tagged w/ Health Insurance
-
-
Washington lobbyists have been enjoying a multi-million-dollar sugar rush from the food industry.
Soft drink makers, supermarket companies, agriculture and the fast-food business have poured millions into campaigning against what they fear could be a burgeoning national movement to raise money for health care reform by taxing sweetened beverages.
During the first nine months of 2009, the industry groups stepped up their lobbying in Congress. They have spent more than $24 million on the issue of a national excise tax on sweetened beverages and on other legislative and regulatory issues, according to an examination of lobbying reports filed with the Senate Office of Public Records. The review shows that 21 companies and organizations reported that they lobbied specifically on the proposed tax on sugar-sweetened beverages - which among other things would include sodas, juice drinks and chocolate milk.
About $5 million of the money was spent on a national advertising campaign aimed at Capitol Hill lawmakers and promoting a newly formed coalition called Americans Against Food Taxes . The group bills itself on its website as a coalition of "responsible individuals, financially-strapped families, [and] small and large businesses" but its 400-plus membership list is dominated by industry heavyweights such as Burger King Corporation, Coca Cola, Pepsico and Domino's Pizza.
Many health officials and advocacy groups have argued for years that sugary drinks, particularly those with high-fructose corn syrup, have been key contributors to a rise in obesity rates in the United States, especially among children. Some argue that the time is right for a soda tax, which they say could not only cut consumption but also generate revenue to close state budget gaps and pay for new health care programs.
A proposal for a national excise tax on soft drinks surfaced in a May funding policy options paper during the Senate Finance Committee's deliberations on health care reform. Food lobbyists attacked then and continued their efforts in July when President Obama raised the possibility of a soda tax in an interview with Men's Health magazine. The proposal has not emerged in any of the health care reform bills still in play on Capitol Hill.
But the issue may be gaining traction in some key states. This week, California lawmakers are holding a high-profile hearing in Los Angeles to examine the link between childhood obesity and sugary drinks. In New York, Gov. David Paterson has revived the idea of a sugared beverage tax after a previous proposal was shot down by the legislature earlier this year in the face of industry opposition.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/04/soda-tax-mobilizes-food-l_n_345840.htmlWashington lobbyists have been enjoying a multi-million-dollar sugar rush from the... more
-
-
Teaming with the liberal Brave New Films, a former Blue Cross pitchman is now pitching against Blue Cross.
Andy Cobb, who once tried to sell Floridians on a Blue Cross health insurance plan, says he's fed up with the industry.
"I was a spokesman for BlueCross and Blueshield of Florida," Cobb says. "Call me a spokesjerk. People who make money for buying things you don't need. And we're telling you lies."
"They, by which I mean I, make money by standing in the way of reform," Cobb says in the ad, which appears as a spoof of something like a freecreditreport.com ad. "It's time for change."
"That's why I'm calling on leaders from the spokesjerk industry," Cobb continues. "The freecreditreport.com guy. The Shamwow dude. And Senator Bill Nelson, recipient of big money from insurance companies -- to lead us. To walk away from their cash cows and tell American people the truth.
"And us spokesjerks, we'll be fine," Cobb adds. "There's plenty of room in entertainment for people who tried to sell you the worst product in American history. Private health insurance."
WATCH: Andy Cobb: Health Insurance "Worst Product In American History"
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/06/ex-blue-cross-spokesman-s_n_348281.html
Though this story was posted earlier I re posted it becuase it lacked a headline or story that reflected the story behind the video.Teaming with the liberal Brave New Films, a former Blue Cross pitchman is now pitching... more
-
-
For the 10th year in a row, SELF Magazine set out to determine the healthiest cities in America for women to live. Sara Austin, Features Director at SELF, announces this year’s winner and shares how other cities across the country measure up.For the 10th year in a row, SELF Magazine set out to determine the healthiest cities... more
-
-
Over 50,000 die every year for lack of health care and more for denial of care despite having health insurance. That's well over 100 deaths per day. 50 million (and growing) in the U.S. have no health care at all. This is why nine Lieberman constituents and members of Mobilization for Health Care Now were arrested today as they sat-in Lieberman's DC office and demanded to see him.
