Krugman: A Serious Drug Problem

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/06/opinion/06krugman.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

There was a brief flurry of outrage when Congress passed the 2003 Medicare bill. The news media reported on the scandalous vote in the House of Representatives: Republican leaders violated parliamentary procedure, twisted arms and perhaps engaged in bribery to persuade skeptical lawmakers to change their votes in a session literally held in the dead of night.

Later, the media reported on another scandal: it turned out that the administration had deceived Congress about the bill's likely cost.

But the real scandal is what's in the legislation. It's an object lesson in how special interests hold America's health care system hostage.

The new Medicare law subsidizes private health plans, which have repeatedly failed to deliver promised cost savings. It creates an unnecessary layer of middlemen by requiring that the drug benefit be administered by private insurers. The biggest giveaway is to Big Pharma: the law specifically prohibits Medicare from using its purchasing power to negotiate lower drug prices.

Outside the United States, almost every government bargains over drug prices. And it works: the Congressional Budget Office says that foreign drug prices are 35 to 55 percent below U.S. levels. Even within the United States, Veterans Affairs is able to negotiate discounts of 50 percent or more, far larger than those the Medicare actuary expects the elderly to receive under the new plan.

[tabasco]

1. Professor Krugman is such a genius.

I really like the way he writes. He has a very good style of writing which is easy to understand. He helps people like myself, i.e., not too savvy with economics, understand the complexities of this legislation. He has been very pessimistic about our economy under Bush and of course he is right.

[Beetwasher]

2. The US Is Now Really Just One Gigantic Ponzi Scheme

99% of the population are just marks getting bilked by Bushco.

[Dr Ron]

3. Give away to pharmaceutical companies and insurance companies

Besides the above advantages to drug companies, the bill also wastes money to benefit the insurance companies by wasting money on Medicare HMO's. Private insurance companies have four times the overhead of Medicare so this is just a drain from the system.

Conservatives claim to be worried about increased government control over health care, but HMO's are far more restrictive (on both doctors and patients) than traditional Medicare. Apparently restrictions coming from big business are ok as long as they aren't from the government.

[jbnow]

4. We'd have done better

to have no drug plan, just used the negotiating power for Medicare recipients. The feds do it for the programs they pay for such as Medicaid and veterans hospitals. It would have cost the taxpayers nothing (except the cost of the negotiator) and saved seniors and disabled more money.

I suspect some of the votes it got from Dem's was fear of how it would sound if they voted against "helping seniors".

There is so much deception around the passage of this bill and "hidden" horrors in it. Things like complete lack of coverage between about 2,000 and 5,000 of the drug cost. (But people are still paying the premium while they are paying 100% of the costs in that time.)

Or the ban on coverage for the gap, people can't buy insurance for what the plan doesn't cover. The only explanation i heard for this was by some senator that said people abuse what they get for free. I'd respect that idea more if this was their health care plan, though they could much better afford the costs.

There will also be a restrictive list of what is covered. If people need a drug not on that list it does not count toward their portion or spend-down. Doctors can try to get exceptions but that will cost us doctors.

I know several doctors who quit taking Medicaid patients when this state restricted approved prescriptions for them. Doctors want to prescribe drugs they think are best, but the time and hassle of getting exceptions was too much. They had put up with the low payments of Medicaid, but they gave up when that rule passed and it was so time consuming.

I have so many more complaints...but this is a horrible plan. Horrible for Medicare recipients and the taxpayers, horrible for everyone but the drug and insurance companies.