The GOP's war on health care consumers

We are a country that is besieged by     a  political war on health care consumers.  . It is clear on whose side  is the GOP : it is not us, , the patients and the potential patients. We, the end user of health care, are collateral damage to political battles over how to repair a sick  system that leaves so many out and bankrupts many, with  the prognosis it will  get sicker.

The   GOP ,is dedicated and  determined  to repeal Obamacare or terminally delay it.  They want you to forget what a consumer oriented piece of legislation it is.

The current GOP hollering  is all about 2014 talking points in  individual races.  The campaign to repeal Obamacare  is a Don Quixote quest because  even if the Senate turns Republican in 2014,  Obama has two more years to veto any Congressional attempt to kill it.   

The GOP’s goal  also appears  to make sure their business base sees Obamacare as a bane, as  they spread misleading information, or commit  sins of omissions in characterizing the law. It is a strategy banking on  perpetuating  ignorance .:” It is too long to read; too hard to understand; so throw it all out.”

 They war whooped  with glee when the President  delayed  one part  until 2015:   collecting a penalty that  would be imposed  on businesses with more than 50 employees that failed to offer insurance. It only affects those which did not already offer health insurance. That affects no more than 1% of all employees,  6%  of all  businesses (only 2%  with over 200 employees) . Everything else takes effect in 2014,  including individual mandates and the exchanges.

Here is what the GOP  would want to  happen to all of us who are  consumers  if they could repeal Obamacare:  

We would again be denied coverage for pre-existing conditions,  30 million of us will not be able to get affordable insurance,   college age kids will no longer be required to be on their family’s insurance, and once again there will be high deductibles for mammograms, prostate screening, and colonoscopies .Once again there will be  bankrupting deductibles for our insurance or  too high employer  provided premiums .  Obamacare premiums will be subsidized by income level to make costs affordable. With Obamacare’s repeal, those provisions go away.

Repeal Obamacare and insurance companies would  be able to return to their prior practices of raking off more than 20% of  premiums for their overhead and profits.  Their virtual monopoly will continue. . In fact, the exchanges will be the first truly free market for insurance since all premiums and  all benefits will be open to large numbers of insurers and published side by side comparing apples with apples.    

Businesses, too, will benefit  since they can use the same public  information to negotiate better deals for insurance they offer their employees and small businesses will have access to their own exchanges and group rates only offered to large businesses before

Here is how the competition in  open market exchanges have already worked to drive down costs. In California and Oregon  insurance premiums offered through the exchanges came in as much as  25%  below the actuarial  forecasts or prior published rates. This is also  good for the cost of the program, since subsidies for lower income customers of the exchanges  will also  be lower.  

Piously, some members of the GOP pay lip service to the consumer benefits they like. However, they offer no way to cover the 30 million  uninsured or to pay for parts they like as covering pre-existing conditions. When you hear such pontifications, challenge them to tell you how they would pay for them.  It is that latter problem Obamacare addresses and the critics of health care reform who profess to care for consumers are blowing hot air.

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