Proven Reform: After healthcare reform in Mass, costs now HIGHEST in nation!

[KingCondanomation]

This is by far the best article I have read on what healthcare reform has actually done so far.
Wasn't this so called "reform" that we are going so deep into debt for, supposed to reduce healthcare costs? As if that isn't bad enough, there is people gaming the system with only insuring themselves when they need it, healthcare providers are all losing money and they will have to make cuts, meanwhile waiting times are increasing and there is a doctor shortage.
In short they have all the same problems that plague universal healthcare systems that exist elsewhere.

Lastly hopefully we can all also see that Mitt Romney is a FAKE conservative.

"Former Massachusetts governor and likely 2012 presidential aspirant Mitt Romney has been on the wrong side of the defining political battle of our time.

Mr. Romney claimed earlier this month on "Fox News Sunday" that the Massachusetts health reform plan he signed into law in 2006 is "the ultimate conservative plan." But there are many similarities between it and the ObamaCare loathed by conservative voters.

Both have an individual mandate requiring most residents to have health insurance or pay a penalty. Most businesses are required to participate or pay a fine. Both rely on government-designed purchasing exchanges that also provide a platform to control private health insurance. Many of the uninsured are covered through Medicaid expansion and others receive subsidies for highly-prescriptive policies. And the apparatus requires a plethora of new government boards and agencies.

While it's true that the liberal Massachusetts legislature did turn Mr. Romney's plan to the left, his claims that his plan is "entirely different" will not stand up to the intense scrutiny of a presidential campaign, especially a primary challenge. Mr. Romney needs to be more honest about his Massachusetts experiment and its failings.

Mr. Romney insisted in a recent interview on "Fox News Sunday" that "our plan is working well," and he defended his state's right to create its own plan. He also said in his book "No Apology" that because of the plan everyone in Massachusetts now has access to "portable, affordable health insurance." Not exactly.

While Massachusetts' uninsured rate has dropped to around 3%, 68% of the newly insured since 2006 receive coverage that is heavily or completely subsidized by taxpayers. While Mr. Romney insisted that everyone should pay something for coverage, that is not the way his plan has turned out. More than half of the 408,000 newly insured residents pay nothing, according to a February 2010 report by the Massachusetts Health Connector, the state's insurance exchange.

Another 140,000 remained uninsured in 2008 and were either assessed a penalty or exempted from the individual mandate because the state deemed they couldn't afford the premiums.

Mr. Romney's promise that getting everyone covered would force costs down also is far from being realized. One third of state residents polled by Harvard researchers in a study published in "Health Affairs" in 2008 said that their health costs had gone up as a result of the 2006 reforms. A typical family of four today faces total annual health costs of nearly $13,788, the highest in the country. Per capita spending is 27% higher than the national average.

The state's stubbornly high health costs are partly the result of intrusive government regulations that stifle competition in the insurance market and strict mandates on what services insurance must cover. A 2008 study by the Massachusetts Division of Health Care Finance and Policy found that the state's most expensive insurance mandates cost patients more than $1 billion between July 2004 and July 2005. The Massachusetts health reform law left all of them in place.

Further, insurance companies are required to sell "just-in-time" policies even if people wait until they are sick to buy coverage. That's just like the Obama plan. There is growing evidence that many people are gaming the system by purchasing health insurance when they need surgery or other expensive medical care, then dropping it a few months later.

Some Massachusetts safety-net hospitals that treat a disproportionate number of lower-income and uninsured patients are threatening bankruptcy. They still are treating a large number of people without health insurance, but the payments they receive for uncompensated care have been cut under the reform deal.

The Bay State is also suffering from what the Massachusetts Medical Society calls a "critical shortage" of primary-care physicians. As one would expect, expanded insurance has caused an increase in demand for medical services. But there hasn't been a corresponding increase in the number of doctors. As a result, many patients are insured in name only: They have health coverage but can't find a doctor.

Fifty-six percent of Massachusetts internal medicine physicians no longer are accepting new patients, according to a 2009 physician work-force study conducted by the Massachusetts Medical Society. For new patients who do get an appointment with a primary-care doctor, the average waiting time is 44 days, the Medical Society found.

As Dr. Sandra Schneider, the vice president of the American College of Emergency Physicians, told the Boston Globe last April, "Just because you have insurance doesn't mean there's a [primary care] physician who can see you."

