A Better Healthcare Proposal

Newt Gingrich has just posted what I consider to be a much better alternative to the current plan to repair our current healthcare system. Although I am sure he is much better followed than I am, I also want to post it here:

Six Straightforward Steps to Better Healthcare

To create a system that delivers more choices of higher quality health care at lower cost we need to take the following six straightforward steps:

1. Stop Paying the Crooks. First, we must dramatically reduce healthcare fraud within our current healthcare system. Outright fraud -- criminal activity -- accounts for as much as 10 percent of all healthcare spending. That is more than $200 billion every year. Medicare alone could account for as much as $40 billion a year. (Read about our latest CHT Press book, Stop Paying the Crooks, edited by Jim Frogue.)
2. Move from a Paper-based to an Electronic Health System. As it stands now, it is simply impossible to keep up with fraud in a paper-based system. An electronic system would free tens of billions of dollars to be spent on investing on the kind of modern system that will transform healthcare. In addition, it would dramatically increase our ability to eliminate costly medical errors and to accelerate the adoption of new solutions and breakthroughs.
3. Tax Reform. The savings realized through very deliberately and very systematically eliminating fraud could be used to provide tax incentives and vouchers that would help cover those Americans who currently can’t afford coverage. In addition, we need to expand tax incentives for insurance provided by small employers and the self-employed. Finally, elimination of capital gains taxes for investments in health-solution companies can greatly impact the creation advancement of new solutions that create better health at lower cost.
4. Create a Health-Based Health System. In essence, we must create a system that focuses on improving individual health. The best way to accomplish this is to find out what solutions are actually working today that save lives and save money and then design public policy to encourage their widespread adoption. For example, according to the Dartmouth Health Atlas, if the 6,000 hospitals in the country provided the same standard of care of the Intermountain or Mayo health clinics, Medicare alone would save 30 percent of total spending every year. We need to make best practices the minimum practice. We need the federal government and other healthcare stakeholders to consistently migrate to best practices that ensure quality, safety and better outcomes.
5. Reform Our Health Justice System. Currently, the U.S. civil justice system is the most expensive in the world -- about double the average cost in virtually every other industrialized nation. But for all of the money spent, our civil justice system neither effectively compensates persons injured from medical negligence nor encourages the elimination of medical errors. Because physicians fear malpractice suits, defensive medicine (redundant, wasteful treatment designed to avoid lawsuits, not treat the patient) has become pervasive. CHT is developing a number of bold health-justice reforms including a “safe harbor” for physicians who followed clinical best practices in the treatment of a patient. Visit CHT's Health Justice project page to learn more.
6. Invest in Scientific Research and Breakthroughs. We must accelerate and focus national efforts, re-engineer care delivery, and ultimately prevent diseases such as Alzheimer's Disease and diabetes which are financially crippling our healthcare system.

Learn more about this realistic and innovative approach at the Center for Health Transformation website.

Health Plan Details Explained

In case you had any question about how the proposed Obama health plan will work, the chart recently posted on the capitol hill newspaper website, www.rollcall.com, explains it in clear terms. Clear, that is, if you are a bureaucrat.

(A full size version can be found here.)

Mr. Obama still contends that those against this plan are out to get him or just want to bring him down. But this particular proposal transcends party lines. One look at the chart, said to have been prepared to explain how the processes will flow, leaves the viewer dumbfounded and with an obvious sense of the bureaucratic layers of cost that would be required to manage such a plan.

Yes - health care needs to be reformed. But not this way. And if this is the only way, I'll happy continue the current system. This plan must be stopped, and it can only be stopped by spreading the word so that everyone knows the truth.

Could the youngest MP bring down Brown's government?

After a whopping defeat in the Norwich North by-election by 27 year-old Conservative candidate, Ms. Chloe Smith, Labour was forced to concede a seat previously held by Ian Gibson. Her 7,000+ vote majority cannot be ignored, because it could very well be a preview of what is yet to come in the next general election. Her win now makes Ms. Smith, a University of York graduate, the youngest MP in Parliament (possibly very good news), and is causing a lot of turmoil in the ranks of Labour.

In a move that angered many supporters, Mr. Gibson, who had previously held the seat with a majority of over 5,000 votes, was forced to bow out of the election due to his implication with the expenses scandal. It now appears that the voters may maintain a long memory after learning of the excessive expense abuses widely reported earlier this Summer. And this is what has a number of senior Labour figures and back-benchers concerned. Some are again calling for consideration of a leadership change, so things are getting quite interesting.

Yes, it almost reminds one of Ms. Thatcher's plight when Conservative party leaders decided that a change was necessary to hold control. Have Labour finally realised that if such a change is not done now, it could be too late to save their leadership in the next elections?

One thing is certain - any defeats such as that brought about by Ms. Smith deal a powerful blow to the Brown Government. Conservatives now have the best opportunity ever to capitalise on the current situation. We will enjoy watching to see if they are able to make it happen.

Stopping the Government Healthcare Plan

President Obama wants to spend $1,000,000,000,000 on a new health care system that not a single supporter has been able to show will actually reduce costs. Yes, that's a lot of zeroes, folks. I do not believe this is a good idea, and I hope you will agree to help us defeat this ill-conceived plan.

Regardless of your feelings about Mr. Obama, do you really want the government running health care? He says he wants to reduce costs - but the simplest way to reduce costs, which will cost the government and taxpayers nothing, is to put a cap on malpractice judgements. Yet, he has openly opposed any cap such as this, so what are we to believe?

We have experienced socialized medicine first hand, and here in the UK it is not a pretty sight. It takes weeks to get tests that would be considered essential to us in the US, and often people are denied treatment based on broad guidelines set by a government committee. But this bill goes even further, calling for counselling of seniors on steps that could be taken to shorten their lives to get them out of the system and save money!

If you want to be subject to these kinds of regulations, with the costs that inevitably will continue to grow along with them, then you can simply ignore this issue. But if you have any question in your mind as to if we should spend a trillion dollars on this proposal, then call your congressional representatives today and urge them to defeat HR 3200. Too much is at stake to allow such a questionable proposal become law!

*** Major Points in this Bill ***

House Bill 3200 will:

1. Create a government run insurance program that likely will add over 100 million people onto the backs of taxpayers (Lewin Group).

2. Mandate that everyone buy over-priced health insurance that is created by politicians and lobbyists - a huge profit gain for insurance companies. It is estimated that insurance costs will GO UP by up to 95%. This plan has failed in Massachusetts where there are still 2.6% uninsured, premiums have gone up at rates higher than the rest of the country and the state is now spending an additional $1.5 billion in taxpayer money on health care!

3. Create government rationing that will allow insurance company profits to grow and allow government to avoid paying benefits (Campaign for Liberty).

4. Create government committees that will tell doctors what medical tests and treatments they CAN and CANNOT order and punish them financially if they don't "comply" (See: www.doctorsforpatientfreedom.com).

5. Prevent you from buying private insurance that is not "government-approved" after 2013 (On page 16 of bill - See: http://www.aapsonline.org/newsoftheday/00351)

6. Create a massive bureacracy that will interfere in the relationship you have with your doctors.

7. Add to the national debt and increase government spending by at least $1.5 trillion over ten years!

8. Cut spending for Medicare patients by $400 billion over ten years!

9. Force seniors to attend "counseling sessions" about alternatives for "end of life care", or more often if they get sick (House bill, p. 425-430).