tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-43052682944315978172024-02-20T15:29:06.682-08:00The Health Care Morassthe United States' health care system and how to fix itDeirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.comBlogger80125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-88302422060743853002010-08-20T11:02:00.000-07:002010-08-20T11:12:26.881-07:00Dose of Reality: Teamsters Tango with Alaska Regional HospitalIn <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality36.html">the latest</a> in his <a href="http://healthcaremorass.blogspot.com/2010/07/double-dose-wells-fargo-and-alaska.html">investigation of Wells Fargo, the State of Alaska, and the sudden status of a for-profit hospital as preferred provider,</a> Davis delves in to Alaska Regional Hospital's history. <blockquote>…the present hospital was actually built and owned by Teamsters Union Local 959 in 1976. It is easily understandable why the hospital’s website does not dwell on this chapter of its history that took place during pipeline construction days.<br /><br />The era of construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, 1973 to 1977, was a wild time in Alaska, and during that period the Alaska portion of the Teamsters Union, Local 959 with its 23,000 members, was making money hand over fist, taking into its pension trust funds $1 million each week. Head of Local 959 was the notorious Jesse L. Carr who in the late 1960s was charged with extortion, embezzlement, and making false claims to secure a government loan.…Under Jesse Carr’s leadership, the Teamsters Union chose to build an empire by investing in real estate and construction. </blockquote>Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-54955822768702183102010-07-12T13:39:00.000-07:002010-08-20T11:13:46.480-07:00Double Dose: Wells Fargo and Alaska Regional HospitalNeil Davis has been on the trail of some interesting, and rather peculiar, wrinkles in the State of Alaska's new AlaskaCare health plan administration. Wells Fargo Insurance Services is the current administrator of AlaskaCare for the state, and something is fishy in their new choice of preferred provider. In an early release of the <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality34.html">June Dose of Reality</a>, Davis describes the document that tweaked his curiosity about the recent change from a nonprofit, Providence Hospital, to a for-profit, Alaska Regional Hospital:<blockquote>The reason for the change in preferred provider, the Wells Fargo document implies, is to save money. In support of that idea the document contains a table showing dramatically different costs for medical procedures undertaken at Alaska Regional Hospital and Providence Hospital, both in Anchorage. This is the fishy part: the cost figures given are so different for the two hospitals that something has to be wrong and probably purposely misleading.…Having previously <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Press/mired.html">looked a bit</a> at the pricing structure and markups over cost of these two hospitals, I could not accept the idea that to be treated at Providence, on average, costs AlaskaCare members 3.4 times as much as at Alaska Regional.</blockquote>Following up on this for the <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality35.html">July Dose of Reality</a>, Davis discovered that Wells Fargo and Alaska Regional's parent company have a long history together. And that history reveals some shady dealings:<blockquote>Among the allegations that led to Columbia/HCA’s guilty plea and payment of fines were that Wells Fargo CEO Carl E. Reichardt and four other directors of Columbia/HCA were fully aware that senior management had “devised schemes to improperly increase revenue and profits, and perpetuate a management philosophy that provided strong incentives for employees to commit fraud.” Reichardt and the other four also were charged with knowing about HCA’s improper acquisition practices, which involved offering personal benefits and perquisites to hospital executives during HCA’s negotiations for the purchase of their hospitals.</blockquote>Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-19723592105715596102010-07-12T12:28:00.000-07:002010-07-12T13:38:26.032-07:00Dose of Reality: Discount Health CardsNeil Davis' May Dose of Reality offering features <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality33.html">an analysis of discount health care cards</a> (a bad deal). Davis' attention to this middleman scam in the health care business was drawn by a full-page ad in the <span style="font-style:italic;">Ruralite</span>, <a href="http://www.gvea.org">GVEA's</a> member magazine. The ad, Davis decided, is deceptive and close to fraudulent. The skinny on discount cards boils down to this:<blockquote>If you look into the matter you will find that the best approach is to forget the discount cards altogether. A discount card is not likely to get you a discount greater than 10 percent, and if you are not insured you can probably do better by paying cash right away every time you go to the doctor or hospital. </blockquote>Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-20479249565136242872010-05-29T12:24:00.000-07:002010-05-29T12:39:50.240-07:00Dose of Reality: Obamacare<a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality32.html">April's Dose of Reality</a> is a discussion of the 900-page <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patient_Protection_and_Affordable_Care_Act">Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act</a>, which may, says Davis, actually do some good.