Five of the Lieberman Nine have been released. The other four intend to stay in jail until Lieberman meets with them to discuss rejecting the money he accepts from insurance companies!
Meanwhile ABC News reports: "Later we will see much a larger protest from the other side of the political spectrum as potentially thousands of protesters gather with Republican lawmakers on the West side of the Capitol. Those protesters will lobby against Democrats' health care bills in large part because they include a public option.."
Congress is getting it from all sides. Their compromises with the insurance industry infuriate progressives and as weak as what's left of a public option is, the right are protesting it's inclusion. You can't please everyone so you may as well have a single payer system, medicare for all, problem solved, which is what is buzzing about as we hear that Pelosi is allowing a vote on the Weiner amendment for a single payer system!
Huff post reports the following:
______________________________________________
Nine protesters were arrested Thursday in a demonstration at the office of Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) to demand that he pledge to stop accepting from the health insurance industry.
Lieberman, who last week said he would join a GOP filibuster of any health care bill with a government-run public option, has accepted about $1.5 million from health professionals and insurance agencies since 2003, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Twenty protesters, including four students from the University of Connecticut, marched into the senator's office in the morning and demanded to speak with him. Aides denied their request, offering constituents a closed-door meeting with two legislative aides, which was rejected. Nine protesters then staged a sit-in, saying they would not leave the office until they could have a discussion with the senator in person.
"We're waiting to see if the senator for Aetna is ready to be the senator for the people," explained one protester, Kai, who wouldn't give his last name. Aetna has spent over two million dollars on lobbying in 2009, and has donated $65,000 to Lieberman's campaign committee.
Within 10 minutes of the protesters' arrival, Capitol police were on the scene. They dragged away nine protesters, including two of Lieberman's Connecticut constituents, as Senate staffers watched from the lobby and office hallways.
After the arrests, five of the remaining protesters continued on to Lieberman's committee hearing, which was already underway. They stood in the back of the chamber and quietly held up signs reading "Patients Not Profits" and "Insurance $$$ Makes Me Sick."
"It's ironic Lieberman is chairing this meeting on corporate crimes," said Medea Benjamin, who characterized the practice of accepting campaign donations from health insurance companies as criminal.
_________________________________________________
http://mobilizeforhealthcare.org/2009/11/05/abc-national-news-video-about-9-arrests-today-at-senator-liebermans-office-calling-for-lieberman-to-stop-accepting-insurance-company-money-money-that-should-be-used-to-pay-for-patients-care/
Mobilization for Health care has a petition to sign urging Lieberman to "publicly pledge that he will no longer accept any money from any insurance companies." (http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/1312/t/10007/petition.jsp?petition_KEY=2159)
Over 2000 signed this petition within just a few hours of this story breaking.Over 50,000 die every year for lack of health care and more for denial of care despite... more
-
-
Sucks.
Yes there are positives touted by Pelosi et al. But the negatives outweigh the positives:
- No effective cost containment mechanisms
- A negligible pubic option (you remember the public option don't you?)
- Will not result in making health care more affordable
- Many provisions that will benefit corporate stakeholders (no kidding, it was written by insurance lobbyists)
- This loophole has been added—“while making sure that such a
change doesn’t further destabilize the current individual health insurance
market.”
- No say over reimbursement and
coverage policies
All of this from a progressive health reform website. The article contines with the following:
__________________________________________________
In sum, this $1.055 trillion plan over ten years will not fix the major problems of cost and affordable access to health care in our deteriorating system, will add new layers of bureaucracy and complexity to the present system, is not fiscally responsible, and is not sustainable.
