Medical System Runs Risk Of Nationalization, Gingrich Says

[seafan]

Source: Tampa Tribune

By WILLIAM MARCH
Published: Apr 14, 2007


TAMPA - Former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich brought his potential presidential campaign to Tampa on Friday, telling a group of medical professionals the nation's health care system must change drastically to avoid political pressure for a national health care system.

"I don't think we can get to any kind of fundamental solution within the current system," Gingrich said.

Gingrich wasn't specific about what form the new system should take, but he said it should be based on making consumers more responsible for keeping tabs on the quality of their own health care and paying for it.

.....

Read more: http://www.tbo.com/news/metro/MGBTLWYGH0F.html

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No, we of the chattering classes must not be allowed to clamor for something so anti-American as a government-based universal health care system. No siree.

[Joanne98]

1. Thank Gawd!

[Vexatious Ape]

2. Oh the horror.

[Raven]

3. When these guys give up their cushy health care insurance, I'll

be willing to listen to them. In the meantime...no Newt, a new system should be based on reasonable prices for health care and prescription drugs!

[Orsino]

4. Medical System Runs Risk of Gingrich, Orsino Says n/t

[sutz12]

5. Somehow That doesn't ring true.

>>"it should be based on making consumers more responsible for keeping tabs on the quality of their own health care and paying for it."<<

The problem with that statement IMO is that when one is enduring a crisis, one cannot "keep tabs on the quality of their own health care." That's why there are strong protections in most states surrounding the Mortuary industry. People in crisis can't make rational judgements easily. Not to mention how do we force people to pay for something they can't afford.

The part that bothers me the most about this, though, is the out and out fear mongering he's using. :puke:

[CBHagman]

36. He seems to be echoing the Bush administration.

I think most people don't realize that various members of Bush administration have been attacking the employer-provided health care plans (i.e., paying premiums for a PPO or HMO and then paying co-payments) as too generous and essentially the equivalent of giving away free health care. Yeah, I know; I never thought of a system that costs me thousands of dollars a year (and is worth it) as "free."

For the Bush administration "taking responsibility" means changing the tax code to discourage employer-provided plans and encourage health savings accounts. Such changes will no doubt cause the numbers of the uninsured -- and the numbers of deaths and bankruptcies -- to swell even more.

[kurth]

6. How about bringing our primary health care availability up to par with CUBA?

For starters.

[peacetalksforall]

7. Man, that writer ticked me off - I was left hanging by this paragraph

"Gingrich wasn't specific about what form the new system should take, but he said it should be based on making consumers more responsible for keeping tabs on the quality of their own health care and paying for it."

What the heck does it mean? So, I read the article. Nada. No more. What a teaser headline:

Medical System Runs Risk Of Nationalization, Gingrich Says

So, do we wait until September to find out what the heck he means by consumers doing something or until he talks to another medical association.

That thought of his sound ominous, knowing him.

[aquart]

11. What he means is: Fend for yourselves!

Government's only functions are to aid in the amassing of more wealth for the already rich, and to keep the poor from rebelling over it.

[rodeodance]

16. it is like HSA---people in OR save money to pay for h. i.

[DBoon]

23. He means the poor and sick should die quickly

to avoid burdening insurance companies with expensive medical care

[EST]

8. What an idiot!

Political pressure for a nationalized health care system is exactly how we can keep tabs on and demonstrate responsibility for the costs and quality of our health care.

[jody]

9. I wish we could nationalize out government. n/t

[drm604]

10. Fine,

then we can avoid nationalizing health care by nationalizing health insurance. Like they do in Canada. How's that sound Newt, are we on the same page? (I wish...)

[Warpy]

12. What planet are these people from?

I really, really want to see Gingrich making half a dozen phone calls when he's passing out with chest pain, trying to find the cheapest hospital.

The free market system does not work in health care. Illness is not a consumer decision!

Single payer national health insurance NOW. Nothing less will do.

[EFerrari]

13. Good luck with that one, Newt. The medical community

is being ripped off three ways to Sunday right now.

[colinmom71]

14. I'm amused by the inherent paradox in the writer's first sentence...

Quote - "telling a group of medical professionals the nation's health care system must change drastically to avoid political pressure for a national health care system."

