The bogus death statistic that won’t die
The bogus death statistic that won’t die
by Michelle Malkin
Creators Syndicate
Copyright 2009
Democrat Rep. Alan Grayson of Florida has found his calling: Death demagogue. First, he accused Republicans of wanting sick patients to “DIE QUICKLY.” Next, he likened health insurance problems to a “Holocaust in America.” Now, he’s unveiled a new website entitled “namesofthedead.com” in memory of the “more than 44,000 Americans [who] die simply because they have no health insurance.”
Just one problem: The statistic is a phantom number. Grayson’s memorial, like the Democrats’ government health care takeover plan itself, is full of vapor. It comes from a study published last December in the American Journal of Public Health. But the science is infused with left-wing politics.
Two of the co-authors, Drs. David Himmelstein and Steffie Woolhandler, are avowed government-run health care activists. Himmelstein co-founded Physicians for a National Health Program, which bills itself as the “the only national physician organization in the United States dedicated exclusively to implementing a single-payer national health program.” Woolhandler is a co-founder and served as secretary of the group.
Sounding more like a MoveOn.org organizer than a disinterested scientist, Dr. Woolhandler assailed the current health reform legislation in Congress for not going far enough: “Politicians are protecting insurance industry profits by sacrificing American lives.”
So, how did these political doctors come up with the 44,000 figure? They used data from a health survey conducted between 1988 and 1994. The questionnaires asked a sample of 9,000 participants if they were insured and how they rated their own health. The federal Centers for Disease Control tracked the deaths of people in the sample group through the year 2000. Drs. Himmelstein, Woolhandler, and company then crunched the numbers and attributed deaths to lack of health insurance for all the participants who initially self-reported that they had no insurance and then died for any reason over the 12-year tracking period.
At no time did the original researchers or the single-payer activists who piggy-backed off their data ever verify whether the supposed casualties of America’s callous health care system had insurance or not. In fact, here is what the report actually says:
“Our study has several limitations,” the authors concede. The survey data they used “assessed health insurance at a single point in time and did not validate self-reported insurance status. We were unable to measure the effect of gaining or losing coverage after the interview.” Himmelstein et al. simply assumed that point-in-time uninsurance translates into perpetual uninsurance – and that any health calamities that result can and must be blamed on being uninsured.
Another caveat you won’t see on Rep. Grayson’s memorial to the dubious dead: The single-payer advocate-authors also conceded in their study limitations section that “earlier population-based surveys that did validate insurance status found that between 7% and 11% of those initially recorded as being uninsured were misclassified. If present, such misclassification might dilute the true effect of uninsurance in our sample.”
To boil it all down in plain English: The single-payer scientists had no way of assessing whether the survey participants received insurance coverage between the time they answered the questionnaires and the time they died. They had no way of assessing whether the deaths could have been averted with health insurance coverage. A significant portion of those classified as “uninsured” may not have even been uninsured, based on past studies that actually did verify insurance status. But the Himmelstein team just took the rate of uninsurance from the original study (3.3 percent), applied it to census data, and voila: more than 44,000 Americans are dying from lack of insurance.
Next, the political doctors cooked up scary-specific death tolls for all 50 states (California – 5,302 Texas – 4,675!) Newspapers dutifully cited the fear-mongering factoids. The single-payer lobbying group co-founded by Drs. Himmelstein and Woolhandler took it from there. Last month, the group set up its own memorial on the National Mall for the phantom 44,000 casualties of uninsurance.
Dr. Himmelstein (who was also the driving force behind another flawed study tying medical debt to personal bankruptcies) eschewed scientific nuance and caveats to take to the airwaves and declare starkly that an American “dies every 12 minutes” because of lack of insurance. And now, Democrat Rep. Grayson has taken the monumentally dishonest concept online to solicit sob stories and put flesh on the weak bones of these dubious death numbers.
Where’s the White House health care “reality check” squad when you need it?
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Categories: Health care
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Factoid (n.)~~~like a fact; similar to factual, but not exactly true.
