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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Thu Mar 14, 2013 11:24 am

jj3044 wrote:
WILLIAMS5232 wrote:
jj3044 wrote:This means that the provider gets x to treat a patient with diabetes. If the doctor does a bad job helping the patient manage the condition, the patient comes back many times utilizing more of the doctor's resources, which he is not getting paid more for. It is in the best interests for the doctor to provide better care and FOLLOW UP with the patient, which has been lacking previous. Then, if the doctor makes a set of benchmarks as far as outcomes, they get paid a bonus.


i have trouble thinking this will do much. my mother has diabetes because she drank about a gallon of coke a day. ( i'm not a doctor, this is my opinion ) so 5 or so years ago she gets diabetes and the doc tells her she needs to really start managing her sugar intake. but she doesn't do it. no matter who all tells her to she still eats honey buns and pancakes with ms. butterworths syrup. she drinks coke with every meal. a few months ago they had to up her medicine because it's getting worse. similarly i have an aunt ( no blood relation to my mother ) that is in very bad shape due to taking the same course as my mother not managing here sugar consumption. i can not in any way see this as the doctors fault. punishing/rewarding the doctor for this will only create less/worse doctors and a lower standard. just like the school system blames teachers for a students inability to learn creates poorer education.

i think the doctors job is to diagnose, treat and give advice. and at some point people are going to have to accept that their choices determine their consequences.

There will always be people that just don't care about their health and eat/drink themselves to death. It is the doctor's job to make sure that the proper treatment is available, and the proper resources are available to the patient however, and that is what improves with this model. Where before a patient was on their own to find a dietician to help them with nutrition for example, now the nutritionist works for the provider and the patient has access to them for a lower/no cost. We are trying to eliminate barriers for patients in this model as well as incent the doctors to follow up better and not waste resources.

There is nothing wrong with using some market principles, as well as rewards for good outcomes, etc.

However, these workable solutions are very specific and look at very particular situations. Even though they use the ideas of competition and gain, its not really the market-driven scenario being touted. In fact, for these things to work we would need massive amounts of data and some definite directed planning. It requires a planned system, not just a free and open market. The really key point is that just providing patients with the information and allowing their payments to decide the outcome is not going to work.

Your mother is not going to freely choose the doctor who will put her on a diet.. chances are she will quickly run to another doctor who will be “more sympathetic”, even if the directions given are really not as medically sound. BUT… understand the other part. There is a game to play here. Your mother is an adult and moreover has grown up in a world where she is allowed her free choice, has been taught that eating what she wants and enjoying it are “rights”. That sense of entitlement comes very much from the market-driven economy.

Funny, isn’t it.. the problem here is a market and yet, the market is supposed to be the ultimate solution?
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby BigBallinStalin on Thu Mar 14, 2013 11:31 am

thegreekdog wrote:
In 2000, 13.1% of the population was uninsured (which means 86.9% were insured).
In 2009, 16.3% of the population was uninsured (which means 83.7% were insured).
In 2011, 15.3% of the population was uninsured (which means 84.3% were insured).

http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/13/news/ec ... /index.htm
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/opi ... 57789682/1

The Affordable Care Act insured approximately 3.6 million more people (raising the percentage from 83.7% to 84.3%).

Now, how much does the Affordable Care Act cost? The cost is constantly changing (I read yesterday that the estimated cost went up... I guess by changing I mean it always goes up). The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the ACA will cost more than $1.7 trillion in federal spending from 2012 to 2022; this cost is set to be offset by penalties and taxes, resulting in net spending of $1.2 trillion.

So, Night Strike's statistics are correct. And, once again, you have no statistics Player. So when you say "once again you care more about ideology than truth" are you talking about yourself? The ACA costs an incredible amount of money and insures 3.6 million more people. Either of those numbers could change, but how can you not be worried?


lol, what a boondoggle!

Those Obamacare-fans are a bunch of useful idiots.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby Night Strike on Thu Mar 14, 2013 2:45 pm

PLAYER57832 wrote:Second, direct use.. doctors prescribe antibiotics to people who don’t need them because, as you say, if that doctor doesn’t give off the antibiotic, then some other doctor will… and the patient will likely not return. Many of these doctors know they are doing something incorrect, but feel they have no choice because they want to make a living. They will try to educate, but some people just won’t listen.


I hope you realize that's NOT because of market-driven principles. Health care does NOT run on market principles, which is a major culprit of the exploding costs. Insurance was designed to only cover catastrophic problems, not routine procedures. Today, people use them for routine procedures (including medicines), which allows providers to jack up the costs since the people receiving the treatments don't actually pay for them.

PLAYER57832 wrote:See, most of also know that while not all regulation is good, not all is bad, either. Adding new regulation is not a universal fix, but neither is dismissing all regulation.


How many thousands of pages has Obama's administration added to regulations? We can visually see just how many thousands have so far been added for Obamacare. Do you really think that every single one of these are good, muchless necessary? Shouldn't you first have to prove that regulations are necessary, beneficial, and constitutional in order to enact them? Why do the rest of us have to go back and repeal them? Furthermore, why are unelected members of the administration unilaterally writing laws and enforcing them? I thought these tasks were Constitutionally divided between different branches.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Thu Mar 14, 2013 4:13 pm

Night Strike wrote:
PLAYER57832 wrote:Second, direct use.. doctors prescribe antibiotics to people who don’t need them because, as you say, if that doctor doesn’t give off the antibiotic, then some other doctor will… and the patient will likely not return. Many of these doctors know they are doing something incorrect, but feel they have no choice because they want to make a living. They will try to educate, but some people just won’t listen.


I hope you realize that's NOT because of market-driven principles. Health care does NOT run on market principles, which is a major culprit of the exploding costs. Insurance was designed to only cover catastrophic problems, not routine procedures. Today, people use them for routine procedures (including medicines), which allows providers to jack up the costs since the people receiving the treatments don't actually pay for them.
While you certainly have part of this correct, I am amazed that you can get so much flat wrong.

Health care doesn't run on market principles... true. Nor CAN it. The major culprit in exploding costs is twofold.
1. we now GET so much more healthcare than we ever did, "technology" is expensive.
2. People value their health, value their families' health and, when finally convinced they are sick will pay essentially whatever it takes to get well... even when such expectations are not at all reasonable.
There are other complications, but those are the biggest factors.

