The Mayo Clinic, praised by President Barack Obama as a national model for efficient health care, will stop accepting Medicare patients as of tomorrow at one of its primary-care clinics in Arizona, saying the U.S. government pays too little.
Mayo’s hospital and four clinics in Arizona, including the Glendale facility, lost $120 million on Medicare patients last year, Yardley said. The program’s payments cover about 50 percent of the cost of treating elderly primary-care patients at the Glendale clinic, he said.
Those greedy, selfish doctors. They only want to help themselves and those horrible insurance companies. Except, you know, health insurance companies only made about 2.2% profit in 2008. And those doctors are just trying to succeed in their chosen careers, running businesses (offices and hospitals, or in this case the Mayo Clinic), raising families, and paying off an average of $140,000 in medical school debt.
Let’s do some basic reasoning, shall we? It costs money to treat patients. The medical equipment, the drugs, the cost the building, salaries for receptionists, accountants, and other administrative staff… well, the list could go on, but I don’t have all day here. Since it costs money to treat people, medical professionals charge their patients for their services. Just like one pays for their home, clothing, groceries, transportation, and other necessities and/or frivolities. That’s just the way life works. If you want something, including medical care, you pay for it or find someone willing to give it to you.
Insert the government. The government has stepped into an arena where it has no business being, and demands that doctors not charge certain patients more than a given amount, regardless of the patient’s history or circumstances, and regardless of how much it actually costs to treat that patient. As stated above, the Mayo Clinic was only able to charge the government for about half of the cost spent treating Medicare patients. Well, the Mayo Clinic has bills to pay, so they have to get that money from somewhere. Guess where? The privately patients paying out of pocket or through their own private health insurance. Which is one of many reasons health insurance is so expensive.
The Mayo Clinic has given up trying to recoup any of the money lost to a government run health plan. They need to pay their bills. They need to make a profit so they can hire more doctors and researchers and scientists to discover and develop new ways to fight disease and illness. They can’t keep bleeding money to the government, and it’s not fair to their other patients, who have to involuntarily pick up the extra expenses.
How long before other facilities close their doors to government health care plans? How long before the government will force them to remain open? How long before the doctors quit? How long before the government forces them to remain doctors? I know it sounds extreme, but let’s follow the line along the path. The government will make it so unpleasant and unprofitable to practice medicine that no one will want to do it. Then to “fix” the problem that it created, the government might begin assigning careers to people…like they do in Communist China.
That’s a worst case scenario, of course. But why even take one step down that path? Let’s turn around and run the other way. Let’s privatize health care again. It’s the only system proven to truly work.
wwwexler says:
Not so fast. You LIE.
http://blog.aflcio.org/2009/05/27/health-insurance-profits-soar-as-industry-mergers-create-near-monopoly/
ealth Insurance Profits Soar as Industry Mergers Create Near-Monopoly
Bookmark and Share
by Mike Hall, May 27, 2009
Profits at 10 of the country’s largest publicly traded health insurance companies rose 428 percent from 2000 to 2007, while consumers paid more for less coverage. One of the major reasons, according to a new study, is the growing lack of competition in the private health insurance industry that has led to near monopoly conditions in many markets.
The report says such conditions warrant a Justice Department investigation and, says Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), provide compelling evidence of the need for a public health insurance plan option as part of the health care reform initiative President Obama and Congress are developing.
Schumer says the report from Health Care for America Now! (HCAN)
is the starkest evidence yet that the private health care insurance market is in bad need of some healthy competition. A public health insurance option is critical to ensure the greatest amount of choice possible for consumers.
According to the recently released HCAN report, “Premiums Soaring in Consolidated Health Insurance Market“:
In the past 13 years, more than 400 corporate mergers have involved health insurers, and a small number of companies now dominate local markets but haven’t delivered on promises of increased efficiency. According to the American Medical Association, 94 percent of insurance markets in the United States are now highly concentrated, and insurers are thriving in the anti-competitive marketplace, raking in enormous profits and paying out huge CEO salaries.
These mergers and consolidations have created a marketplace where a small number of larger companies use their power to raise premiums—an average of 87 percent over the past six years—restrict and reduce benefit packages and control and cut provider payments.
In a letter to the Department of Justice’s Anti-Trust Division, Richard Kirsch, HCAN national campaign manager, and David Balto, former policy director of the Federal Trade Commission and now senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, write:
Simply put, the private insurance companies have secured monopolies or tight oligopolies and exercised that power to put profits ahead of patients….There were no actions taken against anticompetitive conduct by health insurers in the last administration, in spite of the fact that cases by state attorneys general have secured massive fines against these insurers. A lack of antitrust enforcement has enabled insurers to acquire dominant positions in almost every metropolitan market.
They ask for an investigation of the already consummated mergers that “harm competition or create an anticompetitive market structure.” They also urge the Justice Department to conduct investigations of “anticompetitive conduct by dominant insurance companies and challenge that conduct where appropriate.”
Many dominant insurers limit the ability of providers to choose rival insurers or inform patients about more efficient and comprehensive coverage. The DOJ should investigate tools used to stifle competition such as physician gag clauses, most favored nations provisions, all-products clauses, and silent networks, which prevent providers and consumers from having the full range of competitive alternatives.
Schumer last week co-sponsored a Senate resolution urging the creation of a public health plan option and says a public health plan “is critical to ensure the greatest amount of choice possible for consumers.”
We believe that it is fully possible to create a public health insurance plan that delivers all the benefits of increased competition without relying on unfair, built-in advantages. If a level playing field exists, then private insurers will have to compete based on quality of care and pricing, instead of just competing for the healthiest consumers.
Click here for a copy of the full report.
Tell us what you think should be included in comprehensive health care reform. Take the 2009 Health Care for America Survey. The survey gives you the opportunity to make your voice heard and helps shape health care reform to meet the needs of working families.
January 1, 2010, 2:01 pmJenny says:
I believe I said profits overall, not profits at the ten largest insurance companies. Don’t call me a liar without backing it up with something relevant.
January 1, 2010, 2:11 pmBob says:
1. The fact that the 10 largest health insurance companies have a monopoly on providing insurance to people residing in many states is all the more reason to allow people to shop across state lines!
2. The point is that when the government intervenes and dictates pay to doctors, hospitals, etc., it will automatically move payments to the government’s advantage, which means no profits. When the medical community no longer has the money to invest in research and draw top talent, the quality of our health care system will slide to unacceptable levels… only it will be too late to change it back because once the govt. gets its claws into something, they never let go. We’ll just have to live with sorry health care and pretend like its great, like the people in Canada and Britain do.
Wex, calling people a liar is low-class man. Jenny made her point that the 2.2% profit was for all 1,700 insurance companies, not the top 10. She was right and you owe her an apology. Make your point, but make it with some class.
January 1, 2010, 3:06 pmwwwexler says:
You are in denial if you don’t recognize what’s going on.
No hope for you, you only see what you want to see. The health insurance industry is ruining the economy of this nation and your bullshit phony numbers are just part of the ignorance that allows the system to continue.
January 1, 2010, 4:45 pmJenny says:
My numbers are phony? You’re the one only accounting for a select portion of the insurance companies.
January 2, 2010, 12:20 pmAaden Black says:
Hi, just read this blog, very informative. I will definately be coming back. Can’t wait to read more …
January 18, 2010, 12:09 pmscotty says:
when the law works; use the law. when the facts work; use the facts. when neither work; jump up and down and call someone a liar.
January 6, 2011, 10:40 pm