There are lies, damn lies, and statistics. This covers about all three rolled up into one. More proof that you can take a statistic, apply guesses, and come up with some idea that is completely wild.
You could take these same numbers of uninsured people, make an educated guess and say if they had no health insurance that they couldn’t afford car insurance, and guess that they had less car accidents due to the fact that they knew they didn’t have car insurance and were more careful drivers.
More faulty conclusions from the party of bad science.
More liberal truthiness. Reporters just parrot these news releases like, the number of people killed by drunk drivers.
You expect them to tell the truth? Any spin to make socialized medicine the law of the land.
By the by, I have yet to see a pro-Obamacare liberal explain how their assertion that socialized medicine = longer life expectancies with statements made by Obama official Robert Reich. Who said we shouldn’t expect to live longer than our parents.
Because I thought one of the big arguments for socialized medicine was that we’d all live so much longer in a socialist utopia!
He’s right about that. There is a Holocaust going on in America. It’s called abortion. Maybe that’s where they got that 44,000 figure from.
How many insured died during the same period? Perhaps it’s safer to be without health insurance due to the prevalence of MRSA and other infectious diseases transmitted by healthcare workers.
My Uncle Bob would say, “I stay away from hospitals because too many people die in them.”
My mother died at age 51 of terminal breast cancer in the mid-1960s. I was 17 at the time and our family had no health insurance. Although the parents of my mother kicked in, the bills were astronomical. It didn’t matter to the doctors, nurses and hospitals – they fully treated my mother until her death after a few weeks in the hospital.
Contrary to people like Grayson, there are plenty of doctors and members of the healthcare industry who take the hippocratic oath seriously when it comes to patients in distress. An overwhelming number of doctors understand that it isn’t all about money.
And I would like to add one other thing here. Religious people are much more likely to act morally and protect life. In most every survey I have seen, conservative church goers outnumber liberal church goers by 2 to 1. Grayson is a Democrat, and it is likely that he supports a secular view of the world in which people are disposable for convenience rather than beings who God has an interest in saving.
Are those people dying in the streets? Because if they’re dying in hospitals, then they are receiving health care. There’s not a hospital in America that allows people to simply die. Aside from the ethics, it’s actually illegal.
So perhaps Comrade Grayson can show us the 44,000 corpses lying in the streets of America?
He’s right about that. There is a Holocaust going on in America. It’s called abortion. Maybe that’s where they got that 44,000 figure from.
The number of aborted babies since Roe vs Wade is well over 50,000,000. Let me repeat that – 50 million. Obviously none of these aborted babies had names or and form of health insurance. The Supreme Court considered them to be no more than dust of the earth.
One other point, if these 50 million babies were now young adults or on their way to adulthood, we wouldn’t need illegal immigrant labor.
Sounds like if I don’t have health insurance, then there’s no chance I’ll die instantly in a car accident, from being shot, falling down stairs and breaking my neck, etc., etc.
They make it sound as though health insurance saves lives. Insurance can’t save lives, it pay the bills or a portion of the health costs. Medicine just doesn’t have the ability to save all people from dying regardless of whether the person has insurance coverage. With a gov plan, more people will die waiting to get treated for things that are treated now. And we can kiss goodbye any research and development of new procedures.
ManBearPig is impressed.
Could a Nobel Prize be next for these idiots?
So, what are they going to do about cars? Cars are killing people at an alarming rate. Poor people drive less expensive cars and die more horrific deaths!!!
Stoooopid idiots.
Leftist just love to throw around statements such as that-TRUTH? Leftist make up their own truth as they go along. Democrat Rep. Alan Grayson of Florida, Drs. Himmelstein, Woolhandler, and company have an agenda that far exceeds insurance companies and healthcare-power. They are after power over our lives and Socialized Medicine would certainly give it to them.
Our medical records become public records-every federal and police agency has access to them. In the name of Public Health and Cost Containment they start asking….and it never ends.