You also have right that insurance skews the system, but not as you describe. The coverage provided keeps shrinking-- covering less. Why? Because the customer of insurance is almost always the employer. It USED to be that employers offered insurance because it was a better bargain than offering more pay. They got to offer a nice benefit and got a nice tax benefit. Now, they offer it mostly because they have to… either to meet union demands (more and more rare) or to meet legal demands, and will go with the cheapest policy they can legally, with few exceptions.

Similarly, your idea that providers jack up costs for treatments they are not receiving is not some scheme, it is part of how insurance works. Reducing the coverage offered won’t reduce costs. It will just mean that people have to pay more, in many cases, more than they can afford. In fact, much of the savings to be found are in offering more, basic and preventative coverage.. exactly why insurance companies are doing just that, and exactly what the law you so despise is promoting as well. That part will take time, and will be somewhat offset by the fact that technology keeps increasing.

Conrary to what you seem to think, the real truth is that most people have little control over their health. Of course diet and exercise do a lot, but they are not cure-alls. Furthermore, people are notoriously poor planners and deciders. Just look at how many men refuse to even go to a doctor, as an example.. until they get chest pains, and often even then.. it’s the wives who call. In many cases if they had gone earlier, there would be more to be done. Then again, maybe that is what you consider a cost savings.. someone dying? Insurance companies do!

Night Strike wrote:
PLAYER57832 wrote:See, most of also know that while not all regulation is good, not all is bad, either. Adding new regulation is not a universal fix, but neither is dismissing all regulation.


How many thousands of pages has Obama's administration added to regulations? We can visually see just how many thousands have so far been added for Obamacare. Do you really think that every single one of these are good, muchless necessary? Shouldn't you first have to prove that regulations are necessary, beneficial, and constitutional in order to enact them? Why do the rest of us have to go back and repeal them? Furthermore, why are unelected members of the administration unilaterally writing laws and enforcing them? I thought these tasks were Constitutionally divided between different branches.

Oh please, you really don’t understand or care to understand Obamacare or any other law passed by Democrats. You just get on your high horse and declare “against the constitution”. You know what.. you could spend one tenth of that time reading and understanding and maybe come up with something real to complain about. Your rhetoric is just something you have heard on the grapevine.

None of that “unilateral laws”,e tc, etc, mattered to you when it was policies you like. You bring that up when it is something you think you dislike.. and more often than not cannot even come up with TRUE reasons to dislike it. In this case.. its basically “someone told me its socialism and socialism is bad, so I am against it”. Try harder.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Thu Mar 14, 2013 5:37 pm

thegreekdog wrote:
PLAYER57832 wrote:
Night Strike wrote:
80-85% of the population was already covered by insurance at an annual cost of about $2.3 trillion (mostly private money). Because of the (Un)Affordable Care Act, approximately 90-95% of the population will have insurance, with all the increases coming from governmental spending. And how does that make the system better AND sustainable?

Your facts are incredibly wrong. How on earth do you interprest that the increases will come from government spending? And how do you justify continually ignoring the real cost savings that are projected in the longer term?

OH... I get it, once again you care more about ideology than truth.

Funny what considering profit above everything else does.


In 2000, 13.1% of the population was uninsured (which means 86.9% were insured).
In 2009, 16.3% of the population was uninsured (which means 83.7% were insured).
In 2011, 15.3% of the population was uninsured (which means 84.3% were insured).

http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/13/news/ec ... /index.htm
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/opi ... 57789682/1

The Affordable Care Act insured approximately 3.6 million more people (raising the percentage from 83.7% to 84.3%).

Now, how much does the Affordable Care Act cost? The cost is constantly changing (I read yesterday that the estimated cost went up... I guess by changing I mean it always goes up). The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the ACA will cost more than $1.7 trillion in federal spending from 2012 to 2022; this cost is set to be offset by penalties and taxes, resulting in net spending of $1.2 trillion.

So, Night Strike's statistics are correct. And, once again, you have no statistics Player. So when you say "once again you care more about ideology than truth" are you talking about yourself? The ACA costs an incredible amount of money and insures 3.6 million more people. Either of those numbers could change, but how can you not be worried?
You present statistics, but not any that actually challenge what I have said. Just putting out numbers doesn’t make your data superior. Of course the initial costs will be more, and of course the cost estimates are constantly changing, because more and more of the plan are being implemented and also because the healthcare scene itself keeps changing. The savings are not going to come immediately AND may well be offset by increases in technology. But, per Nightstrikes data, 90-95% of people will be covered instead of 84%. I consider that a success.

Oh, and the reason that went down each year you gave is pretty much a “no brainer”, it was due to the recession and many layoffs.

I still have no idea why you think that refutes what I said or why you think it shows that the costs won’t go down in time.. or that this was the primary goal of the plan anyway. Coverage of more people is itself a worthy goal.

I said much earlier in this thread that the real answer was something like we see in various other countries. (France comes to mind). This was a compromise that Republicans almost seemed to agree to just so they could make sure no better plan went through. Its as though they want a bad plan instead of a good one, because their real goal is something other than seeing more Americans receive medical coverage for the lowest cost possible.

That said, it DID do some important things.. it allows people with p re-existing conditions (read just about anyone who has had ANY gap in insurance) to get coverage and it allows for true lifetime coverage for really sick people.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby thegreekdog on Thu Mar 14, 2013 6:02 pm

PLAYER57832 wrote:
thegreekdog wrote:
PLAYER57832 wrote:
Night Strike wrote:
80-85% of the population was already covered by insurance at an annual cost of about $2.3 trillion (mostly private money). Because of the (Un)Affordable Care Act, approximately 90-95% of the population will have insurance, with all the increases coming from governmental spending. And how does that make the system better AND sustainable?

Your facts are incredibly wrong. How on earth do you interprest that the increases will come from government spending? And how do you justify continually ignoring the real cost savings that are projected in the longer term?

OH... I get it, once again you care more about ideology than truth.

Funny what considering profit above everything else does.


In 2000, 13.1% of the population was uninsured (which means 86.9% were insured).
In 2009, 16.3% of the population was uninsured (which means 83.7% were insured).
In 2011, 15.3% of the population was uninsured (which means 84.3% were insured).

http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/13/news/ec ... /index.htm
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/opi ... 57789682/1

The Affordable Care Act insured approximately 3.6 million more people (raising the percentage from 83.7% to 84.3%).

