OOPS! Woman championed by Obama eligible for aid, despite Obama's claims otherwise

reply to post by UsernameCory


watching this healthcare thing unfold makes me glad I live in Canada. Its not perfect but we didn't have to mortgage our house to get my mom cancer treatment.

Cheers

Originally posted by thebulldog
reply to post by UsernameCory

 

watching this healthcare thing unfold makes me glad I live in Canada. Its not perfect but we didn't have to mortgage our house to get my mom cancer treatment.

Cheers

That's the point. The woman in this article DOESN'T EITHER, despite what Obama may have told people or alluded to in his on-stage theatrics. Since she is eligible for Medicaid she doesn't have to lose where she lives.

reply to post by JIMC5499

The biggest problem with our current system is GOVERNMENT both on the State and Federal levels. They handicap the insurance industry with rules and mandates that raise the costs of doing business and hamper competition.

Employer-provided insurance developed with NO government involvement whatsoever. It was a business tactic to attract the best workers.

When the government stepped in and created regulations and mandates to expand coverage and access, the system began its descent into politico-economic Hell.

Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels has provided self-managed insurance to thousands of formerly-uninsured citizens, and 70% of state employees (including the governor himself), with a plan that cut costs and waste. People use accounts partially funded by the state to meet basic care needs. Catastrophic insurance covers costs that they can't afford.

People CAN be trusted to use their own judgment when they are given the means to do so.

Sadly, the LAST thing Obama wants is less dependence upon the government for the "necessities of life."

jw

reply to post by thebulldog

Its not perfect but we didn't have to mortgage our house to get my mom cancer treatment.

Neither did Natoma, but if you read the article, she has TWO mortgages on her home; one of which is a "line of credit" she used to take cash out to spend as she wished, instead of paying for her health care.

She is also a small business owner, like the ones whose taxes will be increased under Obamacare to pay for everyone else's benefits.

jw

Originally posted by jdub297
Employer-provided insurance developed with NO government involvement whatsoever. It was a business tactic to attract the best workers.

Employer-provided health insurance came into being as a direct result of Roosevelt freezing wages during World War II. Companies were not allowed to offer more money to attract workers, so they started offering fringe benefits, the first of which was health insurance.

I'm not attacking you jdub, as a matter of fact I agree with you, but, I just wanted to point this out.

reply to post by JIMC5499


Health insurance goes back to the development of the railroads. The "Blue Cross" charitable programs began around the time of the first stock market crash, before the Depression.

Roosevelt froze wages, but he was not in office, nor were the caps still in effect, during the late '40s when employer-provided insurance became widespread.

Before then, people dealt with providers one-on-one for their primary care, and "accident insurance" covered catastrophic expenses. Even well into the '60s, most people chose and paid for preventive and primary care on the own.

Government "reforms" led to the development of HMOs and other cost-sharing programs. We've gone downhill ever since.

jw

Originally posted by jdub297
Some Americans already belong to or participate in a "system that doesn't bankrupt individuals." It is called "consumer-driven health care."

And exactly has consumer driven healthcare done over the years?

In 1960 the US life expectancy rate was 17th in the world. Today its 40th.
Developing countries like China had been climbing up the rank while we have been downgrading.

Today we are 37th in Healthcare in the world below many developing countries. We were 12th in the 1960's

I could bring a tonne of statistics to show you how this nation has been declining in welfare for its own citizens. Ironically, we could see a definite pattern in the 1960's before the privatization of the Nixon administration, and its impact today. And yet there are still people willing to deny it over the sake of ideology.

You see consumerdriver healthcare is effective? Yet, we have held a consumer driven healthcare industry for last 4 decades. How the hell can consumers control prices when healthcare corporations work in cooperation with one another to rise premiums and pre-existing conditions? How does the consumer control the market when these corporations themselves work hand in hand to benefit eachother? By your assumption, if a consumer doesnt like his or her healthcare insurance and cannot afford it, they can just move on to another corporation but hows that when these corporations are working side by side to increase costs? If a consumer is prevented from coverages due to pre-existing conditions in one insurance firm, how the heck is it going to be any different in another insruance firm?

