July, 2015, Part 3, The Unfolding Disaster That Is Obama Care:

Every month for years now we have had to discuss how bad Obama Care is turning out to be under the continuing theme, “the unfolding disaster that is Obama Care.” This month is no different. As the legislation continues to march through America, driving up health care and health insurance prices as it serves as dead weight on economic growth, it cements it rightful place as the worst piece of legislation Washington has ever produced.

It never had a chance to be successful since it really never addressed the underlying root causes of our ever increasing health costs in the country:

• Americans eat too much of the wrong kind of food, resulting in obscenely high obesity rates for the country. 
• Our food chain is infested with overdoses of high fructose corn syrup, salt, and other unhealthy additives. 
• Americans smoke too much. 
• Americans do not exercise enough. 
• The country is in serious need of health care tort reform. 
• Barriers to insurance company competition across state lines need to come down. 
• Obama Care never “followed the money” to find out who is actually profiting from the ever escalating healthcare costs in this country and how to get those factors under control. 
• Obama Care never got the immense amount of fraud and abuse in current government healthcare programs, Medicare and Medicaid, under control in order to save money to efficiently fund other government health care initiatives. 
• Obama Care never put serious research money towards curing the major diseases that drive high healthcare costs such as high frequency cancers and dementia type diseases. 

You cannot resolve any problem unless you understand and address the underlying root causes. No difference here but with a big exception: Obama Care legislation never addressed these listed root causes and thus, has no chance of ever being successful.

This week we have been taking a look at the latest disasters from Obama Care, including the gathering evidence that ObamaCare policy holders are in for a big and ugly financial surprise in their 2016 costs along with some personal stories on how Obama Care is causing havoc with American families.

1) Correction to previous version at the request of parties involved.

2) Some supporters of Obama Care actually think that the legislation did not go far enough in giving the Federal government bureaucrats and Washington political class more control over our lives and personal health care situation than what Obama Care does. these folks favor the complete takeover of health care by the government, similar to the so-called single payer systems in some European countries.

There are at least two serious problems with this mindset, both of which we have discussed already in past blog posts:

• The Federal government is incapable of doing anything efficient or effective. There is no reason to think that putting them in charge of every facet of our personal health care would somehow come out any differently.
• The actual, real life experiences of Europeans who get sick under a single payer plan have been absolute horror stories, with people waiting months and months just to get a simple medical test done, people dying before they could get treated, etc.

But there is another reason to fear a single payer plan as outlined in a Recent Washington Times article. A recent survey of health care executives in Britain found that many of them plan on rationing health care options in order to get their skyrocketing costs and financial obligations under control. 

About 40% of England's 211 clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) are considering putting limits on eligibility for services such as foot care, hip replacements, knee replacements, and other treatments. In addition, smokers and those who are considered obese will be among those denied surgery and other treatment, according to a survey conducted by the HealthService Journal, in an extension of the controversial policy of “lifestyle rationing”.

Chief executives, chairs and board members at 67 CCGs were asked: 

• “Is your CCG considering introducing new limits to access/eligibility for services during 2015/16, for financial/efficiency/value reasons?”
• Among the respondents, 39% said yes, 57% said no and 4% did not know.
• Jeremy Taylor, chief executive of National Voices, which represents 140 health charities, stated:  
• “It’s very worrying to hear this because access to services that people need is a key aspect of what makes the NHS the NHS. It’s comprehensive, it’s national, it’s free at the point of use and it’s not based on ability to pay, so if you want to ramp up rationing then you call into question the extent to which it’s still a comprehensive service based on clinical need. This is worrying but not surprising, given the overall financial state of the NHS.”

This is what happens when government bureaucrats start taking over your life, in this case, your health care aspect of your life.  By never attacking the root causes of high health care costs, see the list above which includes such maladies as smoking and obesity, you never the tame the causes of ever rising health care costs. As a result, with limited financial resources and rising health care costs, you have to at some time start cutting back on quality and quantity of services, the exact same thing that is happening in England's single payer system.

And Obama Care is taking us down the same road since it also did not attack the root causes of our rising health care costs. By allowing the root causes to fester and grow in this country, you can be sure that at some time down the road in the world Of Obama Care, rationing will also occur in this country, it is the simple rule of supply and demand.

3) One of the root causes of our ever rising health care costs is the ever rising incidents of cancer and dementia-related illnesses. Unless research and breakthroughs occur in these two illness areas, it will not matter who has an Obama Care health care insurance policy since at some point in time the entire health care industry collapses in this country.

Consider the current incidence and projection of Alzheimer's diseases, just ONE of the dementia related diseases. According to statistics in a recent article in the AARP Bulletin newspaper:

• Current national spending to treat Alzheimer's patients in 2014 was $214 billion.
• That annual number will grow to $486 billion by 2030 and $1.2 TRILLION by 2050 unless something is done to curtail the disease.
• The number of Alzheimer's patients in 2014 was about 5 million people.
• That will grow to 8.4 million by 2030 and 13.8 million by 2050.

Obama could have made an epic contribution to history, the country, and his legacy if he had proclaimed to the country back in the early stages of the Obama Care legislation development that the country would make a concerted research and financial effort to cure Alzheimer's disease within ten years. This would have been the equivalent of John F. Kennedy's proclamation that America would put a man on the moon by the end of the 1960s decade.

But, alas, as always with this President, he was not epic. he focused on trying to fit an insurance solution to a public health problem and failed miserably.  Without taming the Alzheimer's threat, without curbing the obesity epidemic, without getting the country to kick the smoking habit, without making our food supply healthy, etc., without putting a public health solution together for the problem, it does not matter how much an Obama care Bronze plan costs today. 

Because very shortly, no one will be able to afford any health care as the rising costs of our public health problems overwhelm the ability to provide care.

4) As we often do with these Obama Care posts, lt us close today with real life stories of real life Americans and how ObamaCare is ruining their lives. The source of these true stories is the website:

www.ourhealthcarestories.com

STEVE - ALABAMA: Like many, my health premium has nearly doubled ,and my deductibles and co-pays have increased some four fold. Yesterday my wife, who has a serious illness that has attacked her eyes over the years, learned that she could no longer receive a prescription that her doctor wants to write for her. This drug would help maintain her condition as to avoid flair ups with her eye problems. Her doctor informed her he can no longer prescribe the medication due to the recent health care law changes. 

PATRICK - VERMONT: My wife and I are both over 65 and on medicare. Our supplement in the past was free and all we paid was co-pays for medical care and prescription, with no yearly deductible. Our supplemental insurance, United Healthcare, said they were not allowed to offer that plan any longer. So, this year we have to $30.00 each, plus a $2,500.00 each for deductible. It is pretty tough living on a fixed income. So it pretty evident that the elderly can no longer go to a movie, restaurant or any form of enjoyment. The little extra we had after regular bills is being sucked up by the insurance and medical needs.

ERIN - MASSACHUSETTS: I lost coverage with doctors in my area. It's not right and it's not fair. The current federal government and their policies are detrimental to the health of my business and my family.

ROBIN - CALIFORNIA: My premium went up $350 my deductible went from $500 to over $5000 and my benefits were not at all any better.

That will do it for today and this month on our continuing update on the unfolding disaster that is Obama Care. More individual Americans suffering as a result of the law, the continuing failure to address the root causes of the rising health care costs, more jobs lost as a result Of Obama Care, and how rationing might be coming to this country sooner than later. I am sure that more disasters will bring us back to this topic next month. 

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