Now, how much does the Affordable Care Act cost? The cost is constantly changing (I read yesterday that the estimated cost went up... I guess by changing I mean it always goes up). The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the ACA will cost more than $1.7 trillion in federal spending from 2012 to 2022; this cost is set to be offset by penalties and taxes, resulting in net spending of $1.2 trillion.

So, Night Strike's statistics are correct. And, once again, you have no statistics Player. So when you say "once again you care more about ideology than truth" are you talking about yourself? The ACA costs an incredible amount of money and insures 3.6 million more people. Either of those numbers could change, but how can you not be worried?


You present statistics, but not any that actually challenge what I have said. Just putting out numbers doesn’t make your data superior.[/qoute]

The term "superior" implies that you have data. I hate to break it to you Player, but yet agan...

YOU HAVE NO DATA!
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Thu Mar 14, 2013 6:46 pm

I posted my data earlier, several times, from several sources.

But here is yet another:
http://www.healthcare.gov/blog/2013/03/ ... costs.html
The law includes innovative tools to drive down health care costs. It incentivizes efficient care, supports a robust health information technology infrastructure, and fights fraud and waste. After decades of growing faster than the economy, last year, Medicare costs grew by only four-tenths of a percent per person, continuing the trend of historically low Medicare growth seen in 2011 and 2010.

Major progress in Medicare is sparking smarter care in the private market, and it’s working to bring down costs in the private market. Overall health-care costs grew more slowly than the rest of the economy in 2011 for the first time in more than a decade. And just last week, USA Today reported health care providers and analysts found that “cost-saving measures under the health care law appear to be keeping medical prices flat.”

Even though the health care law is working to bring down costs, critics continue to claim the law is too expensive. In reality, the law is fully paid for, and according to the independent Congressional Budget Office, the law reduces the deficit over the long term. The facts show that employers, patients and our federal budget can’t afford to roll back the law now:

•Fully repealing the Affordable Care Act would increase the deficit by $100 billion over ten years and more than a trillion dollars in the next decade. It would also shorten the life of the Medicare Trust Fund by eight years.
•Health care spending grew by 3.9% in 2011, continuing for the third consecutive year the slowest growth rate in fifty years.
•Health-care costs grew slower than the rest of the economy in 2011 for the first time in more than a decade.
•The proportion of requests for double-digit premium increases plummeted from 75% in 2010 to 14% so far in 2013.
•Medicaid spending per beneficiary decreased by 1.9% from 2011 to 2012.
•Medicare spending per beneficiary grew by only 0.4% in fiscal year 2012.
•Slower growth is projected to reduce Medicare and Medicaid expenditures by 15% or $200 billion by 2020 compared to what those programs would have spent without this slowdown, according to CBO.
At the same time the law is driving down cost growth, the Affordable Care Act is strengthening coverage and expanding coverage. Thanks to the law, more than 34 million people with Medicare received a no-cost preventive service. And, over six million Medicare beneficiaries received $5.7 billion in prescription drug discounts.

Some have proposed turning Medicare into a voucher program--undercutting the guaranteed benefits that seniors have earned and forcing them to pay thousands more out of their own pockets. If we turn Medicare into a voucher program, our system doesn’t have any incentives to be more efficient and lower costs. Instead, as costs rise, vouchers will leave seniors to pay more and more out of their own pocket.

The health care law is working to lower costs, increase efficiency, and deliver better patient outcomes – without cutting costs at seniors’ expense. In recent years, we have seen dramatic slowing of the growth of federal health care programs. The best approach to reducing our deficit is to continue implementing common-sense reforms. The health care law is putting us on the right path to make Medicare and Medicaid stronger, more efficient and less costly.


or http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/ ... ers-money/

Issues » Health Care
How Health Reform Saves Consumers and Taxpayers Money
The Affordable Care Act Lowers Costs and Improves Quality
June 29, 2010
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Download this memo (pdf)
Dowload high resolution graphs (pdf)
Health reform’s three major goals—insurance reform, affordable coverage, and slower cost growth—are all critical. But controlling costs is key to achieving the other two. Insurance that offers meaningful protection and is affordable to most, if not all, Americans, across the income scale, hinges on getting ever-rising health costs under control.
Fortunately, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act links the commitment to coverage with a commitment and a strategy to contain health care costs. The Affordable Care Act has multiple provisions to enhance efficiency and eliminate waste, which saves money for patients and taxpayers and improves the quality of the nation’s health care.
According to the Congressional Budget Office, the Affordable Care Act is fully funded, strengthens the Medicare trust fund, and reduces the federal deficit.
 Spending reductions and new revenues under the Affordable CareAct will fully pay for new benefits to help families afford coverage, and the CBO estimates they will reduce the deficit by $143 billion from 2010-2019 and by between 0.25 percent and 0.5 percent of GDP (about $1.2 trillion) from 2020-2029 (see Figure 1).
 Eliminating excessive payments to private insurers (Medicare Advantage plans) and adjusting prices and other measures to assure efficiency improvements in hospitals, nursing homes, and home health providers save about $400 billion over 10 years.
 CBO estimates that Medicare savings reduce the program’s annual growth rate from 6.8 percent to 5.5 percent—adding 12 years of life to the Medicare trust fund (see Figure 2).
Effective implementation of the Affordable Care Act will reduce administrative costs for small businesses and individuals.
 Thirteen percent of insurance premiums currently go to administrative costs, and people buying on their own in the individual insurance market may pay 30 percent of their premiums to these costs. The Affordable Care Act sets a 20 percent limit on these costs for small firms and individuals.
 The new marketplaces or exchanges for small businesses will lower administrative costs even more. Exchanges streamline marketing and enrollment, and monitor insurer practices to give small businesses and individuals the same administrative efficiencies that only big businesses get today. That lowers administrative costs to 10 percent.
 These efficiencies are estimated to save consumers $211 billion over six years following the introduction of exchanges in 2014 (see Figure 3).
The Affordable Care Act modernizes our health care payment and delivery system (see Appendix).
 Health industry leaders and experts across the political spectrum are in agreement: improving health care quality and lowering costs requires bringing health care into the information age, reforming health insurance markets, learning what works, and rewarding health care providers accordingly. Modernizing the payment and delivery system means moving payments away from fee-for-service every time a patient visits a doctor, checks out of a hospital, or is prescribed a battery of clinical tests.
 The way to get better value is to change the way we pay for care—to shift from a fee-for-service system that rewards more (and more expensive) services without regard to health benefits, to a system that rewards effective care that is provided efficiently.
 The Affordable Care Act’s new authorities create a clear path for payment and delivery reform to lower costs and improve quality. The law penalizes poor performance, rewards good performance, and establishes mechanisms to innovate, evaluate, adapt, and broadly apply effective payment incentives. This path relies primarily on improving Medicare, but its initiatives explicitly extend to the private sector—recognizing that the current excessive spending and inefficiency in the health care system apply to the public and private sectors alike.
Modernizing our health care system with effective implementation of the Affordable Health Care Act will slow cost growth and reduce the deficit even more than expected.
 System modernization—preventing illness, reducing administrative costs with health information technology, and coordinating care—will save $406 billion across the entire health care system and $127 billion in Medicare over and above savings from more accurate prices in the current payment system described above. These actions taken together reduce Medicare’s annual cost growth over the next decade from 6.8 to 4.9 percent, saving a total of $524 billion over 10 years (see Figure 4).
 Greater efficiency across the whole system will lower annual growth in the nation’s health care costs from 6.3 percent to 5.7 percent, even after taking the costs of coverage expansion into account (see Figure 5).
 Even without recognizing potential savings from modernization, CBO found that the Affordable Care Act fully pays for itself and contributes $143 billion to deficit reduction. Taking the full savings potential of modernization into account reduces the federal deficit by an additional $257 billion from 2010 to 2019, for a total of $400 billion in deficit reduction (see Figure 6).
 Achieving these modernization goals means that the health care industry would simply begin to match the performance of the bulk of American businesses as they’ve become increasingly efficient over the last 15 years. Doing the same in the health care industry would achieve the same level of productivity growth improvement that every other U.S. industry has accomplished in recent years.