What to do now? Rather than accept an unworkable bill that is politically expedient, we would be better off to make a major course change. The best first option would be to call for a floor vote, as originally promised by the House Speaker Pelosi, for the amendment proposed by Anthony Weiner (D-NY) to substitute HR 676, a single-payer proposal, for HR 3962. If that fails, shelving this bill would be the best option, but if that is not possible, lawmakers should be pressed to retain the amendment proposed by Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) to allow states to experiment with single-payer plans, as a number of states would like to do (eg. California, Colorado, Illinois, Maine, New Mexico, New York and Pennsylvania). That amendment has already been passed by a rare bipartisan vote of 27-19 in the House Education and Labor Committee.
_________________________________________________
http://www.guaranteedhealthcare.org/blog/john-geyman-md-pnhp/2009/11/05/health-care-reform-2009-no-bill-is-better-than-a-bad-billSucks.
Yes there are positives touted by Pelosi et al. But the negatives outweigh... more
-
-
Several of the largest health insurance companies, including Cigna Corp. and Aetna Inc., rallied on Wall Street after Republicans won the governor seats in New Jersey and Virginia. The health insurance providers are hopeful the Republican victories will further their fight against the Democrats’ plans to overhaul their industry as part of health care reform.Several of the largest health insurance companies, including Cigna Corp. and Aetna... more
-
-
At the current pace of rate increases, on my 54th birthday I will pay over $1 million a year for health insurance. How about you?At the current pace of rate increases, on my 54th birthday I will pay over $1 million... more
-
-
After months of struggle, House Democrats unveiled sweeping legislation to extend health care coverage to millions of Americans who lack it and create a new option of government-run insurance.After months of struggle, House Democrats unveiled sweeping legislation to extend... more
-
-
What Joe Lieberman wants, in all probability, is attention.
The reason this is a little scary for Democrats is because the usual things that serve to motivate a Congressman don't seem to motivate Joe Lieberman.
Would voting to filibuster the Democrats' health care bill (if it contains a decent public option) endear Lieberman to his constituents? No; Connecticutians favor the public option 64-31.
Would it make his path to re-election easier? No, because it would virtually assure that Lieberman faces a vigorous and well-funded challenge from a credible, capital-D Democrat, and polls show him losing such a match-up badly.
Would it buy him more power in the Senate? No, because Democrats would have every reason to strip him of his chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee.
Is Lieberman's stance intended to placate the special interests in his state? Perhaps this is part of it -- there are a lot of insurance companies in Connecticut -- but Lieberman is generally not one of the more sold-out Senators, ranking 75th out of the 100-member chamber in the percentage of his fundraising that comes from corporate PACs.
Are there any particular compromises or concessions he wants in the bill? He hasn't stipulated any, at least not publicly.
Might he have a legitimate policy objection to the public option? Certainly there are some legitimate objections -- whether or not you agree with them. But Lieberman's objections don't make any sense. He says he's worried about blunting "the economic recovery we’re in" even though the public option provisions wouldn't kick in until 2013. He says he's worried about debt-reduction when the public option would make the bill more deficit-neutral. And he campaigned on a public-option type alternative called "MediChoice" in 2006.What Joe Lieberman wants, in all probability, is attention.
The reason this is a... more
-
-
1. Although efforts have been made to reform the healthcare industry since 1912, we should not be too hasty in enacting change.
2. The federal government has no business interfering in people's health care decisions.... Well, unless a woman is trying to terminate a pregnancy, or the patient’s last name is Schiavo. (or insurance industry CEOs need tax exemptions)
3. The government is incapable of running anything efficiently, and if allowed to offer a health care option, will run it so efficiently that it will put private insurers out of business.(just like the post office put Fed-Ex out of business)
4. We are a Christian nation, and we don’t believe in helping the least among us. Some people just don’t deserve health care. Getting sick is God's punishment for doing something wrong.
5. The current system, with 47,000,000 uninsured, a million medical bankruptcies annually, and 18,000 deaths annually due to lack of insurance, is working just fine. In fact, we have the best health care system in the world!!!
