The Lack of Affordable Healthcare in the US

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Now they have gone ahead and voted it onto the floor...way to completely ignore the will of the people you serve.
And once again, VP Pence has to be the tie breaker...what BS!
Not how it was supposed to work assclowns.

And now we are once again trying to push repeal without a replacement ready to go.
Leaving millions in medical limbo....destabilizing the market.
Destabilizing the market means more uncertainty...more uncertainty means prices go up to cover theoretical possibilities and speculations.
Congress ignores and tries to discredit their own Republican chosen and run CBO.
Fucking John McCain comes back like a fucking hero, gives a speech about being bipartisan and working together, then casts his vote to destroy access to the same type of healthcare he is receiving on the dime of the American people who’s feet he is about to yank the rug out from under.
Eat a d!<k John McCain.

Once again...this is not a medical bill.
This is a tax bill.
And that is why it doesn’t take 60 votes to pass.
It is a repeal of taxes on the rich, while raising prices (essentially taxing people) on premiums and deductibles to the point it is no longer affordable to have.
Make no mistake...this bill will kill people...the elderly, the disabled, the sick and ill, including children...about 8 million of them alone.
There are estimates that prices for some will jump by 100%....100%...that’s just inhuman.
But Trump thinks people pay $12 a year for their insurance now....so how anyone can have any trust in anything he says is beyond me.
Where is his promise of cheaper, better coverage for all including pre-existing conditions, no cuts to Medicaid or Medicare, everyone will have healthcare, and it will be paid via the govt. and taxes or closed tax loopholes (as Bernie proposed).
He lied.
He continues to lie about this deadly bill...this will NOT help the common person...this will be a huge jump in prices.
Employers will drop providing insurance since that provision is torpedoed as well.
So that great insurance your employer pays the majority of is not safe...the price will be passed onto the employee.
Or, they will just flat out tell them “Sorry, buy your own.”.

Trump tweets this morning about banning Trans people from serving in our Armed Forces...after all the BS rhetoric about how he is the best pal of women and LGBQT people.
More lies.

Daily lies.
Open your eyes.

Fight for your healthcare or watch it be destroyed.
 

I DON'T THINK PISSED REALLY COVERS IT ! ! !
Alan Simpson, the Senator from Wyoming calls senior citizens the
Greediest Generation as he compared "Social Security " to a Milk Cow with 310 million teats.

Here's a response in a letter from PATTY MYERS in Montana ...
I think she is a little ticked off!
She also tells it like it is!​



"Hey Alan, let's get a few things straight!!!
1. As a career politician, you have been on the public dole (tit) for FIFTY YEARS.

2. I have been paying Social Security taxes for 48 YEARS (since I was 15 years old. I am now 63).

3. My Social Security payments, and those of millions of other Americans, were safely tucked away in an interest bearing account for decades until you political pukes decided to raid the account and give OUR money to a bunch of zero losers in return for votes, thus bankrupting the system and turning Social Security into a Ponzi scheme that would make Bernie Madoff proud.

4. Recently, just like Lucy & Charlie Brown, you and "your ilk" pulled the proverbial football away from millions of American seniors nearing retirement and moved the goalposts for full retirement from age 65 to age, 67.

NOW, you and your "shill commission" are proposing to move the goalposts YET AGAIN.

5. I, and millions of other Americans, have been paying into Medicare from Day One, and now "you morons" propose to change the rules of the game. Why?

Because "you idiots" mismanaged other parts of the economy to such an extent that you need to steal our money from Medicare to pay the bills.

6. I, and millions of other Americans, have been paying income taxes our entire lives, and now you propose to increase our taxes yet again.
Why?

Because you "incompetent bastards" spent our money so profligately that you just kept on spending even after you ran out of money.
Now, you come to the American taxpayers and say you need more to pay off YOUR debt.

To add insult to injury, you label us "greedy" for calling "bullshit" to your incompetence.

