[Discussion] Health Policies and ACA Reform/Repeal

The existing health thread is for discussion on how changes to current policy will/have personally affected you or those you know. This thread is for more general discussion of the subject.

Please Enjoy These Finnish People Politely Going After Nikki Haley for Saying They Hate Having Good Healthcare

But they are all tweets so I can embed easily. Go check it out for a quick read.

But there was a nice quote

Sauer followed up by adding that Finland has the world’s third lowest infant mortality rate, the lowest maternal mortality rate in the world (the United States ranks worst of all developed countries), and the lowest cancer mortality rate in the European Union. For good measure, Sauer noted that Finland has recently been ranked as the happiest country in the world; the United States is the 19th happiest.
farley3k wrote:

Please Enjoy These Finnish People Politely Going After Nikki Haley for Saying They Hate Having Good Healthcare

But they are all tweets so I can embed easily. Go check it out for a quick read.

But there was a nice quote

Sauer followed up by adding that Finland has the world’s third lowest infant mortality rate, the lowest maternal mortality rate in the world (the United States ranks worst of all developed countries), and the lowest cancer mortality rate in the European Union. For good measure, Sauer noted that Finland has recently been ranked as the happiest country in the world; the United States is the 19th happiest.

Are they hiring software developers?

Nikki Haley is wrong: Finland takes care of new moms way better than the US

American moms are four times more likely to die in childbirth than Finnish moms. The maternal mortality rate in Finland has been going down for years. In the United States, it has risen steadily since 2000.

In Finland, 99.6 percent of pregnant women report getting regular prenatal care, likely a product of their universal health coverage system. In the United States, where millions of Americans are uninsured, only 77 percent of women began their prenatal care in the first trimester.

American babies are twice as likely to die before their first birthday as Finnish babies. In 2017, just 97 Finnish babies died in their first year of life, the lowest number the country has ever recorded.

There’s a reason the international nonprofit Save the Children ranks Finland second in its Mothers Index, which measures the well-being of moms and children in 178 countries. The United States, meanwhile, comes in at 33rd.

Haley’s tweets make an inaccurate assumption that I see a lot in health policy. They take as a given that more expensive health care is better health care. She suggests that in order to get to lower prices, Finland must be “skimping” on the care it gives women.

We’re often used to price being an indicator of quality. There’s a reason that first-class seats on a flight cost more than those in coach, and why a meal at a Michelin-starred restaurant costs more than one at McDonald’s. For so many things we purchase, the more expensive thing is the nicer thing.

Except it turns out this doesn’t really apply to health care. We have wild variation in health care prices in the United States, and study after study finds no relationship between how much health care costs and what type of quality a patient receives. This is true for the overall cost of the procedure, as well as what the patient contributes (which is usually some share of that overall price). Unlike restaurants or airplane seats, there’s little evidence that the more expensive doctor is the better doctor.

(Small caveat here: I do want to note that, as long as we’re on the topic of prices, Sanders’s original tweet on the price of having a baby in Finland seems to be comparing apples and oranges. He says it costs $60. That figure likely comes from this news report, which says that it costs the patient about $60 for her delivery, not the overall cost to the health care system. The $12,000 figure, on the other hand, appears to be more in line with the overall cost of delivery, which includes what the mom and her insurance pay.)

As for how Finland gets its low prices? It isn’t about skimping on care for pregnant women. Instead, Finland does what pretty much all our peer countries do: They regulate the country’s health care prices. The Finns look at health care as something akin to electricity or water, something so essential to life that the government needs to step in and make sure it’s affordable to all.

Sometimes regulating prices will mean some version of rationing. You sometimes see national health systems in Europe, for example, refusing to cover a certain drug because they think the prices are too high.

But in Finland, there is no evidence that there is any sort of rationing in the space of prenatal care and childbirth. Instead, the Finnish system seems to be giving women a health care experience that mothers in the United States should envy.

I had conversation with a person from work today who stated that he thought it was a bad idea to go to a national health type service because nearly 20% of the US economy relies on for profit healthcare. I replied by saying that greater percentage of the US economy depended on human bondage prior to 1865 and that the argument that we must continue making a mistake because so many people are financially invested in its continuation has never struck me as a terribly compelling one.

