Obama, Senate Dems Consider Public Health Care Option With A Trigger

Source: Huffington Post

Obama, Senate Dems Consider Public Health Care Option With A Trigger

The Obama administration and Senate Democrats are debating a health care reform outline that will insist upon a public option for insurance but leave open the possibility for it to be kicked in via triggers.

Multiple Democratic sources tell the Huffington Post that the White House and key members of the Finance and Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committees are in the process of hammering out key principles on health care reform -- with a meeting scheduled at the West Wing this afternoon. One of the components will be music to progressive ears: that any bill includes an option publicly run health insurance coverage. But it also comes with a caveat that could engender opposition from that very same constituency.

A trigger would pave the way for public option to come into place only after certain market conditions are met -- mainly if private insurance companies are unable to achieve various metrics for coverage within a certain time frame. The proposal would placate many of the private health care actors who consider a public plan the first step towards a single-payer system. Progressives, however, view it as reform in name and not substance.

"This is really, obviously, a mechanism to kill the public plan," said one progressive health care reform advocate. "We will see what comes out, but the fact that they are debating this is problematic."

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/02/obama-senate-dems-conside_n_210390.html

if given a chance now. It's bullshit. It's like when I give my daughter time to get ready for school. At 7:30, when the bus will be here at 8 and she is not ready... do i THEN give her time to do it herself?? hell no! They have had their chance to make things right. They are not going to do that. They even left that meeting where they supposedly agreed to change things to obama's face and went right out and said they never said they would. this is bullshit!

One of the main reasons that some here use private backup is to help overcome NHS delays. Or have I misunderstood your post ?

... by a certain date, or if too many people are still uninsured at that date, then a public insurance policy will be created". In other words, "stop gouging the public so much, and then we won't create a public competitor that will undercut you and draw more customers away from you".

But I could have it wrong too.

What they pay for private insurance seems to far exceed the combined NH contributions of both employees and employers per employee and as you're aware ours covers those not contributing too.

I must confess I don't envy them setting up a single payer system from scratch. It would however provide the biggest boost to employment in their history.

The US already has two Single Payer Health Care Systems up and running...MediCare and the VA.

It would be a relatively simple operation to expand Medicare to cover ALL Americans.
There are many legitimate complaints about our Medicare system, but I don't know ANYONE who would trade their Medicare for the private For Profit alternative.

Just TRY to tell a Senior that he must give up his Medicare and BUY Health Insurance from the For Profit Health Insurance system.

that either Medicare or VA covered all healthcare, regardless of treatment involved , for everything from routine doctors appointments and ambulances etc through to major operations without the patient paying anything to anyone in advance or at any time come to that.

Is that the case - that a patient simply has to be able to confirm cover by either ?

Our NHS employes c. 1.3 million making it the world's third largest employer after India Rail and the Chinese National Army.

Your population is c. 6 times higher than ours so I'm guessing that eventually , assuming you get single payer and although not necessarily in direct proportion, your equivalent may become the world's largest employer.

Don't sound very simple to me.

For instance, in the US doctors and nurses aren't employed by medicare, but they bill medicare for their services. There is no indication that the various public, private, and educational hospitals would be somehow swept up by a single-payer plan. I don't see any sort of nationally funded hospitals or clinics in the future for the US.

our doctors are not employed by the NHS - they do work for them. Same applies to a lot our nurses who are actually contract nurses. The NHS also pays , where necessary , for the use of private hospitals and clinics.

The main point is that nothing affects the patients and at present I don't think you'll ever reach that point sad to say.

Let's see, for $3,000 a year per American we get:
1. Health first, then cost
2. Everyone covered for everything


For an ADDITIONAL $5,000 a year per American we get MORE:
1. Cost trumps health -- too bad -- you die!
1.5 40,000,000 million without insurance and increasing, more and more and more without protection... yah!
2. All except politicians and CEOs with partial coverage and copays.
3. No coverage for pre-existing conditions.
4. Loopholes that leave the covered uncovered

AND NOW,

5. An unreachable trigger that would put us to that HORRIBLE idea at the top. Ooooh. Shudder.

That extra $5,000 a year per American is SOOOOOO worth it don't you think!

It's covered. We're not. We're in a donut hole. Here. Now.

then no coverage until you cross the hole, then coverage kicks back in. The limits change, but the hole is about 2 to 3 times the size of the rim.

The donut hole pertains to the prescription drug plan Republicans made a few years back.

We're talking about the entire Health Care system, not just some little drug program.

If it contains a trigger that's only meant to pacify the masses, AND contains a requirement that we all purchase for-profit insurance coverage - and both of these items look increasingly likely - THAT'S when we'll realize that all of the work to put Democrats in Congress and in the White House was a massive joke on us.