<blockquote>Anyone aware of the control that the health insurance and pharmaceutical industries exert over Congress should not be surprised that the new law does good things for these industries, and very little that may harm their profitability right away. The surprise (for me at least) is that the new law actually does do some good for the public—and in ways that might and should eventually lead to the demise of the for-profit health insurance industry and the continuing obscene profits of the pharmaceutical industry.</blockquote>The act allows for self-insuring, although it does not include a public option, unfortunately. Health care cooperatives already exist, and this bill may strengthen them by providing an option that costs less. (Obamacare doesn't do much to reduce health care costs, alas--some, but not much.) Neil uses the example of the Seattle-based <a href="http://www.ghc.org/">Group Health Cooperative</a>. The more people who join health care cooperatives, the stronger they will become. And cooperatives, unlike insurance companies, exist to benefit their members. (Insurance companies, you recall, exist to make a profit for their investors.)Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-32866618980016763412010-05-28T19:10:00.000-07:002010-05-28T19:22:46.691-07:00Dose of Reality: ACHIA's a bad deal unless you're desperateIn the <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality31.html">March 2010 Dose of Reality</a>, Davis takes on ACHIA and the sudden spate of cheery ads and announcements publicizing Alaska's Comprehensive Health Insurance Association:<blockquote>These ads stress the idea that every Alaskan already has the ability to buy health insurance. Why do you suppose that is? Could it be that the ads are a propaganda ploy trying to promote the idea that we don’t really need health care reform just because it promises that everyone will be able to get insurance despite pre-existing conditions? Also, we might ask, why are so few Alaskans enrolled in the ACHIA program?</blockquote>Davis <a href="http://healthcaremorass.blogspot.com/2009/03/insuring-uninsurable.html">tackled the ACHIA program</a> in an earlier article, too, in <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality18.html">February 2009</a>, describing how the program works.Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-40117619303763633842010-05-28T19:04:00.000-07:002010-05-28T19:10:04.030-07:00Dose of Reality: We Haven't Hit Bottom YetIn the <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality30.html">February Dose of Reality</a>, Neil Davis writes:<blockquote>Back in the 1950s before Alaska achieved statehood, my father was assistant director of the Fairbanks federal prison and then director of the Nome federal prison. In those capacities he saw many people with problems that they sometimes surmounted but often did not. That experience led him to believe that a person headed downward had to hit a floor before bouncing back upward to put his life back in order. I recall him saying of one of his prisoners, “That guy has not hit bottom yet; his life will get worse until he gets there, then maybe he can rebound up to where he can live a decent life.”<br /><br />It seems to me that this is where the American public now is on health care reform: things are bad but they are going to have to get a lot worse before the public finally rebels against the insane for-profit health care system that it has allowed to come into existence.</blockquote>Davis provides a few grim statistics to show just how bad health care in this country really is—and worse, how bad the trends in heath care have become, relating to bankruptcies, child mortality, poverty, and CEO salaries.Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-73755819794011600432010-02-24T13:53:00.000-08:002010-05-28T19:04:25.256-07:00Dose of Reality: Looking at 2009In Davis' <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality29.html">January Dose of Reality</a>, he observes that "for the first time, health care reform bills have actually gotten to the House and Senate floors—and been passed." This is a significant achievement, despite the problems associated with them. A <a href="www.kff.org/healthreform/upload/healthreform_tri_full.pdf">comparison of the two bills</a> (PDF) was provided by the Kaiser Family Foundation, but, Davis writes, <blockquote>Reading through the Kaiser report the main impression I got was that neither the House nor Senate bills do much if anything to reduce the incredible complexity and cost of the American health care payment system. This complexity adds much to the system’s dysfunctional nature and allows uncontrolled escalation of costs.</blockquote>In other words, both bills miss tackling the main problems with our system.Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-16158800214531642302010-01-09T18:03:00.000-08:002010-01-09T18:06:33.308-08:00Imagine: Travel care like health care<object width="560" height="340"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/5J67xJKpB6c&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/5J67xJKpB6c&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="560" height="340"></embed></object>ect>Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-83185817646858423882009-12-31T11:51:00.000-08:002009-12-31T11:58:40.838-08:00Dose of Reality: My Rogue Big Toe TwoNeil Davis' <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality28.html">December Dose of Reality</a> continues with the (expensive) lessons learned from his ingrown toenail:<blockquote>Since last reporting I have again managed to inveigle my way back into Fairbanks Memorial Hospital for a few more days to explore the staff’s expertise in the use of modern diagnostic capabilities designed to unravel the secrets of how my rogue big toe could cause so much havoc. Adding that into the mix of my three other hospital stays plus several days experience with Home Care personnel, I can now say that during the past month or so I have had an unusually comprehensive exposure to the ways of modern medicine. I’ve learned all about emergency rooms, medivac flights, intensive care units, cardiac units, surgeries, cardiac rehab and physical therapy centers, MRIs and various other scanning technologies, plus the supporting function capabilities typical of hospitals and clinics. Considering all this, perhaps it is not amiss to claim that this past month or so my interaction with modern medicine was of such an involved nature that few having such an intensive and comprehensive experience have lived to tell the tale. (Tee, hee; that’s a joke. Did you get it?)</blockquote>Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-56060849592036719602009-11-23T14:58:00.000-08:002009-11-23T15:25:42.212-08:00Dose of Reality: My Rogue Big ToeNeil Davis' latest <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality27.html">Dose of Reality</a> confronts a cost-saving measure often touted by those who don't follow their thought through to its consequences:<blockquote>One oft-repeated conservative mantra we hear nowadays is the one telling us that the road to health care reform requires each of us to take on more personal responsibility for our own health care. You have to read between the lines to get the intended message here: each of us needs to take care of our own—and nobody else’s—health care needs. In there also is the idea that we should not help raise overall health care costs by running off to the doctor with every little sniffle and ache.</blockquote>Davis experienced the hidden ingrown toenail in this viewpoint: quite literally.<blockquote>I suddenly found myself unable to walk and with severe pain that improved only slowly as I spent the next two days in the Intensive Care Unit of Fairbanks Memorial Hospital, and then, after being Medivaced to Anchorage, another nine days in the ICU of Providence Hospital. </blockquote>Sometimes, it's best to let the experts deal with small things, before they turn into big expensive painful things. And since your average person doesn't have the training to recognize when a small thing can become dangerous, how can one distinguish between "taking responsibility" and "risking life and limb"?Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-18409088563068329402009-11-11T12:29:00.000-08:002009-11-11T12:49:41.856-08:00Baucus bill written by WellpointAn <a href="http://www.democracynow.org/2009/11/11/study_over_2_200_us_veterans">interview today</a> on Democracy Now! with <a href="http://www.harvardscience.harvard.edu/directory/researchers/stephanie-woolhandler">Dr. Steffie Woolhandler</a> makes it clear that the health care reform bill is skewed. <a href="http://www.nlm.nih.gov/changingthefaceofmedicine/physicians/biography_335.html">Woolhandler</a> explains:<blockquote>The reform process in Washington has been hijacked by the private health insurance industry. If you look at the Baucus framework, which was the basis of the Senate bill—it’s on the Senate Finance Committee website. Just right-click on that document, and it turns out the author of the document was <a href="http://littlesis.org/person/39422/Liz_Fowler">Elizabeth Fowler</a>, who’s a former vice president of Wellpoint, the nation’s largest private insurance company, covering 35 million people. So the private insurance industry has hijacked the process. What’s come out of the House, what’s likely to come out of the Senate, is a completely inadequate bill that takes about $500 billion in taxpayer money and hands it over to the private health insurance industry. <br /><br />… the Massachusetts plan is considered the model for the national legislation. There’s a mandate that makes it illegal to refuse to purchase private health insurance. The fine is up to $1,068. The good thing with the Massachusetts plan was there was a big Medicaid expansion, but you didn’t need to do the mandates in order to do the Medicaid expansion. <br /><br />Much of the Massachusetts plan has been wildly expensive. According to the state’s report to its bondholders, it’s cost $1.3 billion this year. The state has opted to pay for that by stealing money from safety net clinics and hospitals, so that safety net providers that care for immigrants, the mentally ill, people with substance abuse, that provide primary care, they’ve seen their funds shrunken, so that money could be handed over to purchase insurance policies. Massachusetts now has the highest healthcare costs in the history of the world.