The editors dedication to doing so is evident even when their support of the "public option" doesn't square with the news the provide readers... as in this delicious morsel of cognitive dissonance from editor Anne Zieger...
Establishing a government-run public health plan to compete with private health plans may be a great idea, or the model may truly be rife with those nasty "unintended consequences" its opponents like to cite. I simply don't have enough data to tell you whether it's a good idea for the long term.
But what I can tell you is that as a blunt instrument, it seems that analysts are pretty much agreed that a public plan will have the immediate effect the Obama administration is hoping for, which is to drive down private health insurance costs. A new study by Lewin Group is only the most recent to project that a government-run plan would come in with much lower premiums than its private competitors--in its case 20 percent lower. And sure enough, private health plans will have to respond with big price cuts of their own.
True, if you're a financial manager reading this, one of those pesky "unintended consequences" is probably that you'll find that your reimbursements falling. Private health plans are going to pass those price cuts on to you, after all. Hopefully, you'll make up the difference by seeing far more insured patients walk in your doors, a deal that's pretty much on the table under any version of reform, but yes, for the short term you'll be in a scary place. Hopefully, though, the longer-term picture includes a more-stable system that works better for everybody.
Overall, the bottom line is that at present, giving way on a government-option plan is a pointless compromise that wastes not only an enormous amount of Congressional time and effort, but also a unique moment in history when the President, the Congress and the people are agreed that it's worth seeing everyone take some big bruises to fix some of health system's biggest problems.
Namby-pamby half-measures like a health co-op, which, let's face it, still has an incentive to keep its medical expense low so it can grow and attract new members, are feel-good nonsense which do nothing to take advantage of the government's powerful position in the industry. Create health co-ops and you've only added another player to basic capitalist cycle, not-for-profit though it may be.
So I say, come on now, Congressional leaders. Don't pussy-foot around--be honest and forceful about what the government option is intended to do. It's designed to hit the health insurance industry with a clue-by-four and let it know that the time of extreme profit-taking is on its way out. If you can't get that through, so be it, but at least you'll have fought the good fight. Don't let this once-in-a-lifetime chance to save countless Americans' lives and health go away because you refused to take a real stand. - Anne
Meanwhile there are these stories about the impact of government involvement on "profit taking"... (which will also affect Anne's job no doubt..)
According to a new analysis by The Lewin Group, under a health reform draft currently under consideration by Congress, the number of uninsured Americans would fall dramatically, by about 32. 6 million, and premiums for a "public option" plan would be an average of 20 percent less than private plans for families.
However, things don't look so rosy for providers, the report suggests. Hospitals that accept Medicare and other public plan reimbursements would see cuts that take them down to an average of 32 percent below what private health plans pay. Physicians would see their pay cut by an average of 14 percent below what private insurances pay out for a given treatment, Lewin's analysis concluded.
While Lewin doesn't make a big deal of it, apparently it does support the conclusion that a public plan would put considerable pressure on private plans to lower their premiums, something employers and consumers are likely to favor. However, clearly providers face a real threat here. This data is definitely something to chew on..
Yes indeed, especially since a lot of those private sector providers are in the non-profit sector, and accept a whole bunch of Medicaid and Medicare folks already. Meanwhile there is this, also in Fiercehealthfinance...
The next few months shouldn't be much better for non-profit hospital systems than the first half of 2009 was, according to a new report from financial ratings firm Standard & Poor's. S&P says that with the recession continuing to grind away at balance sheets and credit market troubles limiting access to cash, systems are continuing to struggle.
The agency reports that median operating margins fell or remained flat for the 134 systems it rates, regardless of their credit rating. Overall, the median operating margin for the group was 2.4 percent, compared with 2.8 percent the prior year.
Net margins, which take into account plunging investment income, fell from 6.3 percent in 2007 to 2.5 percent in 2008. Meanwhile, cash reserves were sapped as health systems used savings for capital investments and pension funds, and to post collateral on interest-rate hedges known as swaps.
As a result of these pressures, health system rating downgrades doubled in 2008, to 18, with S&P lowering the outlook for 27 systems, up from 14 such actions the previous year.
To learn more about the S&P report:
Read this American Medical News piece
I am sure all that public reimbursement will make the non-profit situation just namby-pamby....
Good thing Anne has that quality of care and impact on life expectancy and morbidity issue worked too... particularly among the chronically ill seniors, poor minorities and low birth weight neonates... but maybe that's just the namby-pamby in me...
At least Zieger is honest: a government takeover of health is a blunt instrument: price controls and rationing.
Now I am wondering if she was being sarcastic or serious?
Read more here
