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Cuts that Kill
This morning employees of community health centers across the country got this email:
“Today’s
decision by House appropriators to cut $1.3 billion in funding to
Community Health Centers levels a devastating blow to Americans who are
already struggling in the economic recession. If this cut were to be
approved, it will mean that America’s Health Centers will lose the capacity to serve 11 million patients over the next year, with well over 3.3 million current patients losing their care within the next few months.”
I happen to know a Doctor who runs one of the larger health centers on
the east coast. She's been at it for a long time. I cut to the chase and
asked if this means people would die:
Will people die unnecessarily? You better believe it.
All programs are at risk. You think folks are pissed off now, if these cuts go as written, it’ll be a disaster. It’s going to be a very ugly couple of years.
Well there you have it. A credible voice says people will die as a result of belt tightening. The rubber just met the road.
I’m not smart enough to know what should be cut and what should stay. I
do know that cutting a billion here or there on the 15% of the
discretionary budget is not going to do a thing. These are rounding
errors that are being played with.
The President’s budget is a joke. If we follow that path of trillion
dollar deficits we won’t make it another five years without an
explosion. A big one.
There is no way we can avoid that fate unless Medicare, Medicaid, Social
Security and the military come on the table. The President didn’t even
address this 85% of the budget. Like the Doctor said: It’s going to be a very ugly couple of years.
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I sent this link to the Doc who runs a clinic and made these comments. Her response:
Bruce Krasting
Well, at least we know that people don’t know what health centers do. It’s not battered women or substance abuse patients; there are programs for that .. It’s Mr. Jones who made $40,000, got laid off, and works three jobs without healthcare bennies. We see the patients the rich docs don’t want to see because they’re in pharma’s pockets and golf courses. Let’s face it, some folks are poor (and I’m not talking the chronic welfare or scam artists or illegal immigrants). If every provider gave a half day of charity care a month, I’d be out of a job, and gladly. Some of the comments were pretty cold. Reminds me of Ebinezer Scrooge: If the poor would rather die, they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population. What goes around comes around.
The US spends about $700 billion dollars to kill tens of thousands of people with their military, but they don't want to spend $1.3 billion to prevent tens of thousands of Americans from dying during this government sanctioned depression. If we don't feed the machine, the machine wants to kill us.
In cases where people aren't forced to work, or move in with relatives, there will exist charity. If bleeding hearts really want to make a difference they'd donate their time and money to such causes, not just their votes and my money.
Tocqueville states in 'Democracy in Action' that charity associations acted as a social net much better than government ever did. Fear not, government is not the solution for all problems.
If you listened to these medical community organizers, you would believe that spending less than 200% of GDP on medical centers is criminal.
If society listens to people like you, letting the poor die of neglect is the remedy to the financiual crisis.
Still waiting for someone to explain why the cost of care for the US is 2.5x that of the UK, despite a similar health profile.
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_spe_per_per-health-spending-per-person
Folks, we're 1.8x more expensive than France. France! The fucking French are spending less money than we are! A lot less!
Is this really not clear?
We're not paying for health-care, we're paying for insurers. They're better-paid than the care providers, and they generate good returns for their investors. There's money to be made here.
Fortunately, now we've got the government universally involved, so in addition to paying the insurers, we'll pay for a strong regulatory and oversight infrastructure as well. We can't involve government in the CARE--that'd be socialist.
We just need them to step in and bill us for their assistance in handling the INSURANCE.
And how.
If they were serious about controlling health care costs, we'd have a single-payer system. People need health care, not health insurance.
I work in an ER. We get a lot of pt's that should have went to the local health clinic but were turned away due to lack of capacity. In the ER we see pts. for sore throats, earaches, infected toenails, minor cuts, abrasions, pinkeye, boils, broken toes and fingers, fevers, scabies, rashes and a dozen other complaints that are not an emergency. Why do these people come to the ED? Because their doctor is too busy to see them, or because they have no insurance. Or the local clinic is too busy to see them. The ED is not the appropriate level of care for these complaints. Most do not pay.
If everyone had some basic level of coverage, clinics would open up using mid-level practioners like PA's and FNP's. Why would they open up? Because EVERYBODY who walked through the door would have an ability to pay! It wouldn't have to be much, either. A hundred bucks would probably be enough. But there has to be a co-pay to ensure that those that use medical do so for appropriate reasons. A $20 dollar co-pay would do the trick. (taken out of your welfare check if you didn't pay. Or turn people away if they don't pay. Is this the government "death panel" you are talking about?)
AND, if there was only one insurance provider for everybody, the doctors could fire half their staff, the half that works in the billing department. The half that spends their days trying to pry money out of the insurance companies.