I can find a few more, if you like…..
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Thu Mar 14, 2013 6:50 pm

BUT let me be clear about one thing... we need further reform, but not a return to what was or even less universal coverage. This bill is benefitting the insurance industry, but I believe that was the Republican plan.

The solution is what other countries have.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby thegreekdog on Fri Mar 15, 2013 6:45 am

PLAYER57832 wrote:BUT let me be clear about one thing... we need further reform, but not a return to what was or even less universal coverage. This bill is benefitting the insurance industry, but I believe that was the Republican plan.

The solution is what other countries have.


The Affordable Care Act is essentially the Republican plan from the 1990s, yes.

As for your data, it doesn't show the increase in insured or the actual costs or projected costs. It shows the predictions people are making as to how much money the law may save on a going forward basis; those predictions do not include how much money the law will cost in federal spending and if they do, these predictions usually do not take into account costs incurred by the federal government subsequent to 2014 or so.

I'm not calling for cutting the Affordable Care Act and doing nothing (which is what your first link presupposes). Further, your first link makes bold predictions, all of which are positive. The entire first paragraph reads like a campaign speech.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Fri Mar 15, 2013 2:53 pm

thegreekdog wrote:
PLAYER57832 wrote:BUT let me be clear about one thing... we need further reform, but not a return to what was or even less universal coverage. This bill is benefitting the insurance industry, but I believe that was the Republican plan.

The solution is what other countries have.


The Affordable Care Act is essentially the Republican plan from the 1990s, yes.

As for your data, it doesn't show the increase in insured or the actual costs or projected costs. It shows the predictions people are making as to how much money the law may save on a going forward basis; those predictions do not include how much money the law will cost in federal spending and if they do, these predictions usually do not take into account costs incurred by the federal government subsequent to 2014 or so.

They are at least as valid as your projections.


thegreekdog wrote:I'm not calling for cutting the Affordable Care Act and doing nothing (which is what your first link presupposes). Further, your first link makes bold predictions, all of which are positive. The entire first paragraph reads like a campaign speech.


Note that a lot of my condemnation was directed at Nightstrike, who has a far less nuanced opinion. Even so, my basic point is that ensuring that all people are able to get medical care is more important than saving a few dollars.

And that, really is what this is about. Do we ensure that being a citizen of the US means we get healthcare (for which we pay unless truly indigent) and other things people need OR are these just optional niceties that only those who are fortunate enough to be in the top 40-50% of the income earners get to have.

Further, the other question is who is responsible for the debt, and therefore for paying it back. The Republicans, many conservatives want us to believe that the debt is BECAUSE average Americans are greedy and keep demanding more and more from the government without paying more. There is some truth to that. People do want more and do want to pay less. BUT… the idea that it is social security and medical care that is causing our country to be in debt is ridiculous. Social security is a prime example. There was, in the late 70’s and early 80’s a surplus in the social security fund. Was it saved, was it used responsibly to prepare for the future? NO.. Reagan used it to “balance” his budget and then offer tax rebates, particularly to his cronies. Further presidents each decided to keep offering tax bennies, sometimes to everyone and not just the wealthy.

So, the part about people wanting to pay less is correct, but the part that people can do without things like medical care and that we “cannot afford it” is based on the idea that a few people have the right to whatever they want and no responsibility for the consequences of those demands.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Fri Mar 15, 2013 3:31 pm

Real healthcare reform.

So what would REAL reform look like?

A lot of this I have already described, but here again.

#1. True universal coverage. Set a baseline of coverage, based on getting the “biggest bang for the buck”. IMPORTANT—w hatever limits and coverages are set, the situation is going to change as technology and information advances. The system must be structured to “learn” from errors. This would mean collecting data and setting up various algorithms to process the data. This would them have to be reviewed by people, at least initially. This will be available to everyone at the same cost, but it will be the minimum coverage for all.

#2. Anybody wanting additional coverage will be free to purchase it from fully private companies, but they will do so as individuals. All “group coverage” will be eliminated. Belonging to the honored society of the elephant tusks will no longer give you a discount, because medical coverage is a basic right of all people. Private companies will be allowed to vary their premiums based on “lifestyle” factors, but not necessarily genetic factors.

