FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 18, 2011
10:18 AM
MONTPELIER, VT - January 18 - Flanking Gov. Peter Shumlin at a Statehouse press conference, the Vermont congressional delegation today announced federal legislation to let states in 2014 provide better health care at less cost.
A provision by U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) in the new federal health care law allows states to propose pilot programs in 2017. Now Vermont's congressional delegates – Sen. Patrick Leahy (D), Sanders, and Rep. Peter Welch (D) – have drafted a bill to authorize federal waivers three years sooner. Sanders will introduce the bill in the Senate for himself and Leahy, and Welch will introduce the bill in the House.
Sanders said, “At a time when 50 million Americans lack health insurance and when the cost of health care continues to soar, it is my strong hope that Vermont will lead the nation in a new direction through a Medicare-for-all single-payer approach. The goal is clear: quality, cost-effective health care for all Vermonters. This is essential not only for the wellbeing of all Vermonters but for job creation. We must do all we can to lower the crushing costs of health care that are now devastating Vermont businesses and their employees. I look forward to working with Sen. Leahy and Rep. Welch to get the appropriate waivers and flexibility for us to go forward toward a single-payer system.”
Welch said, “When Vermont innovates, the nation often follows our lead. Providing Vermont and other states with the flexibility to build upon health care reform will result in better care and greater access at a lower cost. Allowing us to become a laboratory for innovation and excellence will help Vermonters, while once again allowing us to lead the way.”
Leahy said, “While some in Washington are trying to turn the clock back on health reform, Vermont instead is moving forward. This state waiver bill will give Vermont and other states the choice to go above and beyond what the federal health care law does by devising their own reforms. Vermont has always been a leader in health care quality and access, and this bill will give our state the flexibility we want to offer Vermonters the best care and coverage while controlling costs.”
Shumlin said The Affordable Care Act “will bring Vermont critical money to make our health care system work better and to cover some of the uninsured. We want to do it better and faster than the federal law contemplates. We want to control costs and cover everyone. I am so pleased that our congressional delegation supports us in this effort, and I thank them for introducing this important legislation. This is just the beginning of this process, and there are other waivers we will need to get it done. If we work together, I am convinced we can persuade the federal government they should not stand in our way."
This press conference came one day before a report is to be delivered to the state Legislature by William Hsiao, the Harvard University economist, outlining health care options for Vermont that could require a federal waiver to be implemented.
The new national health law will provide insurance for 32 million more Americans and make other significant strides, but Leahy, Sanders and Welch said Congress and the Obama administration should let states make additional improvements.
Under their bill, states would be able to seek U.S. Health and Human Services Department approval to implement pilot health care systems beginning in 2014. To qualify, state plans would have to be at least as comprehensive and affordable as the federal model and cover at least as many people. States could not offer lower quality or less affordable coverage. A single-payer system like Vermont is considering or any other state initiative could not cause the federal government to incur more costs.
The waiver provision also requires HHS to create a coordinated process so states in a single application also could seek waivers already available under Medicare, Medicaid, and the children’s health insurance program.
A fact sheet on the new "State Leadership in Healthcare Act" is available here.
Source: Common Dreams
"Rather than waste time on debating how much reform insurance companies will permit - - if any - - -it is time to change the debate" - Kucinich Kicks off Health Care Debate with Renewed Call for Single-Payer
Source
GOP claims 650,000 lost jobs from "ObamaCare," and cites the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office as the source. But the CBO never produced the number. What follows is a story of how statistics get used and abused in Washington.
Read it all at Yahoo! News
Rick Ungar - The Policy Page - Forbes:
"The Republican case is laid out in a document published on January 6th, under the authorship of the House GOP leadership and named, “Obamacare: A budget-busting, job-killing health care law.”
It’s an interesting document and well worth reading.
Indeed, the GOP arguments put forth in the study would be truly compelling were it not for the fact that the claims made are so astonishingly dishonest that it takes but a few hours of research to disprove and discredit virtually every substantial claim they make. If you question this, and I know many of you will, I have carefully provided links to each and every document and report the GOP has relied upon so that you may read these authorities for yourself." Well worth the time to read the rest, where Mr. Ungar does the work for you.
PBS:
"As the House of Representatives gears up to vote this week on a proposed repeal of the health care reform bill, public support for the move is falling.