And then tort reform. So that provider doesn't order that MRI for that bruised calf that he knows probably isn't compartment syndrome, but he needs to cover his ass anyway, just to be safe. Of course, without the ability to sue, the perpetual whiners will claim that that is going to hurt the "quality" of health care. And if it is Obama that does tort reform the right will claim he is destroying the healthcare system.
This country needs single-payer health insurance financed by a broad tax that everybody pays into according to ability.And that is mandated to run a balanced budget.
gh
excellent comment. My father in law is a forty year medical veteran so is my mother and sister in law. They say the same. Only in corrupt, corrupt America can you pay outrageous amounts of money and still have a broken system. It all gets sucked off by Big pharma, Big insurance, and Big lawyers
Tks gh.
i know some doctors from india who migrated here. they said that they take 3-4 times as many patients as they do here and make 1/10th the money in india. the only reason doctors/dentists are paid so much is that they limit immigration in these fields. doctors in third world countries also get better training according to him as they see a wider variety of diseases and have seen many more cases during residency than doctors here.
But seriously 300$ for getting my teeth cleaned by a dentist for 15 mins is a bit too much. any larger procedure and I would definitly fly to mexico if it werent covered by insurance.
No thank you, but not being able to litigate for malpractice kind of nullifies any perceived benefit. Especially when places like that are prone to malpractice.
Also, I'd call their quality into question.
This is so typical. Any time someone gets forced to cut govt, they always and deliberately aim it at the stuff that punches people in the gut. We have $50B of unspent "Stimulus". I'll bet there's plenty of unspent TARP we could buy these people some dialysis with as well. Why aren't any of those programs under the gun?
We also have north of 70 billions in totally ludicrous tax cuts for those who do not need them at all for survival nor comfort.
But hey! Let's not touch that since pretty much everyone around here seems to believe they'll benefit from these...one day...when they make it to billionaire status. Mbwahahahaha!
Such delusional bullshit everyhwere in this country. It's so sickening!
Population deflation. But, it isn't going to happen without a lot of turmoil.
i take it from the thread that "death panels" are risk on!
Be happy to serve on the one that works on the Wall Street geriatricksters (sic).
this 'memo' is simply a veiled PR release for "the cause".
but, yes mr. K, we are still "friggin doomed".
as always, tnx for the articles.
wait til we're stuck with obamacare and they have to make these same type of cuts
but the cuts will be much larger and affect a greater number of people
another good one, bruce, to chew on†
Gotta keep those 900 military bases open and all the tax breaks
for google ,WAl Mart the banksters and all the other crooks.
What a few million w/out health services?
The crash is here. When do the protests start?
The local ACCESS transportation company contractor reports that the Methadone treatments that the community 'health' services provide for addicts, supposedly wanting to kick the habit, the drivers have been criticized by the chauffered riders for showing up in Ford Econoline vans.
Seems the addicts are upset and want to be picked up in sedans instead.
Where's that fucking beam, Scottie?
Such a believable anecdote.
Had a friend who got a weird calf injury...looked bad, big bruise, but not particularly
painful. Went to a clinic in Boston (she's on subsidized health care).
They check it out, its determined its just a muscle bruise. Gets a call a day later:
"Come in for an MRI". Since the leg was already getting better, she declined but
the physician called and insisted she get an MRI. For what? She couldn't say.
This was either gross medical mismanagement or an attempt to create a bigger bill.
I think it was the later if only because I spoke to the MD and she didn't seem to
care that the problem, only a few days later, was already rapidly resolving itself.
Will people suffer? Maybe. Maybe these clinics need to a bit more scrutiny on how
they're run as well. This isn't the first time they tried to talk my friend into more,
questionable, services as well.
Well I've been noting the pissing in the ocean budget cuts, round 4, today. Leave it to these asshats not to cut the things they should and hack the things they shouldn't. I am simply in awe of these people. It's like a war. Thumb your noses at us huh? Try this on.
I am getting a passport this week. Not because I am planning a trip...but because I am planning an evacuation.
long ago and far away i knew a lunatic fringe.
he was a chartist extraordinaire.
all this cutting is kabukie theater. the entire mess cannot be corrected. our special interest,government,corptocracy cannot be fixed. like a million mile monofilament that is snarled from one end to the other. if you pull one area to straighten. 10 other areas knot up tighter. we need to cut the entire mess off the rod and go back with fresh line.
Our whole system is so broken. So much money is wasted and yet people don't have access to basic service.
Our whole system is so broken. So much money is wasted and yet people don't have access to basic service.
Killing off a bunch of "useless eaters" is part of the Elite's plan.