After a longer than normal silence, he told me we shouldn't talk politics anymore.

It is sad how helping people to not die in the streets or be bankrupted because they broke their arm is a "political" issue. I bet that person self-identifies as a christian too.

Paleocon wrote:

I had conversation with a person from work today who stated that he thought it was a bad idea to go to a national health type service because nearly 20% of the US economy relies on for profit healthcare. I replied by saying that greater percentage of the US economy depended on human bondage prior to 1865 and that the argument that we must continue making a mistake because so many people are financially invested in its continuation has never struck me as a terribly compelling one.

After a longer than normal silence, he told me we shouldn't talk politics anymore.

Of course! A totally adult response to put your hands over your ears and loudly declare "I can't hear you anymore!"

Paleocon wrote:

I had conversation with a person from work today who stated that he thought it was a bad idea to go to a national health type service because nearly 20% of the US economy relies on for profit healthcare.

But that 20% won't just vanish. That is money companies and individuals are paying so they will have that money back and they won't stuff it all in a mattress. They would invest so the economy would still be fine.

It sure must be swell being wrong and knowing you are wrong, but doubling down anyway because to admit a mistake or failing of knowledge would just be too much. Just too much. I wish I could ignore all the sh*t I hate about life and myself and just declare that I am right and everything else is wrong.

farley3k wrote:

But that 20% won't just vanish. That is money companies and individuals are paying so they will have that money back and they won't stuff it all in a mattress. They would invest so the economy would still be fine.

Whoa, whoa! Slow down there, farley. These people cannot even connect A to B. Do you really think they're going to get to C and D, too?

farley3k wrote:
Paleocon wrote:

I had conversation with a person from work today who stated that he thought it was a bad idea to go to a national health type service because nearly 20% of the US economy relies on for profit healthcare.

But that 20% won't just vanish. That is money companies and individuals are paying so they will have that money back and they won't stuff it all in a mattress. They would invest so the economy would still be fine.

The new government run healthcare machine will also absorb many of these people looking for new jobs as well.

Socialism!!!

Mr GT Chris wrote:

Socialism!!!

Lite (TM).

Most of that 20% are people that work in healthcare not "insurance" and that is not going to change if we go to medicare for all.

Nothing to say the government won't or can't contract with big insurance companies to actually implement and manage a national plan. Probably would make less money but it doesn't go 20% to zero.

Medicare For All: What Does it Actually Mean?

I'll support almost anything that puts insurance companies out of business.

Quintin "Earth-Shattering Meteor for 2020" Stone.

Donald Trump just made sure health care will decide the 2020 election

Just 24 hours removed from arguably his best day as President, Donald Trump picked a political fight he cannot win.

On Monday night, the Trump administration announced that it now supports a ruling from a Texas judge that would invalidate the entire Affordable Care Act -- aka Obamacare -- a move that almost certainly will push the fight over how health care is delivered in this country to the Supreme Court.
"The Department of Justice has determined that the district court's comprehensive opinion came to the correct conclusion and will support it on appeal," said Kerri Kupec, a spokesperson for the Justice Department.