#3. Set a premium on technology. Right now, research is essentially “free”. It only gains value when a product is marketed and sold. When the government does the research, they even give the technology away to whatever company is doing the most similar research or has the most similar products. Instead, set a base rate for gain from technology. This is particularly true in medicine because so much of medical research is considered public need or done in response to military issues. Set a very low tax on ALL technology based products that would then be cycled back into research. A tax of, say 0.25% or perhaps 1% would go a very, very LONG ways toward funding new research without seriously hampering profits.

#4.Require that all non-citizens have insurance.

#5. Hold medical entities responsible directly for problems they cause. I can give a list of some, but just as an example, bed sores are already something that care facilities generally cannot bill to Medicaid. (some exceptions, but bed sores are caused when patients are not moved enough and are almost always preventable).

#6. Replace the medical torte system with one of responsibility and correction. In particular, if people knew their medical care was paid, then the need to sue for every last bruise will somewhat diminish. When medical entities are responsible themselves for correcting (or paying for the correction) of problems they cause, then correction will happen far more quickly than any lawsuit claim, which will just be paid by insurance companies anyway. Eliminate insurance coverage for truly guilty or negligent parties. They need to be dealt with criminally. To some extent, even the entity hiring or retaining the guilty person will have responsibility. Again, this changes the scenario from “I don’t want to report doctor xyz because it might mean getting sued” to “I see an issue an I am going to mention it so it gets corrected before it causes problems”. I realize I am “skimming” here, skipping a lot of details, but trying to keep that short...

#7, Put all medical conditions and treatments into a computerized type medical “key”, similar to biologic keys, to aid in all diagnosis and interventions. Doctors will still be required to identify issues correctly, but can spend more of their time on actually dealing with issues. Errors in diagnosis and treatment will be reduced significantly, particularly as the program is improved in time.

#8. Start some SENSIBLE discussion of end of life issues. This is not about teaching one religious belief, but about letting people understand the options before they are crying in the doctor’s office, or fighting with siblings over “what to do about mom”. EVERYONE should have a living will, where they specify what THEY want and do not want done in an emergency, in the case they are incapacitated, if they have a major illness at a time when they cannot make (or communicate) those decisions readily. I would honestly like to see this start in high school, though it takes a careful teacher to do it right. (that is, to teach in a way that informs, but is fully respectful of the range of beliefs and feelings). Failing that, we need better universal guidelines that allow doctors to say “hey, this lady is 80 years old, I wish she had family to consult, but she doesn’t, do we really want to put her through an aggressive chemotherapy regime for a 5% chance of curing her pancreatic cancer?” Right now, depending on the state and the individual doctor’s “risk tolerance”, that might not happen.. and chances are we taxpayers will foot the bill if the doctor decides to go ahead.

#9. Similarly, leave beginning life decisions in the hands of families, individuals. No government, no other person has a right to push their opinion. Medical personnel have the right to advise and make medical recommendations, but bystanders have no place in those decisions. Religious beliefs vary about what constitutes life. Unless you yourself are willing to personally pay fully and put in your own time to care a highly disabled child, you have no right to demand that others do it. The supreme court, in conjunction with medical science has set the beginning of legal life at 12 weeks – a few weeks past the heartbeat appearing, but before the brain is developed more than rudimentarily. After that point, there should be some definite limits to what “highly disabled” means, but once that threshold is reached this should be an individual choice. BUT.. the law should be built to change that with medical advances. The biggest problem today is that we are quickly reaching a point when very, very young and ill children can be born and kept “alive”, but with little hope of anything most parents would consider a real life. Keeping a 2 month fetus alive might sound like a medical miracle, and it is… but is the result a life you would wish upon your child? The honest answer is often “no”, though the optimism bias and failure to fully understand other people’s situations tends to make people think otherwise.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby WILLIAMS5232 on Sat Mar 16, 2013 7:42 pm

PLAYER57832 wrote:
WILLIAMS5232 wrote:This.......... consequences.


do you think the adversisers of these products have any culpability?


let me look up the word culpability real quick......

ob, ok. so it means "blame". i'm really impressed with your vocabulary. however, your spelling needs work.

to answer your question. no i do not. but that's where our opinions are so different. i tend to put more blame to the consumer than the provider where you would prefer the opposite. it's typical, i think, for a democrat to try to weasel out of any blame that can be placed on a poor decision. surely when you eat sugar alot. and you start to get fat and lose energy you should know that you are practicing unhealthy habits no?

edit;
PLAYER57832 wrote:Funny, isn’t it.. the problem here is a market and yet, the market is supposed to be the ultimate solution?


the only problem here is making my insurance and her insurance cost the same. now of course it's my mother i'm talking about and i would happily pay for her insurance if she needed it, but she doesn't. so i'm not. how many other people with her attitude am i going to be paying for? when is the nation as a whole going to get healthy so i can start getting this supposed "cheaper insurance in the long run"

personally i doubt it ever will. mainly what i'm saying is, what my health insurance costs me now will never be cheaper no matter what happens with the ACA. i'll never be rewarded for maintaining a healthy lifestyle other than staying healthy. so i'm supposed to rejoice with you when people that aren't making sacrifices get rewarded? i'd rather not. so just let me be glum and quit trying to sell a bag of poop.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby jj3044 on Sun Mar 17, 2013 10:52 am

WILLIAMS5232 wrote:
PLAYER57832 wrote:
WILLIAMS5232 wrote:This.......... consequences.


do you think the adversisers of these products have any culpability?


let me look up the word culpability real quick......

ob, ok. so it means "blame". i'm really impressed with your vocabulary. however, your spelling needs work.

to answer your question. no i do not. but that's where our opinions are so different. i tend to put more blame to the consumer than the provider where you would prefer the opposite. it's typical, i think, for a democrat to try to weasel out of any blame that can be placed on a poor decision. surely when you eat sugar alot. and you start to get fat and lose energy you should know that you are practicing unhealthy habits no?

edit;
PLAYER57832 wrote:Funny, isn’t it.. the problem here is a market and yet, the market is supposed to be the ultimate solution?


the only problem here is making my insurance and her insurance cost the same. now of course it's my mother i'm talking about and i would happily pay for her insurance if she needed it, but she doesn't. so i'm not. how many other people with her attitude am i going to be paying for? when is the nation as a whole going to get healthy so i can start getting this supposed "cheaper insurance in the long run"

personally i doubt it ever will. mainly what i'm saying is, what my health insurance costs me now will never be cheaper no matter what happens with the ACA. i'll never be rewarded for maintaining a healthy lifestyle other than staying healthy. so i'm supposed to rejoice with you when people that aren't making sacrifices get rewarded? i'd rather not. so just let me be glum and quit trying to sell a bag of poop.

