Massachusetts near-universal health insurance

Massachusetts Faces Costs of Big Health Care Plan

Three years ago, Massachusetts enacted perhaps the boldest state health care experiment in American history, bringing near-universal coverage to the commonwealth with Paul Revere speed.
To make it happen, Democratic lawmakers and Gov. Mitt Romney, a Republican, made an expedient choice, deferring until another day any serious effort to control the state’s runaway health costs.
The day of reckoning has arrived. Threatened first by rapid early enrollment in its new subsidized insurance program and now by a withering economy, the state’s pioneering overhaul has entered a second, more challenging phase.
Thanks to new taxes and fees imposed last year, the health plan’s jittery finances have stabilized for the moment. But government and industry officials agree that the plan will not be sustainable over the next 5 to 10 years if they do not take significant steps to arrest the growth of health spending.
With Washington watching, the state’s leaders are again blazing new trails. Both Gov. Deval Patrick, Mr. Romney’s Democratic successor, and a high-level state commission have set out to revamp the way public and private insurers reimburse physicians and hospitals.
They want a new payment method that rewards prevention and the effective control of chronic disease, instead of the current system, which pays according to the quantity of care provided. By late spring, the commission is expected to recommend such a system to the legislature…………..

Bold for emphasis – this is code for rationing care. Is this what American’s want, reduction of the quality of care to save costs?

This is the inevitable conclusion to any government run health insurance system, rationing to save costs.

National health insurance is great in concept until you are sick and actually need treatment.

Obama mulls making vets foot bill for service injuries

Obama mulls making vets foot bill for service injuries

The Obama administration is considering making veterans use private insurance to pay for treatment of combat and service-related injuries. The plan would be an about-face on what veterans believe is a long-standing pledge to pay for health care costs that result from their military service.

But in a White House meeting Monday, veterans groups apparently failed to persuade President Obama to take the plan off the table.

Enough said, if Obama pushes this through Congress, it will prove some of the things I have read about him and his hatred of the people in the military. I try hard to not believe it but to even mention something like this is just disgusting to me. Just like it was disgusting when the Bush administration tried to ignore the problems at Walter Reed.

This could all be part of the national/universal health insurance plan since it will do away with private insurance.

Truly injured/disabled vets deserve the full financial support of the America people and government, anything short of this is not acceptable.