You assume that consumers have options in a the private insurance industry, and for that to happen, you must deny the reality of the fact that these corporations work hand in hand in price fixing. Becuase this is exactly what has been happening over the years.

Pure consumer driven healthcare with no parachute coverage is a joke and it brings this nations health down to developing world standards. We had this system for 4 decades, and we have seen it steadly get worse. These corporations benefit from declining health environments, this is why the declining conditions in this nation has benefitted them specifically.

Are you opposed to letting consumers of ANY servic Te (and especially health care) have control of the basic transactions and decisions?

Nobody was ever opposed to consumers making their own decisions. That was never the proposal to begin with, but out with the rightwing talking points, and out with the scare tactics. Its about consumers who have been left out by the insurance industry, and their options to be still be covered. You argue that this woman is eligible for medicaid, well thats wonderful, that proves a point, that people in her position alway end up needing some form of socialized system to save them. There are millions like her who are not as fortunate.

It necessitates lowered standards

You look at the statistics for the last 40 years and tell me what standards of health have been improving here in the United States.


[edit on 17-3-2010 by Southern Guardian]

I think I prefer her to "Joe the Plumber."

She's got an income of $6,000/year. While she's a "candidate" for aid (so says the clinic, scrambling to justify itself) no one apparently told her that this was available (some of you can relate to this). The liens she took out for her treatment were not with the clinic, but rather with other lenders. Unless there's a homestead law there in Ohio (like the one that kept my mother-in-law's house from being sold out under her for debts), she would be at risk for the money.

So she had these huge medical bills (which may not be from the place where she's being treated for leukemia) and took out loans to pay them -- because she's the kind of person who pays back her debts.

She's only in her early 50's, and until her story was brought to national attention, nobody bothered to tell her that she was eligible for Medicare. The places where she was treated might have told her. They just didn't.

Not all doctors take Medicare (in my volunteer work, I was helping a woman here in Texas try to find local doctors who took Medicare patients).

Her plight is common to the self-employed:

Because Canfield was self-employed, there are no records of her business, and she said most of the people whose houses she cleaned are now in nursing homes or have died. She said that she doesn't have any savings left, and that with at least a month of chemotherapy still to go, she won't be generating income anytime soon.

Like many of the people we see at the senior center, they sort of "drop through the cracks" of the system. Counselors spend time with them telling them how to find aid and wade through the paperwork to get on Medicare and so forth.

Being a high profile case, she may get her eligibility confirmed within weeks. I think that if you talk to people (like myself) who have tried to get people on Medicare and Social Security disability, you will find that the process takes months... if not years.

Did you notice this part?

However, Canfield's fears that she could lose her home - if, for example, the hospital tried to put a lien on it - are not necessarily unfounded, Sornberger said.

"There are other hospitals that will do that," he said. "There's nothing in the industry that says you can't do it. So she could go 5 miles to some other facility and find that they do have that practice in place."

So she probably has heard of people there in Ohio who became ill and who DID lose their houses when the hospital put a lien on it. Since she did cleaning for the elderly, she undoubtedly saw cases where the family had to sell off everything and move their relative to a nursing home.

And Canfield pointed out that even if she does get financial aid, it could take weeks before that money kicks in. Despite the hospital's assurances, her original fears remain.

"The taxes still need to be paid," she said. "I have a home equity line that needs to be paid back every month."

So she can't work right now because (as your article say) she collapsed from leukemia and is currently undergoing treatment (more medical bills, by the way), and the bills and loan payments are piling up. And NOW people are rushing in with options.

The "free market" hasn't worked well for health care. There was a piece on NPR recently where they called around and priced a CT scan from different places (there was, as I remember, a $10,000 difference in cost for the same procedure, all within a 20 minute drive from a location).

It's nice to see that she's getting the financial counseling she should have gotten in the first place. I hope she does well.

And I hope that you and the others here will take some time and volunteer with places (like a local senior center -- as I do) to help folks get medicare and medicaid and deal with problems in our health care system. You would get a feel for what it's like at "ground zero."

I think it would be very enlightening for you.

Originally posted by Southern Guardian

Originally posted by jdub297
Some Americans already belong to or participate in a "system that doesn't bankrupt individuals." It is called "consumer-driven health care."

And exactly has consumer driven healthcare done over the years?

