There's a lot of fantastic stuff in that article, but I'll break it down for you here because I'm such a nice guy. The author shows case after case where hospitals are blatantly overcharging customers for everything from CT scans to gauze pads. And I'm not talking small overages either. Those gauze pads? Try $77 a box. A BOX. That's the same box you buy at Walgreens for $5. What's worse is that these "nonprofit" hospitals are turning the biggest profits in our country. Bigger than Exxon Mobile, bigger than Apple, it's disgusting... and because they are "nonprofit," they get to enjoy all of the tax benefits that come along with it. Their CEOs are making four, five, 7 BILLION dollars a year. Billion. And if you're not already sick, here's where it gets really shady. Most of these overcharges are based on prices that they make up. Look in that article for stuff about the "chargemaster," a document that puts arbitrary costs on everything the hospital bills you for.
And when the author confronted the hospitals, the doctors, the government, he basically got a big shrug from all of them. The message was "yeah, so, that's just how it is." No one other than patients and billing advocates seemed to care the slightest bit that these hospitals are gouging us beyond repair. As the author says, by bringing these prices down to where they would be if you were to buy the same products at a drug store, the country would save tens of billions of dollars each year.
Wait, wait. What does this have to do with the country? See, this problem goes all the way down. It starts with the medical manufacturers, the people who make the drugs and who make the equipment. The overcharge for what they are creating. The hospitals happily pay that price, because it then justifies their markup even more. By markup I mean a drug that costs a hospital $2,000 to buy, they charge you $40,000 for it. That's a serious markup. And your insurance company will netotiate with the hospital to knock off some of that price -- but not much -- and then gloat to you about how much money they are helping you save. All of these forces then work together to lobby congress, basically buying them off so that they don't regulate any of these prices. And who gets screwed? All of us.
So here's the part where my opinions on healthcare completely changed. Because of this article, I now believe that the government ABSOLUTELY should be intervening in the healthcare of this country.
Hear me out. I'm not talking about taking over healthcare, doing the whole "death panels" thing, or that they should be covering the payments for your healthcare or hiring doctors or anything like that. But what I discovered is that the only entity that has ANY kind of negotiating power with these hospitals is Medicare. And the reason Medicare is able to negotiate prices down to more reasonable levels (like from $30,000 down to $4,000) is because they have such a huge client base that the hospitals actually need them in order to stay as profitable... er, NONprofitable... as they are.
I honestly had no idea that there was this level of corruption in our healthcare system. Maybe I'm stupid, I don't know. But the fact that we are all going in circles shows me that there is no such thing as a "free market" in that industry. It's similar to the cell phone companies. Everyone is in everyone else's pocket, and together they are slowly making us all more and more poor. Because they work together (AGAINST us), they are able to continually jack up prices and we are the ones who get screwed. We're basically reaching a point in this country where if you get something as serious as cancer or heart disease, you might as well just die... because in order to survive you are going to saddle yourself and your loved ones with so much debt that you will be essentially ruining their lives to save your own. What's the point of healthcare if that's the outcome?
Here's what I propose. Medicare should become available to us all. It should no longer be taxpayer funded, it should instead be run as a private insurance company, but managed by the government. Why leave it to the government? Because then it can be forced by LAW to keep its subscribers first and over profits. When there's no incentive for Medicare to raise prices on us, it won't do it. But if Medicare steps in as a private insurance provider and says "hey you can stick with Metlife and pay these ridiculous prices, or you can sign up for Medicare and pay the same premiums, but you get these enormous discounts," why would you NOT sign up?
If Medicare goes that route, it helps all of us. It takes the burden off the government (and taxpayers) to have to pay for the care of the elderly. It becomes self-funded because of all the young people paying into it as an insurance provider. It also forces other competing insurance companies to lower their premiums, improve payout amounts, and put pressure on the hospitals to lower their markups. If hospitals are receiving pressure from everyone, essentially we are a "union" forcing them to do what's right... and they will, or else they will run the risk of going out of business.
To be clear, I am still not a supporter of Obamacare. I do not believe the government has a right to FORCE me or anyone to have medical insurance. I also don't believe there is any way for government to play nice with private insurance or hospital companies without room for SERIOUS corruption. But I do think there is a way that the government can step into the world of healthcare, play by the rules, and still forcibly keep everyone honest.
I really hope you read that article. Here's a link to it again, just in case you're too lazy to scroll all the way back up to the top of this entry. Yes it's a long read, but it is important, important stuff. If we as a country do not get a grip on this now, in 20, 30, 40 years we are going to be wondering how we suddenly went bankrupt. I'm no genius, but I can see what's on the horizon. And I know it's more complicated than the solution I proposed, but why not START in that direction and see where we wind up? It's time for us to say a big "fuck you" to these politicians, these rich-ass insurers, and these hospitals that take advantage and make a mockery out of the idea of "saving lives."
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