That decision, which caught even many Trump allies by surprise, again thrusts the health care issue to the center of the political debate, and virtually ensures that the 2020 election -- like the 2018, 2016, 2014, 2012 and 2010 elections before it -- will turn on the ACA.
It's a baffling move for Trump, who spent most of Monday basking in the glow of a series of conclusions, according to Attorney General Bill Barr, in special counsel Robert Mueller's report that were about as favorable as the President could have hoped for: That the special counsel did not establish that anyone in Trump's campaign conspired with the Russian government in 2016 election interference, and that there was not sufficient evidence for Barr to establish an obstruction of justice charge against the President.
Switching the spotlight of the national debate from Russia to health care so quickly would be risky under any circumstances but is particularly problematic given that a) the past five elections have shown that people care deeply about and vote on the issue of health care and b) getting rid of Obamacare is not a broadly popular view with the American public.
In a February, Kaiser Family Foundation poll on the ACA, 50% approved of it while 37% disapproved. In fact, since President Barack Obama left office in January 2017, his signature legislative accomplishment -- and the one that bears his name -- has grown steadily more popular. Since May 2017, according to Kaiser data, more people have approved of Obamacare than disapprove -- a sea change from most of the previous five years, when the law was consistently underwater in terms of approval. Many of the provisions of the law that have long been the most popular -- allowing kids to stay on their parents' insurance through age 26, no discrimination by insurance companies because of a patient's preexisting conditions -- remain in effect. The least popular provision -- the individual mandate that forced everyone in the country to have some sort of health care -- was effectively eliminated by congressional Republicans (and Trump) in their 2017 tax law.
Those numbers explain why House Democrats ran hundreds upon hundreds of TV ads during the 2018 midterm elections making the case that Republicans, if they had their way, would have eliminated Obamacare altogether. "Republicans will do absolutely anything to divert attention away from their votes to take away Americans' health care," then House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-California) said in the days leading up to the midterms. And, following Democrats' takeover of the House in 2018, Pelosi was just as clear; "Health care was on the ballot, and health care won," she said.
The data back up Pelosi's position. More than 4 in 10 voters in 2018 said that health care was their top priority in the election, according to exit polling. Democrats won those health care voters by 52 points. 52!
That massive edge for Democrats reflects just how much the political landscape has tilted on the issue over the past decade. Opposition to what many conservatives viewed was a massive government overreach into what should be best handled by the private market led to Republicans winning control of the House in the 2010 midterms. By 2012, public opinion on the law had stabilized somewhat and Obama was re-elected relatively easily. Two years later, however, amid implementation problems and the famous/infamous backtracking on "if you like your health care plan, you can keep it," Republicans again ran on their opposition to the ACA and made more seat gains in Congress. In the 2016 presidential election, Trump ran explicitly on a plan to repeal and replace the ACA. By 2018, Democrats were able to capitalize on the fact that House Republicans had approved a repeal and replace package that never became law because it failed in a late-night vote in the Senate.
Trump's decision to pick this fight at this moment is, therefore, tough to understand. There's no question that his base hates Obamacare and would like to see it gone. And that he believes that at least part of his 2016 victory -- and maybe his chances at re-election in 2020 -- hinge on him making good on removing the most visible footprint of his predecessor. At rally after rally during the 2018 campaign, Trump re-told the story of John McCain's decision to vote against the so-called "skinny repeal" of Obamacare, a line that always drew boos and jeers directed at the late Arizona senator from the crowd.
Trump has spent the entire first two years of his presidency playing to his hardcore base -- and, seen through that lens, the decision to re-litigate the ACA fight makes some sense. But Trump won't win a second term solely on the strength of his base. And by picking the Obamacare scab, Trump is energizing and inflaming Democrats and many independents. And that is a major political mistake.

Someone is awfully confident that 75 more emergencies won't happen in the next several hundred days.

Yonder wrote:

Someone is awfully confident that 75 more emergencies won't happen in the next several hundred days.

Democratic candidates are all dancing around some form of nationalized healthcare so it's virtually certain that healthcare will be a major campaign issue for the 2020 election.

It's also an issue where Trump has managed to break just about every promise he made about it (outside of trying to destroy Obamacare).

While I'm sure a goodly percentage of Trump's followers will just be happy that Obamacare was finally destroyed, there's also going to be about 14 million people who lost their health insurance because of Trump and a lot more who are paying a lot more even though the orange one promised they'd be paying less.

I'm not going to overestimate the intelligence of the electorate, but even a few percentage point shift in how white Independents and white people in red states vote will severely hurt Trump's re-election chances.

OG_slinger wrote:

I'm not going to overestimate the intelligence of the electorate, but even a few percentage point shift in how white Independents and white people in red states vote will severely hurt Trump's re-election chances.

Shooting one's party in the foot is one hell of a follow-up to "No collusion."