Only 25 percent of people polled now support repealing the health care law, according to an Associated Press-GfK poll out Monday, compared to 46 percent on Jan. 7..."
“Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in healthcare is the most shocking and inhumane.” ~Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
From CNN.com: "Emergency room wait times a national problem
According to a 2009 report from the Government Accountability Office, emergency department wait times continue to increase. The report says the average wait time to see a physician is more than double the recommended time in some cases.
Research from Press Ganey Associates, a group that works with health care organizations to improve clinical outcomes, finds that in 2009, patients admitted to hospitals waited on average six hours in emergency rooms. Nearly 400,000 patients waited 24 hours or more." These types of stories - where a 2 year old winds up losing her limbs because the ER staff was too busy to take care of her - would diminish, not grow, if it was affordable for the average citizen to have a primary care physician they were able to build a relationship with.
With the House preparing to vote this week on whether to repeal the health-care law, the chamber's new Republican majority is confronting a far more delicate task: forging its own path to expand medical coverage and curb costs.
The House's GOP leaders have made clear that they regard the repeal vote, scheduled to begin Tuesday, as the prelude to a two-prong strategy that is likely to last throughout the year, or longer.
They intend to take apart some of the sprawling law, which Democrats pushed through Congress last year, piece by piece before major aspects of it go into effect. At the same time, Republicans say, they will come up with their own plan to revise the health-care system, tailored along more conservative lines.
On the cusp of undertaking this work, the GOP has a cupboard of health-care ideas, most going back a decade or more. They include tax credits to help Americans afford insurance, limiting awards in medical malpractice lawsuits and unfettering consumers from rules that require them to buy state-regulated insurance policies. In broad strokes, the approach favors the health-care marketplace over government programs and rules.
House Republicans have termed their strategy "repeal and replace." But according to GOP House leaders, senior aides and conservative health policy specialists, Republicans have not distilled their ideas into a coherent plan. More at the Washington Post
The Plum Line:
Today brings a new Marist poll: "More registered voters want the law expanded than fully repealed, with the latter category amounting to less than a third. A total of 49 percent want to let it stand or change it so it does more, versus 43 percent who want to scale it back or get rid of it entirely. " Which one of the following comes closest to your opinion about what Congress should do with the 2010 health care law:
Let it stand: 14
Change it so it does more: 35
Change it so it does less: 13
Repeal it completely: 30
Ezra Klein:
"There's no 'job-killing' health-care law. There's only the health-care bill. And my problem with the modifier 'job-killing' isn't that it's uncivil, though perhaps it is. It's that it's untrue."
The GOP lifted the claim from this Congressional Budget Office report (pdf) -- but the report never says the bill will kill jobs. What it says, rather, is that the law will slightly reduce labor. It's not that employers will fire workers. It's that potential workers -- particularly older ones -- will retire somewhat earlier. "The expansion of Medicaid and the availability of subsidies through the exchanges will effectively increase beneficiaries’ financial resources. Those additional resources will encourage some people to work fewer hours or to withdraw from the labor market."
Guess what happens when a congressional town meeting audience isn't created by the Koch brothers or fueled by Fox News? There's a different kind of confrontation. Here's what happened at a meeting earlier this week at Ohio's Walsh University, with GOP Rep. Jim Renacci (OH).
Source: Daily Kos
From the latimes.com: "Rejection of a challenge to a federal law on body armor for felons suggests a reluctance to rein in Congress' powers under the Constitution's commerce clause."
Great news from Harry Reid this morning on Meet The Press.
From Crooks and Liars:
HARRY REID: One of the things that always troubles me is when we start talking about the debt, the first thing people do is run to Social Security. Social Security is a program that works. And it's going to be-- it's fully funded for the next forty years. Stop picking on Social Security. There're a lotta places--
DAVID GREGORY: Senator are you really saying --
HARRY REID: --where you can go to save money.
DAVID GREGORY:-- the arithmetic on Social Security works?
HARRY REID: I'm saying the arithmetic in Social Security works. I have no doubt it does.
DAVID GREGORY: It's not in crisis?
HARRY REID: The ne-- no, it's not in crisis. This is-- this is-- this is something that's perpetuated by people who don't like government. Social Security is fine. Are there things we can do to improve Social Security? Of course.