Sooo, in order to avoid a national health care system, the national health care system must change... Nor did Gingrich seem to know what those changes should entail. He just knows the changes should take place... Uh-huh...

And dude, if you're intending on running for national office, it might be a better idea to address the PEOPLE who vote rather than referring to them as "consumers". Granted, the address was to health care workers but equating people as consumption just feels kind of tacky. Since you know, the government is supposed to be "for the people, by the people" it therefore is supposed to work for the people, not the corporate hoard.

[rodeodance]

15. risk?---and I thought showing compassion was the IN thing to do~!!

[Tektonik]

17. Oh the humanity

People without insurance may actually be cared for; HOW HORRIBLE!

[Warren Stupidity]

18. Great news!

As a self employed person, having been porked by the feds for taxes as per usual I just got the latest bad news from my health insurance 'provider' and it is the annual cut in services and increase in costs. Oh joy! If only that fabulist newt wasn't just making shit up as usual.

[fshrink]

19. Millions of Americans run the risk of being covered. nt

[Joe Chi Minh]

22. An ugly prospect... Even the poor?

[grytpype]

20. They think we are getting too much heath care.

The supply siders think the reason health care costs are so high is because we get too much health care.

So if they push the costs back on to consumers, we would get less health care and the cost couldn't go up as much.

Meanwhile, they and their families get everything they could possibly need.

Lucky they're going to be out of power for 25 years or more.

[Joe Chi Minh]

21. Oh! No! Nationalisation? It was reported in the UK newspaper, the Daily Mail, today,

that, since Blair's creeping privatization of our National Health Service (including privatisation of the cleaning work in the hospitals) 50,000 Brits go abroad each year for medical treatment, for fear of succumbing to MRSA and the other lethal bugs rampant in our hospitals and causing many deaths. All due to drastically reduced standards of ward cleanliness, by inevitably profit-oriented private companies.

[Autobot77]

34. And this fact is used by the righties

And the republics use this fact to argue against national health care. They say Brits go abroad to seek treatment, but they never say it's because of privatization, not dissatisfaction of national health care.

[Joe Chi Minh]

40. Well, that takes some beating. If it were a game, you'd have to laugh at their

imagination and gall in peddling such grotesque distortions and lies!

[Doremus]

43. Heh, I think your superbugs are the offspring of our superbugs.

They'll not find much respite from them over here, if the US is where they're headed.

We're even so "privatization-friendly" as to allow corporations to feed livestock the last antibiotic that still works against them, thereby speeding up the resistance process.

Much better human 'cattle' die -- those of the bovine species affect the bottom line, ya know. :sarcasm:

[Seldona]

24. The unspoken truth about the con approach to health care is this.

Screw the poor. Pay into the so called safety net for 2 decades and get a rheumatic disease? Tough. Die.

Pardon me in advance, but go fuck yourself Newt.

[Akoto]

25. Let me relate our recent "medical system" experience ...

I still live at home. Last November, my mother suffered a heart attack. She had natural cholesterol issues which had clogged up one artery. The rest were fine.

Fortunately, the heart attack was stopped at the doctor's office, and she was sent to the local hospital (Hospital #1) for further treatment. Several days in ICU with lots of testing. Finally, she had a catheter so that they could look into her heart. They neglected to tell her that nobody at the hospital was actually licensed to place a stent, however, and that she'd have to be transferred to another hospital for that.

Hospital #1 Bill: $37,500 (originally $50,000, then deduct 25% uninsured discount)

My mother spent one and a half days at Hospital #2. The treatment, as compared to Hospital #1, was very impersonal. They repeated the catheter and then placed the stent, before sending her home.

Hospital #2 Bill: $38,500 (again, after a 25% discount)

We hired a lawyer, who is a friend of the family, to negotiate our bill. The first hospital took $5,000 and left it at that. The second hospital has absolutely refused to budge. The lowest they'll go is $14.5k, IF we pay them all at once.