</blockquote>Democracy Now! has been closely following the health care reform issue. For further background on this bill, see also <a href="http://www.democracynow.org/2009/11/9/house_passes_healthcare_bill_with_amendment">this recent interview</a> with Rep. Dennis Kucinich and Jane Hamsher.Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-7242911035571869512009-10-22T12:48:00.000-07:002009-10-22T12:49:21.045-07:00Franken on medical bankruptcies<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/TgqqSHr0wVA&hl=en&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/TgqqSHr0wVA&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-64268114128605885322009-10-20T11:19:00.000-07:002009-10-20T11:24:35.701-07:00Health care discussion panelThe University of Alaska Fairbanks Student Pre-Medical Society will host a free public panel discussion on health care reform and how it could affect Alaskans <b>Sunday, Oct. 25, from 4-6 p.m. at the Davis Concert Hall</b> on the UAF campus.<br /><br />"The UAF pre-med society's goal is to offer the public useful information and discussion on health care reform in understandable language," said Nick Bajada, public relations officer for the society and an undergraduate in UAF's biomedical program.<br /><br />Panelists include <b>Richard Seifert</b>, a UAF professor and member of the Fairbanks Memorial Hospital Foundation Board; state <b>Sen. Joe Paskvan</b>, vice chairman of the Senate Health, Education and Social Services Committee; <b>Melanie Arthur</b>, UAF assistant professor of sociology; <b>Mike Powers</b>, Fairbanks Memorial Hospital CEO and fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives; state <b>Rep. John Coghill</b>, member of the Health, Education and Social Services Committee and the HESS finance subcommittee; <b>Lloyd Hilling</b>, Tanana Valley Campus economics instructor; and Dr. <b>Mark Simon</b>, medical director of Golden Heart Emergency Physicians.<br /><br />The event is free and the public is encouraged to attend. Seating is limited.<br /><br />CONTACT: Nick Bajada, UAF Pre-Medical Society public relations officer, nickbajada@gmail.com. Marie Gilbert, Institute of Arctic Biology information officer, at 907-474-7412 or megilbert@alaska.eduDeirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-21695649550917151372009-09-28T17:37:00.000-07:002009-09-28T17:46:17.577-07:00Health care reform is realThis month's <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality25.html">Dose of Reality</a> concerns the way the American public pays for health care:<blockquote>[I]t is important to remember that the public always pays, and in fact, it is the only payer of the cost of health care. Many decades ago, the members of the public mostly paid for health care in only one way: by direct payment to health care providers using cash if they could, or chickens and pigs if they could not.<br /><br />Then during World War II especially, the public begin to pay more of its medical bills by funneling money through insurance companies…But now that is changing as the system is being reforming in an underhanded, backdoor fashion. Leading the reform is the for-profit health insurance industry, and by doing so <b>the industry is slowly putting itself out of business.</b> The steps the industry is now taking to retain profitability are forcing the American public to funnel an increasing proportion of its health care expenditure through other, more efficient pipelines, namely direct payments to medical providers and payments to them through government channels.</blockquote>In other words, the insurance companies are making it so onerous to pay premiums and co-pays and deductibles that their customers are simply dropping insurance altogether—which means the companies get nothing from them.Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-62678292310525623732009-09-28T11:50:00.000-07:002009-09-28T17:50:22.162-07:00Two Town Meetings on Health CareAlaska’s two senators have now held town meetings on Health Care in Fairbanks, Senator Murkowski on August 13, and Senator Begich on September 26. The contrast between the two hosts and their events was striking.<br /><br />Based on their comments, questions, and levels of applause to statements, I concluded that the 500-member crowd attending the Murkowski town meeting was largely right-leaning Republican, with the majority having an anti-Obama, anti-government attitude that biased them against increased government involvement in health care. This group also showed a substantial presence at Senator Begich’s town meeting hosting about 300, but probably were outnumbered by persons of less conservative bent who were in favor of greater government involvement in the form of establishing a public health insurance option and greater regulation of the health care insurance and pharmaceutical industries.