Healthcare truth NOT covered by media, so much for investigative reporting

Affordable mandated private insurance – the BIG lie – A look at the actual numbers on a MA site

9/20/2009 at 2:48am

This was posted on another website.

Over here in Massachusetts, we have government mandated private insurance. Just like the proposed national plan, we have subsidies available to lower & moderate income levels. If you don’t meet these levels, you are on your own to buy your own insurance from the state group pools that are supposed to offer ‘affordable’ insurance choices.

Well, I just went to the site in Massachusetts that helps uninsured families find and enroll in these plans. I typed in my income was above the 54,936.00 limit for assistance for a family of three and choose to find plans for a family of three of the following ages – 38, 41, & 14.

Here are the results:

Low premium. Most have deductibles and co-payments. Prescription drug coverage included. 4 plans $836.84 – $952.45/mo

– Okay, there is your first option….for between 836.84 – 952.45, you can buy a family plan with high premiums, deductibles, and co-payments. Now if you make 55,000 dollars a year, you and choose this plan, you would be paying 19.63 percent of your income for health insurance that DOES NOT FULLY COVER YOU, CAN DENY CLAIMS, & WILL COST YOU MARKEDLY MORE IF YOU ACTUALLY USE IT….(I used 900 dollars a month as a mid-way figure between the costs presented for purchasing this plan). It may be slightly more or slightly less.

Looking closer, I went into the program and looked at some of the deductibles. One plan the deductible is 2000.00 per family member up to 4,000 dollars total before they pay for hospital stays. Prescription drug copayments could be as high as 180.00 co-pays for some prescriptions. There is a 250.00 dollar fee for emergency room visits. The cheapest plan had a deductible of 35% for hospital stays.

Okay…moving on to the next one….

Moderate co-payments. Some have no deductible. Prescription drug coverage included. 6 plans $1,037.26 – $1,343.15/mo

Okay…so let’s first figure out the percentage of GROSS income you will be paying for this plan – again, I choose a mid-way number, 1150.00 from the price range offered. At this price, you are paying a full 25 percent of your income for health insurance and it still has copayments! A quarter of all the hours you work and you STILL are not fully covered. Let’s look more closely at one of these plans. First, I found that you had to pay 1,250 dollars a month for a plan with no deductibles (however you still had to pay 500 dollars per hospital admission, so I don’t see how that isn’t a deductible, but moving on)…Prescription drugs co-payments range from 15 dollars to 1/2 the cost of the drug AFTER the prescription drug deductible is met!

Wow, this is shaping up to be an inspriing model for a national health insurance plan! Alright, on to the ‘cadillac’ programs…(cadillac meaning that they may actually cover more of the cost, if you need care…maybe because remember, they can still DENY care)

Low co-payments. No deductible. Prescription drug coverage included. 4 plans $1,493.62 – $1,739.38/mo

Whew, I am getting sticker shock at this point. Okay, let’s start with the mid-level range for one of these plans, say 1,600 bucks a month. Or, to put it another way, for a mere 34.9 percent of your income you can have nearly full coverage health insurance that still can be denied, but it may cover a lot of if you ever need to use it. Fingers crossed.

Looking at a plan that matches the price I choose, the maximum out of pocket expenses is 2000.00. You STILL HAVE out of pocket expenses with the most expensive plan. Co-payments for meds were as high as 90.00 dollars per script. Durable medical equipment costs were 1,500 dollars before they pay a dime.

There you have it! That is the reality of health insurance costs for a family that makes too much to get government subsidies. And, from what I am reading about the national plan, the income rate for subsidies will be much lower. Also, you might want to know that the MA plan is becoming financially insolvent and they have been paying for the subsidies for purchasing health insurance by cutting benefits to lower income people…the poor sacrificing for the slightly better off. A reality that will be happening to people on Medicare and Medicaid across the country, if this current plan passes.

