Poor an no health care? Insurance exec: prioritize spending

[The Straight Story]

Insurance exec: Lifestyles push health-care costs

Snip:

What Colacino wanted to discuss was why. The major reason is people's lifestyle. He said two-thirds of the population are responsible for less than 10 percent of health-care costs. The other one-third are responsible for 90 percent of the cost. Those people are those who have made unhealthy decisions or have managed illnesses poorly. The trick, he said, is figuring out what to do with those that fall into this group.

....

"We need to say, 'I'm the reason, what can I do?' and then we will see decreases," he said.

For those who are uninsured, Colacino suggested state-sponsored programs like Medicaid, Family Health Plus and Child Health Plus to provide some access to preventive care. Public assistance programs are available for people with low incomes.

For those living paycheck to paycheck, who view the doctor's office and prescription drugs as one more unmanageable expense, they should prioritize spending.

"You need to think, 'What happens if I don't go (to the doctor)?' " he said, stressing the result is a "bankrupt" health system.

http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070222/BUSINESS/702220310/1003

This is more of what I have been saying for some time - YOUR life and choices affect ME and my costs, so people should be punished if they don't live their life the way I tell em to.

Well, at least that is the logic I hear from some anyway. Our new god is money and health care costs, and this god has the power and the will to force you to quit sinning, or punish you.

Now excuse me while I go to church (the gym) and worship at the altar of fitness and how I should live my life to please others with what is now partially their body.

Freedom of choice over one's own body my ass. The prudes are winning, and sex outside of marriage will eventually fall into their scope as well, how many partners you have, etc and so on.

[depakid]

1. Insurance exec = parasite on the system

who needs to be put out of business.

[leftyclimber]

2. What happens if I don't go to the doctor? Easy.

I don't get evicted, because I can still pay my rent.

I get to have electricity, because I can still pay my electric bill.

I get to have a little bit left over to eat, because I can still afford groceries.

I swear. If I met that guy on the street ... :mad:

Well, it wouldn't be pleasant.

[BluePatriot]

3. What a cold guy

Health insurance shouldn't have a risk management model on the business side. EVERYONE gets sick, EVERYONE dies. Yes, there is preventative care, but it only goes so far.
...grr.

[SharonAnn]

12. An accident, appendicitis, encephalitis, pneumonia, etc. The $$$ involved in any of these

will bankrupt anyone living paycheck to paycheck. It's not a matter of "prioritizing".

An accident or appendicitis and the medical and/or hospital care associated with it could cost $10,000 to $100,000 and often does. Some are much, much more expensive than that. Hundreds of thousands of dollars for treating ONE accident or illness. Bankrupt and you and your family are still vulnerable to more accidents and/or illnesses.

A large part of the health care costs are in the last few months of life. That was true for my dad last year and he wasn't really ill until he started losing his balance and fell, was in the hospital for injuries from the fall, had a stroke and died a month after the fall. But still, hugely expensive even though it was not a long, lingering situation with chemotherapy, surgeries, and multiple hospital stays.

However, an insurance company executive would see things as coldly as he describes them.

[Warpy]

14. That attitude is common among most upper management types

Born into affluent suburbs, educated at prep schools and the better colleges, entertained their whole lives at country clubs, they have no clue what their poorest workers go through, what they can and cannot afford on what they're paid.

They have no clue the choice is between insurance and food, shelter, utilities, transportation and clothing.

May Karma catch up with the lot of them. They are killing us.

[ikojo]

23. You have no idea the truth you write....

I work for an HMO and trust me I don't even make $40k but I work my TAIL off. I am friends with the admin to one of the executives. We had a storm a few weeks ago and I took the bus home. The VP of HR had offered to give me a ride earlier in the day but I didn't want to stay late (I get in at 7AM and she comes in at 9AM)so I took the bus home.

Seems she gave my friend (the admin assistant) a ride home and I came up. The VP said she just didn't understand why I could not buy a little car to get around in when the weather is really bad. The admin took this opportunity to let her know money was tight for me. She probably pulls down a nice salary and her husband works in the financial services field and comes from a rich family (his daddy was an executive) so for her roughing it is staying at the Ritz Carlton when there is no electricity. The executives all get bonuses while the ones who do the work get nothing.

OY vey!!

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

4. What does one expect...

From an insuranceco exec? Did he mention anything about the huge insuranceco administrative costs ballooning or the obscene executive compensation packages or their fleets of corporate jets?

Betcha he didn't.

No, it's all the fault of Joe and Jane One-Fodder-Unit and their propensity for potato chips. They need to purge, have high colonics, blood chelation and eat macrobiotic. They smoke you say? Flay, draw and quarter them. But don't mention that Phillip Morris bears no legal responsibility for its actions. They might hold some of their stock.

Trouble is, Joe and Jane can't afford to live healthy and work out at the gym. Medical and insurance bills, you see.

[Missy M]

5. They should "prioritize spending"....

is he serious. Should they decide not to pay the heating bill so they freeze to death, buy no food so they can starve, surely those two things are not considered healthy.