DAVID GREGORY: Means testing. Raising the --
DAVID GREGORY:--retirement age--
HARRY REID: --don't--
DAVID GREGORY: --do you--
HARRY REID: --I'm--
DAVID GREGORY: --agree with either of those?
HARRY REID: --I'm not going to go to with any of those backdoor methods- you know, to whack Social Security recipients. I'm not going to do that. We have a lot of things we can do with-- this debt. It's a problem. But one of the places where I'm not going to be part of picking on is Social Security.
While there are a wide array of opinions about health care reform and its impact, it is indisputable that our nation's children, especially low-income children and those with special health care needs, are better off today because of the new law. Repealing health reform would be devastating for these the millions children and families who already are or soon will benefit from this historic legislation. Why? Here are 10 key reasons:
1. If health reform were repealed, insurers would go back to denying coverage for children with pre-existing conditions. Parents of children with cancer, children born with a birth defect, children with asthma, special-needs kids, among others, would once again be unable to get coverage for their kids without the Affordable Care Act.
2. Insurers would return to the practice of placing lifetime limits on coverage so that if a child is fortunate enough to beat leukemia when they are 8 they would be uninsurable if they face another serious illness later in life.
3. Dependent children through age 26 would not be guaranteed access to coverage on their parents' policy, leaving scores of young adults, including recent high school and college grads, back among the ranks of the uninsured.
4. Insurers would not have to cover vision care services or eyeglasses for children even if it is impossible for a child to be successful in school if they can't see.
5. Insurers also would not be required to cover dental care, a horrible return to the days when lack of coverage could cause a child to die from an infected tooth that could have been addressed for about 100.
6. Repealing health reform would jeopardize the future of the successful Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP), a federal-state program that offers low or no-cost coverage for families who earn too much to qualify for Medicaid but not enough to buy their own coverage. CHIP and Medicaid have been crucial for families during this recession, ensuring that coverage for kids has remained stable despite the downturn in the economy.
7. Children with terminal illnesses would be returned to the days when they would not be able to get compassionate end-of-life hospice care unless they agreed to forgo looking for a cure for their illness.
8. Insurers would be allowed to resume the practice of charging co-payments for preventive health services, including essential well-baby and well-child visits, and vaccinations, creating financial disincentives for parents to get care for their children that keeps them healthy.
9. Children in foster care would no longer qualify for Medicaid beyond age 18.
10. New efforts to eliminate bureaucratic red tape and streamline enrollment processes for children who are already eligible but not enrolled in public health coverage would suffer if health reform was repealed. Nearly two-thirds of children who are uninsured actually qualify for coverage but face significant barriers that make it difficult for them to sign-up or re-enroll for coverage. Read it all here.
Now This Is What a 'Death Panel' Looks Like: "'It let's you make your own choice,' says Barbara Aplin, shouldering an oxygen tank on her way to the lunch line here at the senior Community Center in Green Bay, Wisconsin. She is speaking not of her meal options in 2011 but of so-called 'death panels,' the more colloquial name for the new Medicare rule now paying doctors to counsel this seventy-six-year-old ('and three-quarters!') and her fellow senior citizens about end-of-life care. If you listen to the new fear merchants from the right, the rule pushes seniors to opt out of medical treatment that might prolong their lives. But take an afternoon to listen to the actual grandmas, and you get a much different kind of scare. If her children don't listen to an end-of-life plan, Aplin says, 'I'll come back to haunt them.'" What's getting Fox News's granny panties in a twist comes down to a new billing code — "voluntary" instead of "v66.7" — that the Obama administration added back in to Medicare regulation on New Year's Day after dropping it from the rather contentious Section 1233 of the health-care bill. But we couldn't find a single elderly American on Medicare who was against the provision.
"Death panels," now that they're going down in a slightly different way, don't strike those a bit closer to actual death as particularly deadly — and certainly not as anything new. Here's something Fox News won't tell you: While the controversial billing code for an end-of-life conversation did not exist on Medicare forms until January 1, many doctors had the chat anyway — uncompensated. One primary-care physician told us that others found a way to bill "for the disease, and then add a v66.7 'encounter for palliative care.' And then I bill by time and code them usually a 99215, as it is usually forty-plus minutes."
With the new health-care regulation, she says she'll simply bill for "voluntary advance care planning." A different check box, as it were. See also: Anatomy of the Right Wing's Death-Panel Meme
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