Well, Captain Bullshit, I have a few questions for YOU:

1. How much money have you earned from the American taxpayers during your pathetic 50-year political career?

2. At what age did you retire from your pathetic political career, and how much are you receiving in annual retirement benefits from the American taxpayers?

3. How much do you pay for YOUR government provided health insurance?

4. What cuts in YOUR retirement and healthcare benefits are you proposing in your disgusting deficit reduction proposal, or as usual, have you exempted yourself and your political cronies?

It is you, Captain Bullshit, and your political co-conspirators called Congress who are the "greedy" ones.
It is you and your fellow nutcase thieves who have bankrupted America and stolen the American dream from millions of loyal, patriotic taxpayers.

And for what?
Votes and your job and retirement security at our expense, you lunk-headed, leech.

That's right, sir.
You and yours have bankrupted America for the sole purpose of advancing your pathetic, political careers.
You know it, we know it, and you know that we know it.

And you can take that to the bank, you miserable son of a bitch.

P.S. And stop calling Social Security benefits "entitlements”.
WHAT AN INSULT!!!!

I have been paying in to the SS system for 45 years, “It's my money”- give it back to me the way the system was designed and stop patting yourself on the back like you are being generous by doling out these monthly checks of my own earned money.
 
So the GOP is has once again tried to pass a pile of shit...one that would block grant Medicaid (aka destroying it) to the states.
There are 3 confirmed holdouts...Rand Paul, John McCain, and Susan Collins.
The Graham-Cassidy bill would have again, left millions without healthcare.
Would not address the issues of cost.
In fact would make it more expensive for everyone.
Lindsey Graham liked to flap the bill in the air for the press saying “This is Bernie Sander’s worst nightmare!”
Hahahaha
The elderly, children, disabled, and the poor are losing their healthcare...fucking hilarious!
Yep, really funny, just like the people in wheelchairs being physically carried out of hearings for protesting this nasty piece of legislation that would be a death sentence for certain folks.
The thing is...this bill may not be totally dead.
Rand Paul said he was against it last time too, but then ended up voting in favor of it.
You think you are paying a lot right now, if this thing passes somehow, we would ALL be paying a whole lot more, without the patient protections (including pre-existing conditions - which EVERYONE has!!)...the partial CBO score has not gotten any better than the last pile of crap they tried to push through...again, before the CBO even scored it.
What happened to the promises of Trump?
Better healthcare.
Cheaper.
Everyone will have it.
This bill does none of that....it is anti all those promises.
But they need to cram it through before the end of the month, because right now they only need 51 votes...after the 30th, they will need 60 - which means they would have to work in a bipartisan manner with the Democrats.
The public in favor of this bill is right around 17%.
Sad.

Call your Representatives or email them!
It’s super easy!


Jimmy Kimmel Fights Back Against Bill Cassidy, Lindsey Graham & Chris Christie


 
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What’s a few children without health insurance?
Just a few...9 million or so...
This is just part of the Republican waaaay better health insurance plan.
Come on everyone....email your Representatives and let them know they need to start representing their voting constituents instead of their big money donors' interests.
How sad...and children pay the price.
Disgusting.



House Passes Children’s Health Insurance Bill,
But Kids Are No Closer To Health Insurance
The Senate doesn’t seem interested in passing this particular CHIP reauthorization.

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(a couple of smug douche-bags talk about circle jerks)​

WASHINGTON ―
The House passed a bill Friday reauthorizing the lapsed Children’s Health Insurance Program.
But instead of a bipartisan affair that Democrats and Republicans could pat themselves on the back for, the bill became a partisan fight over offsets that ultimately moves Congress further away from renewing CHIP.

The bill that passed Friday 242-174 ― with 227 Republicans and 15 Democrats voting yes, and 171 Democrats and 3 Republicans voting no ― almost certainly won’t become law.

Instead, Congress will likely wait for an end-of-the-year spending bill to reauthorize the program, which covers roughly 9 million low-income children and pregnant women.

