Bill Moyers interviews Cigna Exec re: Health Care in America

I think our health care system in the United States is inexcusable. Aside from the fact that I have 2 children with Type 1 Diabetes, our national health care crisis is crippling our economy. I know many of you would play music and run your own businesses if you were not tied to some job for health care...While law enforcement and peoples attention are watching an idiot hang a flag upside down ( as is his right) in a town of 1000 people hoping to open a business, this REAL problem is continually pushed aside in the media and in the public forum.

Read this...It is jaw dropping.

Original link

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I saw the interview and it is sad, but the good news is that the gentleman from Cigna was able to change his perspective. That means that others like him may also be able to do this as well.

Apparently Congress(Dems) have a new $1.5 trillion health care plan to roll out!

Read this....

Really good piece!

Watching this just reinforces just how f'd up the whole system is. Time to grab our pitchforks and torches folks.

I didn`t clink the link yet but all I will say is that the problem with the entire health system is human greed. There is so much $$$ being made that those who have the power to change this must first let go of greed and trade it in for compassion. Until that happens, nothing will change.

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I've had one raise in 5 years while working for a mostly state funded non-profit MH agency. While the state has cut our funding and the number of services has increased, our insurance rates have grown dramatically. The agency pays 60 percent of the cost. More and more employees are dropping insurance because they cannot afford the increase.

On the other side, while there is a push to force insurance companies to provide mental health services they have a way to counter. Make sure it cost an agency like us more to bill and collect money from them than it is worth.

Things we run into:

Services must be pre-approved. - If a service is given before approval we don't get paid. If a patient arrives in crisis they are supposed to sit there while their services are approved.

Request for services must be done by the clinician. - With many companies the receptionist cannot call the insurance company for approval of services. It must be the clinician. This can take up to an hour of the clinician

Umm, you made your point...thanks for playing..

Health care is a social issue, not a political one.

It certainly is a political issue when you consider the amount of government involvement in providing health care.

I`m with Dean on this Billster. Part of the problem is politics and all the politicians receiving some kickback. Again, its all greed.

Someones health should not be debatable or voted on. If you need help, you get it. Thats it.

I`m with Dean on this Billster. Part of the problem is politics and all the politicians receiving some kickback. Again, its all greed. Someones health should not be debatable or voted on. If you need help, you get it. Thats it.

So from that I can infer that you favor eliminating Medicare, Medicaid, and any other form of insurance subsidy? That you oppose the Canadian or European social medicine models that rely on government funding and administration?

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Currently, aside from Medicare and Medicaid, government is not involved in health care and they won't really be if they pass so called health care reform. What is being worked on in congress is insurance reform and its not reform, it will be enshrining the current system with changes around the edges. Getting everyone on health insurance is not health care reform but it does help the insurance companies to make even more money.

Real health care reform would be what most politicians tell you that you can't have. You go to the doctor and the government pays. This is the system in every other major industrialized country in the world. We are always presented with horror stories of such systems but those exceptions are presented to us by wealthy Americans who have a vested interest in the way things are. There will be no savings from and nothing better about the insurance reform we are all about to receive, it is a boondoggle to benefit the insurance industry, plain and simple.

I hate to be pessimistic because I do believe people can change how they feel but from what I saw in that interview, he looks like an older man who is pretty much set financially and is retired or pretty close to it. What does he have to lose? Now get a kid up there whos just starting out making $100,000 with two babies and a mortgage; basically just starting out and is not "set", lets see how much he has to say against the system!

If you eliminate all the political BS involved and all the politicians with their own agendas and $$$ kickbacks, there is no need to subsidize. If you need something, you get it. Very simple concept. The $200 antibiotic goes down in price to .$75 because no one is getting rich from the sale.

Why do so many people feel the healthcare system needs to be a profitable one? I don`t get that. Call me naive but when we have lost compassion for fellow human beings, all hope is lost.

Yeah, many of those "wealthy Americans" being politicians.

Except the government gets the money from citizens, so that means people that use more health care are subsidized by people that don't get sick. So that's a political problem right there because it takes money from one group and passes it to another.

If we want to discuss reforming the social aspects of health care, then you have to address things like the exorbitant costs of end-of-life care, the questionable use of heroic treatments in all circumstances, and the realities of infant mortality. :poke:

You are 78 years old. You are diabetic, have high blood pressure, and arterial sclerosis. Despite treatment for the last 20 years, these chronic conditions have required that your toes be amputated, and you have such limited stamina that you can't walk a single flight of steps.

Now you have symptoms that may be signs of a colon cancer. Simply diagnosing requires either an invasive procedure or highly advanced equipment such as a CT or MRI. Should that diagnose your disease, treatment will require surgery, hospitalization, rehabilitation, and chemotherapy that may or may not kill you in the process. Even if successful you will now be 80 years old and still have your various chronic conditions and have spent two years in and out of the hospital.

But hey, if you need it, you get it. Simple, right? :poke:

Hey Bill, that is EXACTLY it. Because we are supposed to err on the side of TREATING people.

And, I hope you are not inferring that each of these chronic illnesses is an 'at fault' illness, rather than a genetic predisposition, lack of adequate health care early (due to the corporate insurance environment or the neglect of say, the VA).

This is exactly what we should be providing our citizens. If they want to keep insurance private? Fine. I want a 1 to 1 tax credit on every dollar spent.

The same medications we pay out the nose for here ( say a $78 bottle of Lantus-long acting-insulin) costs under $2.00 in many nations, and 1/2 in all others.

Did you look at the Bill Moyers link?

Did you see Sicko (which is referenced in the above link)?

Perhaps you saw Sick Around the World on Frontline?

We, Americans are getting bankrupted by a broken, money grab based system, and after they grab the cash, you get to DIE of your illness. Healthy people generally work and pay taxes and contribute to society.

I found the part about Michael Moore extremely interesting. That Cigna actually participated in smear campaign against Moore's movie is very disturbing. Especially when you realize that the talking points the health care industry put out about Moore were quoted by all of the right wing talking heads and their followers. He basically said that the Michael Moore movie was true.

It costs $2 in poor nations because somebody here is paying $78. If everyone paid $40, then the people in poor nations wouldn't have it at all because they can't afford $40. So that's just another form of subsidy. Do you object to people in poor nations having medicine? Again, I'm not intending to be flip, but these choices do not exist in a vacuum.

So you`re saying, let them suffer?

No, I'm saying palliative care, which it seem to me almost no one else ever discusses.

For anyone else's benefit (I looked it up to be sure)

Palliative care:

Medical or comfort care that reduces the severity of a disease or slows its progress rather than providing a cure. ...

Let me think on that one Blister......