3 posts tagged “health care”

On December 15, 2008 the New York Post ran an article about Dr. John Muney, a doctor who is providing affordable health care for his patients.

An enterprising New York physician sick of dealing with tedious and time-consuming health-insurance practices is cutting out the middleman and offering unlimited office care directly to patients for $79 a month. 
Dr. John Muney, a surgeon with clinics in all five boroughs, has started offering everything from yearly mammograms to mole removal for less than $1,000 a year.

As I said that was on December 15th 2008.  On March 4, 2009 there was another article in the New York Post about the good Doctor:  STATE SLAPS DR. DO-GOOD.  It took the state just over 2 months to start trying to shut Dr, John Muney down.  Why?  What did he doing wrong?  According to the state his offense is providing affordable health care.

The state is trying to shut down a New York City doctor's ambitious plan to treat uninsured patients for around $1,000 a year.
Dr. John Muney offers his patients everything from mammograms to mole removal at his AMG Medical Group clinics, which operate in all five boroughs.
"I'm trying to help uninsured people here," he said.
His patients agree to pay $79 a month for a year in return for unlimited office visits with a $10 co-pay.
But his plan landed him in the crosshairs of the state Insurance Department, which ordered him to drop his fixed-rate plan - which it claims is equivalent to an insurance policy.

Dr. Muney (and his patients) disagree with the state.

"I'm not doing an insurance business," he said. "I'm just providing my services at my place during certain hours."

He says he can afford to charge such a small amount because he doesn't have to process mountains of paperwork and spend hours on billing.

"If they leave me alone, I can serve thousands of patients," he said.

The State disagrees.

The state believes his plan runs afoul of the law because it promises to cover unplanned procedures - like treating a sudden ear infection - under a fixed rate. That's something only a licensed insurance company can do.

[emphasis added]

Big Government steps in and screws things up again.  Thanks to the stupid laws enacted by the state medical doctors are not allowed to sell their service how they want.

A possible solution that Muney's lawyer crafted would force patients to pay more than $10 for unplanned procedures.
They are waiting to see if the state will accept the compromise. Still, Muney is unhappy because, he said, "I really don't want to charge more. They're forcing me."
One of his patients, Matthew Robinson, 52, was furious to learn the state was interfering with the plan.
"The whole point is, he [Muney] found a way of paying his rent, paying his workers, and getting to see patients for the price," said Robinson.
"How can the state dictate you've got to charge more?"

Just another example of Government bureaucrats driving up the cost of affordable health care.  The truth be told there are a lot of lessons here.  First look how much cheaper health care is when you cut out the insurance companies.  Second, look how when the Government gets involved it screws up a good thing and hurts the people that it is supposed to help.  Lastly what right does the state have to dictate to any private enterprise what they can can charge for their goods and services?  

Now just wait for B.O. and the Democrats to get a hold of our health care system on a federal level.  I guess if B.O. does take over health care he will solve the Social Security crises, because most of us will not be living long enough to draw any funds...

God help us.
 

Arrrgh!  I like to wake up and relax on Saturday morning, check my email, have a cup of coffee, read the news and just relax before I start the weekend.  My wife Tivos Oprah every day (as well as Dr. Phil) and usually watches them at some point.  So the other day the liar Micheal Moore was on Oprah and my wife decided that she would save it for me to watch.  Why?  not sure other than she like to see me get frustrated.

So she tells me that she wants me to watch this interview about his new propaganda film "Sicko".  I told her that I did not want to see that fat lying pig because it would just irritate me (it actually already had as you may have noticed).  Well she turned it on and I tried to ignore it but I could not.  And before you get me wrong, I do not mind hearing the other side of an argument or debate, that I have no problem with.  I do have a problem with liars though and Micheal is a big (dual meaning) liar.  So why should I listen or trust anything he says?  If he lied before he will lie again.  What really makes me detest Michael Moore is something he did in his propaganda film Fahrenheit 9/11 where he makes it appear that American soldiers are mocking a corpse with rigor mortis.  In fact the soldiers had picked up a an old man who had passed out drunk.  This is but one single example of a multitude of lies and deceptions in that movie.  So why should I listen to anything he says now?  I shouldn't, nobody should.  If you want to see the whole story on Fahrenheit 9/11 read this.

So I watch and listen to Moore spit out what he calls facts but in reality or just a bunch of lies or half truths.  I watch the clip where he takes some American 9/11 rescuers to Cuba for treatment that they cannot get here.  Is Moore so dumb that he thinks that we will believe that the health care system in Cuba is better than ours?  Yeah, he is that dumb.

In just the few clips that they show I see so much wrong and so many lies that I wonder how anyone in America can be so ignorant to believe Mr. Moore.   the problem is that there are a lot if ignorant people that will.  A few months ago I referenced an article by Walter Williams talking about health care around the world that I would like to hear Mr. Moore refute with some REAL facts.

I also understand that our system has some problems but I would stress that letting the government take over health care would be a disaster.  I thin JimK summed it up pretty well here.

Moore is asking us to place our very lives in the hands of the same people that are managing a war he considers a failure, the people that created the pyramid scheme that is Social Security, the same folks that brought you the Susan B. Anthony and the Sacagawea dollar.

Hell no, dude.  That doesn’t make any sense!

Ok enough of that, let me get back to enjoying my weekend...

With all this talk about a "universal" health care for all Americans it makes me wonder just how dumb the Democrats and their followers actually are.  I guess many people can be allured by the idea of "free" health care for everyone, who could oppose that?  The problem is "free" is never "free" and at what additional cost are we looking at?

First, I would point out that we already have Socialized Health Care run by our government for our soldiers and we can all see how well that is working.

But what about other countries with socialized health care?  How well are things going for them?  Walter Williams gives us some statistics as to how things are going...

London's Observer (3/3/02) carried a story saying that an "unpublished report shows some patients are now having to wait more than eight months for treatment, during which time many of their cancers become incurable." Another story said, "According to a World Health Organisation report to be published later this year, around 10,000 British people die unnecessarily from cancer each year — three times as many as are killed on our roads."

The Observer (12/16/01) also reported, "A recent academic study showed National Health Service delays in bowel cancer treatment were so great that, in one in five cases, cancer which was curable at the time of diagnosis had become incurable by the time of treatment."

Yeah that is great!  You can see a doctor, eventually and maybe get treatment before it is too late and you will have no out of pocket expenses.  Well, except for an enormous tax burden and higher gas prices due to a larger gas tax to pay for the government health care.

But what about Canada you ask?

The story is no better in Canada's national health care system. The Vancouver, British Columbia-based Fraser Institute has a yearly publication titled, "Waiting Your Turn." Its 2006 edition gives waiting times, by treatments, from a person's referral by a general practitioner to treatment by a specialist. The shortest waiting time was for oncology (4.9 weeks). The longest waiting time was for orthopedic surgery (40.3 weeks), followed by plastic surgery (35.4 weeks) and neurosurgery (31.7 weeks).

Canadians face significant waiting times for various diagnostics such as computed tomography (CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and ultrasound scans. The median wait for a CT scan across Canada was 4.3 weeks, but in Prince Edward Island, it's 9 weeks. A Canadian's median wait for an MRI was 10.3 weeks, but in Newfoundland, patients waited 28 weeks. Finally, the median wait for an ultrasound was 3.8 weeks across Canada, but in Manitoba and Prince Edward Island it was 8 weeks.

Yeah that sounds great.