Here is the link to the site
https://www.mahealthconnector.org/portal/site/connector

My conclusion: SINGLE PAYER INSURANCE NOW – because nothing else will WORK

 


Additional Healthcare Links That May Be Useful For You:

State-by-State Medicare Locator
http://www.ehealthmedicare.com/medicare-by-state

A Guide for Families and Friends of People with Medicare
http://www.medicare.gov/pubs/pdf/11034.pdf

2013 & 2014 Medicare Costs At A Glance
http://www.medicare.gov/your-medicare-costs/costs-at-a-glance/costs-at-glance.html

Locate a Geriatric Specialist by Insurance
http://www.zocdoc.com/insurances


 

30 Sept 2009: hilarious description of proposed GOP for profit healthplan:

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    An Open Letter from Alan Grayson’s Mother

    Dear Parents of Republicans,

    As so many of you contacted me regarding Tuesday’s incident, I hope you don’t mind my responding to all of you at once. I understand that you are very upset, no parent wants to see their child sad or distraught, and I hope you will forgive me for not getting back to you until today. I didn’t want to respond without first giving my son Alan a chance to tell his side of the story, and as I’m sure you can understand, he has not only been very busy with his homework, but as one of the new kids in school, has also been trying to meet his classmates, get acclimated, and make new friends. Now that he and I have had a chance to talk, I can respond to your concerns.

    First, speaking parent to parent, I truly am sorry that Alan’s presentation at Show-and-Tell made your sons and daughters cry. That being said, after discussing the matter at great length with my son and others, I think that perhaps many of you weren’t getting the whole story.

    When Alan told people that your children’s plan for health care was “die quickly”, he was, for all intents and purposes, saying the same thing that the Grassley boy said about him and his friends. Let’s face it, “pulling the plug on Grandma” is, in every sense, making Grandma die more quickly. So you see, our kids are 99% in agreement on this. The only difference is that Alan and his friends want every Grandma to have access to a plug in the first place.

    Some have told me that their child wasn’t so much upset about what Alan said or how he said it, but that making people afraid that the other kids want their loved ones to die is the Republican kids’ favorite toy, and they didn’t like the idea of my son playing with it, especially since he’s new and didn’t ask permission first. Some pointed out that for many of the more unfortunate, it’s the only thing they have. Please don’t blame Alan, this is my fault. You see, when he was young we taught him to share, and he sometimes forgets that other people weren’t brought up that way.

    Please don’t get me wrong. I’m not telling you how to raise your children, but even Alan noticed many of them are having problems, so, again parent to parent, I want to share a couple of our concerns with you.

    Depending on how involved you are, you may or may not have noticed that the Republican kids have a lot less friends than they used to. Maybe it’s because they throw a tantrum and start name-calling when they don’t get their way. Maybe it’s because they’re idea of working together is for the majority to give them what they want but not vice versa. A lot of people say it’s because if they don’t do what they’re told, they’re allowance will be taken away. Personally, I think it’s because they don’t understand what sharing is all about. Anytime Alan or one of his friends brings it up, they call them ‘Socialists’. Well as I understand it, a large majority of people in this country say they’d be willing to pay a little more if it meant that everyone’s Grandma would have access to that plug so many people are fighting about pulling. That’s not ‘socialist’, sharing everything is ‘socialist’, sharing 10% is ‘religious’, and sharing a few percent or less is, well, just sharing.

    Also, I don’t know him but maybe some of you do. Back in June, one of the Republican boys said that they had a comprehensive health care plan and were just putting the finishing touches on it. I’m sure you know who I’m talking about, the dark kid, I think his name is Johnny Boehner or something like that. Anyway, if you know him or his parents, please find out when he’ll have it finished because my Alan is very worried that more people have already died while holding their breath waiting for it than will die this year because they don’t have health insurance.

    So, again, while I’m sorry my son made your children cry, I think there may have also been an overreaction or misunderstanding on their part. I think a lot of it was just a case of a new kid in school trying to fit in and speak the way he heard the other kids speaking. In his case, he was just talking like the wrong kids.

    As I said earlier, I never presume to tell other parents how to raise their children, but maybe if more of you made your kids spend more time on their homework and less time sticking their ‘doo-dads’ into staff members, foreign ladies, and the butts of every man, woman, and child in the United States, we’d all be better off.

    Respectfully yours,

    Alan’s Mother

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