<br /><br />Perhaps most striking was the difference in approach and performance of the two hosts. Senator Murkowski stated at the outset that she was against more government involvement in health care. That statement not only made the majority of the audience happy, it set the tone of the entire meeting: generally negative toward any substantial health care reform. Senator Murkowski responded to questions and comments in ways that built on the fears of those in the audience and promoted what I took to be her own personal views. Although she proclaimed that she wanted input from all quarters, it was quite obvious to me that she was not receptive of any new information.<br /><br />Thinking back on that town meeting after attending Senator Begich’s later one, I was struck by Senator Murkowski’s comparative lack of knowledge about health care issues and apparent willingness to ignore factual information on the topic. To me, this was best illustrated when someone asked if Senator Murkowski knew of even a single country where universal health care was successful. Ignoring the well-known fact that universal health care is successfully operating in every modern country except for the United States, the good senator walked slowly across the stage, shoulders hunched, head shaking and eyes downcast as though seeking inspiration from the floorboards as she replied, “No, I can’t.” Oh come on, Senator, I thought to myself, you are not that ignorant, you know better than that and are just being disingenuous.<br /> <br />By contrast, Senator Begich displayed an impressive breadth of knowledge about and understanding of health care issues. He too had made an opening statement. Unlike Murkowski’s negative opening, Begich’s contained positive assertions regarding desirable goals of health care reform. Some of them were little more than motherhood statements, but at least they were positive in nature. I did not agree with some of Begich’s views—for example, he stated that he was against having a government-operated single-payer health system—but he did at least display an attitude of guarded openness toward the proposal of a public option insurance program.<br /><br />He used a question on that issue to suggest that perhaps a better option might be to allow everyone to buy into the Federal Employees Health Benefits Insurance program enjoyed by members of Congress and all other federal employees and retirees.<br /><br />I hope Senator Begich was aware that he was making quite a radical proposal because in this program the government (using funds supplied by the taxpayers) picks up 75 percent of the premium cost. Now that is serious government involvement in health care! At least financially, it is about three-fourths the way to a single-payer health care system. To complete the process the next logical step will be to eliminate the useless middleman: the health insurance industry.Neil Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01323124273350850306noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-12256437445537144602009-09-16T17:20:00.000-07:002009-09-16T17:22:50.728-07:00Desperate measures for desperate times<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/XCw_UoRhTUk&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&feature=player_embedded&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/XCw_UoRhTUk&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&feature=player_embedded&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowScriptAccess="always" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-59506683185735548982009-09-16T17:07:00.000-07:002009-09-16T17:09:32.999-07:00We're Number 37<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/yVgOl3cETb4&hl=en&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/yVgOl3cETb4&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-24218161734331011182009-09-10T10:53:00.000-07:002009-12-31T11:51:30.703-08:00Obama's speech on health care reformHere's <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/09/obama-health-care-speech_n_281265.html">a transcript</a> of Obama's speech to Congress on health care reform, along with some videos, from Huffington Post.Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-46436285509471562832009-09-09T10:25:00.000-07:002009-09-09T10:58:03.743-07:00Public meeing on health care with Senator BegichSenator Begich will be holding a forum in Fairbanks, from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sept. 26, at <a href="http://www.friendschurch.org/">Friends Community Church</a>, <a href="http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=friends+community+church+fairbanks+ak&sll=38.892091,-77.024055&sspn=0.402965,0.404434&ie=UTF8&ll=64.822806,-147.744055&spn=0.027532,0.050554&z=14&iwloc=A">1485 30th Avenue.</a> Begich has held open discussions/question-and-answer town hall meetings in Anchorage and Juneau; according to the <a href="http://www.adn.com/life/health/story/894186.html">Anchorage Daily News</a>, they've been beyond "lively" and have gone into outright rudeness. <blockquote>Begich said he's interested in what people have to say about health care reform, but is growing tired of the lies, myths and fear tactics.