I stand back and watch these people demonize and threaten the Insurance Companies, in one case just because Humana had the temerity to write their customers about this Health Sham and a total war declared against them for turning against Fearless leaders Plan and threatening them with revocation of their anti-trust exemption. Oh, no can’t disagree with
Dear Leader but – If you agree and worship at the alter of said Dear Leader why you have your very own tax payer funded site to go to, HHS, and actually heap praise on the One with no problems what so ever.
A few things that I noticed.
1) how many of the supposed 44,000 uninsured were uninsured, but had the means to be able to purchase healthcare? We already know that a good number of the 47 million uninsured number that is thrown around make more than $50,000 a year and choose not to buy health insurance.
2)It says that out of the 44,000 California has 5,302 of the deaths. Let’s look at the population of California for a minute. As of 2008 the population is listed as 36756666. This means that aprox 1.44% of the population supposedly died from lack of insurance. So tell me again why we are supposed to screw the other 98% that have lived?
3
Now it is actually pets that cause global warming (or at least that is the latest envio-wacko theory).
If they are so into extrapolation of data and conclusions, let me get this straight:
IF I have insurance, I won’t die, but IF I DO NOT have insurance, I will surely die.
Wow, that’s some Insurance Policy!
Lets not confuse bad acts of players on one side of the issue with moral absolution of players on the other. Whether or not you agree with health care reform, insurance companies deserve a lot of the criticism they get.
Yes, Rep Grayson’s assertions are dubiuos. His claim about the Republican Healthcare plan is a mischaracterization and misrepresentastion of the facts.
The Republican Healthcare Plan should be read, and understood, before commenting on it.
Too bad he took a liberal Robert Reich’s words and attributed them to Republicans. Don’t these knuckleheads remember there are sound bites from the past that constantly paint them as liars and hypocrites using their own words and those of others against them? When will they ever learn?
I found it interesting on Foxnews last night during, I believe it was the Hannity show, regarding those medical codes the American Medical Association has a monopoly on and all of the money they stand to gain from Universal Healthcare.
I found this brief article on the internet regarding their history. Looks like “follow the money” is good advice:
Yeah, I did a survey too and I called 100 people at random out of the phone book. Nobody answered so I can safely assume that they are all dead due to lack of health insurance. Wow, what a problem we have here.
Grayson is a certified moron but he fits in very well with the rest of the Democrats.
With or without insurance, we’ve got a hundred percent death rate.
YOU LIE!, Democrat Rep. Alan Grayson of Florida.
The old and chronically infirm will only be given ‘hospice’ instead of treatment under government managed care. How would that not be worse because EVERYONE NOW in the U.S. can walk into a hospital and be treated for a life threatening ailment?
YOU LIE!, Democrat Rep. Alan Grayson of Florida.
Using the same caculations I come up with 1,452,000 uninsured Americans that are living healty, happy lives.
Also, I wonder how many of those 44,000 died of old age.
Stats are a joke. I did an exit poll of 100 men and found that men are 100% gay. Ok, so I did the poll outside a gay bar in P-town, but you don’t need all the facts. Do you?
RACIEST!
Correction! Jimmy Carter says your a RACIEST!
I think we all need a lesson in Marxism, communism and how to impose it on the masses. Ask the Russians how their universal healthcare is working out. From my perspective it has created “universal distrust’ by the population of their own medical people. It is just another arm of the government that they fear.
We need to admit that we have been complicit in allowing our schools to omit the most necessary part of education…..American history and the extraordinary accomplishment of those that established this Republican…a first in the world and certainly something to be proud of and to promote throughout the world…. Something Obama doesn’t even understand, much less act upon. Whatever he learned at Harvard, it wasn’t that.
A couple of notes:
1. Codes are added as new treatments become mainstream.
2. There are codes for Other/Misc for procedures not defined by existing codes.
3. There are occasions where codes overlap/duplicate.
Any organization can associate a value with a CPT code, but a licensing fee must be paid to the AMA.
Overall, the medical codes situation is pretty much a non-issue. The amount of money made by the AMA from established codes is minimal compared to the efficiency that standardization brings.
