Help with Obama's Health Care Plan

• bigredbaseball0

  I am not big into politics, and really have not read the entire bill. I was hoping someone could give the the abridged version, and basically just lay out what the bill actually means. My main question is what, if any, effect will it have on Physical Therapist/people's ability to get physical therapy?
• CenterBHSFan

  

  I would venture to say that it probably doesn't matter if people read it or not. There are going to have to be spending cuts implemented somewhere. And that "somewhere", IMO, will probably equate to skimming everywhere.
  
  There will always be a need for physical therapy, they can't do away with it or even 1/2 of it. But, I would think that they would cut alot of the hydrotherapy stuff (and things of that nature) down a bit. I was just talking to my niece last night who works at Wheeling Hospital, and she was telling me some of the stuff that that hospital is going to have to reign in on. Basically, it will not affect or have much of an effect on patient care.
  She also said that she's thinking repetitive x-rays and blood tests will probably be reigned in also; along with certain surgeries are going to be moving to out-patient, which is a natural progression anyway, due to technology advancements.
  But, this is, as we all know, necessary fat-trimming that needed to take place regardless of healthcare insurance. I don't think there's anything to freak out about.
  There are going to be cut backs that are going to be largely unpopular, however, if it actually takes place - which remains to be seen, so it's useless to really talk about it yet. (preventative care - breast exams, pap smears, etc.)
• BoatShoes

  bigredbaseball0 wrote: I am not big into politics, and really have not read the entire bill. I was hoping someone could give the the abridged version, and basically just lay out what the bill actually means. My main question is what, if any, effect will it have on Physical Therapist/people's ability to get physical therapy?

  It doesn't seem correct IMO, to refer to the bills in Congress as "Obama's health care plan," as unlike when Clinton, or Bush 43 or Reagan were president, President Obama did not enter a specific bill into either house for his prime domestic initiative.
  
  Instead, the House of Representatives has passed;
  
  "The Affordable Health Care for America Act" which you can read a brief summary of, with generally little bias right or left, but skimming on deep details on wikipedia.org
  
  The senate passed "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act" which you can also search and read about at wikipedia.org
  
  Nonetheless, as the plans stand now they seem impossible to pass because of Scott Brown's victory and Massachusetts. Any passed by the house will be "too liberal/progressive" for the senate and likely any bill passed by the Senate will be "too weak" for the House.
  
  The Senate Bill is projected by the Non-Partisan Congressional budget office to reduce the federal deficit by 132 billion dollars over the next ten years and by 1 trillion dollars the following decade.
  
  Nonetheless, Conservatives who are concerned about the bill's impact on the deficit, have claimed that the CBO projections are erroneous and that the bill will add to the deficit because, as a general rule, government programs always have cost overruns and are inefficient.
  
  There are also concerns by Conservatives about projected cuts in the social welfare program, Medicare, which they say will not in effect make the program more efficient but instead decrease the level of care offered by the program.
  
  Among the most significant aspects of the bills that would be created would be a market place to buy insurance beyond that offered by your employer or, any insurance at all if you do not have it.
  
  This market place would be federally regulated and state health insurers would have to "buy in" and compete with insurers from other states in this federally regulated market place offering consumers more choices and offering insurers more customers.
  
  Conservatives have been suggesting a federal law forcing states to allow out of state insurers to be able to sell in their states...essentially allowing us to buy insurance from companies nationwide, like car insurance.
  
  This differs from the democrats plan only in that the dems think this market place should be federally regulated and that insurers should have to "buy in".
  
  Another important aspect is that under either bill...an insurance company would not be allowed to deny an insured coverage based upon a "pre-existing condition."
  
  This might be problematic in that insurers would be forced to take on riskier patients and incur more costs and it is feared it could be spread throughout the base of others that they insure, failing to keep down the cost of premiums.
• nmeccc

  bigredbaseball0 wrote: I am not big into politics, and really have not read the entire bill. I was hoping someone could give the the abridged version, and basically just lay out what the bill actually means. My main question is what, if any, effect will it have on Physical Therapist/people's ability to get physical therapy?

