health care

Ezra Klein highlights a Kaiser Family Foundation report that discusses health care inflation:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2009/09/a_number_is_worth_a_...

He observes that the average cost of a family health insurance policy in 2009 was $13,375, and has grown at a rate nearly four times faster than wages. If we continue on the current trajectory, a family policy in 2019 will cost between $24,000-30,000. It's hard to get one's mind around these numbers.

Health reform naysayers must be challenged about how they expect to reign in such health care inflation without significant reform. And, Blue Dog Democrats and fellow travelers must be asked how they plan to contain costs without a public option. I understand and respect that for many, the prospect of change looks scary. To me, the possibility of staying the course looms even scarier.

The following article is coming out in this week's New England Journal of Medicine:

http://healthcarereform.nejm.org/?p=1790

In a nationally representative random sample of physicians, 73% stated support for a public insurance option (63%) or single-payer healthcare (10%). The people on the front line of delivering health care, who have potentially the most to be concerned about in terms of income, practice freedom and so forth, are overwhelmingly in favor of a public option. This is really quite extraordinary and needs to be disseminated far and wide.

What a long way we've come since the days when the AMA tried to kill Medicare by calling it socialism (sound familiar?) and did help kill the Clinton health care plan.

As in all things, true reform will start at home.

Specifically, I am talking about health care reform, and the practice of classifying domestic violence as a pre-existing condition.

Update - Today (9/15) my outrage just went from a 9 on a 10 point scale to a 15. Follow below for the update.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0910/p09s03-coop.html is an interesting article providing insight into possibilities for states such as Vermont and California to consider single-payer health care plans in order to save their state budgets. Perhaps such a change could happen in North Carolina as well, if it were touted as a great states' rights agenda piece. And it would save money to boot. Why move north or west? Stay home and make change!

This post at Daily Kos captures my own view of the political world as well as any I've read lately. And it has special relevance in my view for Brad Miller and David Price.

Price and Miller are two bright Congressman I've supported for years. In fact I recently signed on to help sponsor a fundraiser for Miller here in Chapel Hill. Both are usually reliable votes on issues important to me, though each manages to equivocate a bit too much for my taste.

When it comes to the public option, will Price and Miller vote with progressives and hold the line against Sick Inc., or will they take our money and run to a half-assed compromise that mandates profits for Big Insurance without the safety valve of a government-managed plan?

I can't even begin to guess what'll happen, and that's pretty disturbing too.

Obama just gave a great speech on health care. He reassured those who were listening, he showed he is the master of the subject, and he even embraced some ideas the Republicans have used against him. The man really is a conciliator. I hope it works. I did not see Va. Foxx run forward to kiss him like she always did w/ Bush, however... ;-)

I live in NC near Raleigh. My job is in the pharmceutical industry. I work in Cary and don't often leave the office during the work day for much of anything. I bring in my lunch every day and may go out to eat with friends once in a blue moon.

However, some things are really important -- important enough to get me out of my office on a weekday -- so one Thursday several weeks ago I met up with other proponents of a strong public option in America's health insurance reform fight at Kay Hagan's Raleigh office.

So it’s the day of the big speech, Mr. President, and we got trouble with a capital “T” right here in Health Care City.

What are you gonna do? Do we follow the traditional Democratic Party legislative process of passing...something...at any cost, assuming the entire time that the Left and the Netroots will “go along with the program”, or is there a risk that the calculus doesn’t work as well today as it did in 1994 and 1996?

Well, lucky for you, I’m a fake consultant, and I know a few things about your “target market”, so before you answer that question...we need to talk.

We are coming down to the home stretch on healthcare, and we have seen the results of the first couple of rounds of crazy that have been sent forth in an effort to stop the process.

In addition to the Town Halls, opponents are flooding the email inboxes of America’s “low information” voters with no end of lies. Those emails are getting passed around and around and around, and by now some of them have probably appeared in your inbox.

But it’s summer...and who has time to respond to this stuff?

Well, guess what, Gentle Reader: I’ve already done the hard work for you.

Today’s story is an email response that you can send right back to your “inbox friends”. It’s a reminder of some of the frustrations that we all share in this country and some explanations of what’s being proposed...and a few words about socialism, to boot.

So get out there and copy and paste and forward and reply, and let’s see if we can’t fight the madness, one email at a time.