I bet Anita Dunn will take this on and correct all the ONE’s statements using this crap science. Yeah.
i saw and heard this lying moron when he made this comment and cartoon. he just simply took the obama/pelosi plan and labeled it the republican plan and was of course covered by cnn with no fact check. if the people of orlando/tampa re-elect this lying weasel who wants to destroy medicare by covering illegal immigrants, so be it. but the billions removed from medicare and the destruction of the economy are on them. ASK TENNESSEE HOW THIS CRAP WORKS, ASK OREGON, ASK MASSACHUSETTS. first these socialist weasels promise you the moon and stars for free, then when they can’t deliver and you get angry, they bring out the guns and tanks to KEEP THE PEACE. it has happened everywhere communism takes hold. GOREBECHOV TEAR DOWN THAT WALL. TIANNEMIN SQUARE. NORTH KOREA. CUBA. VENEZUELA.
A liberal lying? Nah, not in a million years.
How about the recent claims of either 98,000 OR 200,000 deaths (depending on source) annually from “Preventable Medical Errors”.
The lower number is more than Diabetes, Alzheimer’s, or Influenza. The higher number is also more than Stroke or Respiratory Disease, and third only to Cancer and Heart Disease.
This is PREPOSTEROUS. I don’t need to assess the “studies” used to come up with these absurd numbers to know that they’re bogus. It is beyond reason.
But, it would be nice if someone with some expertise would check into these numbers that the TRIAL LAWYERS are using to drum up business.
…conservative MD trade organization…?
Which one would that be?
After seeing yet more and more articles in JAMA with titles like “…and Social Justice…” and “…Gun control…”, I canceled my AMA membership some time ago.
The AMA may be a trade organization; but, conservative?
About that, I am far less than sure.
Only one question needs to be asked: “were they receiving MEDICAL CARE when they died?” That makes the insurance question moot. Nobody gets turned down for treatment in the US, its just a question of who pays.
I’m sorry to hear that.
My father’s mother died when he was 12.
Yep.
Thank you for that.
I treat each case from each patient the same, without having any – any – idea of their financial/insurance status.
When I was in independent practice, I sent out the bills after the care (diagnoses on specimens) had been rendered and completed.
Yep again.
That old annoying, irreconcilably 180-degree different, opposite-worldview thing again.
Great article, Michelle, but let’s stop arguing on their terms because you get stupid tripe like this:
On October 23rd, 2009 at 8:48 am, chapoutier said:
We need to stop arguing against this collectivist takeover on their terms.
Boiled down, this is not about the stats or the corruption or reforming health care.
Those who seem to want to stop government from dictating values, morality, and the bedroom somehow conversely and desperately want the government to decide how much and what kind of health care they can get.
Chap et. al., you are slaves pining for a gilded cage.
Gee. What part of “whether or not you agree with health care reform” confused you, FilmLadd? Because I thought I was quite clear that one can be against health care reform and also accept the reality that the health insurance companies are somewhat less than innocent players in this little game. But apparently that requires more nuance than you are able to muster.
I thoroughly disagree!
Health insurance companies, besides alerting consumers to coverage limitations and inclusions in enumerated contracts both parties sign, also conduct numerous seminars and inundate their clients w/ annual and monthly news letters, brochures, and catalogs explicitly stating what they do and DO NOT cover.
It’s up to the consumer to know what coverage is included/limited in their health contracts by actually taking the time to read them. If then you feel you have enough coverage, great; if not, then you may need to renegotiate or shop during the next open-enrollment period. But in either case, the consumers bares the responsibility to get informed.
I saw this guy spewing on Fox yesterday, he looked deranged.. I thought horns were going to sprout from his head.. SCARY
As someone who works with Insurance Companies every day (verifying Insurance and getting authzns for Pediatric Oncology and Stem Cell pts in the SF Bay Area), my personal experience is that my 40 odd Clinician’s primary concern is treating pts. Over the 13 years I worked this job, I struggle with the fact that these Clinicians don’t want to practice Managed Care Medicine. A lot of the time they think Fee For Service Care. What that means is: they do a service, they get paid for it; not `Is this Radiology or Laboratory an In-Network Provider for my pt’s plan?’ It’s not that my Doc’s don’t care, their primary concern isn’t taking out tonsils or amputating feet for the money it brings in. It’s aggressively treating the pt. They are mindful when reminded that certain procedures need to be done locally and not at our Facility.