According to Democrats, the problem with the bill, which would extend CHIP for five years and reauthorize community health centers and other public health programs for two years, is that it would pay for children’s health insurance by taking money from a preventive care fund.

The GOP bill would also use new Medicare means-testing to partially pay for CHIP.
As Republicans repeatedly pointed out on the House floor Friday, Democrats were voting to protect seniors making $40,000 a month from paying about $135 more.

Debate on the floor was testy, with Democrats and Republicans going back and forth over who was to blame for letting CHIP lapse.
Energy and Commerce Chairman Greg Walden (R-Ore.) blamed Democrats for their unwillingness to negotiate on offsets.

The ranking Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee, Frank Pallone of New Jersey, blamed Republicans for spending nine months trying to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

“Now House Republicans are using the reauthorization of CHIP and community health centers as a way to once again sabotage the ACA,” Pallone said.

He said that by taking this route, House Republicans were guaranteeing CHIP wouldn’t be reauthorized until the end of the year, because Senate Democrats wouldn’t go along with this bill.

And Pallone criticized Republicans for trying to undermine the ACA Prevention Fund, which helps pay for immunizations and research into preventing diseases like diabetes and Alzheimer’s.

Most states have had enough money left over to carry CHIP until the end of the year, some even well into next year, but children from some states face the possibility of losing their health insurance soon if Congress doesn’t act.
While Democrats and Republicans couldn’t agree on the offsets for the bill, Republicans also very nearly couldn’t agree among themselves.

Earlier in the week, GOP leadership tried to switch out the Medicare means-testing by just taking more from the Prevention Fund.
That wasn’t the bill that Republicans reported out of committee, or the one GOP leaders agreed on, but Ways and Means Chairman Kevin Brady (R-Texas) apparently wanted to preserve the Medicare offset for tax reform or other legislation.

GOP leadership decided they would change the legislation in the Rules Committee, and jam through the new bill on the House floor by modifying the bill’s language via an amendment in the nature of a substitute.

But when word got out to conservatives that leadership was going to alter the legislation in a rule, Freedom Caucus leaders objected.
HFC Chairman Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) had a heated argument Tuesday night on the House floor over the switch, according to lawmakers who witnessed the exchange.

The usually talkative Meadows refused to say anything about the tiff ― “I really don’t want to talk about it” ― but members familiar with the disagreement said the moderate Tuesday Group, the conservative Republican Study Committee, and the ultra-conservative House Freedom Caucus had all agreed on an offset that took some money from the Prevention Fund and raised some money from Medicare means-testing.

“It was viewed when that changed at the last minute that ... we were taking a step backwards,” one Freedom Caucus member said of the group’s process concerns.

The Freedom Caucus met Tuesday night and quietly agreed they would take down the rule if leaders proceeded with their plan, citing their objections to Republicans “legislating on the rule.” (The rule is typically used to lay out guidelines for debate, though leaders do occasionally make legislative changes in the rule.)

By Wednesday afternoon, GOP leaders had caught wind of the plan and decided they would go back to the original offset deal, thus setting up the bill for its easy passage on Friday.

While the typical process for legislation is for it to pass one chamber and then go to the next, the Senate seems to have no interest in passing this CHIP reauthorization.

As Democrats repeatedly said Friday, this issue will probably get vacuumed up at the end of the year in an omnibus spending deal.

In the meantime, Republicans will probably use the bill to ding Democrats for voting against a popular children’s health insurance program, Democrats will criticize Republicans for playing politics, and low-income children will be no closer to a guarantee of health insurance.

 
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Still trying to take away our healthcare!

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How is this better healthcare Mr. Trump and Republicans?
Kicking 9 million children off healthcare to help pay for your terrible tax cuts for the ultra wealthy.
Simply amazing the lack of human feeling and empathy on capitol hill.
Please everyone call your Representatives and tell them to fund CHIP and stop with this crazy tax giveaway to the rich!
Inhuman.
Sad.
Children will literally die from preventable illnesses and a lack of healthcare, but Congress is too greedy for their Tax giveaway...what’s a few extra dead children right?
(Making America Great!!)