  I would love to read the Senete version that was passed, but it is locked behind closed doors for no one to see. That is transperancy for you!
• Bigdogg

  nmeccc wrote:

  bigredbaseball0 wrote: I am not big into politics, and really have not read the entire bill. I was hoping someone could give the the abridged version, and basically just lay out what the bill actually means. My main question is what, if any, effect will it have on Physical Therapist/people's ability to get physical therapy?

  I would love to read the Senete version that was passed, but it is locked behind closed doors for no one to see. That is transperancy for you!

  First of all don't beleive everything you read on here. There is a reason why the Democrats did not pass health care already. ITS STILL BEING DEBATED! If you really want to know what going on, here is a good place to look:
  
  http://www.thomas.gov/
  
  HR 3962 is the House passed proposal and HR 3590 is the Senate vehicle.
  
  Here is a good place to compare each version:
  
  http://healthreform.kff.org/
• Bigdogg

  nmeccc wrote:

  bigredbaseball0 wrote: I am not big into politics, and really have not read the entire bill. I was hoping someone could give the the abridged version, and basically just lay out what the bill actually means. My main question is what, if any, effect will it have on Physical Therapist/people's ability to get physical therapy?

  I would love to read the Senete version that was passed, but it is locked behind closed doors for no one to see. That is transperancy for you!

  You got to be smart enough to know where to look. Took me about 30 seconds.
• fan_from_texas

  BoatShoes wrote: Among the most significant aspects of the bills that would be created would be a market place to buy insurance beyond that offered by your employer or, any insurance at all if you do not have it.
  
  This market place would be federally regulated and state health insurers would have to "buy in" and compete with insurers from other states in this federally regulated market place offering consumers more choices and offering insurers more customers.
  
  Conservatives have been suggesting a federal law forcing states to allow out of state insurers to be able to sell in their states...essentially allowing us to buy insurance from companies nationwide, like car insurance.
  
  This differs from the democrats plan only in that the dems think this market place should be federally regulated and that insurers should have to "buy in".

  These proposals seem relatively fair and straightforward, implementation details aside. It makes a lot of sense to allow insurance companies to compete across state lines and allow employees to purchase insurance other than through their employee.
  

  Another important aspect is that under either bill...an insurance company would not be allowed to deny an insured coverage based upon a "pre-existing condition."
  
  This might be problematic in that insurers would be forced to take on riskier patients and incur more costs and it is feared it could be spread throughout the base of others that they insure, failing to keep down the cost of premiums.

  And this, I think, is a stupid idea, particularly because it combines the concept of not being able to deny coverage for pre-existing conditions with maximum ratios between the highest premiums and the lowest. So say you have a 30 year old male who works out all the time, watches what he eats, doesn't smoke, doesn't drink, no family history of anything . . . and a 65 year old morbidly obese person who smokes, drinks, and has otherwise terrible health habits.
  
  The 30-year-old is easy to insure because he's as close to risk-free as it gets. The 65-year-old is nigh-impossible to insure because of the terrible habits and risks. Any system that requires you to insure the latter, and yet imposes a maximum that you can charge the latter necessarily entails someone else picking up the slack--likely the 30 year old. These sort of programs provide coverage to all at a reasonable price, but they do it by disincentivizing healthy choices and lessening the penalties for bad choices. On the margins, that's an issue.
  
  Sure, for the people who came down with cancer and are fighting bankruptcy, this would be a godsend. But my inclination is that most health issues suffered by people are relatively preventable through good lifestyle choices. Any system that doesn't reward good choices nor punish bad choices isn't likely to see people continue to make good choices. That will drive up overall costs.
• BoatShoes

  fan_from_texas wrote: And this, I think, is a stupid idea, particularly because it combines the concept of not being able to deny coverage for pre-existing conditions with maximum ratios between the highest premiums and the lowest. So say you have a 30 year old male who works out all the time, watches what he eats, doesn't smoke, doesn't drink, no family history of anything . . . and a 65 year old morbidly obese person who smokes, drinks, and has otherwise terrible health habits.
  
