Health Care debate Archives

Insurance Giveaway?

December 11, 2009 Philip Miller Comments 0 Comment

This just in from Robert Reich. Many of you have received this.

Hi. I’m Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor under President Clinton and currently a professor at the University of California.

You’ve probably heard about a possible “deal” in the Senate to do away with the public option.

I’m here to tell you that this is no deal: it’s a gift to Big Insurance, plain and simple.

To which Captain Renault of Casablanca would have retorted:

“I’m shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!”

We have repeated the same so many times: the insurance racqueteers ultimately will not lose this great battle of wills. And the gang of 5 who are now trying to finalize your Christmas present … are not much better.

Trying to Put Genie Back in the Bottle

November 19, 2009 Philip Miller Comments 1 comment

We have seen the emergence of “evidence-based medicine” in the last 10 years. This has been an effort to further legitimize and give scientific basis to common medical therapies. A medical version of “show me the money.” I have always thought this was rather inane, since it presumed that all medicine for the last 2000 years has been unscientific and irrational. Although the reality is medicine is not nearly as scientific as asserted. Only 10-20% of medical practice is based on sound scientific principles. This rankles most physicians who believe that conventional medicine is scientifically-based. The highest form of medicine is the practiced art using scientific principles and technology.

A series of US Task Force recommendations are being rolled out by the Department of Health and Human Services. These are well-intentioned and rational. Examining the literature and epidemiology of medical practices in an effort to determine what is safe, sane, practical and effective. The trap is “effective” as you will see.

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Health Care Reform: Pleasing Everyone and No One

November 5, 2009 Philip Miller Comments 0 Comment

After countless months the debate marches on. Congressional House and Senate bills proliferate. I have lost track. It is beyond our comprehension trying to read through each of these bills.

There have been many lost opportunities. This has never been about health care reform. This is about health insurance regulation. If you carefully sift through all the heartache stories and testimonials, you will see the real drama – unexpected hospitalizations. So the real crisis is coverage of catastrophic loss – astronomical hospital bills. Routine appendectomy — $50,000. Complicated heart attack — $250,000+. Catastrophe loss should have been the starting point.

Insurance is not the answer. It is the problem. Insurance subsidizes high costs.

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Wither Now Health Care?

August 30, 2009 Philip Miller Comments 0 Comment

[originally posted on Huffington Post]

The Patriarch of the Kennedy Dynasty has passed. Whither now health care reform? Why is this important?

For the last 40 years Edward Kennedy was the voice of the under-represented. His lifetime goal was a more perfect and accessible health care system in the United States. He worked tirelessly to achieve these goals. We are told that he counseled Barack Obama in the early days, “I will support you openly under the condition that you make health care the centerpiece of your administration.” Wise counsel. But this may have been a strategically and untenable position. Like the myth of Sisyphus, since the days of Franklin Roosevelt every president has aspired to a more perfect health care system.

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Dr. Philip Lee Miller

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Tag: Health Care debate