about insurance until after the patient was examined and determind to need our care or not. Some folks come to the ER for care not because they cannot afford it or because they are uncovered but because they do not want to wait for an appointment at their regular doctor’s office.
I don’t see health care professionals rationing care. We treat whomever walks in the door. I know doctors who treat people without insurance and work out payment plans even though most of the people will neglect to pay the bill. It is your bill. people pay for cell phones, cable TV and all kinds of luxuries but then think that their health care should be free. One of the biggest criminals who does not pay the bill is government. government sets Medicare rates based on its budgetaryu problems and many physicians get underpaid. It costs them to treat people which is why more and more are not accepting Medicare patients.
You also paint a false picture. I believe that we should take care of the most vulnerable in our country and we can do that. I do not believe that we should overhaul the entire system and unconstitutionally force people to buy health insurance. Fix the parts that are broken but do not overhaul the entire system. There are only about 12 million people who cannot afford health care who want it (many of whom are eligible for existing programs but have not signed up). Fix that but do not mess it up for people who have coverage and those who do not want it. The young do not want to pay the same premiums as older people because they use far less in health care services. If a person decides not to have care and then needs medical services then it is up to that person to pay his bill. I know plenty of people who get bills for medical services and they work out a payment plan. It is called responsibility.
People sure jumped on cash for clunkers and the car payment that came with the program but they cannot pay their health care bills?
Denying coverage for pre-existing conditions is rationing.
Many folks will only go to the ER when it’s an emergency, not for preventative care.
Where I’m from you’ll wait 4 hours to get into the ER unless you lie and say you have chest pains. I waited in the waiting area and alone in a room without a doctor for almost 6 hours while a hernia was about to kill me. I don’t know if many people use the ER for some sort of convenience around there.
“People sure jumped on cash for clunkers and the car payment that came with the program but they cannot pay their health care bills?”
And your evidence that people who cannot afford health care upgraded their car with Cash For Clunkers?
Many insurance companies can afford pre existing conditions if they make you pay more for the insurance (like life insurance or car insurance). People expect to have a lot of problems and then be covered and pay the same as others. Other insurance companies cover pre existing but people have to wait for some period of time.
10 years ago 57% of ER visits were for non emergent conditions. And you have to wait because those with non emergent conditions are taking up beds and doctors do every test in the book (defensive medicine) so that they don’t get sued for missing something totally unrelated to why you showed up.
My point in CFC is that people will finance the things they want but will not make arrangements to pay for the care they need. How many people without health insurance have luxuries. There are very few abject poor and they are not reason enough to overhaul the entire system.
I guess it depends on how you define luxury.
It seems that whether it is the insurance companies, or the O’bamma gubbmint, that compassion has been replaced by cost analysis- having the government also do this is but adding another layer of bureaucratic apathy to the situation, and that is never a good thing, not to mention that if that IS your objective, then the government should just step out of the way- one layer of apathy is enough, and the insurance cos. can do THAT fine by themselves.
What kills me in this whole debate, is that reform of our health insurance system could have been done much easier, just by removing pre- existing conditions, and assuring portability of insurance from state to state.
Add in tort reform, and other than those piddly little regs, you would be able to keep the government out of your lives.
Sounds sensible to me.
Waiting for 6 hours will beat the government telling you to go home and take a pain pill, and wait 6 months for your turn at a doctor who has been overwhelmed by so many new patients that he has no time for a piddly little hernia- it will become point of view healthcare- from YOUR point of view, it seems pretty darn urgent, but from a bureaucrat’s POV, it is a hernia he or she will never feel, and it won’t matter if your doctor says otherwise.
Sounds like crappy healthcare to me.
Bigd: “10 years ago 57% of ER visits were for non emergent conditions.”>>
DAR
A testament to the US health care disaster. People without insurance getting their patchwork care from emergency, skipping their bill and passing it along to the rest of us. The most asinine upside down idiotic way of delivering care to a population possible. Thank you free market.
D.
Bigd: I don’t see health care professionals rationing care.>>
DAR
That’s because it’s the insurance companies doing it. If you don’t see this then you are blind deaf and dumb.
Bigd: many physicians get underpaid.>>
DAR
All US physicians are over paid. Everyone of them. They should be paid less, far less, like in other countries. This will come to pass. Those getting medicare rates are being paid about right, but still too much.
You never did answer my question of why an appendectomy should cost 18x as much in the US, as in France. Doctors in other countries are getter better results and they all get paid far less than in the US. Perhaps because they are less focused on getting rich they can focus on the patient rather than their golf game.
We have a physician friend who just quit working at the hospital and now works at the VA. He makes less money but is far happier since he can now focus on the patient without the constant battle with the greed based insurance companies.
D.
The cost is more because labor costs in France are lower, malpractice insurance is lower and the US spends a great deal of money on innovation. You can get your appendix out immediately here no matter who you are.
No, insurance companies are not out denying all this care you claim. Medicare denies more claims than all private insurance companies.