The difficulties in getting primary care have led to an increasing number of patients who rely on emergency rooms for basic medical services. Emergency room visits jumped 7% between 2005 and 2007. Officials have determined that half of those added ER visits didn't actually require immediate treatment and could have been dealt with at a doctor's office—if patients could have found one.

Mr. Romney insists that in Massachusetts, "We didn't do what President Obama's doing, which is putting controls on our system of premiums for private insurance companies."

But that is what's happening now: Faced with soaring medical expenses, Gov. Deval Patrick, Mr. Romney's successor, wants to cap insurance rate increases at 4.8%, not the 8% to 32% increases the companies have requested for April 1. Three of the four major health insurers in Massachusetts showed operating losses for 2009. If their rates are capped, they say they'll be forced to cut payments to health providers, putting further pressure on doctors and fragile hospitals."
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...871093652.html

What a clusterfuck...and we want to do this to the rest of the nation?!?

[Jarod]

You mean the Romney plan?

Your likely nominee for President in 2012's plan?

[PostmodernProphet]

One third of state residents polled by Harvard researchers in a study published in "Health Affairs" in 2008 said that their health costs had gone up as a result of the 2006 reforms. A typical family of four today faces total annual health costs of nearly $13,788, the highest in the country. Per capita spending is 27% higher than the national average.

ouch.....

[KingCondanomation]

You mean the Romney plan?

Your likely nominee for President in 2012's plan?

HAhaha right on man great point!
You see everyone, because the same shit will pass under the name of Obama rather than Romney there is a magical spell cast which will ensure that none of the bad things that happened will happen again!

Actually it's worse, at least when Mass passed it, businesses and people could flee to other states, now some will leave the country or just go out of business.
Just do me a favor and slap every Dem politician's face who keeps saying their priority is "creating jobs".

[KingCondanomation]

ouch.....

Yeah no kidding, the Dems on here are children and acting like this is a game, this is real hardship not just what it will cost but that everyone now faces long wait times for healthcare.
Pay more, get less.

[Jarod]

HAhaha right on man great point!
You see everyone, because the same shit will pass under the name of Obama rather than Romney there is a magical spell cast which will ensure that none of the bad things that happened will happen again!

Actually it's worse, at least when Mass passed it, businesses and people could flee to other states, now some will leave the country or just go out of business.
Just do me a favor and slap every Dem politician's face who keeps saying their priority is "creating jobs".

1) The plans are very different.
2) Your numbers are wrong re: Mass.
3) Funny how the Republicans love Rommney but hate Obama.

[KingCondanomation]

1) The plans are very different.
2) Your numbers are wrong re: Mass.
3) Funny how the Republicans love Rommney but hate Obama.

1. You obviously did not read the article, it goes over the similarities and if you did then point out HOW they are different.

2. My numbers are not even mine, they are taken directly from reports from the state. You have different numbers?

3. I agree with you on this slightly, I don't think they love Romney but he has lied about being a real Conservative and playing like he is one and some have fallen for that. Hopefully less will now but this is a strawman and you are only really attacking on this because you hope to avoid answering the harder part.

[Bonestorm]

ouch.....

The most interesting thing about that quote is what the author is not telling you. Let's take it a step at a time:

One third of state residents polled by Harvard researchers in a study published in "Health Affairs" in 2008 said that their health costs had gone up as a result of the 2006 reforms.

The first thing that should jump out a discerning reader is in bold. The author is exclusively relying on poll data to get the reader to believe that health care costs have gone up as a result of the reforms. Let's take a look at the Helath Affairs press release on the study:

In the first year after implementation of the reforms, the financial burden of health care on individuals dropped significantly across a number of measures, particularly for lower-income adults. While some of the gains in affordability persisted in fall 2008, the shares of adults reporting problems paying medical bills and problems with medical debt had moved back toward 2006 levels as health care costs continued to increase. Furthermore, by fall 2008, the share of lower-income adults with out-of-pocket spending of 10 percent or more of income was no longer significantly different from pre-reform levels, although higher-income and all residents reported no increase in out-of-pocket costs. Despite this, Massachusetts adults, including low-income adults, were no more likely to report having an unmet need for care due to cost, and the declines in unmet health care needs due to cost from 2006 to 2007 were sustained.

So the fact of the matter is that (1) costs to individuals dropped significantly in the immediate aftermath of the reforms; (2) while health care costs have increased since then, they remain at about pre-reform levels and, most importantly the reforms have resulted in a continued decline in unmet health care need due to cost. In short, while the polls show one thing, the facts show another. Why didn't the author of the Wall Street Journal op-ed tell us that?