This Moron Grayson is showing his ignorance. Once again we have a Know-Nothing with no real world experience bloviating and putting it on the record forever that he has the intellectual skills the size of a pea. This man needs to be ostracized and more, LAUGHED AT.
Woolhandler?! – as in “pull the wool over their eyes” w/ dubious facts and contorted predictions?
Oops! “…the consumer bares the responsibility to get informed.”
I, and many, likely the overwhelming majority, of us here agree with that..
But, the paternalistic, statist, collectivist, opposite-worldview holding socialists thoroughly disagree with that.
Agreed.
Agreed.
But, the etc., etc., etc. socialists disagree with that – irreconcilably, the way water irreconcilably flows downhill; the way unchecked power corrupts.
On October 23rd, 2009 at 11:05 am, chapoutier said:
Actually I think you missed MY nuance, which goes something like this:
YOUR nuance is designed to distract the slaves while their leg chains are clapped on.
These left wing doctors that the Obama crowd keeps trotting out are the quislings of their profession. If you notice, these doctors generally are not involved in patient care and they would not how to draw blood if their lives depended on it. Most of them work for “think tanks” and at universities. If you notice, these doctors never mention tort reform. These doctors are on the side of the trial lawyers. Harry Reid is a poodle for the trial lawyers and these doctors work with Reid on his propaganda. Nobody would allow these doctors to treat their kids for a boobooo from a tricycle accident. The doctors would not even know how to put a bandaid on a child.
You can tell this by looking at them, how?
How has tort reform worked in Texas and California?
Health care reform I could believe in!
So the problem with health care/health insurance is cost and availability?
Why is the cost of health care/health insurance going up and how to change that?
Millions of illegal aliens get free health care. Hospitals/health care workers pass that cost onto people who pay and on to health insurance companies. Health insurance companies raise their rates because they have to cover the cost of health care for illegal aliens. Doctors and facilities are stretched providing care for more and more people.
What to do; what to do? How about slamming our border shut and tossing the illegal aliens back over the fence. Let’s use the assets we have to cover Americans.
Result, lower costs and more availability because the number of doctors/hospital facilities we have would be caring for fewer patients and fewer of them would be uninsured. Why do people think that we have to destroy the whole system to take care of the problem? The problem is free health care to an increasing number of illegal aliens. Get rid of them; problem solved. And, please, no talk of how un-nice that would be of us. I would ask the question I hear alot; what part of illegal do you not understand?
I have spent my entire adult life in the range of low middle class or even lower, yet I have always had health insurance for myself and the four children I have raised. If I could do it, anyone who wanted to could do it.
Come on – no insurance company is going to lower its rates under its volition; let’s try it in all FIFTY states before we decide if tort reform works or not.
You are right. Even after Texas passed their tort reform law, malpractice insurers there tried to raise their rates 19%! It wasn’t till the legislature stepped in and smacked them around a bit that malpractice insurers dropped their rates. By a whopping 15%. When you consider that malpractice premiums represent about 1-2% of the overall cost of medical care, you will see what a silly canard tort reform is.
Huh? I thought the great thing about federalism was that you got to try new ideas out in individual states to see if it worked BEFORE taking it to the national level! In any case, tort reform has been tried in a number of states and has roundly failed in bringing down medical costs.
So Palin is wrong when she brings up the figurative “death panels”, and is the cause of much liberal teeth gnashing, but Grayson can accuse the Republicans of being the angels of death because they call for responsible reform, and that is just fine?
Democrat, hypocrisy be thy name.
That has no relevance to how much they cost the individual doctor. Refer back to the line about “lies, damned lies, and statistics”.
Not sure where to find it, but I seem to recall that the study also included deaths due to vehicle accidents, war deaths, murder, suicide,etc…things that insurance would not have been able to prevent.
