Healthcare Outsider

When the health bill was in its early stages, the word “tea party” referred to a point of historical pride and not a crazed mob, and the public had only begun to froth at the mouth about reform, the Democrats were dealing with some bad press from what may or may not have been actual provisions in the health bill (see: death panels.) The majority party’s apparent solution to the negative image of health care legislation was to include a series of adorable little earmarks in the bill, a few of which we are only finding about now.

Hands down one of the strangest of these is a provision, as reported in the New York Times, to fund the building of bike paths, sidewalks, and playgrounds. The justification for these addenda is apparently that they are part of an initiative to focus more on illness prevention, and exercise is supposedly one of the best ways to achieve this. Don’t these politicians know that playgrounds are only used for bullying, late-night affairs, and narcotics deals?

-Michael B. Sauter

The numbers are in, and it looks like there’s going to be even more coal in the stockings of physicians come Christmas. According to modernhealthcare.com, the Federation of State Medical Boards reports disciplinary action against doctors is up 6% from last year to over 5,700 total cases nationwide. This prompts the question: why this sudden trend? read more »

The New York Times reports that America’s health insurance industry has finally agreed to cover children with pre-existing conditions without dropping them from their families’ plans or forcing them out of coverage with absurd rate hikes. Their sudden divergence from the status quo can only be attributed to the fact that the industry must really, really love children, and have finally recognized what they’ve been doing wrong all these years.

The policy shift certainly couldn’t have anything to do with the new provision in the health care bill that “requires insurance companies to cover children with preexisting conditions.” This seems to be a coincidence at best. Ignore the cynics who scoff that this sudden change of heart – a decision to make the obvious moral choice – would of course only come if the government literally forced them to do it by threatening legal action. These bitter people are missing an important point – these companies truly love children, unconditionally (get it?)

In a statement to the press, Karen Ignagni (President of AHIP) happily broke the news of the industry’s compliance with the new measure in the bill. Ignagni also made a point of clarifying that no, their legal teams haven’t been missing for days because they’re holed up in their offices trying to find every possible loophole they can in order to stop covering children again. She then laughed eerily, turned into a bat, and flew away.

-Michael B. Sauter

As our national health system gears up to enter a post health bill era where we hope to cut costs by reducing inefficiencies in the system, there’s nothing like some good, old-fashioned moral hazard to make it really feel like home again. The New York Times Reports that last month, the FDA approved AstraZeneca’s cholesterol drug Crestor to be used as preventative medicine for people without existing heart problems.

Besides the fact that there are some actual health risks involved with taking the drug on a regular basis (a potential 9% increase in likelihood for type-2 diabetes, for starters) there’s also that boring little problem that people are now going to be picking this stuff up like hotcakes every time their heart skips a beat or they have a mild cardiac arrest. And now that millions more of our paranoid population are going to be covered, thanks to the aforementioned health bill, guess who’s going to be paying for the fact that people will be popping the not-cheap drug like its Aspirin? The taxpayer, that’s who. Thanks, Socialism.

-Michael B. Sauter

After the health care bill passed last week, Attorneys General in 14 mostly Conservative states filed lawsuits intended to show the legislation to be unconstitutionally coercive. Not so in Georgia, where Democratic Attorney General and gubernatorial candidate Thurbert Baker has roundly rejected any such action, despite urgings from angry citizens and lawmakers. Baker’s rationale is that the lawsuits are frivolous and a waste of the state’s valuable time. Now, according to the New York Times, 31 members of the Georgia State Legislature are threatening to impeach the attorney general. It’s as if they’re trying to say “you think THAT’S a frivolous lawsuit!? we’ll show YOU a frivolous lawsuit!”
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So the health care bill has passed. Now what?

Many of the Americans who kept up with the politics of the debate without understanding the actual measures of reform it included are slowly coming to the realization that they actually have no idea what they were so passionately railing against/for. If you’re one of these people, don’t be ashamed (ok, be a little ashamed.) by reading the rest of this post, you can learn, in 60 seconds or less, the essential parts of the bill. CNN lists the five most important elements of the bill for your lazy self to digest while you wait for “Lost” to come back from commercial break:
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Healthcare Outsider’s series on the lesser-known parts of the brand new bill arrives at a newly-instated tax on tanning. CNN reports the legislation includes a law which taxes tanners ten percent for each visit they take to the salon. Why the tax? Evidence suggests that people who use the beds regularly (especially people under the age of 30) nearly double their risk of developing skin cancer. Paying the new tax, and the increased risk of developing melanoma and dying is almost certainly worth paying someone 45 dollars to put you in an oven and make you look like an oompa loompa.

The tanning tax measure is part of a portfolio of minor laws meant to incentivize healthy behavior and reduce medical costs. This also includes a clause which requires restaurant chains to prominently display calorie information.

-Michael B. Sauter

Hidden somewhere in folds of the health bill passed today is a measure which requires most restaurants and fast food chains to prominently display the calorie content of their menu items. To date, Seattle, New York City, and the state of California have imposed similar laws, with mixed results. Now that we’re all going to be covered by the new health care policy, who cares what we eat? [AP]

While we’re on the subject, why stop at calories? There are four other ingredients in food which are costing the health system billions of dollars…

-Michael B. Sauter

Against what appeared at times to be overwhelming odds, president Obama signed the health care bill today. Conservative lawmakers have immediately begun their campaign to repeal the bill before dissatisfied Americans realize that improving health care coverage and regulating private insurance will not, contrary to conventional wisdom, singlehandedly destroy America.

Michelle Bachmann has proposed a formal measure to repeal the infant bill, and Attorneys General in 14 states have filed suit, claiming the portion of the bill which mandates that most Americans have insurance is unconstitutionally coercive. This seems like a reasonable use of their time. Reuters has more.

-Michael B. Sauter

Now that the health care bill seems like it might actually pass, the next question is how we are going to pay for it. While the Congressional budget office suggests the measures will save us billions, estimates for the final cost have been all over the place. Regardless of how much we finally save, the government is still going to spend billions of dollars expanding Medicaid coverage and providing subsidies for employers. Our options are to continue piling on to our already colossal debt, or to find some other way to pay for it. Here is one suggestion…
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