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The Healing of America
The New York Times reviews Washington Post correspondent T.R. Reid's new book on Global health care alternatives, The Healing of America: A Global Quest for Better, Cheaper, and Fairer Health Care
Mr. Reid's underlying message of hope does not preclude an intensely satisfying quotient of moral outrage at the worst casualties of our system as it stands.One is the uninsured working person, too rich for Medicaid, too poor for a standard insurance policy, at first too proud to acknowledge disability, and then too sick for the process that a formal declaration of disability requires. These are the people who die of treatable illness in our country.And then there is the insured working person who discovers, with surprise, that health insurance is a for-profit industry, that the industry term for payment is "medical loss" and that the process of extracting payment for a dire health condition can turn into a bizarre game of "catch me if you can."
A person's last days can be spent in any number of ways. But on the phone pleading with an insurer, that's only in America.
This seems like an unassailable argument to reform our system. How Republicans can support such a system is a mystery to me. It must be those Insurance company campaign contributions, because there is certainly no rational excuse.
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I can understand why Republicans support it. I cannot understand why Democrats support it.
September 16, 2009 6:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Please, call campaign conrtibutions their correct name - BRIBES.
September 17, 2009 9:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Clue: That mystery reason rhymes with "money".
But, no, maybe they're... duuuh... RACISTS, too!
September 16, 2009 6:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Why are the insurance executives and board put on trial for murder?
In America Children (12 year olds) and mentally challenged individuals are put on trial for their lives for less!
September 16, 2009 9:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thank you CNN and NBC for, after a week, making the ACORN story available to the poorest of us and Congress. They are now suspending operation and are being audited.
The story has leg when you think about the majority of the bad loans that caused the failure of so many banks. Toss in election fraud which has ACORN employee in jail as we blog.
This is a microcosm of what Government Health Care wuold be..
September 16, 2009 10:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've often wondered if there are Calvinist or Puritannical underpinnings for the Republicans' views on healthcare- that the uninsured and sick are somehow responsible for their plight, that they have brought it on themselves, and that our system just represents the natural workings of Social Darwinism.
September 17, 2009 8:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes,well I'm always surprised how I continue to be surprised by the vile behavior members of The Grand Old Party will justify to others and presumably to themselves, as doing or bowing to the Will of God. If it puts a buck in their wallet or get's them layed it was decreed by Him to whom we all must give praise. No not Ronald Regan. He was but an instrument of the Devine Will.
September 17, 2009 11:03 AM | Reply | Permalink
About 20,000 die each year from lack of treatment of treatable illnesses. And, 30,000 medicare patients die each year from over-treatment, a problem that can only be laid at the feet of the medical profession who benefit financially - the more treatment, the more money.
September 17, 2009 12:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
The inefficiency of our healthcare system, the overhead costs imposed by the insurers, and the greed of some doctors and hospitals have resulted in costs that are twice what they should be (compare Japan). This is the fundamental problem we confront in trying to provide adequate subsidies to the middle class and poor.
If Nixon were confronting this problem, I have no doubt he would start by imposing wage and price controls on this sector.
September 18, 2009 8:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
As long as we, the Divided States of America, remain divided, then we will head straight for the great fall. Corruption is a cancer that needs a natural cure. Somthing that promotes rebuilding in the smallist cell to the largest. If not then this nation will be taken by some one else, is that the resualts you all think cant happen? How easy was 9/11 ? You better put down your party signs, and burn them, then restructure this whole political mess to meet the times we are in.
September 18, 2009 8:45 AM | Reply | Permalink