We haven't had consumer-driven health care since the proliferation of health, as opposed to accident, insurance programs that spread the cost of what are necessities (socialism) instead of risks (insurance).

In 1960 the US life expectancy rate was 17th in the world. Today its 40th.
Developing countries like China had been climbing up the rank while we have been downgrading.
Today we are 37th in Healthcare in the world below many developing countries. We were 12th in the 1960's

Your sources, such as WHO, are wrong. These reports have been long discredited in this debate. Most legitimate commenters abandoned such inaccurate assessments and flawed "measurements" long ago.

I know you know better; resort to such stats is true desperation.

I could bring a tonne of statistics to show you how this nation has been declining in welfare for its own citizens. Ironically, we could see a definite pattern in the 1960's before the privatization of the Nixon administration, and its impact today. And yet there are still people willing to deny it over the sake of ideology.

Funny how the "decline in welfare" has coincided with grater governmental intrusion into things we used to be responsible for ourselves!

Coincidence or causation? I do not believe in coincidences.
"Ironically," the greater the intrusion of government, the greater our dissatisfaction with our circumstances. How many times do you hear cries of "helplessness" and "abandonment" today compared to the 1960's? When will America quit counting on the government to wipe your ass for you?

As for your "tonne of statistics," anyone can "statistically" prove almost anything, of you don't mind the source or the validity of the "studies."

Nixon did nothing for privatization. He sought and endorsed more government interference in private decisions than ANY recent Republican president. You obviously do not know anything about wage controls, price controls, trade embargoes and the like that came about in that administration.

More grasping at straws? Hoping people take you at your word, instead of relying on fact?

Fact is, when consumers have had real control, they HAVE restrained prices, broadened options and fared better than under third-party payor (both government and insurance) systems.

You see consumerdriver healthcare is effective? Yet, we have held a consumer driven healthcare industry for last 4 decades.

No, we have not. We've had a government and insurance-driven system for 50 years! The sheep who've come to depend on them only believe they are in control, or do not want to be. Some people actually WANT someone else to take care of all their necessities for them.

How the hell can consumers control prices when healthcare corporations work in cooperation with one another to rise premiums and pre-existing conditions?

1st, "healthcare corporations" do not set premiums or conditions. Third-party payors, such as SSI, Medicaid, Medicare, health insurers and co-ops set premiums and conditions of coverage. They raise prices to spread cost of service from the most expensive participants to the most healthy participants. They have "pre-existing condition" exclusions to control costs and better assess risk.

2nd, Consumers can control prices by choosing their health care providers on their own terms, by buying basic and preventive care with their own tax-free money, and by using extra resources to pool risk for catastrophic illnesses/injuries. (It has been done, and it works very well where it's allowed)

How does the consumer control the market when these corporations themselves work hand in hand to benefit eachother?

You are confusing the health care market with the health insurance market. They are neither the same nor do they have the same goals and clients.
When people begin to learn the difference, they will better understand their options and take advantage of them instead of wailing about things they can never influence.

By your assumption, if a consumer doesnt like his or her healthcare insurance and cannot afford it, they can just move on to another corporation but hows that when these corporations are working side by side to increase costs?

I've assumed no such thing. Some consumers have the opportunity to pay for basic services with their own money and from whoever they want. They use government subsidies and insurance for unexpected/catastrophic expenses.
They do that by AVOIDING "these corporations" and their phone products, altogether.

If a consumer is prevented from coverages due to pre-existing conditions in one insurance firm, how the heck is it going to be any different in another insruance firm?

If pre-existing conditions are disclosed, they are subject to a waiting period of about 2 years before such conditions are covered. If they lie, they get no coverage at all. If you've ever filled out an insurance application, then you know that carriers ask about many conditions.

You assume that consumers have options in a the private insurance industry, and for that to happen, you must deny the reality of the fact that these corporations work hand in hand in price fixing. Becuase this is exactly what has been happening over the years.

You assume that "the private insurance industry" or the US government are the only alternatives! Ever heard of self-reliance? Independence? Those two things do not matter to the people who believe that other people should take care of our basic needs.

Pure consumer driven healthcare with no parachute coverage is a joke and it brings this nations health down to developing world standards. We had this system for 4 decades, and we have seen it steadly get worse.

