If you believed all the republican hype about death panels, when we had the health care debate, good for you – they were right. Well, not completely right. What they were saying was that the “socialized” medicine that was being proposed (their term, not mine), would create death panels and huge government oversight that is going to tell us, and our doctors, how to handle our health situations.
What they did not tell you was, that already exists. If you think you, or your doctor, have ANY control over large portions of your health provision, think again. What the fat cats in Washington want is to let things stay as they are, where the prescription drug companies and health insurance providers have the control – given that they are the ones with the high paid lobbyists and the ones who stand to profit from certain decisions.
My doctor wants to prescribe me a certain medication. There are three brands that make something similar, but they are not the same compound – they are, in effect, different medications, although they do the same things. Well, the sort of do the same thing. The side effects are very different and how they work is different. I want Brand X. First, I’m told they won’t cover brand X that I have to try Brand Y or Brand Z. I’ve used Brand Z in the past and had a terrible experience. So, I go ahead and try Brand Y but it is not nearly as potent and doesn’t do the job. So, I call my prescription provider, MedCo, and they tell me that they’ll be “happy to” provide me with Brand X, just have my doctor call this number. WEll, they are making the doctor jump through fire hoops, spend in inappropriate amount of time on the phone, call different numbers, just to get this other medicine. Now, to be clear, this is not a case of I prefer one over the other – these medicines work differently and are made of different compounds. The prescription provided doesn’t want to cover this one medicine because there is no generic yet and the drug is very expensive (but that’s a completely different blog entry rant).
Second example – a different doctor (a specialist) things that my taking this other medicine would be helpful to address a medical need. He has prescribed a certain dosage. The prescription company doesn’t think that that’s the right dosage and will only allow half – HALF – of what the doctor prescribed.
Now, who is making my health provision decisions? Not me, certainly, and not my doctorS! (PLURAL!) Horizon Blue Cross and Blue Shield and MedCo are making my health related decisions and they stand to PROFIT from those decisions. Why don’t they just come clean and call themselves corporate profit providers instead of health providers.
p.s. – thanks, wusses in Washington, INCLUDING President Obama, for giving up on the public option. I’m VERY thankful for the changes that have been made, an improvement, but because there is NO reasonable competition or choice, I’m stuck with what I have. I know it’s better than most, and I know I’m lucky to even HAVE health care (although our Governor is doing everything he can to take that away), but if there were a public option, things would be different and there would be real competition, because the old-boy health networks would be forced to compete. You can’t trust the market to govern these issue when their only concern is profit. Health care should be a non-profit industry.
