27 insurance premium DECREASE in Texas? Anyone know where Linder's pulled this number?

I'm assuming it's bogus or at best very, very cherry-picked, but I happened upon this astonishing claim in this AJC article about GA rep. John Linder's recent (and cowardly, I might add--more about that later) http://www.ajc.com/news/linder-bills-dont-address-real-health-care-issues-120470.html">speech to a Rotary club--specifically:



huh? That's laughable on its face, and a very quick search of "Texas Insurance Premiums" http://www.businessweek.com/blogs/money_politics/archives/2009/08/employer-sponso.html">netted me this:

"Between 2003 and 2008, family premium increases ranged from a high of 45% in Indiana and North Carolina to a low of 25% in Michigan, Texas, and Ohio."

So premiums INCREASED 25%, they didn't DECREASE.

It'd hardly be the first time Linder's lied about stuff, but I do wonder who's fed him this bullshit and what we need to do to counter it.

Anyone else heard it? Know the source? Got a sharp comebacker that addresses both the dishonesty of the meme AND the stupidity of the person advancing it?

deductible high copay plan.

I know it's bullshit--I just want to know where he's getting it so I can start burning it down.

If this Gooper is spreading this lie, well, they're kind of like roaches. You see one, there are more around where it came from.

You see, because the premiums in Texas didn't increase by as much as they did in the other states, then what that really is is a premium decrease.

This lie is a new one. Hopefully someone will be able to pinpoint where this mythical number came from.

when efforts to impose caps in GA were ruled unconstitutional?

or even if such caps in TX exist / existed?

(if they were around for a time but were struck down as unconstitutional, then clearly this meme is completely bankrupt--you'd have to amend the constitution to impose pain and suffering caps! as if that'd be a realistic goal of any reform efforts!)

What I keep coming back to when I hear "YOU GOTTA ADDRESS TORT REFORM!!11!" or suchlike from wingers is quite simple--if this were so bloody important, why didn't YOU GUYS HANDLE IT when you had control of all three branches of government for four years, between the 2002 and 2006 mid-terms?

even tort reform will not lower OUR health insurance costs!!!

Anyway, I think what's blithely referred to by the Right as "tort reform" is both

1) unconstitutional, not something even Fat Tony and the Supremes would tolerate; and

2) something the Republicans could've done something about when they held power but didn't bother doing because... well? they never answer that one. But we're supposed to drop everything and do their stupid "tort reform" first because, well just because!

- in reading the paragraph, the initial subject is malpractice premium costs. It then states that award limits were enacted, doctors flooded into the state and premiums have declined. That leads me to believe that the reduction has been in the Malpractice rates due to reduced exposure and additional physicians into the pool. The paragraph is very poorly worded.

A google search finds an article about malpractice premium reduction in Texas which backs up the initial paragraph:

http://www.thedoctors.com/TDC/PressRoom/PressContent/CON_ID_000153

The sources which claim that malpractice premiums have dropped dramatically in Texas are extremely pro health care industry sources.

Here's the problem with the math:

$2.3 trillion annually on health care
$3.6 billion annually on malpractice claims

3.6 billion/2.3 trillion = .16%

The industry sources claim that 10 cents of every health care dollar goes to pay malpractice premiums. If that is true, then of the $2.3 trillion of annual health care costs, malpractice premiums would be $230 billion. Since $230 billion is 64 times $3.6 billion, it would mean (if true), that $226.4 billion of that $230 billion is going to the insurance companies for administrative costs.

In truth, the total number for malpractice costs is under 1% of total health care costs.

Unfortunately, most of the numbers you will find come from industry sources, either directly or funneled through conservative "think tanks," whose sole purpose is to issue for publication propaganda as news.
----------------------------------------

1. Health care costs have gone UP, not DOWN, in Texas since "tort reform" was passed.

2. Health insurance costs have gone way, way UP, not DOWN, in Texas since "tort reform" was passed.

3. Any savings which might have been effected by "tort reform" has added to profits of doctors, hospitals, and insurers, not reduced health care costs or health insurance.

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that Linder weasel-worded his speech (and the reporter rather cluelessly paraphrased it) to make one think premiums for insurance policy holders had decreased.

I strongly suspect that the malpractice insurance reductions are overstated (and I'd love to see evidence for this "Docs are flooding the state!" business), but I'll look more into that.