<br /><br />"Now the media are talking about the 'swift-boating' of health reform over the recess," Begich told the Anchorage Chamber of Commerce in a lunchtime speech. He said he's seeing evidence of a political smear campaign in television ads.<br /><br />Health reform protesters have been hijacking town hall meetings around the country. There's controversy over whether the dissent is real and grassroots, or a sophisticated attack intended to bring down President Obama and the health reforms he seeks.</blockquote>The point of having a forum like this is to allow the public an opportunity to a) express their opinions, and b) ask questions of—and receive answers from—their representatives in government. That means that when a person is asking their question, everyone else in the audience should let them, and let them hear the answer. It's pretty basic courtesy, but some people <a href="http://www.themudflats.net/2009/08/10/alaska-deathers-heckle-sick-people/">just don't want anybody else</a> to have their say.<br /><br />Let's hope that Fairbanksans will behave like grownups, willing to let every questioner speak, and let Senator Begich answer.Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-67212155427027506202009-08-17T14:43:00.000-07:002009-08-17T14:52:58.603-07:00Alaska's Congressional delegation and health care reformThe July Dose of Reality <a href="http://www.fairbanksopenradio.org/component/myblog/Alaskaa-s-Congressional-Stance-on-Health-Care-Reform.html">tackles the stance</a> of our US senators and representative on health care reform. Davis sums up their approach: "According to its own statements, Alaska’s Congressional delegation hopes to kill meaningful health care reform this year." First, the Republicans:<blockquote>We have not heard much from Representative Don Young on this issue, but Senator Lisa Murkowski has clearly stated her opposition to the public insurance option in an article appearing June 24, 2009, in the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner. First, she presents a tirade against Medicare and Medicaid, playing very loose with factual information both about these programs and the changes to them being proposed by the Democrats in Congress. Then she closes with the false charges that the establishment of a public insurance option would deny the public with choice of doctors, “and leave crucial health care decisions in the hands of government bureaucrats.” Actually, a public insurance option would increase the choice of doctors over what we have now.</blockquote>And then our lone Democrat, a Blue Dog:<blockquote>Senator Begich clearly stated his opposition to establishing universal health care in an opinion piece published by the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner on June 12, 2009. His telling statement: “If Congress gets it right, Americans happy with their health insurance and medical care will keep what they have, while everyone will have access to affordable, quality care.” In his article, Senator Begich pointedly ignored the major issue of the moment, that of instigating a program of public health insurance.</blockquote>Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-42306892995611982292009-08-13T10:22:00.000-07:002009-09-28T17:48:23.361-07:00Sarah Palin on Health CareSarah Palin’s recent Facebook statement (Associated Press, Aug. 8, 2009) in which she called President Obama’s health plan “downright evil” suggests that she did Alaska a big favor by abdicating the governorship last month. Anyone capable of intentionally publishing such a ridiculous and obviously untrue claim lacks the ethics and moral fiber to hold any public office from dogcatcher on up, never mind one as important as the governorship of Alaska.<br /><br />When Palin broke her contract (sworn to on the Bible) with the Alaska voters who put her in office, I figured that she had in mind reverting back to a public communications career as in the years of yore. As an ex-governor, she now could aspire to the role of a respected journalist and commentator on world and national affairs whose clever insights, penetrating analyses and profound judgments would earn her respect far and wide. Admittedly, this aspiration could be a little bold for a logically challenged person who sometimes found it difficult to assemble words into a meaningful sentence and who even sometimes was unable to determine when the end of that sentence had come. So was this a hopeless idea? Not in America, absolutely not!<br /><br />Let’s face it, Palin knew she could easily do it. Despite various psychological weaknesses, she knew she had some nice counterbalancing physiological assets, including a pretty face, a seductively crooked smile and a hell of a wink. The key to success here was merely to pick the right audience to speak to, one to which her physical assets would hold strong appeal and to which her cerebral weaknesses would not matter squat. In other words, Palin needed an audience that liked things simple—not just simple, flat out either black or white—an audience that would suck up to the kind of emotional appeals Palin enjoyed presenting. She did not need to be speaking to that portion of the public that preferred factual information over emotional arguments. Unfortunately for her, there were a lot of people in America like that, maybe even half the population. So forget them; this would not be the audience ex-governor Palin should try to cater to, but this group’s very nature gave a hint as to the direction she go. Best to plant a sharp right heel and do a quick one-eighty away from them. Of course! Now right there in front of her was a ready-made audience already shepherded together by that great Republican leader Rush Limbaugh. This was the audience to go for. Heck yes, Sarah would be a perfect Rush Limbaugh in Lipstick.