At this point, I think Trump might be colluding with the Democrats. /s

Rat Boy wrote:
OG_slinger wrote:

I'm not going to overestimate the intelligence of the electorate, but even a few percentage point shift in how white Independents and white people in red states vote will severely hurt Trump's re-election chances.

Shooting one's party in the foot is one hell of a follow-up to "No collusion."

The sad thing is that Trump could shoot himself in the foot and convince half the country to give him a Purple Heart for his heroism.

Yonder wrote:

Someone is awfully confident that 75 more emergencies won't happen in the next several hundred days.

Well they'll need to escalate the fictional 'invasion' narrative of Texas/Arizona (he doesn't care what happens in California/New Mexico). I'm picturing a Sharknado of Venezuelan refugees.

OG_slinger wrote:
Yonder wrote:

Someone is awfully confident that 75 more emergencies won't happen in the next several hundred days.

Democratic candidates are all dancing around some form of nationalized healthcare so it's virtually certain that healthcare will be a major campaign issue for the 2020 election.

It's also an issue where Trump has managed to break just about every promise he made about it (outside of trying to destroy Obamacare).

While I'm sure a goodly percentage of Trump's followers will just be happy that Obamacare was finally destroyed, there's also going to be about 14 million people who lost their health insurance because of Trump and a lot more who are paying a lot more even though the orange one promised they'd be paying less.

I'm not going to overestimate the intelligence of the electorate, but even a few percentage point shift in how white Independents and white people in red states vote will severely hurt Trump's re-election chances.

I think it is also safe to take the position that for Trump, Obama was an invalid president. Ergo, presuming this is part of Trump's world view, he has to remove every vestige of what Obama did for presidentin while black. Since his political vision is tunneled in on his base it looks like a political win to him as well.

Garrcia wrote:
OG_slinger wrote:
Yonder wrote:

Someone is awfully confident that 75 more emergencies won't happen in the next several hundred days.

Democratic candidates are all dancing around some form of nationalized healthcare so it's virtually certain that healthcare will be a major campaign issue for the 2020 election.

It's also an issue where Trump has managed to break just about every promise he made about it (outside of trying to destroy Obamacare).

While I'm sure a goodly percentage of Trump's followers will just be happy that Obamacare was finally destroyed, there's also going to be about 14 million people who lost their health insurance because of Trump and a lot more who are paying a lot more even though the orange one promised they'd be paying less.

I'm not going to overestimate the intelligence of the electorate, but even a few percentage point shift in how white Independents and white people in red states vote will severely hurt Trump's re-election chances.

I think it is also safe to take the position that for Trump, Obama was an invalid president. Ergo, presuming this is part of Trump's world view, he has to remove every vestige of what Obama did for presidentin while black. Since his political vision is tunneled in on his base it looks like a political win to him as well.

Not just Trump, but Trump’s supporters, followers, and acolytes. There was quite a few stories about Christian Trump supporters who literally believe that Obama was a servant of the devil and that, Trump, while a flawed man, is God’s effort to put things right.

See, it's not removing protections for pre-existing conditions, or kicking people off health care. It's killing this awful thing that provides those in a terrible, bad way, and then replacing it with something much BETTER that will be cheaper and just great.

Stop asking questions about what that replacement thing is, just trust me, it'll be great. No, I obviously can't tell you anything about it until after we get done getting rid of the mess we have now. That'd ruin the suprise! All the GOP folks that you say are being two faced because they say they're in favor of health care and protecting folks with pre-existing conditions, but who voted to kill the ACA totally aren't that because they know about our secret plan for fixing everything. They just can't tell you about it either.

Really, the Dems did the exact same thing when they passed the ACA without consulting Republicans or Real Americans anyway.

Don't forget that we need to save the milkshakes!
Maybe we should call this a war for diabetes? Since we need to protect milkshakes and the free diabetes checks on Medicare are about to be struck down.

Man’s ER Experience in Taiwan Reminds Everyone How Messed up American Health Care Really Is

It sounds like a utopia, but it’s not – most of the world has figured out how to make it happen. And according to Kevin, it’s time for his home country to stop making excuses.