Premiums Up, Choices Down: The First Wave of Obamacare

by Elizabeth Lee Vliet, M.D.

Kaiser Family Foundation just released further bad news about the poorly named Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”). American families facing a bad economy, high unemployment, and crashing home values now get hit with another cost increase: higher health insurance premiums that are rising more every year.

Obama’s campaign focused on “hope and change,” but I suspect these winds of “change” are ones that most Americans did not “hope” for, did not want, and would like to escape.

Look at the bleak facts:

In 2011, the annual health insurance premium for a family of four was pushed above $15,000 for the first time ever.

The 2011 annual health insurance premium was 31% higher than 2006, and 113% higher than in 2001.

Health insurance premiums were 9% higher in 2011 than in 2010. And the media says there is no inflation? Did your income go up 9% from 2010 to 2011? Not for the vast majority of Americans!

Hurricane Irene wreaked visible damage all along the Eastern seaboard this fall. The damage from Obamacare’s extensive new mandates and regulations is less visible, but no less damaging to individuals, families, businesses, and our overall economy. At least we had warning that Hurricane Irene was coming and could take steps to prepare and protect ourselves. But we were falsely promised that the hurricane named Obamacare would lower costs, improve access to health insurance, and “protect patients.” Even in this earliest stage, with only a fraction of the mandates implemented, we are seeing massive damage.

Obamacare advocates like to blame the “greedy” insurance companies. But most of the blame for higher premiums is directly caused by the Obamacare first wave of mandates and regulations.

As of the fall of 2010, all insurance policies must:

keep adult “children” up to age 26 on parents’ policies,
provide “free” preventive care and screenings for everyone
cover pre-existing medical conditions for children

Adding this coverage unavoidably means the policy will have to cost more.

Obamacare regulations already control practically every decision a private insurance company can make. It is only going to get worse as government “medicrats” micromanage every single aspect of insurance coverage.

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Milwaukee spent nearly $800,000 on Viagra for teachers

by Susan Donaldson James

Two years ago, the Milwaukee school district decided that it was more interested in enhancing teacher performance in the classroom than the bedroom.

The district cut Viagra and other erectile dysfunction drugs like Cialis and Levitra from its health insurance plan, hoping to save $786,000 a year.

Officials said too many teachers were using the expensive drugs for recreation, swelling their insurance rates. An estimated 1,000 of the 10,000 school's staff, which includes employees, dependents and retirees, were using the drugs.

Now, teachers are fighting to get the benefit back with a lawsuit. The Milwaukee Teachers' Education Association (MTEA) argues that the new policy discriminates unfairly against men and "creates barriers" to receiving necessary medical treatment.

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Health Care Law Unlikely to Fulfill Promises

Medicare Actuary Doubts Health Care Law

Will Hold Down Costs

by The Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- Two of the central promises of President Barack Obama's health care overhaul law are unlikely to be fulfilled, Medicare's independent economic expert told Congress on Wednesday.

The landmark legislation probably won't hold costs down, and it won't let everybody keep their current health insurance if they like it, Chief Actuary Richard Foster told the House Budget Committee. His office is responsible for independent long-range cost estimates.

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Following the Money, Doctors Ration Care

by Tyler Cowen

Unequal access to health care is hardly a new phenomenon in the United States, but the country is moving toward rationing on a scale that is unprecedented here. Wealthy people will always be able to buy most of what they want. But for everyone else, if we stay on the current course, the lines are likely to get longer and longer.

The underlying problem is that doctors are reimbursed at different rates, depending on whether they see a patient with private insurance, Medicare or Medicaid. As demand increases relative to supply, many doctors are likely to turn away patients whose coverage would pay the lower rates.

Let’s see how this works. Medicare is the major federal health program for the elderly, who vote at high rates and are politically influential, and so it is relatively well financed. Medicaid, which serves poorer people, is paid for partly by state governments, and the poor have less political clout than the elderly, so it is less well financed. Depending on the state and on the malady, it is common for Medicaid to reimburse at only 40 percent to 80 percent the rate of Medicare. Private insurance pays more than either.

A result is that physicians often make Medicaid patients wait or refuse to see them altogether. Medicare patients are also beginning to face lines, as doctors increasingly prefer patients with private insurance.

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Spending is Substantially Lower Under Private Insurance

by Chris Fleming

Whether Medicare or private insurance pays for health care appears to make a significant difference in health spending variation, according to a study by Luisa Franzini of the University of Texas Health Science Center (UTHealth) and coauthors, published today in the December issue of Health Affairs. The study, a follow-up to a highly publicized 2009 New Yorker article by Atul Gawande, shows that in two Texas cities, sharp differences in Medicare’s per-capita health care spending were significantly diminished when private insurance paid the bill.

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Union Drops Health Coverage for Workers’ Children

by Yuliya Chernova

One of the largest union-administered health-insurance funds in New York is dropping coverage for the children of more than 30,000 low-wage home attendants, union officials said. The union blamed financial problems it said were caused by the state’s health department and new national health-insurance requirements.

The fund is administered by 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union. Union officials said the state compelled the fund to start buying coverage from a third party, which increased premiums by 60%. State health officials denied forcing the union fund to make the switch, saying the fund had been struggling financially even before the switch to third-party coverage.

The fund informed its members late last month that their dependents will no longer be covered as of Jan. 1, 2011. Currently about 6,000 children are covered by the benefit fund.

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Obama murdered Medicare

by Thomas R. Saving and John C. Goodman

The health care reform law enacted in spring will have a devastating impact on elderly and disabled Medicare enrollees if its provisions are not substantially changed.

The law creates a new mechanism to reduce the rate of increase in Medicare payments to doctors and hospitals. As a result, Medicare payments will fall below Medicaid rates before the end of this decade, and they will fall increasingly behind the rates paid by all other payers in succeeding decades.

To appreciate what that means, consider that Medicare currently pays about 20 percent below what private insurance pays. At those rates, hospitals lose money on Medicare patients. Under the spending cuts called for in the Affordable Care Act (ACA), payments will get worse in the future.

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Does your faith free you from forced Obamacare?

Why Amish won't have to purchase insurance,

but Muslims will cry foul

by Drew Zahn

The recent health-care reform legislation carries a controversial mandate that all Americans obtain health insurance, but careful study of the passed law reveals there are some groups – the Amish, for example – that can obtain an exemption.

For devout Muslims, however, whose religious beliefs forbid purchasing insurance, the mandate is still binding, religion or not. And most other religious, political or conscientious objectors will similarly find themselves out of luck if they hope to be excused from the requirement.

There is a clause in the fine print, however, that could provide an out for those willing to take it.

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Health Insurers Plan Hikes

by Janet Adamy

Health insurers say they plan to raise premiums for some Americans as a direct result of the health overhaul in coming weeks, complicating Democrats' efforts to trumpet their signature achievement before the midterm elections.

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