Seriously: why shouldn't they screw us in favor of those who take from us?

Who pays our decision makers way to become and remain decision makers? Corps, that's who.

No money from the For Profit Health Insurance Industry finds its way into the pockets of our politicians!

Viola! Money appears.

$300,000 plus dollars to Baucus so far?

CEO can write those checks and he just ups his salary to whatever he wants. He also decides who gets promotions and what salary figures, and he can check the internet for "donors." And they all can donate to a number of groups.

ADD: We need to be paying for our own elections, not letting companies, countries, bad guys anywhere to even have a chance at corrupting our elections.

Whenever they make out their checks to somebody's campaign, they simply make sure the candidate knows where the check came from, from somebody up top.

especially the millions out of work

the Pharmaceuticals the Hospitals the Doctors will all lose more and more money if they DON"T go to Universal Health
people who can afford it will leave for better healthcare over seas

its just REALITY that is coming

Universal Health will come

40 million is going to turn out to be 150 million
then 300 million

the prices are absolutely out of control

its collapsing as we speak

The last figure I saw was $8,160 per American per year. Man, woman, and child.

Single-payer / One-payer / Government-run / "Socialist" health care costs $3,000 per person in other countries.

We can't afford an insurance company run health care system, and no one in their right mind would want one, unless they make money off the corruption they enjoy at the expense of other person's lives.

This is not CHANGE. If this is what gets passed as reform, then I am done with these people.

I am trying to be positive but I am disgusted just reading this crap.

You make a bad bet -- no problem, dump it on the Government. Insurance companies get to have their cake and eat it too.

Edit to add: This is no cost saving but one hell of a profit saving.

:grr:

The suicide rate will go out of sight.

Health care option with a trigger? Now look where the barrel is pointing. It makes an obvious political cartoon, if only I could draw.

Beginning to look that way....

Honestly, how much would it take to admit that the world class standard is okay with us? This isn't like the metric system..this is a matter of life or death!

let the public option compete against them. If they don't compete with the public option - they will find themselves out of business. Then we'll finally have a single payer universal plan.

If you give these cretins in the insurance business a chance without having that gun to their head - we'll just get more of the same.

Gun - yes. Trigger - no.

Triggers don't kill health insurers - guns do.

very good!

"triggers" are just a nice way of saying "never in a fucking million years" - when the government makes policy that says "we are going to leave this up to the private sector (or states in other instances) but if x conditions aren't met we will take over" what happens is the federal government never takes over. States or the private sector surf the system, finding loopholes, getting exceptions and extensions and other finagling and the public option never materializes.

One of the best examples of this is with environmental policy and, to some degree, education policy.

This is nothing more than an attempt to pass something that will PACIFY THE PEOPLE with absolutely NO CHANCE of ever becoming and actual public option.

I'm paying out $5k of my $33k annual salary in premiums for family coverage plus $500 each in annual deductibles for ER, hospitalization and lab work should we need it. How long can we take this kind of beating? :grr:

It might be cheap if I made more money, but by the time I get hit for health ins. taxes and everything else, there is little left of my paycheck to try and raise a family on :(

The next thing they do is to raise your premiums year after year until everyone leaves that plan, then, you are compelled to buy a new plan where you can either be priced out of the market for pre-existing conditions or in the forms you have to fill out, they can find a mistake and cancel you when you do need care.

It really is getting to be time for the torches and pitchforks.

passed with the public option. It negates the whole POINT of having a public option.

Your republic has been pwned.

They don't listen. I told them we pay their wages. It's time they started listening to those who put them in office. Too much greedy corporate control. All our calls, emails, faxes have not done a darn thing if this happens.

I've been bugging mine again today, hopefully enough public outrage over this will turn the trigger into a third rail...

Both of my Senators (Udall and Bennet of CO) are keeping their cards close to their chest.

So is Baucus's office.

Sen. Kennedy and Schumer's aides expressed interest in killing the trigger - they're clearly the good guys in this fight (though I think Schumer's plan gives too much to the insurance companies, but Kennedy's plan is decent.)

This will only work if the public plan is allowed to grow and force out the corporate insurers.

Which seems to be what they are saying to me.

GET RID OF THE INSURANCE COMPANIES!

Enough with the corporate orgy Obama -

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

SINGLE PAYER NOW!

Who the HELL are these LEECHES who provide NOTHING to dictate our health care?

HR 676 (Medicare for ALL) has 93 co-sponsors in the House,
BUT I wouldn't know this if I didn't belong to DU.
Would You?
The Democratic Party Leadership and the MSM are doing their BEST to keep people from finding out that there IS a Single Payer Health Care Bill in the House, AND that it has wide support among REAL Democrats (or at least among Democrats who want to cover their butts.)

