Take 2 and Make Me Call You In The Morning

I just had a prescription copay jump from $25 to $130. No warning. No explanation. Just the tab when I got to the pharmacy. Option A: Pay it. Option B: Skip the medication.

I paid up, but I could afford to. Not everyone can. And no one should have to forgo necessary medicine - especially medication they expect to be covered - because it's too expensive.

Something's definitely askew, and you better believe I'll be on the phone with the insurance company first thing tomorrow. I'll let you know what happens.

Meanwhile, it's incidents like tonight's that make me especially proud to fight insurance companies for a living. I don't mind getting angry when it can be anger well-channelled.

UPDATE: Turns out I have a $100 RX deductible I didn't know about. So my copay went up to $30, but the pharmacy charged me the $130 to cover the deductible. That would have been nice to know and would have saved me a lot of grief in the moment.

Captain Contradiction

This needs to be getting more play. Senator Grassley's solution to the health care crisis? Go work for the federal government:



Mr. Less Federal Government suggests we all go work for the federal government.

Interesting.

Early Exit: 4th of July Edition

One of the best parts of not working in TV anymore is not having to work holidays. I'll be off tomorrow, catching up on life and the like, and most likely won't be online through the weekend.

So with that, have a most excellent holiday, and I will see you back here bright and early Monday.

Diagnosis: No Clue

Yesterday we discovered the President of the AMA doesn't understand how the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program - which is an exchange of all private health insurance plans - works and why "opening it up to the public" is a ridiculous alternative to creating a new public health insurance option. The government doesn't fund the FEHBP. It contributes to the cost of insurance the same way your employer does if you have insurance through your job. It's an exchange of choices for employees of the government. And opening it up to the public is in no way, shape, or form comparable to creating a new public health insurance option.

The President of the American MEDICAL Association either doesn't know or can't articulate the distinction. Clip courtesy of Talking Points Memo TV:



For the record, CNN's anchor and reporter don't know the difference either because if they did, they would have called the President of the AMA on his lack of knowledge about the FEHBP - what it is and how it works. Instead, they think they have caught him reversing position on a public health insurance option. Though it'd be good if he had, he hasn't.

Late Night Laugh

SEIU put this up about a week ago. It's terrific. And funny.

How We Pay For It

President Obama used some good language during today's Town Hall to explain how we'll pay for health care reform. This isn't verbatim, but here's the gist:

2/3 of the cost of reform will come from reallocating money already in the system. For example, the way the system works now, we will spend $177 billion over the next 10 years giving subsidies to insurance companies through Medicare Advantage. Under President Obama's plan, we will stop overpaying insurance companies and use that money where it counts.

1/3 of the cost of reform will have to come from increased revenue. We will get that money by capping itemized deductions for the top 2%.

Altogether, reallocating money and capping deductions to increase revenue will add up to $950 billion to be used on reform.

And that doesn’t include savings from prevention and health IT because it’s not “scorable,” meaning Congress can’t put a hard number on it. But everyone believes there will be considerable savings from prevention and health IT too.

Absolutely Required Reading

No explanation can do this justice. Just read it. Then pass it around. From Jacob Hacker and Rahul Rajkumar for The New Republic:

Afraid of the public option? This is what America will look like without it.

I'm hard-pressed to pick a favorite snippet because the whole article is just that good, but here's a little something:

Look a little further down the road. It's been three years since the president signed the bill. Despite high hopes, the patchwork of federal and state insurance regulations created by the legislation isn't working. The worst abuses--such as revoking policies of people who thought they were covered after they've run up big medical bills--have largely ended. But private insurers continue to ration care in arbitrary ways that put their profits before patients, and many Americans still can't obtain or afford private insurance that promises them health security. The basic problem is that the regulations stand alone, without the auxiliary precaution of a public health plan whose mission is to improve the quality and cost-effectiveness of care.

Those with chronic conditions or nearing retirement age who are self-employed or work for small businesses are hit hardest. A 59-year-old self-employed man with diabetes, or a 48-year-old single mother with breast cancer who works at a small retailer--these are the sort of people who will fall through the cracks without a public plan available in all parts of the nation. They may qualify for a "hardship exemption" so that they are not compelled to buy insurance under the reform legislation's "individual mandate." But not being forced to buy insurance they can't afford is a poor substitute for having access to a public plan they can afford.

Read more here.