States prepare to shut down children’s health programs if Congress doesn’t act
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation,
Colorado will run out of federal CHIP funds within the first three months of 2018.

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Officials in nearly a dozen states are preparing to notify families that a crucial health insurance program for low-income children is running out of money for the first time since its creation two decades ago, putting coverage for many at risk by the end of the year.

Congress missed a Sept. 30 deadline to extend funding for CHIP, as the Children’s Health Insurance Program is known.
Nearly 9 million youngsters and 370,000 pregnant women nationwide receive care because of it.

Many states have enough money to keep their individual programs afloat for at least a few months, but five could run out in late December if lawmakers do not act.

Others will start to exhaust resources the following month.
The looming crunch, which comes despite CHIP’s enduring popularity and bipartisan support on Capitol Hill, has dismayed children’s health advocates.

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“We are very concerned, and the reason is that Congress hasn’t shown a strong ability to get stuff done,” said Bruce Lesley, president of Washington, D.C.-based First Focus, a child and family advocacy organization.

“And the administration is completely out, has not even uttered a syllable on the issue. How this gets resolved is really unclear, and states are beginning to hit deadlines.”

Others paying close attention to the issue remain hopeful that Congress will extend funding before January, but states say they cannot rest on hope.

“Everybody is still waiting and thinking Congress is going to act, and they probably will, but you can’t run a health-care program that way,” said Linda Nablo, chief deputy director at Virginia’s Department of Medical Assistance Services. “You can’t say ‘probably’ everything is going to be all right.”

Most CHIP families, who earn too much for Medicaid but too little to afford private insurance, are not aware lawmakers’ inaction is endangering coverage. They’re about to find out, though.

Virginia and several other states are preparing letters to go out as early as Monday warning families their children’s insurance may be taken away.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), which administers the program at the federal level, issued a notice to state health officials on Nov. 9 detailing their options if CHIP funding does run dry. States forced to end the program will need to determine whether enrolled children are eligible for Medicaid or whether their family will need to seek insurance through an Affordable Care Act marketplace, the guidance said.

Longtime physician William Rees remembers the years before CHIP’s safety net, when families without coverage would put off bringing a sick child to the doctor until symptoms were so severe they would end up in a hospital emergency room.

“Pediatrics is mostly preventive medicine, it’s so important what we do,” said Rees, who has practiced in Northern Virginia since 1975.
“It’s about trying to keep up with routine visits. If (children) don’t have insurance, that often doesn’t happen, so CHIP keeps them in the system and they get their vaccines when they’re due.”

The program, which is credited with helping to bring the rate of uninsured children to a record low of 4.5 percent, has been reauthorized several times over the years.

And under the ACA, the federal government sharply boosted its match rate.
It now provides 88 percent or more of every state’s CHIP costs.

Congress has been unable to agree on how to pay for the $15 billion program moving forward, however.
President Donald Trump’s 2018 budget proposed to cut billions from CHIP over two years and limit eligibility for federal matching funds.

The uncertainty has states scrambling.
Arizona, California, Minnesota, Ohio, Oregon and the District of Columbia will run out of CHIP money by Dec. 31, according to Georgetown University’s Center on Children and Families.

At least six more plan to take some sort of action to address the potential funding loss, including notifying parents their children are at risk of losing coverage.

Some states operate CHIP as an independent program and would have to shut theirs down if federal dollars dry up.
In Virginia, resources are expected to be exhausted by late January.

Nablo said she has no choice but to send notices Dec. 1 to the families of the 66,000 children and 1,100 pregnant women in the state who are covered.

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Ana Elsy Ramirez Diaz holds her son, Milan Rojas Ramirez, as he is seen by physician Margaret-Anne Fernandez at the Inova Cares Clinic for Children in Falls Church, Virginia. A portion of the clinic’s patients are insured through the Children’s Health Insurance Program.​

“We don’t want to act too fast if Congress is going to restore this, but we also want to give families enough time,” she said. “We have kids in the middle of cancer treatment, pregnant women in the middle of prenatal care.”

