An UnACA Horror Story

When does lying about Obamacare become immoral and evil?:

...There are many stories detailing the plight of the poor whose only recourse is the emergency room. They get to the emergency rooms only to be stabilized and not really diagnosed in detail. Generally, not until it is too late do they get care at a point when it is most expensive and deadly. One of the most gut wrenching stories was detailed by a Galveston, Texas medical student where she literally watched a patient die over a few months. The patient died not because they could not help his cancer, but because he was uninsured...

The Pregnant Old

Elisabeth Hasselbeck: Obamacare Causing ‘Many’ Pregnant Elderly Women To Lose Doctors | The New Civil Rights Movement:

...Today, Hasselbeck furthered her ignorant exploration of issues confronting average Americans, by claiming that “many” elderly pregnant women are losing their doctors, thanks to, you guessed it, Obamacare...

The issue was really about changes in a Medicare supplement policy-- I think. Suffice it to say, elderly women rarely need to be covered for pregnancy, though that does sound a growth area for scammers.

Buying The Lie

Obamacare Not To blame For Job And Insurance Loss, Corporate Greed Is:

... Sadly this means the American taxpayers subsidize all employers that pay wages that keep folks poor. They also subsidize all those employers not insuring their workers. There is no free ride. Every corporation operating solely out of corporate greed does it on the back of the middle class, the American taxpayer. The American taxpayer pays the health cost for those corporations who won’t insure their workers. The taxpayer pays for the food stamps and subsidies for the Wal-Marts, Subways, and other employers paying poor wages.

Americans must stop buying into the narrative of appeasing corporate greed in order to get the crumbs left over for their labor. Americans most assert their worth and demand their share of the economy.

Perry The Hypocrite

Forward Progressives — Rick Perry is Now Asking President Obama for Funds From Obamacare:

Texas Governor Rick Perry is at it again, and by “at it” I mean acting like a complete hypocrite. The governor who has made a career out of attacking Washington is once again seeking money from Washington...

Another Medical Horror Story

Chicago Hospital Accused of Cutting Throats for $160,000 - Bloomberg:

...Based in part on surreptitious tape recordings, an FBI affidavit lays out allegations that a Sacred Heart pulmonologist kept patients too sedated to breathe on their own, then ordered unneeded tracheotomies for them -- enabling the for-profit hospital to reap revenue of as much as $160,000 per case...

This is what you get when the profit motive rules the medical industry.

Big Pharma Loses One

Supreme Court says human genes cannot be patented - CBS News:

The Supreme Court says companies cannot patent human genes, a decision that could profoundly affect the medical and biotechnology industries.

In a unanimous decision, the court struck down patents held by Myriad Genetics Inc. on two genes linked to increased risk of breast and ovarian cancer...

Medicare Best At Cost Containment

Simply Left BehindThe Non-Rapturist's Guide To The Galaxy: Bad Medicine

...We all know stories of the aspirin that costs $5 a piece, and we're told its because there's overhead and salaries and equipment to cover. Brill demolishes that shady defense, and points out that most of the money lines the pocket of shareholders and executives of hospitals, doctors' groups and insurers.

As I said higher up, insurers almost look like they're getting scammed, except Medicare. Brill lays out a very strong case for single-payer healthcare, pointing out that Medicare/Medicaid actually get the most cost-effective "bang for the buck" of any insurer out there...and they are still mandated to cover a comfortable profit margin for healthcare providers.

Scootin' Fraud & Hoverin' Too!

Uppity Woman | I'm just one of those Uppity Women. Live with it.

...Now there’s the obvious truth that some people are in need of these scooters. But the truth is, a hundred million dollars worth of people who have them have no business defrauding the Medicare and Medicaid systems at the peril of people who just got rejected this morning for a needed medical procedure. These people deserve to wake up one morning really soon not able to walk, and crawling to that free scooter they didn’t need the day before. The FBI won’t be going after these “customers”. That’s too bad. I think these system milkers all belong in jail and should be forced to reimburse Medicare and Medicaid for their part in this fraud.

