Watch Your Words
I enjoy reading Paul Krugman and almost always agree with him. And while I agree with what he is trying to say in his latest column, Can It Happen Here?, on single payer health insurance, he really has to watch his word choices to avoid giving people unnecessary avenues of attack.
Let me try to clarify my point. Health care is provided by medical professionals. No one, to my knowledge, is seriously advocating making those professionals government employees, or in nationalizing health care facilities. The debate is about paying for health care, not about providing it.
People should be aware that there are a great many places in the United States where there is no health care of any kind. If you get sick, you have to be taken somewhere else. In a lot of rural America there are no doctors, clinics, or pharmacies available. This is not a debate about universal health care, because even if “Medicare For All” were enacted tomorrow, the people who live in those areas still wouldn’t have access to health care.
For those who don’t know, if you have Medicare, you can go to any doctor who accepts Medicare insurance, and that is probably the majority of doctors in the country. Medical decisions are made by the doctor, not Medicare.
3 comments
These days a lot fewer doctors are accepting Medicare patients–they can’t make their student loan payments and meet their other bills on the pittance the government pays for Medicare patients–and which the government almost always pays late.
There are very few doctors taking Medicare/Medicaid patients anymore. Try even finding a doctor taking NEW patients.
I don’t doubt there are fewer doctors since the Republicans started playing games with the reimbursement rate, but a majority still accept it. If you want to really limit your choices join an HMO.
Medicaid is a totally separate program that varies from state to state. Medicare for All will eliminate Medicaid and immediately help out struggling state budgets, as Medicaid programs, even with Federal support are a major item on every state’s budget. The elimination of separate Medicaid programs will be one of the areas of savings under the single payer system.
There are a growing number of doctors refusing to take any insurance, because it is too expensive to comply with all of different forms and requirements. Single payer will cut the paperwork and staffing requirements.