Comments on: The "Uninsurables"

CBS News Investigates The Tactics Used By Insurance Companies To Deny Health Coverage

[toldyouso21]

Posted by rsh_rsh at 10:49 AM : May 24, 2007


You don't understand--America is very, very capitalistic--to the point of it being a religion. High insurance, high pharmaceutical prices--high hospital bills all mean more money--the government could not care less about the citizens, they are owned by big business and are in it for the profit also. As long as we allow businesses to run and influence government via lobbies, special interests and donations and PACs--we will have our current system and it will get worse and worse and worse. Social systems are for countries that actually put their people not personal profits first--we are not a social minded country and most Americans have been trained to reject any idea of shared cost or taking care of anyone in addition to themselves.

[jjp735i]

The bigger suprise is that this is the same type of story that is reported almost all the time, yet because the story reads a little different each time, people think it's new news.

People have neen complaining for years about not being able to get health care. Why not really start reporting on WHY they can't get help from Congress or the Insurance Companies. That is the real story. We already know we cannot afford private insurance. We already know the Insurance Companies are *** us. We do not need to read the same story day after day just because it holds a different spin on the story line.

Do some real reporting.

[MizQue]

I have to pay my own insurance premiums of a little less than $200 a month for lousy coverage. After a few health problems this year, my premiums will most likely skyrocket to an unaffordable level next year, and I will be left without health care coverage. I have gone without the care of specialist because I am afraid I might lose what little coverage I have. I have a choice - go broke or risk dropping dead. Something is horribly wrong in this country when those are your only alternatives.

The insurance and pharmaceutical industry lobbyists have our elected representatives in their pockets. That's the main reason for this mess. No name brand drugs are covered under my policy, but I can buy name brand drugs or generic equivalents of some drugs that are not available as generics here from Canada for **half** the US price, but the government wants to outlaw this on the ridiculous grounds that imported drugs may not be safe. We are talking about Canada, not a third world country, and name brand drugs come from the same manufacturer as the drugs sold here.

[toldyouso21]

Part 2. Many people do not realize that insurance companies cut deals with hospitals and surgeons that both must agree to uphold--this often includes the minimum amounts they can be charged as well as a ceiling. Hospitals must be assured of making a certain amount of money to accept or get in bed with a certain insurance group. This means they also have to agree that for certain services they will pay NO less than a certain price. It also means they will allow certain "extra or unnecessary tests to be performed for certain conditions. People think hospitals, insurance cos and pharm are there to help humans. They are not--they are ALL businesses, whose main and overriding goal is not life --but profit. To that end, they will diagnose conditions that do not exist, prescribe tests or drugs that they know are not really needed (like the overprescribing of acid reflx meds) and Pharm and Medical device companies reward them (discount on equipment and drugs or fringes for the hospital they associate with) Insurance companies are also in the same loop.

Be an informed consumer--before you say a situation is a lie or even go against it--LEARN about it--Americans are easily manipulated because most don't learn anything--they wait to be fed--so if they are fed bs--then that is all they spout and believe. Ask yourself why Ins companies charge more for an outpatient emerg. room visit in metro areas than they do if you stay overnight.

[toldyouso21]

The real problem with the costs is not the insurance companies tho(well maybe i don't know if the pharmicutical own them to) The problem is the BIG Pharmacutical companies. They charge extremely prices. A government control over them to try to make them non-profit would be awsome. or something i dont know what would work to lower prices.
Posted by itwasntme000 at 10:25 AM : May 24, 2007

I normally do not call names but you are an ignorant person and do not have a clue of what you are talking about--the classic example of --"if it isn't happening directly to you--then it must not be true" Grow up. Of course what is said about the health insurance industry is true and it is unfair.

I happen to be in the unique position of having worked for a few insurance companies (Golden Rule, Conseco, etc) as well as worked for pharm co. The fact is, most of the high cost of drugs or equipment is NOT from the drug co but from the mark ups by the distributor and then the hospitals. A drug company may produce a drug for about 300K for a batch of 100K vials at a wholesale cost of 20.00 but by the time the customer gets it in the hospital that 20.00 batch of 20 pills (at an individual cost of 1.00 a pill will have become 6 to 20.00 PER PILL. Because everyone wants to make a profit. Insurance companies are complicit in this.

[torontorsh]

I live in Canada, and to keep it simple, I suggest that the U.S. needs to stop all this private *** and switch to a purely public owned hospital, government set doctor payments rate chart system. When I had a heart attack, a week later, after my angiogram, I had quintuple by-pass. When my son had osteogenic sarcoma, he was admitted the moment the tumor was discovered, had a biopsy in a week, had the surgery he needed after initial chemotherapy in less than a month, a year's worth of chemo, two subsequent lung resections, and survived. My cost was all lf $56! So the problem is that the American people have NOT demanded that their politicians stop supporting the AMA, the private hospitals, and the private insurance companies, and instead support the PEOPLE, and only the PEOPLE. If the 90% of Americans who are NOT part of the medical system did that, this nonsence would end!

[torontorsh]

I live in Canada, and to keep it simple, I suggest that the U.S. needs to stop all this private *** and switch to a purely public owned hospital, government set doctor payments rate chart system. When I had a heart attack, a week later, after my angiogram, I had quintuple by-pass. When my son had osteogenic sarcoma, he was admitted the moment the tumor was discovered, had a biopsy in a week, had the surgery he needed after initial chemotherapy in less than a month, a year's worth of chemo, two subsequent lung resections, and survived. My cost was all lf $56! So the problem is that the American people have NOT demanded that their politicians stop supporting the AMA, the private hospitals, and the private insurance companies, and instead support the PEOPLE, and only the PEOPLE. If the 90% of Americans who are NOT part of the medical system did that, this nonsence would end!

[arrowcatcher]

I'm self-employed but with the help of my creative insurance agent, I joined a union. I pay the dues and get a great Pacificare plan for just $721/month. Such a deal. It doubled in the last 4 years. Basically same situation as Mr. Svonkin. Just under $9K/year after taxes. Glad I can afford it. With a family, it would be $15K/year.

There's more than "cherry picking". I've gotten annual physicals - a mistake! - and any trivial finding the doctor notes has become a major illness on my record. One example of several is a 1995 creatnine test that went wrong at the lab and became "acute renal disease" forever. He redid the test, and it came back in the normal range as it always was and is, but that doesn't matter. My doctor is outraged and says he'll write letters, but we never bothered. There's clearly both cherry picking and gross exagerration going on in the qualification process.

[jlwesley]

Where do you buy state sponsored for 528, I had to cancel my state high risk when it went to 1138.

[itwasntme000]

I don't consider this the problem. Health insurance really dosen't cost as much as you people make it seem. Plus you know damm well right that most of the people uninsured say they cant afford it yet they blow tons of money in bars drinking, in casinos giving it to the indians, or how about on buying and smoking one pack of cigarettes a day if not more??? How many alacholoics and smokers do we have in this country(or both at the same time)??? yet you feel pity for them because they didn't get their priorities straight??? Or if we were in a universal health care system would it not bother you that the idiots that don't care about their bodies are draining the system??

The real problem with the costs is not the insurance companies tho(well maybe i don't know if the pharmicutical own them to) The problem is the BIG Pharmacutical companies. They charge extremely prices. A government control over them to try to make them non-profit would be awsome. or something i dont know what would work to lower prices.