“”I appreciate the dialog as well. It's nice to know that peopple can disagree without being called a racist nutjob.

Medicare unfunded liability is nearly $89 TRILLION. That's 89 million billions of dollars. It is on a path to bankrupt our economy and has served as getting the camels nose under the tent. By increasing its scope and the # of people in that (or similar) system will only serve to increase those costs. Let's not double-down on a bad idea, lest that camel get all the way into the tent and we'd be totally effed.

As I said before, I'm all about increasing access to insurance for people who do not have it, but when the govt increases it's control over anything, it increases control over our lives. Anytime govt gives you something, they can either take it away or use it as leverage to get you to do what “they”want you to do.

A third party payer system is one where doctors and insurance companies negotiate prices, the consumer never fully understands the cost and therefore is a wasteful and ignorant consumer. What was originally intended as a way to offset the financial risk of catastrophic events has been perverted into a system where insurance is supposed to pay for every minor bump and bruise. Imagine how much car insurance would cost if it covered every repair your car every needed? By removing that direct cost from the consumer onto someone else, people would consume MUCH more autocare, demand would increase dramatically and the cost for an oil change might be in the hundreds of dollars. That's what happened to our health insurance system when people lost track of the actual costs of the services they demand.

The polls you find on NPR and other places refer to the AMA, which represents only about 18% of doctors. When asked if they would leave their practice if govt cuts Medicare payments (as a way to pay for public option) 45% of doctors said they would consider quitting. Public option would INCREASE consumption while decreaing supply. Any Econ 101 student knows that will lead to shortages, longer waits, reduced quality and high costs. It's basic economics.

I say we can pass laws that removes exclusion for pre-existing conditions and ends caps of coverage through the private market. The Dems plan only serves to increase the intrusion into our lives, and given their inability to serve us very well, expanding their role in my life is unacceptable to me.”

any feedback appreciated and will be passed on

We are especially interested in seeing H.R. 676 become the law. This would extend Medicare to all U.S. residents, allowing all of us to receive high-quality, affordable health care from the physicians whom we, and not the insurance carriers, choose. Yes, we fervently support a single-payer system.

Every day we have seen private insurance companies take advantage of their insured. Private insurers have become increasingly more inventive in denying payment for legitimate medical claims as they continue to raise premiums, deductibles, and co-pays. And, of course, now, they cherry pick just exactly whom they will insure.

So it has become a fact of life that physicians have been treating more and more long-standing patients without compensation. And when patients do come in for care, they are much sicker, often requiring a more prolonged course of treatment.

And every day, as more and more patients lose their health care benefits, insurance carriers continue to rake in unconscionable profits.

It saddens us that those members of Congress who most loudly decry the public option have no problem accepting a public option for themselves and for their families. How do they have the temerity to deny to their constituents that which they so readily take for themselves?

The public option.
For every American.
Just like in every other industrialized nation in the world.
And just like our own Congress.

Choice (of public option) is crucial.

Stuart Selkin, MD, JD
Pamela Selkin, Esq.
Melville, New York

There are 47 million Americans uninsured. That’s about 1/6 of the population. When someone who is uninsured gets very sick, they go to the emergency room to get treatment. Often, they are unable to pay, so those costs are eventually subsidized by the government, i.e., taxpayers.

I think it is indisputable that the cost of treatment through an ER is more expensive that preventative care. (I’ll look up the data on this if you want it.)

The public option is not and has never been intended to provide insurance to a majority of Americans. In fact, I think 28% of respondents saying they’d choose it is a surprisingly large number.

Finally, as far as cost, people who already have employer-based insurance won’t see any increase. It’s likely they’ll see a financial benefit from it because the whole reform package will lower health care costs generally. And, the responses you quoted above are answers to questions with flawed premises. Less than 2% of taxpayers nationwide will see any increase in taxes to fund health care reform based on the tri-committee House bill. People opposed to $500, $1000, or any increase in their taxes to cover health care is pretty irrelevant to this discussion.

The Quinnipiac Poll does show that 69% of respondents think there should be a public option, but only if they don’t have to pay for it AND this poll was actually taken toward the end of June, BEFORE a lot of the details had come out. Here are some other results from the same poll:

“Although 69 percent of voters nationwide say Americans should have the option of government- run health insurance, only 28 percent would choose to be covered by it, according to a Quinnipiac University national poll released today. Voters say 49 – 45 percent they would pay more to reform health care, but a total of 72 percent don’t want to pay more than $500 a year.

Voters say 52 – 34 percent that most Americans do not get good value in the cost and quality of health care. But these same voters say 70 – 25 percent that they personally get good value in the cost and quality of their health care.

There seems to be a disconnect between the projected price tag that is being thrown around to overhaul the health care system and how much the vast majority of Americans are willing to pay for it. They don’t mind the rich or business financing it, but they don’t seem all that eager to do it themselves. It does raise questions about whether the American people understand the financial enormity of what is under consideration.”

At the end of the day, people have decent health care but have been told that most other people don’t. Either way, they had no interest in paying for the government to run the health care system and this was before they found out how screwed up it would be.

The polling data isn’t irrelevant. Qunnipiac’s poll of July 2009 shows 69% support. That’s not a year ago – that’s last month.

And new polls have different questions that have been changed to change the results. See this post at HCAN’s blog.

We agree that health care reform may not be politically convenient – but when has any worthwhile reform been? The fact is that 47 million Americans are uninsured, millions more are underinsured, and we’ve been waiting for 60 years for something to be done about it.

The issue is far from dead.