From: covici@ccs.covici.com (John Covici)
Newsgroups: misc.handicap
Subject: The Life Threatening Reality of Clinton's Health Reform
Date: 16 Nov 92 22:11:08 GMT
Reply-To: covici@ccs.covici.com (John Covici)
Organization: Covici Computer Systems
Originator: wtm@sheldev.shel.isc-br.com

Index Number: 25621

THE LIFE-THREATENING REALITY BEHIND CLINTON'S HEALTH REFORM
PLAN

CLUB OF LIFE by Linda Everett President-elect Bill Clinton made
lots of promises on the campaign trail about guaranteeing health
care for everyone.  But with each promise came the unvarnished
statement that his proposal ``saves the most'' money.
And the savings will come from gutting you and your family's
health care or Medicare or Medicaid--and much more. Clinton's
plan ``will tightly contain costs so that they rise no faster
than wages.'' So, as U.S. wages plummet to Third World levels
(thanks among other things to Clinton's support for NAFTA) we're
thrown back to Dark Age medicine.
First, Clinton would have a committee cap national and state
health care budgets to limit all public and private costs. The
artificial cap has nothing to do with our country's medical
needs. It does not address the 39 million uninsured and 15 million
underinsured families. Many of these people are uninsured because
they were {denied} coverage due to chronic or pre-existing problems,
and they need significant treatment.
Clinton's ``managed competition'' would have states dictate
the maximum which a doctor, insurer, hospital, or clinic would
receive for meeting all the health needs of one person. Like
health mantainance organizations (HMOs), when a provider spends
more than the flat rate or capitation fee allowed per patient,
it loses money.  Clinton says this ``incentive'' helps doctors
``reduce bureaucracy, eliminate duplicative technology, and
stop waste.'' Like HMOs and their hybrids, PPOs, IPOs, etc.,
managed care stresses preventive care, and financially rewards
doctors {not} to refer you for costly tests or specialists--exactly
the things that are needed in chronic or life-threatening conditions.
Kickbacks are illegal for doctors in traditional medicine but,
in managed care, they become ``incentives''! And Clinton says
he'll stop fraud? That {is} fraud.
-  `Managed Care' Kills - We'll never know how many people
were harmed or killed when denied care in managed plans, but
we do know that rigid cost-containment and managed care policies
contributed to soaring medical malpractice suits in the 1980s.
Yet, Clinton's tort reform plans more ``savings'' by cutting
out even more ``unnecessary tests.'' His reforms protect doctors
only if they adhere to ``approved'' national treatment protocols.
Since insurers are required by the Clinton package to provide
only basic primary benefits, it is unlikely the guidelines will
allow life-saving treatments (called ``futile care'') for those
who'll ``die soon anyway''--exactly the people who need life-saving
treatment!
Clinton's plan hinges on ``managed competition'' and forces
hospitals and doctors into cutthroat competition to undercut
the actual costs of providing services. This will devastate
already overburdened, understaffed hospitals, forcing more time
to be spent, not on treating patients, but on justifying every
aspect of prescribed care to the managed care industry. The
industry itself shifts billions of dollars out of health care
into management.
Employers, given tax credits, are required to insure employees,
buying from private insurers or publicly sponsored purchasing
groups that pool together small businesses and individuals to
buy private coverage.  Such groups will provide coverage and
sliding-scale premiums for nonworkers and people on Medicaid.
-  Abuse of the Elderly - Clinton promises more care for the
elderly and disabled, by scrapping the Health Care Financing
Administration which oversees Medicare. But his plan to subject
all non-managed-care insurance payments to budgetary limits
will drive even more doctors out of treating Medicare patients.
Some doctors can no longer {afford} to treat only people on
Medicare now.
And, where are all those ``unnecessary'' Medicare services he'll
cut to provide rehabilitative services for the elderly and the
disabled? His promises are cruelest here, striking at the hopes
of the elderly and disabled, who have historically been simply
{abused} by many for-profit and other managed programs.
If aspects of Clinton's plan sound okay, like open enrollment
and insurance premiums based on a community rate, ask yourself:
How can you win in the context of a plan which is geared to
cut use of medical services, and is willing to do so at the
sacrifice of human life?

From New Federalist, V6, #43.

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         John Covici
          covici@ccs.covici.com