6. Even though many older couples are forced to divorce in order to avoid catastrophic financial losses due to medical expenses, it’s the homosexuals who are destroying families.(old people don't need houses)
7. A conversation with your doctor about end-of-life issues is an opportunity for your doctor to convince you to kill yourself.(watch out for the youth-in-Asia)
8. We can afford to spend more on our military than all other nations combined, but we can’t afford universal health care.(Of course, there's no money init - besides the US is sadistic - we love to watch people suffer and die)
9. Single-payer, government-run health care is good enough for our men and women in uniform, but to offer the same to the general public would be socialism.
10. Pooling our resources to provide roads, schools, clean water, military, police, and fire protection for each other is not socialism. Pooling our resources to provide each other health care is socialism. (we need to make fire protection private so more CEOs can get rich on human suffering - it's the American way)
11. Socialism is bad. Very bad. Bad! (what's socialism?)
12. Health care is an issue best handled by individual states, like slavery. (that's what we really need in this country - a good civil war to let our troops rape and pillage america girls)
13. We can afford to subsidize Israel , Iraq , and Afghanistan , all of whom have universal health care, but we can’t afford it ourselves.
14. Money and corporate profits are more important than peoples’ health. Sure, reforming the insurance companies would save thousands of lives, but shareholders’ portfolios might be damaged. (we have to keep the poor in their place or the top 1% of the rich will start having to work for a living)
15. Freeing people from holding on to their dead-end jobs for the insurance and allowing them to become entrepreneurs would bankrupt our country. (this is a nation of corporate dictatorship - you will report to work every day)
16. Someone like physicist Stephen Hawking would have been allowed to die under the British health care system. Oh, he’s British? And alive? Never mind.
17. We already have universal health care: it’s called the Emergency Room. Uninsured people can go there for all their health needs (checkups, cancer pre-screening, chemotherapy, etc.), and it only costs the taxpayers a few thousand dollars per visit. (it's fun to watch poor people wait at the emergency room - an American pastime)
18. The Obama health care initiative is part of the liberal-communist-Nazi-socialist-Islamo-fascist-gay-atheist-zombie-transsexual-cannibal sociopath-evolutionist agenda to take away your freedom! If this plan is passed, abortions will be mandatory, schoolchildren will be raped by their teachers, and Negroes will murder your Grandma with her pillow!
19. Keep the government out of Medicare! (But Medicare is run by the government)
20. 50 million uninsured are only 15% of the country.1. Although efforts have been made to reform the healthcare industry since 1912, we... more
-
-
from the web site:
"WHO WE ARE
Billionaires for Wealthcare is a grassroots network of health insurance CEOs, HMO lobbyists, talk-show hosts, and others profiting off of our broken health care system.
We'll do whatever it takes to ensure another decade where your pain is our gain. After all, when it comes to health insurance, if we ain't broke, why fix it?"
More exciting news and information on web site....from the web site:
"WHO WE ARE
Billionaires for Wealthcare is a grassroots network... more
-
-
Checking the "female" box when buying health insurance is likely to cost extra — perhaps up to 50 percent more than a man would pay for the same coverage.
Gender-rating — or what some term as flat-out sexual discrimination — is linked to the simple fact that women, particularly those under age 50 or so, go to the doctor more often than men.
But outrage over how women are treated in the individual health insurance market is mounting as stories emerge of companies refusing to cover maternity benefits and denying coverage because of past domestic violence or cesarean sections, including a Colorado woman who was told she would have to get sterilized to qualify for insurance.
Federal proposals, as well as pending state legislation, would ban gender-rating and require maternity coverage, even as the insurance industry warns that lowering premiums for younger women could mean higher premiums for most everyone else.
Colorado women age 40 and under shopping for health insurance in the individual market, not through an employer, pay from 10 percent to 59 percent more than men, according to analysis by the National Women's Law Center.
They pay more even when maternity coverage is not included. And in many cases, a female nonsmoker pays more for health coverage than a man who smokes.