Greed based. Only you could think 2% profit is greed. As for doctors, who the hell are you to decide that they get paid too much? Does the government decide that piano tuners should get paid a certain amount and leave it at that? No, you have none of the BS that doctors have to put up with to get reimbursed, especially from Medicare.
You have no idea about doctors and what they do here. You stereotype and throw insults. I see more doctors in a month than you have seen in your life and they are working very long hours taking care of people who for the most part caused their own problems.
Bigd: “The cost is more because labor costs in France are lower,>>
DAR
Bingo!
Bigd: malpractice insurance is lower>>
DAR
Yes it is lower, and FAR lower. Also, the doctors have far less in education bills hanging over their heads when they have finished their education.
Bigd: and the US spends a great deal of money on innovation.”>>
DAR
But the US spends (wastes) twice as much as that, on advertising drugs. Other countries don’t have that waste.
This procedure costs 18x more in the US because we have to feed a bloated inefficient for-profit greed based system. Oh, and the doc’s are vastly over paid.
Bigd: “The cost is more because labor costs in France are lower,>>
DAR
Bingo!
Bigd: malpractice insurance is lower>>
DAR
Yes it is lower, and FAR lower. Also, the doctors have far less in education bills hanging over their heads when they have finished their education.
Bigd: and the US spends a great deal of money on innovation.”>>
DAR
But the US spends (wastes) twice as much as that, on advertising drugs. Other countries don’t have that waste.
This procedure costs 18x more in the US because we have to feed a bloated inefficient for-profit greed based system. Oh, and the doc’s are vastly over paid.
D.
D.
Who says they can’t get preventive care now? And there are plenty of insurance companies providing policies for families to buy their own coverage. This type of plan would be the best scenario for someone with a pre-existing condition because the insurance company is more likely to cover them if they are part of a larger plan such as a family (or employer) plan.
However, the point here is the rationing of the vaccines. Prisoners are getting them but someone who is immuno-compromised and clearly in need of the vaccine is denied? Ridiculous. I would think the liberal groups would be up in arms about this because it’s discrimination – by age.
Bigd: This is a foreshadowing of the death panel.>>
DAR
We don’t need a foreshadowing of death panels. We have it currently and our free market rationing system kills tens of thousands a year who shouldn’t be dying at all. No other first world country puts up with this nonsense.
Bigd: promise to have a vaccination for every citizen who wants one.>>
DAR
I have an idea. Let’s let the private market decide who should get a vaccination. Result: The rich. Everyone else gets nothing.
Bigd: elderly with health problems are the ones who are denied.>>
DAR
Hey bigd, use your noggin. Why would a for profit system do anything for the less than wealthy elderly? It wouldn’t. Markets only care about making money. We only have a lot of elderly now BECAUSE we have a government enforced social safety net (with lots of holes). Left to market forces alone, we would be putting them on ice floes or in an even more pure system of greed, using them for medical experiments. Is that what you are for Bigd, torturing seniors?
Bigd: The senior citizens in this country are getting a preview of Obamacare.>>
DAR
Actually, for a good preview that addresses these issues in an adult manner rather than with insane childish hyperbole, I recommend this article written by an acquaintance of mine:
Health Bills: What’s At The Core.
Short, to the point. Good stuff. You’ll learn lots. I did. There are a lot of very good things getting accomplished in this bill and unfortunately no serious criticisms coming from you. If you have something serious to criticize about please give it your best shot but avoid this idiocy with the death panels. It makes you look foolish.
D.
—————
“Here’s what the House and Senate bills do, and how they differ:
Both bills end discriminatory insurance practices based on health status, such as coverage rejections for preexisting conditions and unaffordable premiums for high-risk patients.
Both bills expand Medicaid to cover the near-poor (incomes up to about $30,000 for a family of four), provide support for disabled beneficiaries, and offer preventive care such as quitsmoking programs for pregnant women. Both bills provide tax credits for premium costs to many middle-class Americans (incomes up to around $80,000 for a family of four).
Of 473,000 Arkansans lacking coverage in 2008, virtually all would be eligible for federal assistance.” –ibid
I have given plenty of examples as have many others as to what is wrong with th ebill. You folks who don’t work in health care seem to know it all.
The bill will cost two or three times what they say and while Democrats cry about 20 billion on troops to Afghanistan they spend trillions like it is nothing.
There have been plenty of people looking at what is bad in the bills but you keep defending it.
We should not overhaul a complete system for 12 million who cannot afford insurance.
The free market would do wonders but the market we have is not free. Too many government regulations and restrictions hamstring insurance companies, companies thta only make 2% in profit.
I address these in an adult manner. The real problem is that people like you are so enamored with this idea you fail to see the problems ahead.
You are fine going balls to the walls but when the stuff hits the fan there will be no turning back and we will be stuck with money wasting holes just like Social Security and Medicare.
A major portion of the 57% had insurance but did not want to wait a week to see their doctor.
Very few of the unisured use ERs compared to the total that use them. You know not what you talk about.