One more thing. It seems that scooter website references to medicare are disappearing like cockroaches under a sink. Here’s USA Mobility’s “Medicare” reference page. Or what was their Medicare reference page.

Well, there is one silver lining here. I won’t have to look at that smug smirking bastard in that commercial who says, “It didn’t cost me a thing!” every five minutes on cable Tee Vee. I always wanted to smack that arrogant bastard in the face.

Up next, really soon we hope: Hoveround, where “Your local Mobility Specialist” is standing by!”……..and “9 out of 10 Hoveround owners got their electric wheehchair at little or no cost.”

Medical Scamming At Every Level

Very thorough post that refernces and even more thorough article.

Healthcare Isn't A Free Market, It's A Giant Economic Scam | Techdirt

...The system is completely broken. In researching other aspects of the system, I'd already come to the conclusion that it should be scrapped entirely, with something completely different put in its place, but this article just helps take that belief to another level. And, the scary thing is that the chances of that happening are basically zero. We're stuck with this system, in part because the economic incentives are screwed up so much that it's ripe for widespread abuse. And when you have so many billions of dollars flowing, with a small group of folks profiting massively from that, there's simply no chance they'll allow for any real changes.

And, the really scary thing is that the bits I've talked about here really only scratch the surface of Brill's overall article. And, his article really only touches on one part of the problem. It is a key part of the problem, but it's still just one part. And each of the other parts tend to look equally insane when you start digging deeper. We are in the middle of the most horrifying economic experiment ever constructed with our healthcare system, and it's only impacting almost everyone's lives. Oh yeah, and there's no real interest in taking on the actual problems.

Evil Apple: Liver Edition

Memphis: Where Steve Jobs Goes To Eat His Fellow Americans - By Tal Sutsa - The eXiled

...But, that seems to be the only prideful action anywhere here or in the rest of the States from what I can tell. The sickly Jobs owned that house long enough for him to become a Tennessee resident where the waiting list for a liver transplant is 48 days compared to over 300 on average in the rest of the country. He needed that liver, and he needed it now; and there just aren’t enough organs available in the promised land of California where he made his billions. He had to cross over into the land of the desperate, delusional and impoverished – the South, a land so poor that it now gets manufacturing jobs that used to be outsourced to Mexico and the Pacific rim of Asia...

Saving O'Bucks

'Obamacare' saves consumers nearly $1.5 billion - latimes.com

Consumers saved nearly $1.5 billion in 2011 as a result of rules in President Obama's healthcare law that limit what insurance companies can spend on expenses unrelated to medical care, including profit, a new analysis shows...

Pot Hits High

Pot Legalization Support At Record High, Poll Finds

National support for legalizing marijuana is at a record high, according to a poll sponsored by the pro-legalization Marijuana Policy Project.

Fifty-eight percent of voters said the use of marijuana should be made legal, while 39 percent said it should be illegal, the poll, conducted by the Democratic firm PPP, found...

Medical Wars And Monopoly

Doctors Who Work for Hospitals Face a New Bottom Line - NYTimes.com

Brain Scan News

Vegetative Patients Locked In, but Not Gone? An fMRI Brain Scan May Tell - ABC News "For the brother of Terri Schiavo,..."

Somehow I just knew that Schiavo would get into this story. Sigh. Just because a brain scan revealed a level of consciousness in one patient does not mean it will reveal such in all patients. Think, people.

Seniors Beware

Agency blasts Medicare fee-for-services plans | U.S. | Reuters: "WASHINGTON (Reuters) - People who sign up for popular Medicare options known as private fee-for-services plans may find themselves stuck with thousands of dollars in medical costs, a government watchdog agency said on Monday.

A report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) recommended that the agency that oversees the Medicare health program for the elderly take a closer look at the unexpected costs faced by people enrolled in these fee-for-service plans. It also suggested that potential enrollees be informed of the drop-out rates for the plans.

Lucrative fee-for-service plans are the fastest-growing segment for private companies contracting with Medicare..."

I don't know much about this, but my Scamdar (insert copyright and patent and trademark notice) has just pinged. (The last time I jokingly inserted a copyright symbol into a post I got mightily flogged via email by an irate person. Please, if you're still out there, spare me.)