Preface: Today California government employee unions get cushy expensive medical insurance provided by PERS-Care, which entails choice of their doctor and high quality medical care. Because a Democratic Party governor appears to be a shoe-in for upcoming gubernatorial election, and California already has an all-Democratic controlled legislature, California is likely to end up with what is called a "Single-Payer" health insurance system. A Republican governor would no longer be in power to veto legislation.
This would mean the end of the expensive and high quality medical care for those in government unions!!! Aren't all you union members, showing up in droves like lemmings running to the sea at Congressional Townhall meetings fighting for a "Single-Payer" health system, happy? You're going to get what you wanted and likely very soon here in California.
This will cause more highly competent physicians to drop Single-Payer covered patients and make their living from privately insured and self-paying patients only. It will likely mean long waiting lines for medical care. And it will likely mean that you will end up with a second class doctor who was passed through medical school based on affirmative action as your doctor. Aren't you happy?!! You unions are so smart. Congratulations.
Now read Chris Reed's blog excerpt below from the San Diego Union how this is likely to happen.
Chris Reed - San Diego Union
Millions of Californians are already worried about the prospect of
increased government control of their health insurance if the president
gets his way on his health system overhaul. But maybe they should be
even more worried -- because if we have a Democratic governor to go
along with a Democratic majority Legislature starting in January 2011,
we could very well end up with a single-payer system of government
health care akin to Canada and Britain after all.
How come? Because Rep. Dennis Kucinich's amendment to the main health overhaul bill to to give states the option of creating single-payer health-care systems looks like it has a good chance of being adopted. On July 17, the House Committee on Education and Labor voted 25-19 to approve the amendment.
Allowing states to try single-payer is an easy way for Obama to mollify liberal Democrats who think his proposal is too modest. They believe that if states got a chance to go to single-payer, the results would be far superior to Obama's much more complicated approach and would show the need for a national single-payer system.
The health overhaul is so complex that this angle has been given little attention. But it deserves more. The California Nurses Association, among other special interests, is eager to renew its long push for single payer. The Legislature has twice backed single-payer in recent years, only to have the bills vetoed by Arnold.
What would this mean for California if there was no longer a GOP gov to veto the measure and Congress gave states the option of pursuing it?
Here's the benign description former state Sen. Sheila Kuehl, the leader of the single-payer push, offers for such a system:
A single payer system for California, as developed in my bills and, now, in SB 810, establishes a universal health insurance system that provides every California resident with comprehensive benefits for life; puts your premiums, based on a small percentage of your income and, for employers, a percentage of payroll, with no co-pays or deductibles, directly into healthcare spending; allows you to choose your own doctors, hospitals, dentists, eye care providers, and other medical services, without limiting you to a network; ensures the best use of your money by cutting the current 25% private companies now spend for overhead to just 5%; and, through rewarding excellence and sharing efficiencies and best practices, ensures patient-centered, good quality health care for all Californians. You can't lose the insurance if you lose or change your job. You won't be turned down. The plan is fully funded with the money we already spend on health care, which, last year, combining state, federal, local and all premiums, co-pays, deductibles and out of pocket expenses, totaled more than 200 billion dollars. The bill eliminates wasteful insurance overhead, invests in electronic infrastructure that improves quality while reducing cost, emphasizes prevention and primary health care, and utilizes California's purchasing power to realize savings on prescriptions and durable medical equipment.
That's not how single-payer is working in our northern neighbor. Dr. James Gratzer, a Toronto physician and author, says single-payer in Canada has proven an increasingly unpopular, heavily rationed disaster.
The head of trauma care at Vancouver's largest hospital announces that they turn away more cases than any other center in North America. He's quoted as saying this would be unheard of in the United States.
In Manitoba, which is my former home province, the premier--the political equivalent of a governor--concedes that his pledge to end hallway medicine has fallen short. Hallway medicine is the phenomenon where the emergency rooms are so filled with patients that people are forced to lie on stretchers in hallways, often for days. Overcrowding is a periodic problem. In fact, the overcrowding is worse than last year. The community is rocked by the death of a 74-year old man who had waited in the emergency room for three hours and had not been seen.
New Brunswick announces that they will send cancer patients south to the United States for radiation therapy. New Brunswick, a small maritime province, is the seventh to publicly announce its plans to send patients south. In the best health care system in the world, the vast majority of provinces now rely on American health care to provide radiation therapy. Provinces do this because the clinically recommended waiting time for treatment is often badly exceeded. Ordinarily, oncologists suggest that there should be a two-week gap between the initial consult by the family doctor and the referral to the oncologist, and then two weeks more from the oncologist to the commencement of radiation therapy. In most Canadian provinces, we exceed that by one to two months, sometimes three.
In Alberta earlier this year, a young man dies because of the profound emergency room overcrowding. He is 23. On a winter's night, he develops pain in his flank and goes to the local emergency room. It is so crowded that he grows impatient and goes to another. There, he waits six hours. No one sees him. Exhausted and frustrated, he goes home. The pain continues, so he finally decides to go to the local community hospital. It's too late: His appendix ruptured. He dies from the complications hours later.
Kratzer notes polls show 78 percent of Canadians think they're health-care system is "in crisis." He also tells the story of how it's easier for animals to get MRIs than humans in some provinces, leading one man to make an appointment as "Spot."
Here's the current version of Kuehl's bill.http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/postquery?bill_number=sb_810&sess=CUR&house=B&author=leno Note that its co-authors include Senate President Darrell Steinberg and Assembly Speaker Karen Bass.
AAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!
Posted by: Liz | August 13, 2009 at 10:26 PM