What Is All That Noise Anyway?

Bill Moyers had an enlightening panel discussion of healthcare reform on his show on Sunday. Here are some thoughts that I came away with from the exchange between his panelists...

Ours is the only country where the vast majority of service is provided by entities in the for-profit sector. Those entities are primarily interested in making profits, not improving health.

The panelists were openly pessimistic, opining that the lobbyists for the for-profit interests will gut the public option, making it attractive only to the highest-cost medical users, leaving the lesser-cost and more profitable insurance business covering healthier citizens for the private sector. Meaning, of course, that the really expensive medical care and care for those that don't have or can't afford insurance will be left to the government to pay for...I guess they meant for us taxpayers to pay for.

Moyers' panelists openly feared that the result will wind up being very satisfactory to the for the for-profit sector (mandatory health insurance which they will provide will be enacted) with healthcare for the "poor" and uninsured being left to the government to pay for. Because the "public option" will be gutted, the government will be left to pay the higher premiums set by the private sector for insurance they will offer to cover the poor and uninsured in new and more profitable groups of insureds.

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That feels about right to me. The vast sturm-und-drang going on in Congress is the sound of the battle of armies of lobbyists with their closely allied politicians trying to come up with something that satisfies the desires of competing special interests. The welfare of the citizenry, who will ultimately pay for healthcare reform--as long as it's not the for-profit special interests--is an afterthought.

If anyone wants to talk about a "transfer of wealth", it'll be a transfer out of taxpayer's pockets into the pockets of the insurance companies, drug companies, hospitals, medical research firms, and maybe, just maybe the doctors. No doubt the prospect of such an attractive transfer is what's causing all the posturing, sound-biting and bickering in Washington.

Is anyone worried about the unsustainable escalation of healthcare cost? Are you kidding? If the special interests can get the "reform" changed for their benefit, quarterly earnings of healthcare companies will escalate and the resultant executive bonuses will be unimaginable. Long-term effect? Who cares...let the next generation of citizens and their elected representative worry about that.

A very pessimistic outlook which unfortunately matches my personal view.