Sure, it may help, more in the manner of lowering costs by reducing so-called "defensive" medicine. I do feel bad for medical professionals who make honest mistakes in difficult situations, but tort reform would also protect doctors who are vicious or reckless - like the gynecologist who decided to restructure some of his patient's vaginas - without their consent. Doctors who leave surgical instruments in people may not be vicious, it's not deliberate but such recklessness just shouldn't be tolerated. Some claim fear of lawsuits prevent honest reporting of medical errors now - well tort reform would help with that, right?

How about this - we move to a single payer system and pass tort reform. Now stick with me here, because I know that at first these don't seem related. Once we know that profit is out of the health system, that's one less cause of malpractice. Once every one knows that they will have their medical expenses covered - no matter what - suing for medical costs is gone. We could also have open and honest disciplinary protocols for medical professionals so punitive damages don't seem as important. That leaves pain & suffering. I'm not going to underestimate the importance of that, but compromise is about letting some things go.

You look at countries like UK and France - they aren't nearly as litigious as the US. They also have a single payer system and strong government regulation of industry.

So, take your pick.
1) We can have a free market system, but that has to include minimal regulations on civil suits. It is not the business of the government to decide what a jury can award a plaintiff. It's not their business to set limits on how much an attorney can take of the reward, either. Heck, if you don't like what the lawyer is charging, use some one else. I mean, that's the free market, right?
2) The government protects its citizens. We still have a capitalist society, but we have real regulation, and those regulations are enforced. Our government protects its citizens from corporations whose sole motive is profit and who would recklessly endanger human life in its pursuit. We don't let lawyers become millionaires off of other people's misery, either.

The largest component of any med mal tort claim is past and future medical costs for the patient. If those damages disappear for the patient, they disappear from the med mal claim.

The truth is that med mal claims are a convenient whipping boy of the health care industry, but that's all they are. Their total costs are around 1% of the total health care costs, and most of that goes to the insurance industry for administrative costs.

As for the claim that malpractice claims "force" excessive tests due to "defensive" practice of medicine, I defy anyone to support that claim with anything more than industry bullshit. Getting tests that are needed is difficult for the average patient who has good medical coverage. The notion that they over test because of fear of malpractice claims simply doesn't prove up. Most malpractice claims result from misdiagnosis, because doctors don't test enough.

National health would make that go away.

Pain & Suffering plus Punitive Damages on their own don't make for a very compelling "award" unless one can prove gross negligence - something truly outrageous rather than an oversight or mistake. Or unless the injury is truly horrific.

I throw my idea out there as a dare, because I know they'd never take that deal but also because I believe the two are linked, although the connection may not be apparent.

I think defensive medicine is a contributing factor. The number of C-sections has risen because OBs are so worried about something going wrong in a natural delivery. In many cases, the risk of a problem from not doing something is small, but the test is done because if there is a problem it will be costly. I find it curious that for years Conservatives have been blaming defensive medicine for increased medical costs and now they talk about "Death Panels" and government rationing of care.

Our nation's citizens haven't wanted to mess around much with the common practice of suing in civil court for damages because our rights as workers, drivers, pedestrians, etc. are so piss-poorly protected, otherwise, by our government.

And yeah, I do sympathize with docs who get unfairly targeted by malpractice lawsuits--I'm all for addressing this appropriately. But it's not a cornerstone of healthcare reform.

And for the thousandth time, REPUBLICANS, if this were so important, you shoulda gotten it done in the mid-2000s, when you have control of three branches of government.

He co-shares (with radio turd and former Lester Maddox bagman Neal Boortz) responsibility for spawning one of the most pathetic American cults out there, the FairTax imbeciles.

A more gullible, ignorant lot you'll not find anywhere.

Here's column in the Washington Independent from August 19, 2009:

http://washingtonindependent.com/55535/tort-reform-unlikely-to-cut-health-care-costs

Tort Reform Unlikely to Cut Health Care Costs
Studies Show Malpractice Awards Are Not Big Driver of Skyrocketing Costs

So far Republicans have mostly focused on tearing apart any reform with a role for the federal government, portraying it as the government dictating how long old people get to live. But an undercurrent of those complaints is the insistence of doctors, hospitals, insurance companies and ideological conservatives that medical malpractice claims are out of control and a leading cause of rising health care costs.

