MVNHS© circling...

Ah, the Much Vaunted National Health Service©:

"Thousands of over-75s 'are being denied statins by GPs' that could prevent heart attacks and strokes ... Researchers believe that GPs are reluctant to prescribe such medication for the elderly as they are worried about the possible side-effects." [emphasis added]

Researchers speculate? Who cares?! What do the doc's themselves offer by way of explanation? Well, it may soon become illegal for British physicians to refuse treatment to elderly folks, which is nice.

In theory.

The reality is a bit different, though:

"A map produced by The Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation, using the latest NHS data, shows that in some areas patients are twice as likely to be offered surgery."

This in response to claims that Brits with lung cancer face an uphill battle to receive treatment. In point of fact, MVNHS© results in this area are abysmal, revealing that "only a third of hospital trusts met its 80 per cent target of referrals ... The map shows big variations in two affluent areas of southern England."

But, but, but ... national health care schemes are the most fair, offering equal treatment to all. Yes, but some demographics are more equal than others, wink wink, nudge nudge.

Don't just take our word for it, though; here's an actual victim patient:

"I had no idea then that a patient had died from thirst. My fear of the place was born from my own bitter experiences ... Almost everyone I know locally has a story to tell about its services falling short ... After a four-hour wait, a female doctor looked at my weeping skin and said: ‘Dermatology is not an emergency at weekends.’

Luckily for Ms Kite, the "free" system isn't the only game in town. Those with dollars pounds to spare can opt for "a  private hospital where, for £100, a doctor diagnosed a nasty form of eczema and put me on steroids."

Meanwhile, "regular" folks can look forward to sharing the fate of Kane Gorny, a 22 year who had just successfully fought brain cancer. Unfortunately, he "needed drugs to regulate his hormone levels ... during a hospital stay nurses forgot to give him his medication" and he promptly became the late Kane Gorny.

Once again underscoring the truly insidious nature of nationalized health care (aka ObamaTax).

Domino's Part Deux

And speaking of Domino's . . .     

What happens to all those hundreds of thousand of people covered by risk pools and PCIP?

Come 2014 these money-losing plans are no longer needed. You can say goodbye to COBRA as well, at least for those who lose their employer coverage after January.

With 10,000 baby boomers turning 65 every day there will be more than 5,000,000 new beneficiaries on Medicare when the calendar turns over to January 1, 2014.

And then there are 15,000,000+ who will become eligible for Medicaid on that date.

It takes about 10 years to produce a new doctor. Will we have enough medical personnel to handle all these people? 

Will the federal government have the funds, and personnel to administer health insurance for 20,000,000 more people in January, 2014?

With 43 million on Medicare now, and 54 million on Medicaid, where will the money and staff come from to handle another 20 million new "policyholders"?

Did anyone in Washington bother to think this through?

And this just in, courtesy of Holly Robinson . . .

(Ohio) Gov. John Kasich says he doesn’t know if the state can afford adding more poor, uninsured Ohioans to Medicaid rolls as called for in President Barack Obama’s health-care law.

Even if Ohio opts out of expanding Medicaid, as the U.S. Supreme Court ruled last month states could do, the Kasich administration projects nearly 400,000 Ohioans already eligible will sign up, costing taxpayers $940 million in 2014 and 2015.

That price tag cited by Kasich, a staunch opponent of Obama’s health-care law, is 63 percent ($365 million) higher than projections his administration produced a little more than a year ago.

Domino's

The tiles, not the pizza. Stack them up, give them a little push, watch them fall.  


Years ago Pete Seeger penned a song titled "Where have all the flowers gone?". Recorded and made famous by the Kingston Trio and Peter, Paul and Mary in the 60's, the song, with some lyric modifications might now be re-titled "Where have all the carriers gone?".


Much has been discussed and cussed about Obamacare but very little has been said about the impact on the economy once Obamacare unfolds in 2014 and beyond.


Many carriers will simply withdraw from the market rather than put up with the frustration. The ones that remain will scale back their operations. Support staff, including home office service reps, claims adjudicators and premium accounting staffers will go. Regional offices will close.


