Hillary’s big healthcare con

[NorthCarolina]

The cynical myth she keeps repeating about Bernie Sanders and single-payer

http://www.salon.com/2016/01/23/hillarys_big_healthcare_con_the_cynical_myth_she_keeps_repeating_about_bernie_sanders_and_single_payer/

The Clinton campaign’s cynical capitulation to corporate power appears to be reaching brazen new heights as the Democratic presidential nominee goes on the offensive and publicly attacks her rivals for their advocacy of single-payer healthcare.

Clinton, who has racked up just under $3 million from the healthcare industry in speaking fees over the past two years, has publicly dismissed the “Medicare-for-all” model proposed by Bernie Sanders as well as the publicly administered health insurance option floated during the debates surrounding the Affordable Care Act (ACA), claiming such policy proposals are risky and irresponsible.

Clinton’s position was summed up during the forth Democratic presidential debate with the words: “We have the Affordable Care Act. Let’s make it work.”

There is little doubt that Clinton and the entrenched Democratic Party establishment have little appetite for taking on the medical insurance and pharmaceutical corporate cartel. The call to “build on” the ACA and “make it work” is a campaign promise to the health industry, signaling that under a Clinton administration, business will continue as usual.

And business has been good.

Can someone please explain the advantages of a healthcare system that relies on a for-profit middleman between you and your doctor over a single payer medicare for all system?

[Hoyt]

1. There is little question we will be better off long-term with Single Payer, but

we need a lot of changes short-term. For example, private insurers do negotiate with drug companies on prices, Medicare can't by current law. Private insurers own the systems that administer most of Medicare right now. Do you think our current Congress is going to appropriate billions of dollars to invest in those similar systems or improve them to handle 200,000,000 adittional covered people? Private insurers manage their network of providers. Medicare takes just about anyone. A whole lot of people are scared to death of government run Healthcare. They are likely wrong, but there are a lot of stupid people to convince. There's a lot more, but an obstructionist Congress makes it close to impossible. Plodding along improving ACA seems better than waiting for all that to catch up.

[enid602]

2. insurance mandated

"Can someone please explain the advantages of a healthcare system that relies on a for-profit middleman between you and your doctor over a single payer medicare for all system?"

Better to ask the French, Germans or Belgians to name a few. They don't have single payer. In fact, the only major countries that have SP are Japan and the UK, and Japan's really is a hybrid system.

[Hoyt]

3. Facts are not appreciated here.