  The 30-year-old is easy to insure because he's as close to risk-free as it gets. The 65-year-old is nigh-impossible to insure because of the terrible habits and risks. Any system that requires you to insure the latter, and yet imposes a maximum that you can charge the latter necessarily entails someone else picking up the slack--likely the 30 year old. These sort of programs provide coverage to all at a reasonable price, but they do it by disincentivizing healthy choices and lessening the penalties for bad choices. On the margins, that's an issue.
  
  Sure, for the people who came down with cancer and are fighting bankruptcy, this would be a godsend. But my inclination is that most health issues suffered by people are relatively preventable through good lifestyle choices. Any system that doesn't reward good choices nor punish bad choices isn't likely to see people continue to make good choices. That will drive up overall costs.

  I tend to agree with you. Nonetheless, I think this might be where something like, some kind of minimal "public option" comes into play. It doesn't seem fair to me, to force a company to insure the worst kind of unhealthy people. This risk can be spread out to the whole U.S. tax paying population and also have conditions attached to improve health perhaps???
  
  To me, the public option ought to be an option of last resort...even for the unhealthiest people. We have a public option deliver mail to the farthest reaches of our Union, public options to defend and protect our property in the worst kinds of neighborhoods, and public options to get education...
  
  Hence for a long time, I often thought a good way to "expand a public option" would be to extend TRICARE to reserve military personnel automatically. This way, if you wanted a public option for health insurance you could enroll in the reserve military and have to meet certain health standards, etc.
• BoatShoes

  fan_from_texas wrote:

  BoatShoes wrote: Among the most significant aspects of the bills that would be created would be a market place to buy insurance beyond that offered by your employer or, any insurance at all if you do not have it.
  
  This market place would be federally regulated and state health insurers would have to "buy in" and compete with insurers from other states in this federally regulated market place offering consumers more choices and offering insurers more customers.
  
  Conservatives have been suggesting a federal law forcing states to allow out of state insurers to be able to sell in their states...essentially allowing us to buy insurance from companies nationwide, like car insurance.
  
  This differs from the democrats plan only in that the dems think this market place should be federally regulated and that insurers should have to "buy in".

  These proposals seem relatively fair and straightforward, implementation details aside. It makes a lot of sense to allow insurance companies to compete across state lines and allow employees to purchase insurance other than through their employee.
  

  I also think this is probably the best idea floating around and can't see why it's not being talked about more. Since different states have different standards for their health insurers, don't you think their has to be a new "federal standard?" What do you think about state sovereignty concerns?
• fan_from_texas

  BoatShoes wrote: I also think this is probably the best idea floating around and can't see why it's not being talked about more. Since different states have different standards for their health insurers, don't you think their has to be a new "federal standard?" What do you think about state sovereignty concerns?

  Yes, there would need to be new federal standards. This shouldn't be a concern--Congress can step in and establish federal floors, as it often has before. The whole concept of federalism is to allow the 'laboratories of democracy' to innovate and experiment, then pick the best and make it the new minimum standard. I don't have big concerns with allowing insurers to sell across state lines, like we do in almost every other field.
• BoatShoes

  fan_from_texas wrote: Yes, there would need to be new federal standards. This shouldn't be a concern--Congress can step in and establish federal floors, as it often has before. The whole concept of federalism is to allow the 'laboratories of democracy' to innovate and experiment, then pick the best and make it the new minimum standard. I don't have big concerns with allowing insurers to sell across state lines, like we do in almost every other field.

  I agree with you...but then, what about someone like Justice Thomas who might say that for the Congress to do this they're stretching their Commerce Power into a Police Power...Or Justice O'Connor who might think that it borders on coercion of the states. Then, if the states opted out of the federal standard, you could argue that the state would violate the dormant commerce clause because they can't be protectionist against other states...but then again, Scalia and Thomas reject that doctrine too...
  
  Ultimately I think it's a fair use of the commerce power but and could avoid state sovereignty concerns but there are others....posters like Majorspark or Bman or Eers on here who might disagree...