Health care providers are taking us all to the cleaners. Case in point, in Seattle, a woman went to her dermatologist because of a toenail fungus. Boy did she get clipped. She was there for 5 mins. The md took a clipping to be sent out to a lab. The tab for this clipping was $1144. She challenged Virginia Mason Clinic about the bill and they told her that because she came to the Vir. Mas. hospital campus, that they charged her a hospital FACILITIES FEE. The dermtology dept is across the street from the hospital, but VM makes its clients check in at the hospital lobby so they can say you are coming to the hospital. What a fraud! If this woman had gone to their suburban clinic which is not on a hospital campus, she would not have been charged the facilities fee. She got mad and hired an attorney who initiated and won a class action suit. The reason they won was because the clinic did not DISCLOSE the fee, not because it was price gouging extraordinaire!. The clinic is still charging the facilities fee which is disclosed on their web site in very small print at the bottom of their home page. I was a part of the class action and got some $ back but I will never go to Virginia Mason hospital/clinic if I can help it. When I challenged my bill for similar issues I was told that MEDICARE had approved these charges and that more hospital clinics were making this the standard. No doubt that is true since they can get away with it. If Medicare is that stupid about the costs structure it approves when fraud is so blatant, I doubt it will ever change. Most people who are insured don't even check their medical bills so there is not public outcry except against insurance companies. The real crooks are the providers
Oh no! If people are allowed to drive faster than 10mph on the highway, PEOPLE WILL DIE!
Please show annual funding levels for this line item ("Community Health Centers") for the past ten years. Without that context, it is nearly impossible to know if the end of the world will come if the cut gets enacted. And how many people will die as a result of this $1.3 billion cut??
At some point we have to determine what lives we really care about. We could save approximately 40,000 lives per year if we reduced the national speed limit to 10 miles per hour. But we don't solely because the economic cost would be too high.
This is no different.
Wow, same thought at almost the same time.
On the planet where I make my residence,
approximately 100,000 people die every day, from various causes.
The news organizations, most of whom are very aware that their
subscribers particularly enjoy learning about the deaths of other people,
must pick and choose among all the deaths each day to find the most interesting ones on which to report.
Approximately 105,000 new babies are born every day. In some cases their parents prepared
financially for the event, in others they did not.
Due to the ramifications of peak oil and peak food
and the dependence of food production on natural gas and oil for fertilier,
plowing, pest reduction, and transport, it has been quite evident for
over a generation that for the next generation or more, more people have to die than are being born.
How many people saw this? How many people did anything to prepare?
so it goes ....
on the topic of mortalilty one of the great misconcpetions is that folks are living longer. What is actually happening is that infant mortality in the west has been drastically reduced thereby pushing up the average age of death.
That may be true, but blood thinners and pacemakers are adding many years. No doubt about it.
Both of my parents are alive to to medical help. My father has a pacemaker, my mother is on oxygen 24/7. The pacemaker requires constant attention of a medical expert. The oxygen bottles need to be re-filled constantly. Both are being paid for by medicare.
I'm not complaining, glad they are still alive. But they both are obviously living on borrowed time. I would not want to be in their shoes. With their little vials of pills that need to be taken every day.
No thanks.
Since when does cutting health spending end up with more dying. Every bit of medical research indicates that spending more than 5%-7% of the GDP on healthcare ends up with more deaths. Iatrogenic (physican caused) deaths are one of the leading killers in the U.S. The United States ranks #1 in healthcare spending by % of GDP and we rank about #34 in terms of health care quality. Half of our healthcare costs go to support people with no useful life left. In addition, draining the pocket books of Americans into the healthcare quagmire leaves them with less money and statistics show that health improves with greater disposable income.
All-in-all, take out the scalpels and go to work on healthcare budgets.
People will die "unnecessarily"?
Not only is it necessary that people die, but it is obligatory. In fact, it's unavoidable, started the day we were born.
I'm kinda hoping that I can find a cheap Dr. Kervorkian when my time comes, if I need to be kept alive and have no ability to do so myself. There's only so many times I'll tolerate viewing, "The Housewives of Jew Nersey", and "Monk" and "The Most Horrific Blood-Spewed Traffic Accidents", re-runs.
Why can't people think more like me?
That includes organ donation, and get off the stage when it's time, and stop prolonging the lives of those who would otherwise perish.
Absolutely. I agree with you, when your quality-of-life starts going down hill, its time to start pushing up daisys. I mean, the day comes I gotta wear adult diapers, I hope I have the courage to swallow a bullet.
Cancer, anything like that, I would hope I still have the wherewithal to do the same. I enjoy life to much to ever believe I could be happy when my body starts going downhill.
I'll be 50 this year, and still exercise every day, and am fit with the exception of requiring contact lens and a hearing aid for my one remaining ear. Have a job I enjoy and am good at, maintaining military aircraft. Have a nice motorcycle, wife that rides her own bike.