Texas plans to notify families in January that the program could end.
Funding problems there were exacerbated by Hurricane Harvey because the state asked the federal government that it be allowed to waive co-pays and enrollment fees for CHIP children in counties declared disaster areas.

With less money coming in, funds could be exhausted even sooner than the state first projected, according to Christine Mann, spokeswoman for the Texas Health and Human Services Commission.

In West Virginia, where CHIP funds are expected to run out in March, officials overseeing the program voted this month to shut it down Feb. 28 if Congress hasn’t acted.

Other states, including Maryland, developed their CHIP program as an extension of Medicaid and so are required by law to find a way to keep it going. The same applies to the District, which will need to come up with as much as $12.5 million in local funds to cover the approximately 14,000 children enrolled, the D.C. Department of Health Care Finance said.

The agency will begin looking next month at where money can be diverted.

“It’s pretty chaotic out there,” said Joan Alker, executive director at the Georgetown center. “What really troubles me about it is (CHIP) is successful. Everyone should feel good about it. There’s no reason for this to be lagging on like this. This should be an easy win for Congress.”

CHIP has become a political issue in the gubernatorial race in Maryland, where funding would run out in March. Gov. Larry Hogan, R, has pressed for Congress to pass a reauthorization.

A potential Democratic opponent, Ben Jealous, has criticized him for not having a backup plan to protect the 140,000 children who would be left uninsured.

In Washington, lawmakers in both parties agree on the program’s merits but are at an impasse over how to pay for it.
The House passed a bill this month along largely party lines to extend CHIP funding for five years in part by cutting an ACA prevention fund and raising Medicare rates for wealthier seniors.

That measure unlikely to be taken up by the other chamber. S
enators, led by Finance Committee Chairman Orrin G. Hatch, R-Utah, are working to find a bipartisan solution.

Hatch was one of the authors of the original CHIP legislation in 1997.
The other was Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., who died in 2009.

“I am working with my colleagues to advance this bill in a fiscally responsible manner so we can ensure coverage is maintained,” Hatch said in a recent statement.

Yet during a heated exchange last week in a committee meeting on the GOP tax overhaul, he voiced little urgency.

Back up your concern for the poor by starting with an extension for CHIP, Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, told Hatch.

Hatch responded angrily, “I’m not starting with CHIP.”

Andy Slavitt, who was acting CMS administrator under President Barack Obama, can’t believe there is anything to debate.
That Congress would hold up popular legislation that has never before been subject to politics speaks to the “very fragmented culture of lawmaking,” he said.

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Marbell Castillo, who often takes her granddaughter Maia to her doctor appointments, worries about future health coverage for the little girl if CHIP is not funded.​

“It’s a core program that many low-income families rely on. It’s widely acclaimed to be a success,” he said. “We’re operating in a mode that we don’t do anything until it’s an absolute crisis, and we’re creating more crises that don’t need to happen.”

When Congress failed to extend funding in late September, CMS was able to provide several states and U.S. territories with emergency money to keep their programs going a bit longer.

The agency has used about $542 million in leftover funds from previous years, but it has limited resources to assist much longer.

As families hear that their children could lose health insurance, they’re shaken.
Marbell Castillo learned about the possibility during a recent checkup with her granddaughter Maia Powell at Burke Pediatrics in Fairfax County, Virginia.

The appointment, in an exam room decorated with “Toy Story” and “Finding Nemo” decals, covered the gamut.
A nurse practitioner asked about what the 16-month-old was eating and when she slept.

Maia got her height, weight and temperature taken.
She also got her chubby thighs stuck once, twice, three times with vaccinations for diphtheria and other illnesses.

Castillo walked out with Maia balanced on one hip and worries on her mind.
She often takes the little girl to appointments so her 23-year-old daughter, who works two jobs, doesn’t have to take off.