No more "donations" to The Democratic Party.
I will ONLY consider donating directly to the people on this list.


Rep Abercrombie, Neil - 1/24/2007
Rep Baca, Joe - 9/17/2007
Rep Baldwin, Tammy - 1/24/2007
Rep Becerra, Xavier - 6/13/2007
Rep Berman, Howard L. - 6/15/2007
Rep Bishop, Sanford D., Jr. - 12/11/2007
Rep Brady, Robert A. - 2/27/2007
Rep Brown, Corrine - 4/17/2007
Rep Capuano, Michael E. - 11/9/2007
Rep Carson, Andre - 7/10/2008
Rep Carson, Julia - 1/24/2007
Rep Christensen, Donna M. - 1/24/2007
Rep Clarke, Yvette D. - 2/16/2007
Rep Clay, Wm. Lacy - 1/24/2007
Rep Cleaver, Emanuel - 4/22/2008
Rep Clyburn, James E. - 4/24/2008
Rep Cohen, Steve - 2/7/2007
Rep Cummings, Elijah E. - 1/24/2007
Rep Davis, Danny K. - 1/24/2007
Rep Delahunt, William D. - 2/12/2007
Rep Doyle, Michael F. - 3/21/2007
Rep Edwards, Donna F. - 9/29/2008
Rep Ellison, Keith - 1/24/2007
Rep Engel, Eliot L. - 1/24/2007
Rep Farr, Sam - 1/24/2007
Rep Fattah, Chaka - 1/24/2007
Rep Filner, Bob - 1/24/2007
Rep Frank, Barney - 3/7/2007
Rep Green, Al - 1/24/2007
Rep Grijalva, Raul M. - 1/24/2007
Rep Gutierrez, Luis V. - 1/24/2007
Rep Hare, Phil - 4/30/2007
Rep Hastings, Alcee L. - 1/29/2007
Rep Hinchey, Maurice D. - 1/24/2007
Rep Hirono, Mazie K. - 7/23/2007
Rep Holt, Rush D. - 9/18/2008
Rep Honda, Michael M. - 1/24/2007
Rep Jackson, Jesse L., Jr. - 1/24/2007
Rep Jackson-Lee, Sheila - 1/24/2007
Rep Jefferson, William J. - 6/26/2007
Rep Johnson, Eddie Bernice - 1/24/2007
Rep Johnson, Henry C. "Hank," Jr. - 2/13/2007
Rep Jones, Stephanie Tubbs - 5/23/2007
Rep Kaptur, Marcy - 2/12/2007
Rep Kennedy, Patrick J. - 9/24/2007
Rep Kildee, Dale E. - 4/17/2007
Rep Kilpatrick, Carolyn C. - 1/24/2007
Rep Kucinich, Dennis J. - 1/24/2007
Rep Lantos, Tom - 10/1/2007
Rep Lee, Barbara - 1/24/2007
Rep Lewis, John - 1/24/2007
Rep Loebsack, David - 1/24/2007
Rep Lynch, Stephen F. - 10/9/2007
Rep Maloney, Carolyn B. - 1/29/2007
Rep McDermott, Jim - 1/24/2007
Rep McGovern, James P. - 1/24/2007
Rep McNulty, Michael R. - 1/24/2007
Rep Meehan, Martin T. - 1/24/2007
Rep Meeks, Gregory W. - 9/20/2007
Rep Miller, George - 1/24/2007
Rep Moore, Gwen - 1/24/2007
Rep Moran, James P. - 1/22/2008
Rep Nadler, Jerrold - 1/29/2007
Rep Napolitano, Grace F. - 2/27/2007
Rep Norton, Eleanor Holmes - 3/21/2007
Rep Olver, John W. - 2/16/2007
Rep Pastor, Ed - 1/24/2007
Rep Payne, Donald M. - 1/24/2007
Rep Rangel, Charles B. - 1/24/2007
Rep Richardson, Laura - 9/20/2007
Rep Roybal-Allard, Lucille - 1/24/2007
Rep Rush, Bobby L. - 2/6/2007
Rep Ryan, Tim - 5/8/2007
Rep Sanchez, Linda T. - 4/23/2007
Rep Sanchez, Loretta - 9/20/2007
Rep Schakowsky, Janice D. - 4/17/2007
Rep Scott, David - 9/20/2007
Rep Scott, Robert C. "Bobby" - 1/24/2007
Rep Serrano, Jose E. - 2/7/2007
Rep Solis, Hilda L. - 2/12/2007
Rep Sutton, Betty - 3/27/2007
Rep Thompson, Bennie G. - 6/12/2007
Rep Tierney, John F. - 9/6/2007
Rep Towns, Edolphus - 1/24/2007
Rep Udall, Tom - 2/27/2007
Rep Waters, Maxine - 1/29/2007
Rep Watson, Diane E. - 1/24/2007
Rep Weiner, Anthony D. - 1/24/2007
Rep Welch, Peter - 5/3/2007
Rep Wexler, Robert - 1/24/2007
Rep Woolsey, Lynn C. - 1/24/2007
Rep Wynn, Albert Russell - 1/24/2007
Rep Yarmuth, John A. - 2/27/2007

and, of course, John Conyers who is the original sponsor of the bill.

there, so I am going to email him today. Last time I looked the list had 77, slowly growing I hope.

