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  1. #51
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    Big Pharma Fights Proposal to Keep It From Looting Medicare

    The Trump administration has proposed that insurance plans providing drug coverage to Medicare beneficiaries will no longer be forced to cover six hitherto “protected” drug classes.

    The classes––which include drugs for psychiatric conditions, cancer and immune diseases––are among the priciest of all drugs and account for as much as
    33 percent of total outpatient drug spending under Part D of Medicare.


    Under the proposal,

    Medicare plans could “exclude from their formularies protected class drugs with price increases that are greater than inflation, as well as certain new drug formulations that are not a significant innovation over the original product,”

    “You get much better outcomes when a doctor can work with patients to figure out which medications will work best.” He might have added, as long as the taxpayer pays.

    “When insurers balk at reimbursing patients for new prescription medications, these groups typically swing into action,

    rallying sufferers to appear before public and consumer panels, contact lawmakers, and

    provide media outlets a human face to attach to a cause,”

    well known Pharma tactic to loot Medicare dollars.

    example of

    lobbyist-initiated regulations which protect nothing more than drug industry profits

    and its expensive psychiatric drugs, many of which have cheaper alternatives.

    The Pharma-friendly Alliance for Patient Access has saturated broadcast airwaves

    warning cancer patients about “European style” restrictions on the “newest drugs” without which they will presumably die.

    few to none of the newer psychiatric or cancer drugs show clear improvements over cheaper ones.

    They all lack the safety profiles of older drugs that are widely in use and their main benefit is enriching Pharma.

    https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/12...ting-medicare/


  2. #52
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    There’s no GOP backup plan for the anti-Obamacare lawsuit

    What exactly is the GOP's health care plan?

    The lawsuit aims to strike down very popular provisions of the ACA, including but not limited to

    protections for pre-existing conditions,

    the Medicaid expansion,

    the elimination of
    lifetime or annual limits on most benefits,

    allowing young adults to stay on their parents’ plans until the age of 26,

    closing a coverage gap in Medicare prescription drug plans, and

    even free flu shots.


    The Trump administration said it has a backup plan

    should the anti-Obamacare lawsuit prevail in court,

    but has yet to specify what exactly it is.

    Health officials told Politico

    the administration has no contingency plan should the ruling be held in appeal.

    “We have a chance, working with the Democrats, to deliver great HealthCare!

    A confirming Supreme Court Decision will lead to GREAT HealthCare results for Americans!”

    he tweeted on Monday.

    https://thinkprogress.org/no-republi...-f57d4fe398fd/

  3. #53
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    Another 4,600 Arkansans kicked off Medicaid this month, just in time for Christmas

    Arkansas has kicked nearly 17,000 people off of Medicaid, including 4,655 who lost coverage at the beginning of December.

    They were all enrollees of the state's Medicaid expansion program, Arkansas Works, and

    lost their coverage because of the work requirements the Trump administration allowed the state to impose on their continued participation.

    Up until this week, all participants had been required to report 80 hours of "work activity" every month,

    but the only option for them to report is through a website that shuts down every single night from 9:00 PM to 7:00 AM for "scheduled maintenance."

    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/1820244

  4. #54
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    Why We Still Don’t Really Know What Killing the Individual Mandate Did to Obamacare

    Killing off Obamacare’s individual mandate was supposed to deal a serious blow to the health insurance market.

    Congressional Budget Office projected the move would lead 3 million fewer people to purchase insurance on their own in 2019, when the mandate was set to officially phase out.

    So far, there’s been no sign of such a sharp drop.

    Last week, the Trump administration
    reported that approximately 8.5 million Americans bought coverage for next year on Obamacare’s federal exchange during the recent open enrollment period.

    The total was down just 3.4 percent from last year’s mark of 8.8 million.

    Does that mean Obamacare is sturdier than the wonks thought?

    That the mandate wasn’t all it was cracked up to be?


    https://slate.com/business/2018/12/obamacare-individual-mandate-effect-enrollment.html



    Last edited by boutons_deux; 12-29-2018 at 09:16 AM.

  5. #55
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    Experts say Maine's new Democratic governor can ignore Medicaid work requirement waiver

    In what the monstrous Seema Verma, administrator of the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, called a Christmas gift last week,

    Maine's outgoing Republican Gov. Paul LePage got the power to impose work requirements on the citizens of Maine who are Medicaid enrollees.

    In a late holiday gift to the people of Maine, the incoming Democratic Gov. Janet Mills
    won't have to implement them

    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/1822142



  6. #56
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    Experts say Maine's new Democratic governor can ignore Medicaid work requirement waiver

    In what the monstrous Seema Verma, administrator of the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, called a Christmas gift last week,

    Maine's outgoing Republican Gov. Paul LePage got the power to impose work requirements on the citizens of Maine who are Medicaid enrollees.