On October 23rd, 2009 at 11:29 am, chapoutier said:
This is “bogging down the opposition in weeds.”
How has collectivism worked in Cuba? Soviet Union? Europe? Canada?
Ever been to a doctor in France? I have.
Ever been to a doctor in England? I have.
Not so great.
Seen a hospital in Canada? Talked to people in Canada about their healthcare? Heard the constant debates in newspapers and radio there on how the gubbernment needs to do x and y and z for them?
I say PSHAW on your retarded weeds, you slave mongering sommelier.
Um. Are we debating health care reform or are we debating “what it costs the individual doctor?”
Feel free to support tort reform for any number of other reasons, including because you think that doctors should not be saddled with that much personal liability. But don’t delude yourself into thinking it will in any way adequately address actual health care costs. And don’t delude yourself into thinking that tort reform is actually going to lower malpractice premiums in and of itself. The in both Cali and Texas, after railing about how important tort reform was to lowering malpractice premiums, insurers in both states tried to RAISE premiums until the legislature stepped in and enacted INSURANCE reform.
I’m responding to your b.s. statement, not to the general debate. If you don’t want to be challenged, stop with the crap.
Translation: I don’t want to admit that tort reform is almost useless.
Anybody have any idea what effect (percentage-wise) “tort reform”, i.e., controlling the trial lawyers’ lottery – AKA much, not all, of “malpractice” litigation – would have on the rate of increase of “health care costs”, as opposed to its effect on the amount of “health care costs”?
On October 23rd, 2009 at 11:56 am, chapoutier said:
No we are debating whether to give collectivists power over our medical care.
On October 23rd, 2009 at 11:59 am, chapoutier said:
Translation: I don’t want to discuss the gilded cage I am advocating, I want to capture slaves by discussing the nature of the birdfeed they’ll get.
Tell that to the Dems who failed to see universal health insurance for the failure it is from TennCare and MassHealth, let alone, Canada and the UK.
With liberals, ideology trumps common sense.
My original supposed b.s. statement had nothing to do with the cost to the individual doctor. As you may recall, YOU are the one that brought that to the table. See:
Are you okay? You seem a bit addled.
On October 23rd, 2009 at 12:02 pm, chapoutier said:
Translation: Look how nice the birdfeed is in that cage. Looks good don’t it? Now quit looking at the lock and get in there.
I was simply responding to you dismissing tort reform because malpractice insurance is such a small piece of the entire cost of medical care. It isn’t a small piece to the average doctor, nor is it irrelevant, since it leads to doctors prescribing unnecessary care and procedures to protect themselves from lawsuits, thus raising the overall cost of medical care. Which you know, I’m sure, since it’s been debated endlessly. However, I’m learning that with you there are no established facts. Everything must be argued as if history didn’t exist. Typical liberal idiot.
Couple tort reform w/ other cost cutting strategies, like interstate competition and patent extensions on meds, and it will work! Likewise, since when is 1-2% in savings off billions, if not trillions, considered insignificant and dismissive?
And as the thread has turned to healthcare reform, shouldn’t we look at it from a total sum approach – from both insurance rates for consumers and malpractice coverage to state competition – in brainstorming ideas to control costs other than a gov takeover of health insurance?
So, you are basically complaining that I said ground beef was useless when trying to make an apple pie because I neglected to mention that it can be used to make meatloaf. Okay. Boy, you got me there.
If this is true, why didn’t damage caps result in a drop in overall health care costs in Texas or California? Or in any other state with a cap? Hell, it didn’t even result in a Please oh please explain it to my poor, simple liberal mind.
It is not 1 or 2%. That would be true if you could eliminate malpractice premiums altogether. At least with the example of Texas, we are talking about 15% of that 1 or 2%. That is how much malpractice premiums have decreased And that was only AFTER the insurance companies were essentially forced to drop them after they tried to raise them 19%.
Conservatives have made this a cornerstone for their plan to rein in costs. You can argue “every little bit helps.” But let’s not pretend it is anything but a very very little bit.