I have already said this at least twice in this thread, but I'll repeat myself again:

The law DOES support initiatives to incent people to be healthier and to take ownership of their own healthcare. Under the ACA, "wellness" incentives can now be up to 30% of the value of the plan.

This is quite broad and I have seen a lot of companies and insurers use different strategies, but one of the more popular incentive strategies involves up to a 30% reduction in the amount an employee pays for coverage if he/she has an annual physical, takes a health assessment, and is tobacco free (or, participates in a tobacco cessation program).

These incentive programs work. I have several groups that I work with that have been able to moderate their healthcare costs over the past several years. In some cases, "moderation" means a reduction of medical claims expense, a flat medical trend over the past several years, or a small increase in medical trend, but lower than the average.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby WILLIAMS5232 on Sun Mar 17, 2013 12:09 pm

show


this is bunk. your telling me i must go to the doctor to recieve a 30 percent cut to go to the doctor. i've not been to the doctor but once in the past 17 years. and he did nothing for me then but tell me i don't need a doctor.

i have insurance with my company. if it were not for that, i wouldn't have insurance ( until the ACA ). i'm not interested in living in a society that feels they know whats best for me. in order for you to get what you want, you are expecting me to get what i don't want. and i don't like that.

medical care will never be free. as much as everyone wishes it would be. for everyone who doesn't pay for it there is another person that is. a 30 percent cut in cost is no better than paying 70 percent of something i don't want/need.

tell me, what's going to happen if i quit my job, pull out my 401k, by some property, build a house with a sawmill and work 3 months out of the year making about 12000 dollars per year? will i need to purchase healthcare, or will i be covered under the ACA for free? ( this is a serious question )
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby Night Strike on Sun Mar 17, 2013 1:59 pm

http://swampland.time.com/2013/02/05/how-much-obamacare-costs-in-one-chart/

By the way, people should note how the chart in the link talks about the penalty for not buying insurance. Remember, if this was a penalty, it would have been ruled unconstitutional. It's a TAX, yet the government still refuses to tell that to the public.

Also player, that link itself (from the CBO) says 27 million more people will have health insurance, which is about 9% of the population, meaning my previous statements about barely increasing coverage for a massive price tag is still accurate.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby jj3044 on Sun Mar 17, 2013 11:16 pm

WILLIAMS5232 wrote:this is bunk. your telling me i must go to the doctor to recieve a 30 percent cut to go to the doctor. i've not been to the doctor but once in the past 17 years. and he did nothing for me then but tell me i don't need a doctor.

You may have been healthy then, but there are many "silent" diseases out there that you SHOULD be checked out periodically, even if you feel fine. These silent killers typically are treated easily if caught early, but are very expensive and destroy your quality of life if caught late. 17 years is way too long to go without a checkup, any doctor would tell you that. You are either exaggerating, or the doctor you went to got his license inside of a cereal box.
i have insurance with my company. if it were not for that, i wouldn't have insurance ( until the ACA ). i'm not interested in living in a society that feels they know whats best for me. in order for you to get what you want, you are expecting me to get what i don't want. and i don't like that.

medical care will never be free. as much as everyone wishes it would be. for everyone who doesn't pay for it there is another person that is. a 30 percent cut in cost is no better than paying 70 percent of something i don't want/need.

tell me, what's going to happen if i quit my job, pull out my 401k, by some property, build a house with a sawmill and work 3 months out of the year making about 12000 dollars per year? will i need to purchase healthcare, or will i be covered under the ACA for free? ( this is a serious question )

If you are only making 12k a year, your insurance would be subsidized, and possibly free (I don't know enough about the specific thresholds to definitively say).

You are saying that insurance is forced upon you. Well, yes, it is. Should you have a right to refuse? Maybe, and I'm not arguing that. However, there are factors in play here that make a mandate (or socialized healthcare) needed. See, you can say "I don't want to purchase insurance, I don't need no doctor!", and live a happy life... until you come down with a serious ailment that can only be treated with modern medicine. At that point you can say "well I didn't buy insurance, so I guess I'm not getting the service done, and I'm going to die prematurely!". If that was the case, then the free market principle would work. However, this doesn't happen.

What DOES happen, is that you say "well, if I go to the hospital, they WILL treat me, because they have to. Man I love that Hippocratic Oath!". You get the service done, and because you only make 12k a year, they can't collect anything from you. Guess what? Then, everyone pays for YOUR service! Pretty good gig.

Imagine if you went into Sears and said "I can't afford a TV, but because I want one, you are going to give it to me and the taxpayers are going to foot the bill!". I don't think you would get the TV...
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Mon Mar 18, 2013 4:14 pm

WILLIAMS5232 wrote:
PLAYER57832 wrote:
WILLIAMS5232 wrote:This.......... consequences.


do you think the adversisers of these products have any culpability?


let me look up the word culpability real quick......

ob, ok. so it means "blame". i'm really impressed with your vocabulary. however, your spelling needs work.

to answer your question. no i do not. but that's where our opinions are so different. i tend to put more blame to the consumer than the provider where you would prefer the opposite. it's typical, i think, for a democrat to try to weasel out of any blame that can be placed on a poor decision. surely when you eat sugar alot. and you start to get fat and lose energy you should know that you are practicing unhealthy habits no?

I see, so according to you Democrats are irresponsible... but what about the bill and this debate?

The "problems with the Demoractic party thread is elsewhere"

WILLIAMS5232 wrote:
PLAYER57832 wrote:Funny, isn’t it.. the problem here is a market and yet, the market is supposed to be the ultimate solution?


the only problem here is making my insurance and her insurance cost the same. now of course it's my mother i'm talking about and i would happily pay for her insurance if she needed it, but she doesn't. so i'm not. how many other people with her attitude am i going to be paying for? when is the nation as a whole going to get healthy so i can start getting this supposed "cheaper insurance in the long run"

Apparently you misunderstand the purpose of insurance. See, you buy fire insurance, not because you think you will lose your home to a fire, but because if you did, you would not otherwise have the money to rebuild it or buy another. According to you, the person who keeps their home is somehow a “loser” because they paid into something from which they don’t benefit. Sorry, but I don’t feel sorry for someone who gets to keep their belongings and house.
Similarly, if you “fail to use” all the insurance coverage available, then you can resent paying or you can be intelligent and be grateful for having your health.

