Doctors on strike ... another sign that our health system is under serious stress. http://www.cnn.com/2003/HEALTH/01/03/doctor.strike/index.html
As a West Virginian without any health insurance, I say to my neighbor, now you feel my pain! Anyway, things are really bad. Considering the price of malpractice insurance in the state the only doctors left are the ones who really, really, really don't want to leave. The damage has already been done by the juries who hand out settlements which aren't consistent with the rest of the country as many doctors have already left.
Maybe this will finally force somebody to make a change in the insurance racket. Premiums for all kinds of insurance just keep going higher and higher (the last 5 years, I've paid MORE for health insurance than I got in doctor bills, and with my knee and other problems, I haven't had a banner half decade). People thing getting insurance to poor folks is the answer, but getting insurance rates to drop to a realistic level, might actually make it insurance rather than what it's become- highway robbery.
Well, if you freeze insurance rates, then the insurance companies will start going south too. The root problem is the tort system. Runaway juries need to be controlled. The size of the awards are starting to seriously impact the economy.
The tort system wouldn't be such a problem if insurance companies weren't so damn crooked. At too many insurance companies, Blue Cross/Blue Shields of North Carolina to name one, the policy is to deny coverage whenever possible, since they figure it's cheaper to fight lawsuits rather than actually provide service for the insured.
Nail hit squarely on the head. There was a case at work in which someone driving a car insured by the company, but who was not himself directly insured, hit someone and caused the victim to become a parapalegic. The company could've paid out $10k for medical bills, and that would've been the end of it. The claims adjuster decided NOT to pay since the driver was not insured, just the car. The case went to court, and the jury awarded $17 million to the victim of the accident. The company gambled, and LOST big time. I hate it when I hear terms like "tort reform." It means the legislative branch will take some power away from the judicial branch. I don't like to see the Constitution weakened like that.
People have a right to sue, and need that right, companies have proven over and over again that they are crooked. They are causing the problems in health care, as the last post shows. Why limit what lawsuits can be made and try limiting the influence companies have over legistlatures and lawyers... I want to right to sue and punish my provider, if i ever work for company that provides health insurace, most do not want to anymore.... on a side but related note. Congress furthered this debate, by giving pharmautical companies a cap on what families will be able to get out of them from future lawsuits from their drugs causes autism in kids. I find this amusine becuase the companies have yet to ever admit their drugs have caused autism however, they want to be protected. And of course congress gave it to them, and even wanted to included it as a rider in the homeland security bill, beccuase really that bill was all about protecting us from terrorism and there is no greater terrorism then american protecting their kids from bad drugs given out by companies.
Just to add to my previous post, i now have even less sympathy for insurance companies than I did before. One of my friends was diagnosed with a brain tumor a couple of months ago and her insurance company denied coverage, at first cancelling the policy giving no reason, and then later citing a technicality regarding her status at her workplace. Fortunately, her family is paying for the medical costs out of their pocket, but with the surgery, radiation and chemo etc, it's not cheap. Her family is currently preparing to sue right now and if it goes to trial, I don't see the jury being too kind to the defendants.
Someone has to explain why insurance claims have remained steady for the past 3-4 years but insurance premiums have skyrocketed. Some companies lose some money on their investments and looking to recoup through unwritten collusion, perhaps? Meanwhile, the problem with loser-pays tort reform is that companies will send out the biggest guns they have to get a few lawsuits dismissed and countersue for damages, thus discouraging people who have legit claims from doing anything out of fear that they'll lose and get stuck with hundreds of thousands of dollars of corporate lawyer fees. If you solve that problem, I'm all for sticking people who file clearly frivolous lawsuits.
well pharmaticual companies, especially, but really all companies have the bush adminstration pretty much at the beak and call, so pretty soon most of us can expect no coverage from health care and insurance, I am sure they will blame bin laden somehow...
The problem with the insurance industry is that it's the biggest corporate boondoggle in history. Everybody knows it, but they're afraid to do what's necessary. "We can't have another payroll tax!" Well, guess what? We already do have a payroll tax--it's paid to the insurers instead of the government, that's all. "Competition is the answer to everything!" There's no competition in a deliberately collusive industry. The answer is really quite simple. We have to go to a single-payer system. I'd also like to to round up every single board member, shareholder and employee of every insurance company, line them up against a wall and mow them down like the cockroaches they are, but you can't always get what you want. Of course this doesn't even begin to address the deep and endemic problems in the medical industry. Malpractice is malpractice, even if it's institutionalized. Human beings cannot sleep through classes, cheat on exams and then provide quality care at the end of a 72-hour shift. It's simply not possible. And yet that's routine practice. The only people in this mess who get my sympathy are the ones paying for it all--the citizens.
I think that we'll see single payer in the next decade, but only after a pretty near total collapse of the current insurance system.
My brother-in-law is a general surgeon in Bradenton, FL. He and my sister are considering selling their house and moving out of the state because he has to pay over $200k in malpractice insurance, and that rate is probalby going to go up soon. They (and other doctors who are getting screwed) have my sympathy.