SICK EQUALS DUMB, says Senator Clinton
October 1, 2007
Are American patients, with the guidance of their doctors, capable of
making their own healthcare decisions?
This insulting question has no place in the national healthcare reform
debate. But Senator Hillary
Clinton’s newly released healthcare plan suggests that she considers
this question relevant…and believes the answer to be “NO.”
Senator Clinton’s perspective is clear in the declaration she made at
George Washington University on May 24, 2007:
“There is a moral imperative to extend coverage to all Americans….There
are three parts to my approach. First, lowering costs for everyone.
Second, improving quality for everyone.
Third, insuring everyone.”
The way Senator Clinton seeks to achieve these goals, outlined in her 14
page, “7-step strategy,” reveals her belief that patients and their
doctors are less qualified to make healthcare decisions for themselves
and their families than the U.S. Government.
YOU’LL PAY FOR SCREENING AND VACCINATIONS—WHETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT
Under Senator Clinton’s plan, all insurers participating in Medicare,
Medicaid or the Federal Employee’s Health Benefit Plan would be forced
to cover “high-priority preventive services.”
On its face, this seems like a good idea.
Senator Clinton argues that cost is why people choose not to seek
preventive services.
Removing cost as a barrier to disease detection and prevention, she
asserts, solves the problem.
Enact a government mandate that insurance companies pay 100% for cancer
screenings and childhood immunizations, and Americans will get
healthier.
But there are unintended consequences for every action.
YOU’LL GET GOVERNMENT MANDATES—AND HIGHER PREMIUMS
According to the National Center for Policy Analysis, just 12 of the
most common insurance mandates currently in place raise premium rates by
30%.
The State of California forces over 50 such mandates on the
employer-provided (group) insurance market but not on individual plans.
Consequently, it costs three times more for California employers
to offer insurance than if a plan is privately purchased.
These mandates are largely promoted by well-funded special interests—the
same special interests that would undoubtedly pressure Senator Clinton’s
administration as she tries to enact healthcare reform.
Instead of giving patients the option to buy low-cost, basic health
insurance plans to cover major illness and “pay as they go” for $10
Pneumococcus vaccines and $90 Mammograms, the only plans sold would
contain such mandatory provisions as Infertility treatments, Inpatient
Drug Rehabilitation and Acupuncture, regardless of the patient’s need or
desire for these services.
When Hummers and Ferraris are the only vehicles sold, people on Toyota
budgets can’t afford transportation.
Patients, according to Senator Clinton, are not qualified to determine
for which benefits and treatments they are willing to pay.
YOU’LL HAVE THE TREATMENT THAT WORKED BEST ON PAPER
More disturbing is Senator Clinton’s May 24, 2007 statement that
“doctors and patients don’t know which medical interventions are most
effective—and which have little benefit.”
Rather than trusting the decision to recommend a medication or course of
treatment to a surgeon or the parent of a sick child, Senator Clinton
proposes instead to establish a “Best Practices Institute” so that
“doctors, nurses and other health professionals…would know what drugs,
devices, surgeries and treatments work best.”
Senator Clinton then explains how well this worked for the postal
services company, Pitney Bowes.
The corporation succeeded in cutting $3.5 million in prescription
drug benefits to their employees by using data generated without benefit
of knowing individual patient reactions to different medications or
having the input of the doctors actually caring for them.
Treatments decided by a research think tank far from the exam room, it
seems, do save money.
According to Senator Clinton, that
is where healthcare decisions ought to be made—safely out of the hands
of patients and their doctors.
YOU’LL BE TREATED WHERE WE SAY YOU’LL BE TREATED
Deciding where and from whom to seek medical care is critical to those
facing that decision. This
choice, according to Senator Clinton’s 7-step strategy, ought not to be
left to those receiving treatment.
Rather, she proposes “federal spending to help redeploy high-priority
preventive services…in schools, workplaces, supermarkets, churches,
communities….”
Instead of using healthcare tax dollars in hospitals, rural clinics and
urban health centers where patients now choose to receive care,
government dollars should “fund and train new health prevention outreach
workers, who understood the language, understood the culture of various
constituencies around our country.”
Patients who prefer to receive care from doctors and nurses have not
made the right choice, apparently—and Senator Clinton aims to correct
their mistake.
YOU NEED MANAGED CARE, NOT MEDICAL CARE
She then justifies her proposal to limit those with chronic illness in
where they may seek medical treatment, even those she admits now
“receive care from qualified, capable doctors and nurses.”
The problem, Senator Clinton explains, is a deficiency of
government-funded “trained care managers.
“My proposal would require that Americans with costly, hard to manage
illnesses have…care coordination models under federally-funded plans,
like Medicare.”
Organizations hoping to cash in on this new government program would bid
on the care management contracts, which include subsidized “management
bonus payments” to physicians agreeing to participate in this form of
cost-controlled, government-mandated managed care.
COMMON SENSE: PATIENTS OR POLITICIANS?
As the national healthcare reform debate continues, those with the
highest stakes in the outcome—patients and their families—may wish to
weigh in. Their ability to
make their own healthcare choices with the guidance of their doctors has
been challenged.
Their voices will not be heard in Washington as long as the volume is
controlled by Presidential candidates, particularly those willing to
threaten their right to make such important decisions.
This commentary first appeared on www.PajamasMedia.com on 9/28/07 with the title, "Hillary's Plan is Unhealthy." Click Here to see article.