I’ll ask again:
Anybody have any idea what effect (percentage-wise) “tort reform” would have on the rate of increase of “health care costs”, as opposed to its effect on the amount of “health care costs”?
chap; your tort reform argument is spoken like a lawyer. every one hollers when their ox is about to get gored. the insurance co’s are screaming, and next time a republican controls all three branches, we will see how lawyers howl about tort reform. tort reform saw a massive migration into tx, while illinois being a tort haven is seeing a mass migration out.
correction: mass migration ‘OF DOCTORS’
Also:
Anybody have any idea how much the seemingly endless; time-consuming, and thus money-costing, documentation requirements; and “defensive medicine”; due to the fear of the annoyance and contamination of litigation, add to “healthcare costs”?
If I had to bet, I would bet that it is an order, perhaps orders, of magnitude greater than liablity insurance premiums alone.
Anybody have any info?
Someone?
Anyone?
Bueller?
On October 23rd, 2009 at 12:25 pm, chapoutier said:
And that’s why Republicans are idiots.
Instead of declaring that it isn’t the State’s job to reduce costs in ANYTHING, much less TAKE OVER industries, they concede that ground and piddle with distractions like tort reform, allowing liberals to argue that it’s just best if we all get in the cage. Tort reform doesn’t work.
Bottom line: As a free individual, I am NOT responsible for paying for ANY sommelier’s liver problems.
You can argue tort reform all day long, because you can’t argue that other people should be forced by the state to pay for your liver transplant.
the only thing not bogus is that democrat rep. alan grayson, is brain dead. that this idiot hasn’t figured out that his bs scam has been debunked is amazing. liberals are at their best when lying, something they are experts at.
I am continually amazed that people would actually vote for someone like Grayson. Clearly, he received votes because of the (D) next to his name on the ballot, not because he is brilliant, nor because he brings ingenuity to the table.
He is the quintessential Democrat politician…a hate-monger, prevaricator, a divider…a parasitic leech who has nothing constructive to add to the argument. He serves his party, not those for whom he was elected to serve.
I personally can’t stand to watch him deliver his drivel, without wanting to just smack him.
My uncle Sal T Dogg died last year without insurance.
So did my aunt Rosie Palm. I’m not sure happened to her five sisters but I suspect they went at the same time since they were closely connected. Again, no insurance.
I’ll have to search the family records, but I suspect more. Maybe I should enter these on that silly web site…
“Republicans want you to die quickly”
…this coming from the champions of euthanasia, abortion, genocide, communism, embrionic stem cell research, eugenics…
This study has the average rate increase from 2000 to 2009 for every state, except MA.
Texas was 91.6%. California was 109%.2. They did not give a national average but Texas was right in the middle for all the other states, with Cali definitely being on the higher side of increase, from the 20 or so random states I clicked on.
I’ve never seen a death certificate with a listed cause of death “lack of insurance”. Is he saying the coroner listed the wrong cause?
Now if I might apply the same level of logical thought:
100% of those with insurance eventually. In fact, more people with insurance die each day than those without insurance – therefore, we all ought to get rid of insurance health insurance increasing our chances of living.
Yes, the documents are forged, the numbers bogus, the claims unfounded. But it is the serious nature of the charges and the fact that some companies make PROFITS that compels us to destroy those companies and their profits.
Sounds like “Chappy Approved Science” to me! Dan Blather would be proud of Chappy!
Rate increase for health insurance, yes.
Thank you.
From the tone of some of their wording, I’d bet their answer to the increase in insurance premiums is to have the government tax more and spend more…what a surprise.
My question yet again:
Anybody have any idea how much the seemingly endless; time-consuming, and thus money-costing, documentation requirements; and “defensive medicine”; due to the fear of the annoyance and contamination of litigation, add to “healthcare costs”?
And I will add again:
If I had to bet, I would bet that it is an order, perhaps orders, of magnitude greater than liablity insurance premiums alone.