The health economists and independent legal experts who study the issue, however, don’t believe that’s true. They say that malpractice liability costs are a small fraction of the spiraling costs of the U.S. health care system, and that the medical errors that malpractice liability tries to prevent are themselves a huge cost– both to the injured patients and to the health care system as a whole.

“It’s really just a distraction,” said Tom Baker, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School and author of “The Medical Malpractice Myth.” “If you were to eliminate medical malpractice liability, even forgetting the negative consequences that would have for safety, accountability, and responsiveness, maybe we’d be talking about 1.5 percent of health care costs. So we’re not talking about real money. It’s small relative to the out-of-control cost of health care.”

Annual jury awards and legal settlements involving doctors amounts to “a drop in the bucket” in a country that spends $2.3 trillion annually on health care, Amitabh Chandra, another Harvard University economist, recently told Bloomberg News. Chandra estimated the cost of jury awards at about $12 per person in the U.S., or about $3.6 billion. Insurer WellPoint Inc. has also said that liability awards are not what’s driving premiums. And a 2004 report by the Congressional Budget Office said medical malpractice makes up only 2 percent of U.S. health spending. Even “significant reductions” would do little to curb health-care expenses, it concluded.

Others have theorized that he was actually talking about TX malpractice insurance premiums. If that's so at best it could've been a one-time deal.

Health insurance premiums actually rose, albeit less than the national average in Texas.


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Family Health Insurance Premiums Seen Rising 94% by 2020

<snip>

According to the report's state-by-state analysis, the five-year increase (2003 to 2008) in employer-based premiums for family coverage averaged 33 percent, ranging from a high of 45 percent in Indiana and North Carolina to an average low of 25 percent in Michigan, Texas, and Ohio. Most states saw increases of 30 percent to 40 percent.

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2009/08/20/103165.htm

-----------------------------

However, malpractice insurance premiums have been dropping for years in Texas. No reason not to when they are required to pay out so much less now than they used to.


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One example is Texas. According to Grace-Marie Turner, president of the non-partisan Galen Institute in Washington, D.C., Texas is showing how to get malpractice costs under control. Since the state legislature passed a series of malpractice reforms several years ago, medical malpractice costs have plummeted, and the number of doctors moving into the state has soared.

“There is a cause and effect here,” Ms. Turner told me. “Premiums with one malpractice insurance company have fallen by more than a third, allowing doctors and hospitals to reduce their costs. About 7,000 physicians have moved into Texas over the last four years, and the state has a backlog of applications from other physicians wanting to move there.”

http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2009/08/06/reduce-the-high-cost-of-medical-malpractice/

I can't find the 27% drop, but this is from 2007:

Dave Hendricks: Insurance companies, doctors flock to Texas

When Texas voters in 2003 approved a state proposition capping lawsuit awards for medical malpractice cases, only four insurance companies even offered malpractice policies to Texas doctors.

Now, 30 insurance companies crowd the market, and premiums have fallen like so many San Antonio Spurs playoff opponents. The lower cost of being a doctor in Texas has helped trigger a stampede of applications for physician licenses, with the waiting line now up to 12 months.

Rates have fallen an average of 21.3 percent, and up to 41 percent at one insurance company, says former state Rep. Joe Nixon, a Houston trial lawyer who helped sponsor passage of Proposition 12.

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More at: http://www.mysanantonio.com/business/columnists/david_hendricks/MYSA060207_01D_hendricks_2d9bd79_html.html

I'd had to leave yesterday and wasn't able to follow up, but this would appear to be the info he's using, however a) badly reported by the AJC, and b) irrelevant, really, to the big-picture discussion we're having in this nation.

I wasn't familiar with TX's Prop. 12 before, but this blog entry sheds a little light on the actual "benefit" it's had for the state:

http://www.tortdeform.com/archives/2007/11/did_proposition_12_bring_docto.html

So did Proposition 12 work? It did for wealthy, insured individuals in heavily-populated counties; those people now have less of a wait to see a doctor than they did before. It didn’t work for the poor, uninsured individuals in Texas’ many rural counties.

But as I’ve said before, that’s what tort reform is all about: Protecting the wealthy by punishing the poor.

Finland
Canada
Britain
France
Italy
Germany
Sweden
Denmark
Israel
Australia
New Zealand

all democracies

all with socialized medicine