People are notoriously bad about estimating their own medical risks. Sure, plenty of people want to believe they don’t need medical insurance or need far less than they have. That is a big part of why our emergency rooms are overrun and so many people cannot pay medical bills.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Mon Mar 18, 2013 4:18 pm

Night Strike wrote:http://swampland.time.com/2013/02/05/how-much-obamacare-costs-in-one-chart/

By the way, people should note how the chart in the link talks about the penalty for not buying insurance. Remember, if this was a penalty, it would have been ruled unconstitutional. It's a TAX, yet the government still refuses to tell that to the public.

Also player, that link itself (from the CBO) says 27 million more people will have health insurance, which is about 9% of the population, meaning my previous statements about barely increasing coverage for a massive price tag is still accurate.

Whil you are charting that, how about charting the numerous advances that mean much more care is available every year.

Also, how about charting the cost of caring for highly disabled children... you can stick with medical care, but really ought to include lost income, increased medical care for the rest of the familiy (due to stress)?

OR... care for terminal individuals, including seriously ill elderly people.

You are fine denying fully healthy people care, but have no problem with paying millions for those groups.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby Night Strike on Mon Mar 18, 2013 5:48 pm

PLAYER57832 wrote:
Night Strike wrote:http://swampland.time.com/2013/02/05/how-much-obamacare-costs-in-one-chart/

By the way, people should note how the chart in the link talks about the penalty for not buying insurance. Remember, if this was a penalty, it would have been ruled unconstitutional. It's a TAX, yet the government still refuses to tell that to the public.

Also player, that link itself (from the CBO) says 27 million more people will have health insurance, which is about 9% of the population, meaning my previous statements about barely increasing coverage for a massive price tag is still accurate.

Whil you are charting that, how about charting the numerous advances that mean much more care is available every year.

Also, how about charting the cost of caring for highly disabled children... you can stick with medical care, but really ought to include lost income, increased medical care for the rest of the familiy (due to stress)?

OR... care for terminal individuals, including seriously ill elderly people.

You are fine denying fully healthy people care, but have no problem with paying millions for those groups.


Actually, I don't think the government should be involved in any person's health care.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby BigBallinStalin on Tue Mar 19, 2013 12:05 am

CBO projections now not only imply that the subsidized exchange pool will shrink more precipitously, but the average benefit will be rising 5.7% a year at the end of the 10-year window — faster than seen last August.

This combination of fewer beneficiaries and faster benefit growth implies that low-income and older beneficiaries will make up an increasing share of the insurance pool. ObamaCare subsidies rise with age and decline as incomes rise; falling to zero for households who earn more than 400% of the poverty level.

A faster projected rise in average premiums suggests younger, healthier individuals and families will increasingly decide to go without insurance, with many paying a tax penalty.

While the Supreme Court ruling that states needn't expand Medicaid will likely shift millions of currently uninsured to the exchanges, it doesn't explain the projected enrollment decline.

http://news.investors.com/030713-647240 ... -peak.aspx
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Tue Mar 19, 2013 5:15 am

Night Strike wrote:
PLAYER57832 wrote:
Night Strike wrote:http://swampland.time.com/2013/02/05/how-much-obamacare-costs-in-one-chart/

By the way, people should note how the chart in the link talks about the penalty for not buying insurance. Remember, if this was a penalty, it would have been ruled unconstitutional. It's a TAX, yet the government still refuses to tell that to the public.

Also player, that link itself (from the CBO) says 27 million more people will have health insurance, which is about 9% of the population, meaning my previous statements about barely increasing coverage for a massive price tag is still accurate.

Whil you are charting that, how about charting the numerous advances that mean much more care is available every year.

Also, how about charting the cost of caring for highly disabled children... you can stick with medical care, but really ought to include lost income, increased medical care for the rest of the familiy (due to stress)?

OR... care for terminal individuals, including seriously ill elderly people.

You are fine denying fully healthy people care, but have no problem with paying millions for those groups.


Actually, I don't think the government should be involved in any person's health care.

UNLESS... it is women's care, because according to you, that's not really health care.

AND forget end of life decisions. Only the Roman Catholic Church and their cronies get to make those decisions!
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Tue Mar 19, 2013 11:23 am

A "stand alone" PS.
I did not write this, It came from another mother

On grieving her son's death
"This is such a hard thing to explain to someone who hasn't been through it, but when Ronan got his terminal diagnosis, that was the day for me that he died. That was the day of his death for me was Jan. 10, 2011. Not to say that I didn't enjoy being with him through his life, but I felt — I think — the full weight of that loss on the day that he was diagnosed, and when he did die I was relieved that he was released from his suffering, and so that grief is different than it was. It's just, it's qualitatively different, and not that it's not still devastating. It was devastating to watch somebody deteriorating, too, and to know that you couldn't stop it and to worry that there would be more suffering and wanting so deeply to spare him that. ... For me that first year was really the worst, because watching him change and all the hopes kind of dashed and sprinting to the end at the beginning was how I grieved."


See, this is the thing, Nightstrike, others. When someone decides to terminate a very ill child before birth, it is not that they don't love the child or even don't appreciate the child. It is that they know this child is, essentially already dead. Whether you believe that or not is a matter of faith and biology. MY assertion is just that no other person, particularly no governmental entity or clergy person talking to non-parishoners has the right to make this decision, only the parents. ONLY they love the child, understand the full situation.

AND... proclaiming that you demand people make this choice the way you want AND ALSO proclaiming that you will cut medical care, won't provide payment... or won't provide payment unless they decide the way you think is best, is the worst kind of hypocrisy.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby Metsfanmax on Tue Mar 19, 2013 11:24 am

Night Strike wrote:
PLAYER57832 wrote:
Night Strike wrote:http://swampland.time.com/2013/02/05/how-much-obamacare-costs-in-one-chart/

By the way, people should note how the chart in the link talks about the penalty for not buying insurance. Remember, if this was a penalty, it would have been ruled unconstitutional. It's a TAX, yet the government still refuses to tell that to the public.