You can not even imagine "pure consumer driven health care" because you have no idea what it is nor have you actually tried it.

Now you are just repeating yourself. Sort of like stamping your feet, and saying "it is SO true."

We have not had any "system," except government and insurance control of health care for over 4 decades.


jw

[edit on 18-3-2010 by jdub297]

[edit on 18-3-2010 by jdub297]

If you want an example of how the free market has affected a facet of healthcare you have to look no further than laser eye surgery. Insurance refused to pay for it, the Government refused to pay for it, so it was left to the people who want it to pay for it themselves. The price has come down and the quality has improved. Consumers forced these changes because they WERE able to shop around and choose providers. Right now the price is compairable to buying a pair of glasses, because, GOVERNMENT has stayed out of it.

Originally posted by Byrd
She's got an income of $6,000/year.

Government insurance programs (e.g.,medicaid) require applicants to spend every last dollar of savings and sell all property of any value to qualify.

She CHOSE to minimize her resources and ignore her business to meet "government standards."

While she's a "candidate" for aid (so says the clinic, scrambling to justify itself) no one apparently told her that this was available (some of you can relate to this).

You do not know this. She's an adult business woman whose business catered to the elderly and infirm. She should know of government assistance programs.

The liens she took out for her treatment were not with the clinic, but rather with other lenders. Unless there's a homestead law there in Ohio (like the one that kept my mother-in-law's house from being sold out under her for debts), she would be at risk for the money.

That is as true for VISA, WalMart, cablevision and JC Penney as it is for health care providers. You have know idea how prioritized used her assets, debt, or money generally.

She's only in her early 50's, and until her story was brought to national attention, nobody bothered to tell her that she was eligible for Medicare. The places where she was treated might have told her. They just didn't.

Again, as an adult who's been in and out of various facilities, ran a business providing care services to elderly and infirm, she had every opportunity to identify resources. You speculate what "the places she was treated" informed her. Or what she chose to ignore. Most providers have brochures and staff focused solely on assistance and resources. (They want to be paid, they do not care whose money it is. )

Her plight is common to the self-employed:

Because Canfield was self-employed, there are no records of her business, and she said most of the people whose houses she cleaned are now in nursing homes or have died.

Most self-employed people keep their records, seek new customers to replace or supplement existing business. Any business that followed her practices will fail. Insurance, health care and government programs have NOTHING to do with circumstances she created.

She said that she doesn't have any savings left, and that with at least a month of chemotherapy still to go, she won't be generating income anytime soon.

THAT is likely the result of government programs! They require you to be practically destitute before you qualify.

Like many of the people we see at the senior center, they sort of "drop through the cracks" of the system. Counselors spend time with them telling them how to find aid and wade through the paperwork to get on Medicare and so forth.

Yet you presume that NO ONE at any of her providers did the same for her, or that none of her clients and families did likewise.

Being a high profile case, she may get her eligibility confirmed within weeks. I think that if you talk to people (like myself) who have tried to get people on Medicare and Social Security disability, you will find that the process takes months... if not years.

I have helped several people qualify for disability benefits. SSI takes up to 3 years for a final determination in about 50% of claims; 67% are denied in the first round.
Private "disability" coverage is worse. 80% are denied initially, and 25% of those accepted are ultimately denied at later "review."

Did you notice this part?

However, Canfield's fears that she could lose her home - if, for example, the hospital tried to put a lien on it - are not necessarily unfounded, Sornberger said.

"There are other hospitals that will do that," he said. "There's nothing in the industry that says you can't do it. So she could go 5 miles to some other facility and find that they do have that practice in place."

And? There are lots of creditors that will "do that." Even the US government will do it for services or debts that are not paid (Sallie Mae, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Social Security, et c.).

The speaker cannot do anything but speculate what other businesses of any type will do.

So she probably has heard of people there in Ohio who became ill and who DID lose their houses when the hospital put a lien on it. Since she did cleaning for the elderly, she undoubtedly saw cases where the family had to sell off everything and move their relative to a nursing home.

That same logic justifies concluding that she was fully aware of options and resources available to HER!

And Canfield pointed out that even if she does get financial aid, it could take weeks before that money kicks in. Despite the hospital's assurances, her original fears remain.