A typical family of four today faces total annual health costs of nearly $13,788, the highest in the country. Per capita spending is 27% higher than the national average.

The first thing that should jump out at a discerning reader here is that the author does not tell where she is getting these numbers. As a result, it is impossible to check the veracity of what she is claiming. What we do know, is that the Health Affairs study that this very same author relies on has found quite different results as detailed above. Given that, I'm not willing to accept the unsourced figures she is trotting out because a study that she apparently finds credible has found contrary results.


http://www.healthaffairs.org/press/mayjun0906.htm

[KingCondanomation]

The most interesting thing about that quote is what the author is not telling you. Let's take it a step at a time:



The first thing that should jump out a discerning reader is in bold. The author is exclusively relying on poll data to get the reader to believe that health care costs have gone up as a result of the reforms. Let's take a look at the Helath Affairs press release on the study:



So the fact of the matter is that (1) costs to individuals dropped significantly in the immediate aftermath of the reforms; (2) while health care costs have increased since then, they remain at about pre-reform levels and, most importantly the reforms have resulted in a continued decline in unmet health care need due to cost. In short, while the polls show one thing, the facts show another. Why didn't the author of the Wall Street Journal op-ed tell us that?



The first thing that should jump out at a discerning reader here is that the author does not tell where she is getting these numbers. As a result, it is impossible to check the veracity of what she is claiming. What we do know, is that the Health Affairs study that this very same author relies on has found quite different results as detailed above. Given that, I'm not willing to accept the unsourced figures she is trotting out because a study that she apparently finds credible has found contrary results.


http://www.healthaffairs.org/press/mayjun0906.htm

So basically your counterargument rests on hoping "Conservative" Harvard is falsifying results over people who really didn't incur more costs?

Of course the costs went down for lower income people, I already pointed out that many of them pay nothing and rely on taxes from the rest of us.
You are just cherry-picking facts out of a report.

You also lie and pretend that all her facts came from this source. You want another source, see figure 1 in this link, it backs up exactly what she said:
http://www.commonwealthfund.org/~/me...ted_tables.pdf

[Bonestorm]

So basically your counterargument rests on hoping "Conservative" Harvard is falsifying results over people who really didn't incur more costs?

Of course the costs went down for lower income people, I already pointed out that many of them pay nothing and rely on taxes from the rest of us. You are just cherry-picking facts out of a report.

No, I'm merely saying that it is disingenuous to rely on poll responses when actual data is available.

You also lie and pretend that all her facts came from this source. You want another source, see figure 1 in this link, it backs up exactly what she said:
http://www.commonwealthfund.org/~/me...ted_tables.pdf

I'm not lying at all. I'm saying that I have no idea where her numbers came from since she cites to no source at all for the figures she provides. The report that you link to doesn't tell the whole story since it exclusively looks at employer sponsored plans and in Massachusetts there are lots of people that have state-sponsored insurance so the report excludes the low end of insurance premiums to get those skewed results.

The most interesting thing from the report you cite to is the fact that Massachusetts has one of the lowest premiums as a percentage of per capita income in the country.

[FUCK THE POLICE]

Per capita spending is 27% higher than the national average.

1. B/C MA is such a rich state, they would obviously have higher spending.

2. Covering everyone would obviously cause per capita costs to go up. A more relevant statistic would be average health insurance prices.

[FUCK THE POLICE]

And 70% of MA voters want to keep the reform.

[FUCK THE POLICE]

Massachusetts' uninsured rate has dropped to around 3%

A relevant quote.

Fifty-six percent of Massachusetts internal medicine physicians no longer are accepting new patients, according to a 2009 physician work-force study conducted by the Massachusetts Medical Society. For new patients who do get an appointment with a primary-care doctor, the average waiting time is 44 days, the Medical Society found.

As Dr. Sandra Schneider, the vice president of the American College of Emergency Physicians, told the Boston Globe last April, "Just because you have insurance doesn't mean there's a [primary care] physician who can see you."

And so, at worst, you have healthcare rationed at random rather than healthcare rationed by income.

Anyway, market forces are probably going to drive more doctors into the state. MORE people are probably getting coverage.

[PostmodernProphet]

the numbers you bolded are the "out of pocket" expenses.....what about what insurers paid, employers paid, government paid, premiums, taxes?......