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New Poll Shows 76% Support For Choice Of Public Plan

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Excerpts from the Huffington Post summary:

New poll numbers from NBC/Wall Street Journal produce two major and potentially conflicting story lines when it comes to the Obama administration’s efforts for a health care overhaul.

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• 76 percent of respondents said it was either “extremely” or “quite” important to “give people a choice of both a public plan administered by the federal government and a private plan for their health insurance.”

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• [O]nly 33 percent of respondents said they thought the president’s health care plan, to the extent they knew of it, was a “good idea”

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• But when read a description of the general outline — requiring insurance companies to cover pre-existing conditions, an employer mandate, tax credits for lower income families to buy coverage, and tax increases on wealthier Americans to pay for it – the number of respondents in support rose to 55 percent.

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Public option is not Single Payer. People know that “For profit” is not “For them.” Only a single payer plan such as Medicare lifts the burden from small and large business, puts people first over profit, and cuts out the middle men that crush the country’s financial future. It’s not perfect, but there is no rescission of coverage, no denial for pre-existing conditions, no inequality.

For all the denials from your PPO and the unaffordable medications you cannot receive, how many billions do insurance companies and pharmaceutical firms pay for advertising? Do you think your rates will stay the same if you had cancer or some critical illness that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars? How many months would you have to wait to get disability coverage? How much competition would there be for the shrinking public dollar then as the population expands and more need the same helping hand? Healthcare identity theft is increasing at a startling rate. If someone stole and used your insurance, as it now stands, your insurance company would hold you responsible for the hundreds of thousands of dollars of care they received. This black market would not exist if we had Single Payer insurance.

A fellow I know from England says that whenever anyone had a complex problem, they knew they’d get better care at the National Health Service Hospital, even though they could easily afford private care. Doctors there could participate in both plans. Private patients who paid more would be seen first, and others would wait to be seen as time permitted.

Before this all hardens into cement and we are stuck with business as usual and uncompromising profiteering, Robert Reich explains: How Pharma and Insurance Intend to Kill the Public Option, And What Obama and the Rest of Us Must Do.

Test yourself to see how difficult the decision is.  The Price of Life: When Healthcare Meets Money. Ask who would you want making these difficult decisions? A a select panel of expert physicians or Big Insurance? From COMMENTS on the article:

I don’t mind commenting on this subject.

The ‘Price of Life’ from a scientific or Human perspective:

If viewed from the drug manufacturer’s perspective, then it would be economic; return on investment.

But they have no power as to the availabililty of the product, except to the minority of patients who can pay. Not economically viable.

The target therefore, is private health organisations or health trusts

Whilst the former surely has the ability to pay, directly or from health insurance, they will still make up only a minority of the target population this drug was intended for.

The economics of research, development, manufacture and distribution must reflect the true target: Government funded health-care.

This was the intended target from the beginning. And it is based on guilt, an emotion large Corporations generally don’t feel.

The marketing fact is, ” We have invested an enormous amount of capital in a drug that never before existed, and if you can’t or refuse to provide this new medication, then it is you who must bear the consequences.”

Meaning criticism and real life consequences.

So, the guilt remains with the provider, and the carer. NOT the developer.

Limited resources, and TRIAGE.

The big Pharmaceutical Companies have access to the enormous funds required to develop new drugs.

But the balance between who pays and who benefits will be a major obstacle, until a public funded organisation can provide a similar service for free.

ISN’T THAT WHY WE ARE SCIENTISTS?Are we doing it for the money, or from intellectual morality?

You know that without Single Payer, Big Insurance will be making the decisions and you may lose your life, only their decision will be weighed against their profits.

Either way, unless you are independently wealthy, someone must make the hard choices. Unlimited cost is not a choice that can go on indefinitely. We’ve come to the end of the money line. We are paying top dollar for two wars, for worldwide economic crises brought on by mass greed and theft, and Big Insurance and Big Pharma want things to benefit them, not you, just like it always has. The public does not have a chance against their wealth and influence over Congress.

Game over before it begins. I can’t wait to hear laughter on the end of the line next time my patient’s medication is denied.

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