"The taxes still need to be paid," she said. "I have a home equity line that needs to be paid back every month."

Do you or should anyone else expect "instant gratification?"
Even if she was 100% vested, payment would only come upon submission, review, approval (or denial and appeal), and disbursement of a claim.

Again, as a businesswoman, she should know that reimbursement or payment "could take weeks." Even for her own services!

So what?

The "free market" hasn't worked well for health care.

The "free market" for health care hasn't existed since government began "regulating" and subsidizing services and taking charge of it for others.

There was a piece on NPR recently where they called around and priced a CT scan from different places (there was, as I remember, a $10,000 difference in cost for the same procedure, all within a 20 minute drive from a location).

The NPR piece was about billing for services instead of procedures. Some providers spread the cost for service over all procedures to cover non-paying or low-paying clients; hence, the "$50 aspirin" itemizations. They could just submit a bill to the payor for $50,000 for a bypass, but the "system" requires phony 'itemization.'

Other providers operate on a "fee for service" plan: 1 broken leg, $500; 1 mammogram, $275, 1 vaccination, $25, et c.

In the story, the price varied from $10,000 (at a hospital with an emergency room that spread the costs of services) to $400 at a private "mom and pop" clinic that dealt with its patients/clients one-on-one. A perfect example of how consumer-driven health care controls costs!

And I hope that you and the others here will take some time and volunteer with places (like a local senior center -- as I do) to help folks get medicare and medicaid and deal with problems in our health care system. You would get a feel for what it's like at "ground zero."
I think it would be very enlightening for you.

Here's some "enlightenment" for you:

So far this year, I have helped clients get Short Term disability from CIGNA ($5,000 lump sum, $800 monthly benefit), Social Security disability ($7,500 lump sum, $600 monthly benefit plus healthcare), Long Term disability from Life Ins. Co. of N.A. (reduced by Social Security claims for 'reimbursement' of benefits they never paid), and WIN against debt collectors ($3,865 alleged debt) seeking to place a lien on their home and personal property.

My fees: $0. My time and expenses: $7,775.64.

Deny ignorance

jw

[edit on 18-3-2010 by jdub297]

Originally posted by jdub297
We haven't had consumer-driven health care since the proliferation of health,

In this country, in most states, if you do live below the lower income levels, or if you are not a senior that meets certain criteria, you are not covered under healthcare unless you either go under a private insurer or your wealthy enough to afford the costs of healthcare.

20% of the population is either uninsured, under medicare or medicaid. Over 80% of people in this country are under private insurance:
www.census.gov...

80% of americans are under private healthcare insurance, so this healthcare system of ours is by all means consumer driven.

Your sources, such as WHO, are wrong.

They are wrong because it doesnt suit your argument. Just like factchecker, just like politifact, just like every media and news outlet aside from rightwing orientated media groups. All of them for some reason are biased. You fellas continue to dismiss and dismiss but that doesnt change the reality.

I invite you however to provide 'trustworthy' sources of your own.

Funny how the "decline in welfare" has coincided with grater governmental intrusion!

For the last 40 years you had 27 years of conservatives presidents, 13 years of moderate to liberal presidents. You had the Republicans control the house during the Clinton administration. Over the last 40 years the markets were great deregulated, you had various attempts to privatize welfare including during the 80's forcing poor single parents to pay back the welfare they took out to take care of their kids.

The Government slowly moved to let the Markets dictate more and more and today we have a corporate infested Washington DC. How do you think the corporations managed to grap a hold on our representitives? The current supreme court ruling should have been all the more evidence that for the last 40 years we went through significant deregulation.

Nixon did nothing for privatization. He sought and endorsed more government interference in private decisions than ANY recent Republican president. You obviously do not know anything about wage controls,

You mean minimum wage? You want the corporations to dictate minimum wage? If we have businesses outsourcing labour nowadays, what do you think the american corporations are going to do to wages to compromise and keep jobs here if they had that control?

price controls,

Be more specific?

Fact is, when consumers have had real control, they HAVE restrained prices,

And tell me when was that? I find it laughable at this notion that consumers control the prices these corporate set. I mean where have you been living for the last few decades?