    In a late holiday gift to the people of Maine, the incoming Democratic Gov. Janet Mills
    won't have to implement them

    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/1822142


    sure - find that higher percentage state contribution somewhere else in his budget

  7. #57
    dangerous floater Winehole23's Avatar
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    Death panels are real


  8. #58
    dangerous floater Winehole23's Avatar
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    Tennesse docs get big bux to deny disability claims.

    Https://amp.tennessean.com/amp/10772...mpression=true

  9. #59
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    Just went through our healthcare care review for renewal with my agent yesterday. I still pay 100% of the premium for employee and family. Part of the review is looking at actual costs that the insurance paid in the previous year. Everyone talks about "rich doctors" but the drug expenses are shocking...and these are relatively healthy working guys...one was $33,000+, two were $20,000+...and that is per individual, not family...and only for 10 months since I renew in March.

    Solution???? Drug companies OWN Congress on both sides of the aisle. They will never fix it.

  10. #60
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    We probably will eventually get "healthcare for all" in one form or another because the drug companies that own congress will back it. My guess it happens after 2020 when the anti-Trump backlash puts a Democrat in the White House. They will sell it as a humanitarian "right" and damn the cost, will pay for it with additional deficits. The huge winners will be the drug companies who will transfer trillions of deficit spending directly to their corporate profits.

  11. #61
    4-25-20 Will Hunting's Avatar
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    Just went through our healthcare care review for renewal with my agent yesterday. I still pay 100% of the premium for employee and family. Part of the review is looking at actual costs that the insurance paid in the previous year. Everyone talks about "rich doctors" but the drug expenses are shocking...and these are relatively healthy working guys...one was $33,000+, two were $20,000+...and that is per individual, not family...and only for 10 months since I renew in March.

    Solution???? Drug companies OWN Congress on both sides of the aisle. They will never fix it.
    Yeah that money that the doctors take home is a drop in the bucket compared to money that the drug companies get.

    The solution would be campaign finance reform, otherwise you're probably right that the Pharma lobby is strong enough to prevent a single payer plan that gives the government bargaining power with drug companies from ever passing.

  12. #62
    4-25-20 Will Hunting's Avatar
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    We probably will eventually get "healthcare for all" in one form or another because the drug companies that own congress will back it. My guess it happens after 2020 when the anti-Trump backlash puts a Democrat in the White House. They will sell it as a humanitarian "right" and damn the cost, will pay for it with additional deficits. The huge winners will be the drug companies who will transfer trillions of deficit spending directly to their corporate profits.
    IMO any sort of nationalized "healthcare for all" plan would have a tough time getting past the insurance lobby in Congress. Obamacare was able to thread the needle in satisfying both the insurance and pharma lobby while being pitched as a humanitarian bill.

  13. #63
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    satisfying both the insurance and pharma lobby while being pitched as a humanitarian bill.
    both got paid so poor Americans could get medical care

    Capitalism is shakedown, fleecing of non-Capitalists

  14. #64
    🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆 ElNono's Avatar
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    Just went through our healthcare care review for renewal with my agent yesterday. I still pay 100% of the premium for employee and family. Part of the review is looking at actual costs that the insurance paid in the previous year. Everyone talks about "rich doctors" but the drug expenses are shocking...and these are relatively healthy working guys...one was $33,000+, two were $20,000+...and that is per individual, not family...and only for 10 months since I renew in March.

    Solution???? Drug companies OWN Congress on both sides of the aisle. They will never fix it.
    Complete ripoff. This is one of the aspect we discussed, how the US subsidized medicine for the rest of the world by going out of control here. There's no way you can do anything about this without using price controls of some form. There's simply no compe ion with patent enforcement in place. Once the patent is gone, generics take over and prices plummet. It's just a scam.

  15. #65
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    price increases driven by manufacturer price hikes, not innovation:

    “The skyrocketing cost of many prescription drugs in the U.S. can be blamed primarily on price increases, not expensive new therapies or improvements in existing medications as drug companies frequently claim, a new study shows….. Since rising costs aren’t paying for improved treatments, policy makers may want to take action, says Dr. William Shrank, chief medical officer of the UPMC Health Plan, who is also an author on the study. ‘This observation supports policy efforts designed to control health care spending by capping price inflation to some reasonable level,’ he says.”
    https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/ab...aff.2018.05147

    https://www.npr.org/sections/health-...not-innovation

  16. #66
    dangerous floater Winehole23's Avatar
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    Flu season is shaping up to be a bad one.

    I seldom get ill but will get the shot in consideration of others, as I probably should have done already.

    The flu can kill the young and the elderly with a quickness.

  17. #67
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    Utah Republicans scale back Medicaid expansion approved by voters

    Voters in Utah approved a ballot measure in November that would expand Medicaid,

    but on Monday, state lawmakers passed a bill that provides coverage to about half as many people and adds work requirements.


    "This is a dark day for democracy in Utah,"

    "State legislators turned their backs on voters and on families in need."