Also player, that link itself (from the CBO) says 27 million more people will have health insurance, which is about 9% of the population, meaning my previous statements about barely increasing coverage for a massive price tag is still accurate.

Whil you are charting that, how about charting the numerous advances that mean much more care is available every year.

Also, how about charting the cost of caring for highly disabled children... you can stick with medical care, but really ought to include lost income, increased medical care for the rest of the familiy (due to stress)?

OR... care for terminal individuals, including seriously ill elderly people.

You are fine denying fully healthy people care, but have no problem with paying millions for those groups.


Actually, I don't think the government should be involved in any person's health care.


Do you believe we should rescind the rule requiring an emergency room to treat everyone who shows up there while seriously ill?
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby PLAYER57832 on Tue Mar 19, 2013 11:44 am

Metsfanmax wrote:
Night Strike wrote:
PLAYER57832 wrote:
Night Strike wrote:http://swampland.time.com/2013/02/05/how-much-obamacare-costs-in-one-chart/

By the way, people should note how the chart in the link talks about the penalty for not buying insurance. Remember, if this was a penalty, it would have been ruled unconstitutional. It's a TAX, yet the government still refuses to tell that to the public.

Also player, that link itself (from the CBO) says 27 million more people will have health insurance, which is about 9% of the population, meaning my previous statements about barely increasing coverage for a massive price tag is still accurate.

Whil you are charting that, how about charting the numerous advances that mean much more care is available every year.

Also, how about charting the cost of caring for highly disabled children... you can stick with medical care, but really ought to include lost income, increased medical care for the rest of the familiy (due to stress)?

OR... care for terminal individuals, including seriously ill elderly people.

You are fine denying fully healthy people care, but have no problem with paying millions for those groups.


Actually, I don't think the government should be involved in any person's health care.


Do you believe we should rescind the rule requiring an emergency room to treat everyone who shows up there ill?

Of course not!

And, the primary reason is because during an emergency there just is not time to fully get into all the details.

Also, note, my point is about choice. Nightstrike wants to declare that he is all about freedom… but has glaring exceptional holes when it comes to women’s health and the elderly.

I know more than most people about this. I have have gone into a LOT of details in other threads at other times, maybe you caught some of it, maybe it predated your appearance, I cannot remember.

Anyway, I believe that both beginning and end of life decisions are as much about faith as biology. I think that the state has an interest in setting the EXTREME bondaries.. I mean, you can’t “knock off” your mother in law (no matter how irritating she is ;) ) or your grandmother just to get their inheritances and I would say aborting a child for gender selection is wrong (but hard to prove). However, when it comes to saying that someone HAS to raise a particular child or even give birth to a particular child…. It goes beyond the bounds of what any outsider should say.

AND, the ultimate truth is that most people don’t really and truly think about end of life issues until they are actually faced with the decisions. When they do, it is under stress, often involves a lot of heartache as various children might have differing ideas, etc. Its much better for all if these things are thought out in advance, preferably if the person themselves makes the decisions. (failing that, the siblings should get together and talk about it).

Part of this very much does involve understanding what happens in various situations. For example, a lot of people just don’t know that dementia is not just a simple problem of “grandma cannot think” any longer. People can sometimes go on for years holding dolls, talking about Santa and the Easter Bunny, etc. However, there comes a point when it also starts to impact the throat muscles and the basic immune system… all those changes tend to happen at the same time. This means that its not just that Grandma thinks she is 5 again, she won’t be able to eat, and her body is far less resistant to many diseases. There is a high incidence of death from pneumonia in dementia patients, partially because when the muscles don’t work, the food can wind up going down the wrong tube, but also because the patient’s body is just far less resistant to illnesses. Understanding that makes a difference in how most people view care and treatment. Unfortunately, what often happens, absent a living will, is that the family that is near to the patient and who see the patient will have talked to the doctors, come to reluctantly understand that, well, their mother is just plain dying and there is really little to be done to lengthen the life, but definitely not to improve their living status. But, then in comes Johnny from across the country and he has not had the time to learn and understand, likely feels guilty for not paying attention earlier, is likely somewhat shocked by the state of his mother (“those damn nursing home people – neglecting my MOM!!!!!!” ). The people who live there know that “mom” is half (or fully) out of her mind, forgets that she ate, forgets that she cannot eat most things, etc… but “Johnny” just comes and hears his mother complain about the staff and the food and when the doctor comes in and says “maybe doing this advanced surgery (or fancy new medicine, etc.) is really not a good idea … HE thinks “oh these idiots just don’t care about mom!”.

Anyway, I see this over and over. There is a guy where I work who can basically eat nothing but hamburgers. They try to offer options, but he needs to eat with his hands, etc…. (not going into the full rundown, of course). There is another who complains that his food is “boring”… well, he is on a cardiac, renal, no sugar diet, AND is a picky eater besides! Both of these people are on “suicide watch”. (there are some other issues, but I don’t want to be too specific). Yet, if family comes in and says “oh grandpa has a tumor… get it treated” and maybe get him some counseling. Is that the “correct” decision? The ideal would be if they had thought this out and made their own decisions before they were too far along to be considered competent.

THOSE are the types of situations I am talking about that need to be discussed. I am not suggesting euthanasia. I can understand why some people might think that is a good option, but it is not one with which I am personally comfortable, BUT… I also don’t think that extraordinary measures should be taken to preserve the life of someone who is in that kind of state, not unless they have very clearly said that is what they want. Legally, though, doctors often have little choice.
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Re: Liberty VS ObamaCare: Back to Supreme Court

Postby Night Strike on Tue Mar 19, 2013 1:50 pm

PLAYER57832 wrote:UNLESS... it is women's care, because according to you, that's not really health care.

AND forget end of life decisions. Only the Roman Catholic Church and their cronies get to make those decisions!


The government shouldn't be involved in any of it, nor should individuals be able to force someone else to pay for their medical costs.

Metsfanmax wrote:Do you believe we should rescind the rule requiring an emergency room to treat everyone who shows up there while seriously ill?


Yes. Emergency rooms should be there to stabilize individuals who have a true emergency, not nurse someone back to full health. In no other industry is a person allowed to go in and demand services without paying for them.
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