On October 23rd, 2009 at 1:02 pm, chapoutier said:
Ohhh! Ok then. That makes it alright for the State to force me to pay for your liver biopsy. If only I had realized how little tort reform had succeeded, I could have saved us all that time worrying about my freedom and personal property.
How is your question not answered? When the fear of astronomical lawsuits is removed as in Texas and Cali, doctors don’t seem to be changing their behavior. If they did, one would expect to see premiums decrease, or grow at a slower rate. But they have not.
Maybe the whole “defensive medicine” idea is a myth to allow doctors to justify running expensive tests to line their pockets.
On October 23rd, 2009 at 1:13 pm, granite said:
You’re arguing with thieves that you will indeed miss your car despite the dent in its fender.
On October 23rd, 2009 at 1:20 pm, chapoutier said:
You see Granite? That car has a dent. Why it’s practically broken. You don’t need it.
Private property? Freedom? Bah. You are too stupid to realize that you car has a dent in it.
Here, I will run your life for you.
OT, or is it?:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wODmwAbsCCI&feature=sub
OK, messed up the quote, back to the coffee machine…
Here‘s another study that shows from 2001 to 2005, premiums in Texas rose 39.7%, the third highest rate in the country. The average was 29.6%. This is despite over 2 years of tort reform. California was 33.6%. This is despite a malpractice cap that has been in place for over 3 decades.
How long have those laws been in effect?
How soon after the passage of “tort reform” legislation would doctors’ “behavior” be expected to change?
The next day?
The next week?
The next year?
After 5-10 years?
If you’re talking about a conspiracy among physicians of different specialities to refer patients to each other for multiple consultations, and thus consultative fees; I would not be surprised if that has happened. I also would assume that that would be illegal.
If you’re talking about a clinician ordering clinical lab, pathology, or Xray tests in order to get a kickback from other practitioners, or from reference laboratories; I would not be surprised if that has happened. I also would assume that that would be illegal.
Other than those two examples, how could docs “line their pockets” by ordering lots of expensive tests?
Interesting.
Thank you.
Anyone here actually pay these premiums for their business? We do. (Spouse and I). And the health premiums for our business have risen 700% in the last ten years, accounting for minor changes in plans, # of employees, etc. People in our position are saying that when govt. health care gets here, they will be seeking private care and dumping their employees on the government. We wont do that, and who knows what will happen to us then?
I meant also to ask:
Anyone have any info on how much the insanely high overall cost of living in California factors into that 33.6%?
What was the increase in the cost of housing and real estate; or in college costs, in California over that same time?
Folks working in the health care field, like anyone else, have to pay rent/the mortgage, buy clothes/food, educate their kids, etc.
I am curious as to how much the ever increasing number of illegal aliens influence that factor as well, particularly since the two states exemplified are on the Mexican border.
Perhaps illegal immigration is a factor with those states, but that kind of proves the point that the solution is NOT tort reform, no?
He is the Al Gore of Healthcare.
Not quite, IMHO. It might prove that tort reform is not the ONLY part of the solution. It seems as though some conversations here get boiled down into whether or not tort reform is the end-all, be-all… I would wager that very few believe that is the case.
However, the fact that tort reform would not resolve all issues does not mean it shouldn’t be considered. We just get bogged down here at times as to the magnitude of impact it might have.
If you check Chap’s link it’s for the yaers 2001-2005.
California:
Family premiums did go up 33.6% (from $7898 to $10,551) and median income went up 9.45% (to $47,725) in the same period.
The percentage contributed by covered employees actually went down 6.2% to 22.7% of the $10551 or $2395 a year – $200 a month.
That $2395 out of a median salary of $47725 is 5%.
5%!
Seems affordable. And yet they want to leave 2/3 of the presently uninsured – uninsured, while taking over healthcare.
chap, our resident ambulance chaser does not like tort reform. Hmmmm, go figure. I find your case to be without merit. Dismissed.
It is, without fail, the one thing that is ALWAYS brought up from the right when talking about what they want out of health care reform. If its potential has been falsely magnified in any way, the fault is squarely there.
Stop using my own sources against me. It’s not polite.