CNN iReport

Health Care Bill Facts & Fiction.

Week 2.

In Part 2 of my weekly series on the fact or fiction of rumors surrounding the Heath Care Bill, I think it is important to note two critical things:

1.     Tuesday night’s speech by President Obama may change the dynamics of this debate, thus either killing this series or retooling it altogether.

2.     Obama seems intent on passing something, regardless of how, in order to achieve his goals. This apparently includes a practice called “Reconciliation” which allows him to float a bill through the Senate with only 51 votes instead of the usual 60.

In my opinion, number 2 above is essentially cheating to get his way, and is irresponsible, unprofessional, and un-American – particularly given the size and scope of the Health Care problem. A problem of this magnitude MUST be leveled to the entire American people. That means either a referendum or an Amendment to the Constitution. That would give it the stamp of approval from “We the People” and take out most of the political wrangling (i.e. corruption) that is going on behind the scenes.

On to the topics for research. Several people have requested specific topics be researched and I’ve only chosen three to tackle this week.

One topic, “origins of the bill” will take more research than I’m able to conduct given my available resources (time mostly). With that said, there has been significant research conducted already. The bottom line here is that other people, besides the US Congress, had a major hand in producing the bill. This video presents some answers to that question: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5iJsUXXkwo.

Like him or hate him, Glenn Beck’s research is pretty solid. He apparently has partnerships with several universities that conduct research for him, a personal research team, uses the Fox researchers, and uses his radio staff. Given the breadth of his resources, I would tend to trust his research over any conducted by other media sources. Yes it is presented with a bias toward his conservative ideology, but the facts are the facts.

OK, my three topics today are that the bill will Ration Healthcare, promotes euthanasia services, and Illegal immigrant coverage.

#1. Health Care Rationing – FALSE (technically)

Multiple websites, emails, news stories, etc, question whether HR 3200 will ration health care for anyone.

Section 122, Essential Benefits Package Defined defines the level of coverage. Paragraph (a) states that the coverage must be consistent with the standards in Section 124 and specifies that the bill (1) provides payment for the items and services (2)     limits cost-sharing …” etc.

Paragraph (b) spells out specifically which things will be covered, such as (1) Hospitalization, (2) Outpatient hospital and clinic…., (3) Professional services, etc, etc. The list is fairly inclusive, but then again, I’m not a doctor so some things may be missing.

Paragraph (c) has some interesting language on annual limits and deductibles, but generally this language seems consistent with current insurance policies.

Anyone who has dealt with insurance companies and have had converge declined might feel this is rationing. Why did the company decline the coverage? Probably money issues. Will the Gov’t have similar money issues – most definitely!!

What I found particularly interesting is a quote from Dr. Sanjay Gupta, the Chief Medical Correspondent for CNN from his July 30, 2009 web page at http://pagingdrgupta.blogs.cnn.com/2009/07/30/will-health-care-be-rationed/ :

“…it may come down to numbers and whether estimates of the cost of  health care reform are accurate. When Medicare hospital insurance was conceived in 1965, the House Ways and Means Committee projected that in 25 years it would cost 6 billion dollars. The actual cost? 67 billion, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. You can see how far off costs for Medicare were, based on initial projections –much, much higher. Now the president says they’ll add prevention programs and wellness programs, creating a healthier population and that will be a cheaper population with regard to health care costs. But who knows? You’ve got more people that you’re trying to cover; more people, more tests, more screening. How that all adds up, we’re just not sure.”

I’m going to have to say this rumor is technically FALSE, but I suspect there will have to be some rationing down the road after the cost get out of control.

#2. Bill promotes Euthanasia – FALSE

Section 1233 adds language to Section 1861 of the Social Security Act (42 USC 1395x) and directs that an extensive counseling program be developed and provided to seniors every 5 years. This program outlines the importance of various living wills, powers of attorney, designation of health care proxies and what long term care options are available.

Opponents to HR 3200 claim this section is designed to facilitate the early demise of the elderly. I did not interpret anything in this section along those lines. On the surface, the bill seem to aimed at preventing issues like the Mary Schivo thing where a person spends years on life support and the families argue over whether to pull the plug or not.

This position is supported by the following website post:

“THE TWEET: End of life claims:  The e-mail contains a group of claims related to end of life provisions in the health care bill (pages 425-430).  These claims either state explicitly or suggest that the government will require that the recipient receive these services.

FALSE

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

THE BILL: The suggestion or explicit statement that these services are mandatory is incorrect.  These provisions all deal with voluntary services – provision of information requested by the consumer.

        There may be several problematic aspects of these provisions, including having medical professionals (as opposed to lawyers) advising and counseling individuals on end of life documents such as health care proxies, living wills, etc.”

Now your head can explode because that came from Glenn Beck at http://www.glennbeck.com/content/articles/article/198/28739/

So the claim that HR 3200 promotes Euthanasia is FALSE. It does provide for “end of life” counseling which seemingly advocates life extending contingencies such as living wills, powers of attorney, etc.

#3. Bill includes coverage for illegal immigrants. - TRUE

In my reading thus far, I have not seen any language specifically including or excluding illegal immigrants. Section 152 prohibits discrimination but doesn’t spell it out. Section 242 defines affordable credit eligible individuals (this section is so vague and undefined, it is essentially useless). Section 246 specifies that “Nothing in this subtitle shall allow Federal payments for affordability credits on behalf of individuals who are not lawfully present in the United States”

Now, one would then presume that since it is illegal to be in this country and thus the immigrant is committing a crime, he/she would be excluded. HOWEVER, the historical precedent has been that illegal immigrants are treated regardless. I’ll continue my research, but I suspect that regardless of whether they are excluded from coverage in the bill, they will be treated anyway.

A more detailed analysis seems to think otherwise:

“Immigrants living illegally in the United States could be mandated to have health insurance under the proposed health care reform bill but would be ineligible to receive subsidies to afford such coverage, a report from the Congressional Research Service says.” According to an August 27, 2009 story from CNN by Mariano Castillo (http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/08/27/health.care.immigrants/ )

The story goes on to say, “The report, released Tuesday, "undermines the claims of the president and others that illegal immigrants would not be covered under the House version of the bill," Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Washington-based Center for Immigration Studies, told CNN.

This position seems to be reinforced by the Congressional Hispanic Caucus which may have used a meeting with Speaker Pelosi in July “to reiterate that illegal immigrants should be covered under health care reform legislation” according to Jennifer Bendry in an article titled “CHC Presses Pelosi to Include Illegal Immigrants in Health Bill” dated July 24, 2009 and posted on “Roll Call” (http://www.rollcall.com/news/37180-1.html)

For the time being, since there are many contradictory passages in the bill itself, I’m going to have to call this one TRUE, particularly based on historical precedent.

Next week, I’ll delve into individuals being Fined or Taxed for not having acceptable coverage (section 59B in Title VI) and anything else you might suggest.

Let me know what you want researched.

Duster