When our lawyer told them we couldn't do that, they actually ran a credit check on my mother. They claim that my mom, who makes $200 on a good week, can get a loan to pay off the bill. Then they suggested a credit card. Finally, they decided that anything less than $500/mo in payments would be unacceptable. So, they're getting $25/mo and we'll deal with what comes.

The lawyer has since found that the hospital did all kind of crazy billing. $200 for $25 in pills, for example.

It has really thrown our life into chaos. A nationalized system would have been a blessing for us.

[TygrBright]

31. Hospital billing is totally incomprehensible.

Some years back I was hospitalized to recover from a bad bout of pneumonia, for four days. I lived alone and the decision was made to hospitalize me because I needed (according to my doctor);

1. Above all, rest and quiet
2. 2x daily respiratory therapy
3. Regular medication supervision
4. Daily blood drawn for tests, etc.
5. A chest x-ray before I went home

The idea was that since I lived alone in a small apartment on a busy city intersection with no family nearby I would be hard put to it to get all these things. So into the hospital I went.

The hospital was noisy. I was in a double room and people were always coming in and out, there was no door to close and carts would rattle past at all hours, the room never got very dark, due to the bright nursing station lights opposite, it took anywhere from twenty minutes to an hour for a call button to be answered for various needs, and when I DID get to sleep, they never failed to wake me up within an hour or so to check vitals, etc. It was dirty. The food was worse than high school cafeteria fare and by the time it was delivered to the room the hot items were always stone cold and the ice cream melted to a puddle. By the fourth day I was so miserable I begged the doctor to let me go home so I could get some peace and quiet and sleep!

The bill for the above, plus four days' bed and board, was nearly $13,000. This did not include the doctor's bill ($900, but he wrote off all except $200... I'd known my then-doc all my life, practically,) the chest x-ray ($700, billed separately by a radiological consultant,) lab costs (again billed separately, nearly $1100,) or the respiratory therapy ($2800, billed separately by a medtech firm.)

I was so betwattled by this that I spent several days on an experiment:

What would it have cost me, had I spent the same four days at the most luxurious hotel in town, in a premium room (not a suite, just a very nice room,) getting gourmet room service meals three times a day, with a 24-hour private-duty nurse, and medassist transport to get the chest x-ray and outpatient respiratory therapy?

Took quite a while to track down those costs. Answer: Less than the nearly $6,000 that was my share of the costs based on my then-insurance.

And I would have been spared four days of misery.

This was nearly 20 years ago. Still, I'm betting it's not too different nowadays. I DO understand some of why the hospital costs are so high--that hospital ate a lot of expenses giving uninsured care, and not unnaturally tried to recoup it from people who could "afford" to pay--but it just seemed to me (and still does) that there HAS to be a better way.

confuzzledly,
Bright

[MissB]

39. There was some advice in the business section of today's paper

regarding medical debts. A couple of points: don't take out a loan to pay off the hospital (or credit card). In the end, if payments are something that can be done, the person could file for bankruptcy and the medical bills can be discharged, whereas a loan or a credit card may not be. Of course, the lawyer probably already knows that.

[Toucano]

26. OMG! This is a threat to national security.

Those brave corporations risk so much to maintain their disfunctional and unsustainable profit driven healthcare system!

They deserve a monument!

Thanks Newt for keeping us informed of the terrible risks!

[flaminbats]

27. ohhh, what a friend of the medical community!

He told the AMA gathering that experts expect "four to seven times as much new science in the next 25 years as in the last 25 years."

That means, he said, "that comparing society in 2032 to today will be like comparing today's society to 1880."

so that is why stem cell research should be allowed in the UK, but not in the United States! those who wish to be cured of diabetes need to find another country, but those without medical problems have "the best healthcare system in the world!"

[gulfcoastliberal]

28. Wow, Gingrich & the DLC have the EXACT same position!

Who'd a thunk it? See the Harold Ford speech on the DLC website for details.

[Synnical]

29. Ugh, when will the DoubleSpeak end?

Gingrich recently acknowledged that he was having an affair, which led to the end of his second marriage, at the time he was involved in the Clinton impeachment effort.

In Friday's interview, he denied that was hypocritical, noting that the impeachment effort directed at Clinton was over a perjury charge, not an extramarital affair.

