Medicare Cuts: Health Care Saga Continues (Pgs. 141-160)

With this proposed US Senate health care bill being debated, many wonder how this new bill will allow 50 million new people to have healthcare without raising taxes. The answer is found in the next twenty pages; cuts will be made in Medicare that will affect the elderly, hospitals, home health care providers, and hospice care providers. Basically, all phases of health care will be taking a major hit if this bill passes. If you have stock in a health care insurance provider, then sell on the day this bill passes.

Let us begin. The first cut is on page 141. Beneficiaries in special needs programs would have to be switched over to Medicare Advantage, Medicare, or State Medicaid plans by 1/1/2013. The federal government will no longer fund the health expenses for the disabled, which is a direct violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Passing the buck to the state governments is fiscally irresponsible. On page 142, reasonable cost plans will be phased out by 1/1/2013 as well, which means that everyone's health care premiums, copays, and deductibles will go up. Page 143 will more than likely put some local healthcare providers out of business. Private fee for service plans must be placed within an established network of providers. Starting in 2011, plans available only for retirement community residents must be opened up to everyone. Local insurance companies that give retirement communities special perks that national providers cannot give will have that advantage taken away from them. Since there will be nationalized healthcare, there will also be universal health insurance coverage across the board as well. The elderly who are in these private plans will have to pay more by being placed into public health insurance Medicare plans. To ensure that all of these new elderly people could be placed under Medicare, on page 144, Medicare will be creating four different plans. Medicare plans M and N will go into effect on 1/1/2010. Plans C and F are to be established in 2015. These four new plans will spike the prices of the elderly's premiums to a new high.

Remember when the rest of the country was laughing over the whole tax evasion scandal of former Sen. Tom DaschleSen. Tom Daschle when he was going through his attempt to be confirmed as Secretary for Health and Human Services? Even though he was an expert on health care reform, the media ran him out of town. Pages 145-148 may be the reason why we as a nation will regret that he is not the Sec. of HHS. The Sec. of HHS will now have the authority to change the values of payments given to Home Health Care agencies and Hospice Care providers. The less amount paid to these agencies and providers, the more the elderly and the disabled have to pay out of their pockets. Taking advantage of the elderly and the disabled is despicable. Since current Sec. of HHS Kathleen SebeliusKathleen Sebelius is a proponent for abortion, she will have no moral qualms of raising costs upon the elderly and the disabled. Once the costs are raised, some of them will not be able to afford the home healthcare, which more than likely will result in more deaths of the elderly within their own home because nobody will be there with them on a consistent basis to protect and to help them. On page 149, funding given to hospitals will be decreased by 75% by the Sec. of HHS in 2015. This funding would force hospitals across the nation to take care of less low-income patients. The poor better start exercising properly because after 2015, they will not be receiving the extra care needed due to their economic situation. On page 150, reform is being brought to the Medicare wage index which means that Medicare patients will have to pay more for their insurance starting on 12/31/2011. The extra funds taken away from hospitals, health care providers, the elderly, and from the impoverished will be used to fund having more advanced imaging equipment placed in hospitals on page 151. More funds will be taken away on page 152 from medical suppliers in 2014, who need that extra money to keep the costs of supplies that they sell to the elderly down. That means that the elderly will be paying from both ends. But wait, it gets worse on page 153. Beginning on 1/1/2010, the federal government will only give out lump-sum payments for complex, rehabilitative power wheelchairs. The rehabilitative wheelchairs are the ones that tilt up so that the person could then walk. However, most of the elderly that use power wheelchairs cannot get up to get around and walk. That is the whole purpose of a wheelchair: for those who can't walk. The elderly that can walk do not need wheelchairs. That means that the government will not pay the elderly a lump-sum payment if they need a permanent wheelchair; they have to get it on their own. Is that one of the main reasons why the government wants this bill passed before the start of 2010; to stop paying elderly for wheelchairs. The lack of common sense in this bill is why this bill is one of the worst bills ever created. On pages 154-156, the US government will cut how much money they pay out to health care providers. The cuts would be a gradual percentage every year beginning from 2010 to 2019. That means that the providers will charge the consumers to make up for those cuts. On pages 157-158, a Medicare Commission would be created to "develop and submit proposals to Congress aimed at extending the solvency of Medicare, slowing Medicare cost-growth, and improving the quality of care delivered to Medicare beneficiaries." The Commission's goal would be to make Medicare as cheap as possible so that everyone would have to switch over from their private plans. This is the reason why healthcare providers are shaking in their boots because the federal plans and the state exchange plans will be so cheap. The private health care providers will not be able to compete with the universal plan and go out of business. Page 159-160 would create a Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute. The Institute would do research that would focus on how "health conditions can effectively and appropriately be prevented..." The focus will no longer be placed upon finding cures for disease, but instead upon preventing disease. That is the worst cut of all. In closing, these Medicare cuts will endanger the lives of the elderly if this bill is passed.