Sales reps that promote individual major med and small group insurance plans will be the first to go, starting about a year from now in the summer of 2013. Underwriters will depart in early 2014.


How many thousands of people will lose jobs, how many offices will go dark?


Hard to calculate at this point.


How much will this impact a failing economy?


And what will happen when the carriers finally leave the market entirely? When, not if, because they will eventually withdraw and we will have Medicare for everyone.


States will lose a major tax base as the health insurance business shifts from the private sector to government (taxpayer) funded plans. Premium taxes rank in the top 3 revenue sources for every state. Those lost revenues will have to be made up somewhere else and there will be further reductions in state provided services.


The hits just keep on coming.


How is this working for you?

Stormy Weather: Buckeye style

Got this in email:

"Due to the severe weather throughout Ohio on June 29, 2012, the Ohio Department of Insurance has issued a notice requesting that insurance companies give affected subscribers additional time to pay their insurance premiums."

We had some rip-roaring weather hear the end of last month; lots of folks lost power for days, even weeks. The "request" is really a bit more than "pretty please," though:

"The bulletin, 2012-02, states that insurance companies are to give those who have been directly impacted by the storms 60 days from the date the premium was due to pay their premiums, interest free ... This request to insurers derives from the Federal Emergency Declaration for the state"

Still, it's nice that those seriously affected by the storms and subsequent power loss get a little breathing room.

[Hat Tip: MMO]

Company Check Up

How well is your health insurance company doing under the Obamacare regime and MLR? The mandated Medical Loss Ratio was intended to keep premiums down and penalize carriers that were viewed as greedy.        

As we have stated before, regulating premiums AND "profit" margins is nonsensical in a competitive market place but try telling that to the folks in Washington who have never held a real job.

None the less, if you want to know how carriers in your state have done, the architects of the final solution to eliminate free choice with regard to health insurance are providing data at HealthCare.

We decided to look at some Georgia health insurance companies and see how they fared under Obamacare MLR.

What follows is a summation by carrier name, individual MLR, rebate, small group MLR, small group rebate.

Company	Individual MLR	Rebate	Group MLR	Rebate
Blue Cross	83.3%	0	82.6%	$0
Coventry	68.4%	$44	80.3%	0
Kaiser	126.7%	0	90.5%	0
Humana	113.5%	0	81.5%	0
United Healthcare	NA	0	84.0%	0

Missing from the report are Assurant, Aetna, Celtic and Cigna. If a carrier has fewer than 1000 policyholders for that particular line of coverage they are not subject to MLR rules.

United has fewer than 1000 individual major medical policyholders and are not subject to MLR for that line, but are subject to MLR for small group.

If you were covered by an individual major medical or small group plan from any of the above carriers only those with a Coventry individual plan got a rebate.

Don't spend your $44 in one place.

Obamacare is supposed to bring down the cost of health insurance.

How is this working for you?

Trendy Diabetics

So, received an interesting piece of mail yesterday from my primary life company: Current Trends in Diabetes and Underwriting Diabetic Applicants.

(And yes, I am geeky enough that I find this stuff fascinating)

Turns out, a lot of the hype we see and hear on TV and the radio isn't really hype, after all, The mailing quoted CDC studies which revealed that:

■ The number of Americans diagnosed with diabetes more than tripled from 1980 to 2010

■ In 2010, more than 200,000 Americans under age 20 had diabetes

■ Almost 80 million Americans are considered "pre-diabetic."

In a follow-up conversation with my underwriter, I was told that this carrier alone (hardly one of the biggest names) receives over 300 apps a year on folks who didn't even know they were diabetic.

Yikes!

Ironically Sensible

Political Calculation's "Ironman" has a VERY interesting question regarding the mandate ObamaTax and whether (come 2014) one should buy coverage or roll the dice:

"Does it make more financial sense for you to pay for health insurance or to pay the ObamaCare mandate tax instead?"

The premise is that, at least initially, the tax is going to be much less than the premium for most people, so why bother buying insurance until one actually needs it?

What makes this such an outstanding post is that he quantifies the problem, and offers readers a tool to calculate their decision.

Very cool.