[Triana]

30. Um-hmmm-and the problem with that is...? (n/t)

[cassiepriam]

32. The insurance companies will just figure out a way to keep on stealing most of the health care $$.

[booley]

33. Rather obviouse scare mongering

Use the word Nationalization and to cons that's the same as Socialism and communism. It's a word meant to scare them to action, even if they cant' rationally identify the threat.

I have had more then one con tell me that a universal health care system would be akin to a Fascist coup.

Shredding our bill of Rights, that's fine. But makign sure people can get health care or food or a place to live..THAT'S DANGEROUS!

[heliarc]

35. Class war...

This is such a clear indicator that corporate America has it in for the people and their Government. This is just like the way Oil companies fix the market by squeezing refinery output and manipulating the price of gas to convince us that we don't have a problem with the Oil companies when our gas prices fluctuate before and after elections. Gingrich proves he's a yes man for the rich. Sending signals to his cronies to massage us into submission. These people are sick.

[CBHagman]

37. Remember that Gingrich has opposed health care reform.

See this timeline for a better understanding of what happened during the derailing of the Clinton health care proposal. I suspect few Americans, even those who lived through that experience, realize how deliberate the GOP leadership's strategy was to see that NO health care plan passed. Read The System by Haynes Johnson and David Broder for more details.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/forum/may96/background/health_debate_page1.html

Spring 1991 - Minority Whip Newt Gingrich, in a private discussion about long-term Republican political strategy, predicts that the "next great offensive of the Left," as he puts it, will be "socializing health care." Gingrich declares the need for hardline Republicans to begin positioning themselves now to keep Democrats from winning in the future.

(SNIP)

September 2, 1993 - Clinton's political and policy advisers agree on an explicit congressional strategy. Rather than start from the center, writing a bill that will appeal to conservative Democrats and moderate Republicans (while telling the liberals this is the best deal they can get), Clinton decides to follow a strategy of starting from the left and moving as far to the center as is needed to reach a majority. The advisers do not know that Newt Gingrich is determined there be no Republican support for any Clinton-designed reform and that the whole effort be derailed.

[Fovea]

38. My DURTY LIBERUL challenge to Newt.

Ok, free market boy, here is my challenge.

For the next ten years of your life, you must not use any service provided by an insurance plan, or govt giveaway to office holders past or present.

After your heart attack, or stroke, you must pay for all medications at current market rate, no fair dipping into anything but your own income.

Then, if you are still alive, you can come back and tell us all how you did it with nothing but your smart consumer ju ju.

My money is on your being dead.

[lovuian]

41. Its inevitable

I've been waiting for it to happen even the Republicans know its time

[Toots]

42. I think the military should be treated the exact same way as the general public

when it comes to paying for health care. I mean if their logic is good it is good for all. If the government is unable to provide for decent health care then our military is being shortchanged don't you think? If they are not being shortchanged and are in fact receiving very good health care then what the right is saying is just more lies...

[hunter]

44. Nationalization would be wonderful!

I'd be a happy healthy guy with money in my pocket if the United States had a health care system as good as Canada's. Instead I'm a cranky son of a bitch who can't always pay his medical bills on time.

Good health insurance has always been a fleeting thing for me. It usually depends upon where my wife and I are working. We usually can't get or afford private health insurance.

We've always taken very good care of ourselves, we haven't abused the health care system in any way, but most people in the United States can draw the bad cards that will expose them to the dark side of the U.S. healthcare "system," a continuing nightmare that can grind up even the strongest people and spit them out onto the meanest streets hopeless and broken.

[nadinbrzezinski]

45. News STUF IT, whether you like it or not, IT IS COMMING

[camero]

46. Poor Newt. No more concierge medicine

:boring:

[cap]

47. Newtie just doesn't get it...

"should be based on making consumers more responsible for keeping tabs on the quality of their own health care and paying for it."

Newt, the consumer is tapped out and does not want to pay more for less health care. That's why the consumer is looking at national health care.

You just dont want corporations to pay more in either taxes or health care costs. Funny thing is that with national health care, corporations might pay a bit more in taxes but a lot less in health care costs for a net decrease in overall costs.

You just want the poor to stay in pain.