<br /><br />Sarah knew that her appeal to this ultraconservative audience was already proven by her recent campaign effort with John McCain to help elect Barack Obama president of the United States. She had come out of it with maybe three-quarter million supporters (more than the entire population of Alaska) and a lucrative book contract. Pondering the issue, Sarah Palin could see that although Rush Limbaugh was the acknowledged spokesman for that group he might not continue to be. “He’s OK on talk radio but he’s an ugly ole cuss, and I betcha I can do better than him on TV, and God would want me to,” Sarah must have thought as she reached her decision to shoot for the position of hostess of the Sarah Palin TV Show or whatever the network might want to call it.<br /><br />Oh it was going to be so easy, ‘cause it didn’t matter what you would say as hostess of this production. All she would have to do was do as Rush does: pick a topic, any topic involving President Obama, put on a crooked knowing smile and a sneer in the voice and make fun of Obama’s action.<br /><br />Rush was good. Like just the other day on his program Sarah had heard him say that Obama was going to use several million dollars of the stimulus funds to hire people to clean up and improve the toilets in the national parks. Snickering and scoffing at this huge and pernicious waste of taxpayer funds, Ole Rush made the concept resonate across the airways as another vicious government attempt to takeover our guaranteed 2nd Amendment rights to choose or own methods and manners of bodily waste disposal in the national parks. About the time Limbaugh finished his tirade, a female caller came on air to gush, “Oh thank you, Rush, for telling it to us like it is.” Now that was Sarah Palin’s kind of woman.<br /><br />Shoot, even if none of the networks wanted to shell out big bucks for her to host a TV talk show, there were plenty of other ways to rally the clueless masses. Twittering was good; 140 characters was just about right to detail any idea that she could think up. They might call her tweets “Quitter’s-Twitters,” and those missives could strike to the hearts of millions who would applaud her abandonment of the Alaska governorship. And then there was Facebook and plenty of Obamamania fumbles to attack on it. Hey, just the stupid idea of reforming health care should get plenty of mileage. “It’s evil, evil, evil,” she could say repeatedly. “We’ve got to stop Obama from trying to take our doctors and guns away. You betcha, folks, now is the time to get our country back. Evil, evil, evil.”<br /><br />It really would not matter how it all worked out. Sarah was now rich and famous and also free of those nasty ethical constraints some people thought should be imposed on those serving in public office. She now could say anything she wanted, and hundreds of thousands of Americans already thought anything she said was virtually the word of God. If it really went well, those thousands would turn into millions, and if so she might consider letting Rush Limbaugh serve as her running mate in the next election.Neil Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01323124273350850306noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-8592850175000842002009-08-12T14:16:00.000-07:002009-08-12T14:27:29.410-07:00So what about the "death panels" we've got now, Sarah?Mike Madden of Salon asks this question with his recent article, <a href="http://informationclearinghouse.info/article23250.htm">"The 'Death Panels' Are Already Here"</a>:<blockquote>Opponents of reform often seem to skip right past any problems with the current system -- but it's rife with them. A study by the American Medical Association found the biggest insurance companies in the country denied between 2 and 5 percent of claims put in by doctors last year (though the AMA noted that not all the denials were improper). There is no national database of insurance claim denials, though, because private insurance companies aren't required to disclose such stats. Meanwhile, a House Energy and Commerce Committee report in June found that just three insurance companies kicked at least 20,000 people off their rolls between 2003 and 2007 for such reasons as typos on their application paperwork, a preexisting condition or a family member's medical history. People who buy insurance under individual policies, about 6 percent of adults, may be especially vulnerable, but the 63 percent of adults covered by employer-provided insurance aren't immune to difficulty.</blockquote>Consider that, and then <a href="http://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2009/08/12-9">this news release</a>: "New Poll Shows Canadians Overwhelmingly Support Public Health Care: Group says advocates of private system are out of touch with most Canadians".Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-39751687325592341592009-07-22T11:44:00.000-07:002009-07-22T11:58:12.194-07:00Kucinich amendment passes committeeAs <a href="http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat/452493/a_real_win_for_single_payer_advocates">pointed out</a> in The Beat, single-payer health care came to Canada province by province. Dennis Kucinich(D-Ohio) has successfully introduced an important amendment to America's Affordable Health Choices Act, H.R. 3200: <blockquote>By a 25-19 vote, the House Committee on Education and Labor on Friday approved an amendment to the House's health-care reform bill allowing states to create single-payer health care systems if they so choose.</blockquote>Democracy Now! has a <a href="http://i4.democracynow.org/2009/7/21/as_obama_continues_push_for_healthcare">extensive interview</a> with Kucinich about this amendment and health care reform.Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-80656145909061075242009-06-30T10:32:00.000-07:002009-08-17T14:43:07.112-07:00Comedy team in health care reformNeil's <a href="http://www.esterrepublic.com/Archives/doseofreality22.html">newest Dose of Reality</a> treats the recent hearings on health care reform in the Senate:<blockquote>As we watch the Senate Committee on Finance grapple with the task of how to reduce the cost of health care in the United States it is easy to get the impression that we are watching a remake of the old movie, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abbott_and_Costello_Meet_the_Invisible_Man"><i>Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man,</i></a> a comedy horror film from 1951. The plot in the new version is thin; centering on the old-timey burlesque gag in which the players have a problem that they stumble around trying solve, not realizing that the solution—which as the watching audience is well aware—is obvious. That solution is virtually staring the Abbott and Costello company in the face, but of course these comics cannot see it, and they take humorously extreme measures to avoid looking in the right direction.<br /><br />Replacing Abbott and Costello as lead comics in this modern-day version of that film are Senate Finance Committee chairman <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Baucus">Max Baucus (D-Montana)</a> and his straight man <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_Grassley">Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa).</a> The part of The Invisible Man is played by the proposal for single-payer health care, best embodied at the moment by <a href="http://www.johnconyers.com/healthcare">HR 676,</a> introduced into Congress last year and gaining increasing public support. The remainder of the cast is comprised of the other twenty-one members of the Senate committee and their staffs. Experts all, the cast excellently parodies how we in the public think our elected officials should represent our interests.</blockquote>As well illustrated in <a href="http://www.democracynow.org/2009/6/16/report_senator_max_baucus_received_more">an interview with reporter Mike Dennison on Democracy Now!</a>, Baucus and Grassley are heavily funded by the health and health insurance industries, and have <a href="http://www.truthout.org/061209R">not been interested</a> in a full discussion of health care reform options.Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4305268294431597817.post-51328953185652981912009-06-16T21:07:00.000-07:002009-06-30T12:02:12.465-07:00Single-payer health care teach-in at UAF<b>Addendum</b> 6/30/09: this teach in was postponed and will be rescheduled.<br /><br />Neil Davis is a guest speaker at a teach-in on single-payer health care systems to be held at the University of Alaska Fairbanks campus, <b>Saturday, June 27, from 1 to 5 pm at the Boyd Berry Auditorium in the Reichardt Building (the Natural Sciences Facility)</b>. <br /><br />In the midst of the health care reform debate, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-payer_health_care#Opponents_and_criticisms">single-payer health care</a>, although a system successfully used in many industrialized countries, including <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Australia">Australia</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_and_American_health_care_systems_compared">Canada</a>, and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Taiwan">Taiwan</a>, is not even being considered by Congress. Why? Is it a viable option? How does this system work? What advantages does it have over our own? What disadvantages? How does it compare to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_the_United_States">our own system</a>, or that of countries like Belgium, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_France">France</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Germany">Germany</a>, Great Britain, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Japan">Japan</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_New_Zealand">New Zealand</a>, or the Netherlands? Explore these questions and others at this event.Deirdre Helfferichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07176487150966377070noreply@blogger.com0