    The plan that passed the Republican-led Legislature only extends Medicaid to 80,000 people,

    letting 70,000 others buy subsidized insurance on the marketplace created under the Affordable Care Act.

    "I think we are doing the long-term responsible thing,"

    https://theweek.com/speedreads/823250/utah-republicans-scale-back-medicaid-expansion-approved-by-voters

    the voters, yep, responsible.



  18. #68
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    Minnesota Residents Struggle to Afford Needed Healthcare New Survey Results Show

    https://abouthealthtransparency.org/...ransparency%29

    and MN expanded Medicaid under ACA

  19. #69
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    Minnesota Residents Struggle to Afford Needed Healthcare New Survey Results Show

    https://abouthealthtransparency.org/...ransparency%29

    and MN expanded Medicaid under ACA
    So, is this your KNOCK on the AFFORDABLE Care Act? After all, MN expanded Medicaid and ACA is still the law of the land.

  20. #70
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    So, is this your KNOCK on the AFFORDABLE Care Act? After all, MN expanded Medicaid and ACA is still the law of the land.
    no, it's yet another proof that BigHealth is screwing the country.

    And your beloved Repugs haven't even bothered to expand Medicaid, and where they have, some are restricting it.

    People suffer, people go into poverty or bankruptcy, lives trashed, people die.

    Ain't Capitalistic America great?

    Repugs have NO PLAN except to trash anything the Dems propose and defend the status quo, no matter how many Americans suffer and die for want of health care.
    Last edited by boutons_deux; 02-12-2019 at 05:34 PM.

  21. #71
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    What Happens if Obamacare Is Struck Down?

    The Affordable Care Act touches the lives of most Americans.

    Some 21 million could lose health insurance if the Trump administration were to succeed in having the law ruled uncons utional.

    The Affordable Care Act was already in peril after a federal
    REPUG judge in Texas invalidated the entire law late last year.

    But the stakes ramped up again this week,

    when President Trump’s Justice Department announced it had changed its position and

    agreed with the judge that

    the entire law, not just three pieces of it, should be scrapped.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/26/h...er=rss&emc=rss

    This is how Trash gets revenge on the hated knitter and McCain.

    Trash's personal vendettas override the sufferings, lost wealth, and deaths of Ms of Americans.





  22. #72
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    Louisana Republican blames Medicaid population for 'voting for a living instead of working'

    Abraham's congressional district, the 5th, is the tenth poorest in the nation, and

    has benefitted hugely from the adoption of Medicaid expansion,

    which has provided coverage to half a million Louisianians who were previously uninsured.

    In fact, he's blaming rising healthcare costs on poor people getting access.

    his previous job—he was a medical doctor, running a rural clinic in Mangham, Louisiana.

    It's quite possibly healthier for the population of Mangham not be getting care from this dumb asshole.

    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/1845086




  23. #73
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    Republican official calls Trump ‘tone deaf’ after sparking health care debate



    On Tuesday, President Donald Trump ignited a debate about
    healthcare that

    several Republicans criticized as a bad political move for the president.

    Trump said that he wanted to repeal
    Obamacare, but failed to offer solutions for a replacement.

    He said that his goal was to make the GOP the healthcare party.

    “The Republican Party will soon be known as the party of health care,” Trump told reporters. “You watch.”

    Several pundits saw this as

    a “gift” to Democrats and said that this fight would benefit them in 2020,

    seeing as the healthcare debate did not go over well for Republicans in the past.


    While talking The Daily Beasta

    GOP official called out the president for being “tone deaf,”

    “How about a few more victory laps on Mueller while you can get away with it? WTF is wrong with them?”

    https://www.rawstory.com/2019/03/gop...e+Raw+Story%29


    Trash got Barr not to defend ACA.

  24. #74
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    Trump’s own cabinet secretary tried to stop his latest attempt to kill Obamacare — he ignored them

    Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar
    tried to stop President Donald Trump from waging another war against the Affordable Care Act this week.

    Azar argued against the administration supporting a lawsuit to get a full repeal of the law during a December White House meeting. He cited a lack of an alternative piece of legislation from the GOP,

    Budget director Mick Mulvaney claimed that supporting the “bold stance” would force Congress into repealing and replacing the law.

    Now, the country is firmly behind the law with 50 percent who support it and only 37 percent against.

    It matches the meager 37 percent of Americans who think Trump is doing great on health care.

    While 52 percent disapprove of Trump’s work on healthcare.

    https://www.rawstory.com/2019/03/trumps-cabinet-secretary-tried-stop-latest-attempt-kill-obamacare-ignored/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaig n=Feed%3A+TheRawStory+%28The+Raw+Story%29



  25. #75
    W4A1 143 43CK? Nbadan's Avatar
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    The Trump health care plan is die quick. The ADA is far from perfect, especially since the GOP watered down the mandate but it does cover pre-existing conditions and kids till they are 26...too politically costly items that the GOP needs to keep in mind in 2020

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