[Cassandra]

6. I agree; we should prioritize spending.

Let's spend on healthcare, not on insurance company executives.

[PDJane]

8. Oh, bloody hell........

One should prioritize, allright.

Join the civilized world, pay for universal health care, change the paradigm the world bank works on and put some intelligent folks in charge who will change the way they do business.

[PA Democrat]

10. CEO of UnitedHealth earned $125 million in 2005, and tried to steal more by options backdating

UnitedHealth Group Incorporated NYSE: UNH is a managed health care company. It is the parent of United Healthcare, one of the largest health insurers in the U.S.. It was created in 1977, as UnitedHealthCare Corporation (it renamed itself in 1998), but traces its origin to a firm it acquired in 1977, Charter Med Incorporated, which was founded in 1974. In 1979, it introduced the first network-based health plan for seniors. In 1984, it became a publicly traded company.

In 2005, William W. McGuire, M.D., its CEO, earned $124 million. His compensation in the five years 2001-2005 was $341 million. He was the CEO from 1989 -- when annual revenues were just over $400 million -- to 1 December 2006, when he was replaced as CEO by Stephen Hemsley due to allegations of options backdating done to favor UHC executives such as McGuire (see Options Backdating section below).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UnitedHealth_Group

[rodeodance]

7. one the priveldged I am sure who does not have to worry about $$

[havocmom]

9. Those who can't AFFORD basic exams to catch things early

end up costing more, IF they get past the bulldog inquisitor for insurance coverage just inside the ER. ER is more costly than your friendly, neighborhood G.P. Too many rely SOLELY on ER for medical care when they get to a critical stage - from financially induced neglect of health.

Some IS lifestyle choice Some is genetics. Some is just blind luck/accidents. Some is about not being able to 'manage illness' due to wages that keep them trudging to work sick (infecting others) and no 'discretionary' income to fritter away on going to a doctor.

With advances in genetics, I suppose that part of the equation will be eliminated by insurers forcing through laws governing who can breed at all in the near future.

The poverty thing eliminates a LOT of others who might have become medical care recipients.

Bean counters in charge of medical decisions will also trigger some early deaths, even in the working class that sorta keeps heads above waters. Hell, even upper middle class folks with what they THOUGHT was good insurance are finding there are so many hoops to jump through they really aren't covered like they thought they were.

Sure, some lifestyle choice come into play, but circumstances and excessive corporate greed probably kills more than cheeseburgers and cigarettes.

The corporate mantra of blame the victims just makes me wanna go berserker. I had to threaten to set up a tent/cook-stove in the lobby of an HMO then call a local reporter pal to force them to FINALLY OK a surgery I needed to keep my hand! (And by that time, the surgeon had no assurances it would save the hand)

Lifestyle choice! Ha! THEIR lifestyles over reasonable business practices and reasonable profit maybe.

:grr:

[bobbolink]

11. A Pox On His House!

:nuke:

[subterranean]

13. So which is it?

This guy says people who don't get medical care until they absolutely have to are driving up costs. Bush says the problem is people with "gold-plated" health plans who go to the doctor for every little problem. Who's right? Or are they both wrong?

[Trillo]

15. Didn't mention the elderly.

Yeah, it's "the poor" that are the problem alright.

Curious that "elderly" and "poor" are often the same group.

Our society is so very sick it's really painful to feel just how sick it is.

[Vinca]

16. If you can't afford health insurance, the priorities are

buy groceries and eat or starve and pay a money sucking insurance company for the privilege of having a minimal policy that covers little if anything. It's not like I sit around and wonder if I should buy insurance or a diamond necklace. Sheesh. This guy is more out of touch than most.

[TheWatcher]

17. Note to Insurance Exec.

One of these days perhaps the people are going to get so fed up with people like you and the parasitic system that you are a part of, that they will make it their top priority to render both you and your system extinct.

Just a thought.

Sleep well, filth.

[skygazer]

18. Prioritize spending

I'm thankful to now have at least a little bit of flexibility in my spending but I remember very well those times when I had none. And after rent, food, utilities and the basic necessities of life (I was spending $35 a week to feed a family of four - I don't know how much lower one can cut it), I still owed money every month. There was not enough coming in to cover what went out. No matter what.

I wish these assholes with their helpful pronouncements. would try living for a year on the amount of money so many people have to survive on. Might make them change their outlook.

[Atman]

19. So, it's upsetting to the multi-millionaire that 1/3 are responsible for 90%...

But it's cool for just 1-2% of THEM to have all the money in America?

Yeah, dude...you sure have YOUR priorities straight! Blame poor people's troubles on not being rich like you. Fucking asshole.

.

[rooshab]

20. Prioritize?

You mean like less money for war and more for health care?

[cyborg_jim]

22. Makes sense: dead people don't cost as much to care for.

[WinkyDink]

21. The poor aren't SUPPOSED to live long, get it?

A pox on anyone who thinks this is MY opinion.