Without CHIP, Castillo wondered, what would they do for affordable health insurance for Maia?
 
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Hypocrite liar


​
 
Ep. 22: THIS WON'T HURT A BIT!
Mary Harron


Why is healthcare so expensive?
"This Won't Hurt a Bit" is a short film that tells the all too familiar tale of American healthcare.
A patient enters a hospital with a migraine headache, unaware of the costs his visit will incur on the path to a diagnosis.
He learns much more than he bargained for in this comedy on unaffordable care.​
 
The real reason American health care is so expensive

​
 
It will turn into a healthcare atmosphere where the government makes all the rules, and it is going to get worse.
 
just me said:
It will turn into a healthcare atmosphere where the government makes all the rules, and it is going to get worse.
Click to expand...
And having people like the insurance companies and drug companies set the rules is working?
Give me a break.
 
THE ONLY THING WRONG WITH THE
GOVERNMENT'S CALCULATION OF AVAILABLE SOCIAL SECURITY IS THEY FORGOT TO FIGURE IN THE PEOPLE WHO DIED BEFORE THEY EVER COLLECTED A SOCIAL SECURITY CHECK!!!

WHERE DID THAT MONEY GO?

Remember, not only did you and I contribute to Social Security but your employer did, too. It totaled 15% of your income before taxes.

If you averaged only $30K over your working life, that's close to$220,500.
Read that again.

Did you see where the Government paid in one single penny?

We are talking about the money you and your employer put in a Government bank to ensure you and me that we would have a retirement check from the money we put in, not the Government.

Now they are calling the money we put in an entitlement when we reach the age to take it back.

If you calculate the future invested value of $4,500 per year (yours & your employer's contribution) at a simple 5% interest (less than what the Government pays on the money that it borrows).

After 49 years of working you'd have$892,919.98.

If you took out only 3% per year, you'd receive $26,787.60 per year and it would last better than 30 years (until you're 95 if you retire at age 65) and that's with no interest paid on that final amount on deposit!

If you bought an annuity and it paid 4% per year, you'd have a lifetime income of $2,976.40 per month.

THE FOLKS IN WASHINGTON HAVE PULLED OFF A BIGGER PONZI SCHEME THAN BERNIE MADOFF EVER DID.

Entitlement my foot; I paid cash for my social security insurance!

Just because they borrowed the money for another government spending, doesn't make my benefits some kind of charity or handout!!

Remember the benefits for members of Congress?

+ free healthcare,
+ outrageous retirement packages,
+ 67 paid holidays,
+ three weeks paid vacation,
+ unlimited paid sick days.

Now that's welfare, and they have the nerve to call my social security retirement payments entitlements?

They call Social Security and Medicare an entitlement even though most of us have been paying for it all our working lives, and now, when it's time for us to collect, the government is running out of money.

Why did the government borrow from it in the first place? It was supposed to be in a locked box, not part of the general fund.

Sad isn't it?
 
just me said:
It will turn into a healthcare atmosphere where the government makes all the rules, and it is going to get worse.
Click to expand...
This is patently untrue.
We pay the highest cost in the world but are certainly not ranked number 1. (try 37th-ish)
We have infant mortality rates that do rival third world countries.
Our for-profit system is not set up to help those who need help...it is set up to make sure the profits keep flowing and the prices keep rising.
The number one reason for personal bankruptcy in the US is medical debt.
The supposed “free market” is clearly price gouging and no one is stopping them.
 
Skarekrow said:
This is patently untrue.
We pay the highest cost in the world but are certainly not ranked number 1. (try 37th-ish)
We have infant mortality rates that do rival third world countries.
Our for-profit system is not set up to help those who need help...it is set up to make sure the profits keep flowing and the prices keep rising.
The number one reason for personal bankruptcy in the US is medical debt.
The supposed “free market” is clearly price gouging and no one is stopping them.
Click to expand...
It's not bad enough. If it were, we'd get our change immediately.

More of us have to suffer.
 
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