I knew we could count on you!

BTW, Rep. Stephanie Tubbs-Jones is now deceased. :(

companies overseeing our health any longer. Public Option, Universal no triggers. The last paragraph of the OP says that Medicare had the same triggers made by private industry and has never been met. Why because the triggers are too high to meet. Medicare D sucks and I do not have it as it does not even cover my prescriptions I've been taking for 15 years. Sick of this load of for profit crap controlling our lives..We need to scream from the roof tops. Okay thanks for getting me out of the slump guys/gals...on to calling, faxing, emailing, screaming........

bill.

Jesus Christ! What has happened to our Party???? :wtf:

I DO NOT UNDERSTAND!! We have a majority. We have a Democratic President. Let them freaking filibuster! We need universal health care and a public option is the bare freaking minimum that MUST be included. Why does ANY placating have to occur? Do too many lawmakers have vested interests in insurance company's???

Honestly, sometimes I think I should just go back to being a sheeple because awareness of this BS and trying to fight it doesn't seem to be changing anything except my blood pressure.
:grr:

They want insurance $$ for reelection. It doesn't matter how good a politician is if she can't afford to tell anyone.

and it sucks ass.

Only the illusion of democracy...

the various single payer advocate groups and now many unions that are pushing for single payer, are growing by the day. So the fight will continue.

A public health option with a trigger is no reform at all - in name or otherwise.

Any public health option needs to expressly include an affordability component - e.g. a subsidy so that premiums are within reach of those who need care most - or it is a reform in name only.

None of the (vague) plans currently being batted around do - their goal is to create "affordability" by competition with the insurance companies. Competition with companies which are not forced to accept all patients will never produce affordability because insurance companies will cherry pick their clients (as they do now) to cover only those they can easily make large profits on and the public health option (which presumably must accept everyone) will cover primarily those individuals whose actual care or anticipated care (based on actuarial tables) comes close to or exceeds the premium charged for those in the high risk pool. The premiums for the public health option, unless subsidized, will always be higher than those of a private insurance company that is allowed to cherry pick.

1) NO public money can be channeled to the For Profit Insurance Industry.
Those receiving a subsidy MUST be automatically enrolled in the Public System.

2)The For Profits MUST accept All Comers. No denials for "Pre Existing Conditions" or "High Risk Groups". If the For Profits are allowed to "Cherry Pick", the Public Plan will become a dumping ground.

in any of the petitions/statements I have seen pushing for a public health option (or any of the currently vague descriptions of what that means). I am very concerned that a public health plan option will be passed that only guarantees access (i.e. you can have insurance - but the cost will be a million bucks - don't have that kind of money? too bad).

That is what happened with HIPPA - the last attempt to provide access to health insurance for all. Because I currently am enrolled in a creditable health insurance plan, HIPPA guarantees that I will not be turned down for coverage once I (or anyone covered by my plan) am no longer eligible for the employment based plan. The insurer must make coverage available to me (at a minimum) by allowing me to convert my employment plan to a personal plan. The insurer, however, is permitted to charge me whatever they want to charge me for that plan - in my family's case, the $22,000 being paid to cover our entire family covers less than half of what the insurer will need to spend on care on an annual basis for my daughter - who will age out of my employment plan in two months if she is unable to maintain her status as a full time student. Any guesses how long it will be before the insurer more than doubles the amount it currently receives to cover the entire family in exchange for providing her with a personal insurance policy?

The cost of the plan must be subsidized so that people who need health care can afford it, otherwise it is virtually no improvement over what we now have.

Once a subsidy is guaranteed - I absolutely agree that it should go only to the public health option. (As a practical matter, however, that will kill the public health option since the insistence by those opposing it is that it must compete on a level playing field. Giving subsidies to the public health option but not to the private is not a level playing field - and it it takes allowing private insurers to temporarily receive some subsidies as the price to having the subsidies in the first place, it is a compromise I'm willing to make on the road to single payer).

would be no different from insuring a car after an accident. Insurance covers the likelihood of an event as assessed by actuaries - not definite occurrences. I'm not saying nobody would insure a definite occurrence but I'm equally sure the cost would be prohibitive.

Only universal health care covers everything without exception.