Of course us humans are prone to adapting to what is thrown at us. Well most of us are. But there are some things that I do not desire adapting to. Checking out would be preferable.
Heres to hoping I have the courage when the time comes.
Watched both parents and some others go thru months of shit (literally) UN-NECESSARILY in the extreme.
I'd have preferred a Death Panel for their sake and mine. Now I find it hard to remember them as they were before the two years, one right after the other, each going thru the most dignity killing, life-saving bullshit "medical care" could throw at them.
Forget what the cost must have been, as well.
We're not going to all be able to choose when and how we go but if I have the opportunity, I'll need more courage to stay alive then than I would to find my way to the wilds of some frozen tundra and quietly, painlessly go to sleep.
I'd try and figure a way for a really terrific act of god to happen to me to make my heirs a bit better off insurance wise.
There must be enough of a market world wide for this kind of service that would make a fortune. Kervorkian needed better marketing, methodology, and remuneration.
I heard bill gates being interviewed on Al Jazeera and the topic was the eradication of Polio and how all it would cost is $700 million over and above the $2 billion already raised. The method is oral vaccine, which must be administered three times. The kicker in the interview was how Bill went on to say that by improving the health of the impoverished of Africa the real benefit is not a healthier population but a measurable reduction in the size of families. He sounded like crazy Ted Turner whose dream is a reduction of the world's population by 80%.
here's the clip
http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/rizkhan/2011/02/2011211438324269...
Killing is good business. Two choices, fighting on Main Street or in the desert theater - life is optional, death is favorable and profits are predatory.
This is the tip of the iceberg, Bruce, and let's not act like we don't see this coming with your derivative bets against countries where people will die, too.
I know, it's just business as long as the right side of your mouth never meets your left.
chop out some of the effing bureaucracy (but that'll never happen -- just cut the effing travel budget for these administrative meffers
http://www.aohc.org/conference
http://www.nachc.com/
Shut down the entitlements... pay with cash.
$335b for the F35 JSF, when the two countries we're fighting don't have functioning air forces.
Just look what happened to the F-22. Originally supposed to be something like 750 ordered, capped at 187. The B-2 Stealth Bomber originally supposed to be 132 units, capped at 21.
I am quite certain the F-35 will not ever see its full orders. Spend the money for R & D, spend the money or tooling, spend the money for bases to house these aircraft, then throw it all away by only building a fraction of the numbers originally intended. Why bother even building them at all?
Bombers? Of the original 100 B-1bs built, 66 are still flying, the rest canabilized for spare parts. There are less than 100 B-52s left flying. And of the 21 B-2s built, 19 are in service. One crashed, and #1 never really worked out since it was a flight test vehicle. We modded it to be a Block 30, but I do believe its not being utilized.
But what exactly do we need bombers for these days? Have not used them for anything in what, ten years. Fighters? What is wrong with the F-14, F-15, F-16 and F-18s? They are all great aircraft, and way more capable than anything they would face in the skies abroad.
The Russians and Chinese play with showing us their "stealth" fighters, but in reality they build one prototype, and thats that. Big Deal! Neither of those countries are in any better position to build huge fleets of new aircraft than we are. Are they in a position to pull a Reverse-Reagan on us? Build huge armed forces to try and cause us to spend ourselves into collapse? No.
Reality is that the $335b for the F-35 would end up being a lot more than that before all is said and done, typical for any large military contract. But the same $335b is still just a drop in the bucket, when talking budget deficits of trillions. Larger more painful cuts than that are going to be needed.
Scary times indeed.
How is it that people will be dieing in the streets due to cuts in a government program that has only been in existence since 1995 and is part of the great "Americorps Boondoggle" which is supposed to be a "volunteer" program?
If the utilizers of this program are poor, they are eligible for medicaid/public assistance, if they are children they are eligible for SCHIP, if they are elderly or infirm, they are covered by medicare/SSI.
How about looking at it this way. How much government money is it worth to prevent one person from dieing? Is it worth 100% of all federal monies? If not, why not?
If the gold standard of cutting a program is "whether someone might die", then congratulations, you've just made the budget equal to infinity.
This is the same old pablum you hear from the police and prison guards when their lucre is threatened with cuts, "oh well, we'll just have to let all the rapists and child-molesters out of jail."
The problem, Rusty, is that a few wino-americans and crackheads may freeze in a snow bank in New Yawk, unless they are smart enough to move to Taxifornia, where they will become wards of Governor Moonbeam and the last of the taxpayers/creditors in flake land.
If any cuts are to be made, we must, of course, sell the national parks, fire all border agents, and wipe out air traffic control on a holiday weekend. Such is the logic (hypocracy) of the lefty mind.