Health Spectator

Yes, we’re being ironic. There really is no Republican health care reform plan, as you probably already know. Unless, of course, you count the prattle trotted out by McCain and others who talk about needing to enact tort reform whenever they are cornered and forced to say a few words on the subject of health care reform.

We might have voted for McCain in 2000, given the opportunity, but his policies are looking a bit long in the tooth these days. How times have changed!

Unfortunately, rather than doing something constructive such as joining with the Democrats for bipartisan reform, most Republicans in the House and Senate have settled for blowing smoke and repeating platitudes, most of which are not only shop-worn, but inaccurate.

Recently, one of them ran afoul of that process: a freshman senator in the second district of Kansas, Lynn Jenkins. Confronted with a respectful but persistent 27-year-old constituent who is the single mother of a 2 1/2-year-old boy, Jenkins saw the crowd turn against her after she essentially attempted to blow off the waitress’s question, which the crowd happened to think was a reasonable one: what was wrong with a government-run plan for Americans who are currently uninsured?

Having already stated that she was against any “public option,” Jenkins seemed to think answering that question was beneath her. Then she volunteered that a public option wouldn’t cover just Elizabeth Smith, the 27-year-old hard-working waitress, but would cover everyone in the room. That drew howls from much of the rest of the room, which sported quite a few gray heads. Cries of “what’s wrong with that?” rang out.

So, putting down the notion of a public option can backfire even in a conservative state like Kansas. It’s funny how people are beginning to catch on that maybe they do, after all, deserve health care. Watch it here.

Death panels

Meanwhile, over at Huffington Post, Jamie Court has government statistics uncovered by the California Nurses Association showing that Pacificare Health has a procedure kill rate of 40%, while CIGNA’s is 33%. That means, quite simply, that these companies routinely deny 40% and 33%, respectively, of procedures ordered by doctors caring for their patients.

Why should you care?

Well, Natalie Sarkisyan’s parents had CIGNA health care, and Natalie Sarkisyan fell within that 33%. Wendell Potter, the former VP of Communications at CIGNA, was obviously choked up as he recounted in this video the final days of the Sarkisyan family’s campaign to obtain Natalie a liver transplant. Watch it here.

Overall, the California statistics show, one in five requests for treatment is denied by California health insurers regulated by the California Department of Managed Health Care. That’s a 20% denial rate for procedures ordered by private doctors throughout the state. Remember those apocryphal warnings of “faceless bureaucrats” coming between you and your doctor? To us, it looks like all of California is covered by a private insurance death panel.

Sadly, California is not alone. It’s no doubt happening in your state as well.

Finally, we have a video for those who might like help separating myth from fact. Alison in Rome supplies palliative facts in this video. Did you know that over 18,000 die each year in our country because they don’t have medical coverage? That’s six times as many as died in 9/11, or 50 people every day.

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To Representative Lynn Jenkins from Elizabeth Smith: “Why shouldn’t my government guarantee all of its citizens health care?”

Wendell Potter, former CIGNA exec, recounts the story of Natalie Sarkisyan.

AlisoninRome dispels 3 healthcare reform myths. Were you misinformed?

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• Kill the Bills. Do Health Reform Right.
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• Self Employed Health Insurance Options

This entry was posted on Friday, September 4th, 2009 at 10:44 am and is filed under Editorial, health care, health insurance. You can follow any comments for this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

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