More @ linkChecking the "female" box when buying health insurance is likely to cost extra —... more
-
-
Billionaires for Wealthcare is a grassroots network of health insurance CEOs, HMO lobbyists, talk-show hosts, and others profiting off of our broken health care system. We'll do whatever it takes to ensure another decade where your pain is our gain. After all, when it comes to health insurance, if we ain't broke, why fix it?Billionaires for Wealthcare is a grassroots network of health insurance CEOs, HMO... more
-
-
President Barack Obama is actively discouraging Senate Democrats in their effort to include a public insurance option with a state opt-out clause as part of health care reform. In its place, say multiple Democratic sources, Obama has indicated a preference for an alternative policy, favored by the insurance industry, which would see a public plan "triggered" into effect in the future by a failure of the industry to meet certain benchmarks.
The administration retreat runs counter to the letter and the spirit of Obama's presidential campaign. The man who ran on the "Audacity of Hope" has now taken a more conservative stand than Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), leaving progressives with a mix of confusion and outrage. Democratic leaders on Capitol Hill have battled conservatives in their own party in an effort to get the 60 votes needed to overcome a filibuster. Now tantalizingly close, they are calling for Obama to step up.
"The leadership understands that this is a somewhat risky strategy, but we may be within striking distance. A signal from the president could be enough to put us over the top," said one Senate Democratic leadership aide. Such pleading is exceedingly rare on Capitol Hill and comes only after Senate leaders exhausted every effort to encourage Obama to engage.
(Continued at Link)President Barack Obama is actively discouraging Senate Democrats in their effort to... more
-
-
Chique
-
added this
-
23 days ago
- |
-
Republican pollster Bill McInturff was the keynote speaker on the final day of the America's Health Insurance Plans's state issues conference on Friday morning.
But his speech on how the health care reform debate was playing among the public was interrupted before it even began. A group of protesters began aggressively cheering McInturff for the work he has done for AHIP (he's a hired pollster for the private insurance lobby and, most infamously, was the force behind the 'Harry and Louise' ads in 1994)
McInturff, initially thinking that the cheering was legitimate, thanked the "AHIP officials" in the back of the room for giving him mental encouragement for his speech. He was not being paid for his appearance, he noted.
And then, the protesters -- dressed in business attire to fit into the crowd -- began singing. A relatively lengthy and harmonious rendition of "Tomorrow" from the musical Annie ensued, only with the chorus focused on government-run insurance. "The option, the option, we must have, the option... " went the rendition, in reference to the public plan.
The whole episode lasted a few minutes before the troupe (around 5 or 6 protesters) was escorted out by security.
McInturff, who remarked earlier that he didn't have a joke to lead off with, pointed to the exiting protesters and said "there's my joke." But while his speech had been interrupted, the pollster actually admitted to being mildly impressed.
Story continues below
"If you are going to have protesters at least you can hire people who sing," he said. "That was very good singing."
The musical was written and performed by Billionaires for Wealthcare, a grassroots network of health insurance CEOs, HMO lobbyists, talk-show hosts, and others profiting off of our broken health care system. A group official writes to say: "We'll do whatever it takes to ensure another decade where your pain is our gain. After all, when it comes to health insurance, if we ain't broke, why fix it?"
Check it out for the lyrics too!Republican pollster Bill McInturff was the keynote speaker on the final day of the... more
-
-
If human beings do not support health care reform we are essentially against the survival of our own species. This video was created by MBA students at Presidio Graduate School.If human beings do not support health care reform we are essentially against the... more
-
-
Accidents Of History Created U.S. Health System
If you want to understand how to fix today's health insurance system, you'd be smart to look first at how it was born. How did Americans end up with a system in which employers pay for our health insurance? After all, they don't pay for our groceries or our gas.
It turns out there never was any central logic at work. The evolution of the American health care system began in the 1920s, when choices boiled down to which crazy cure you preferred.
Dr. John Brinkley, for instance, was a huge hit in American radio with his health advice shows. For whatever problem folks had, Brinkley had one fabulous solution: transplant a goat gland into your body. He pitched it as being perfect for everything from dementia to impotence to flatulence. But if, somehow, a goat gland didn't cure your ills, you could always use Bonnore's Electro Magnetic Bathing Fluid or Clark Stanley's Snake Oil Liniment.
Before the birth of modern medicine, hospitals were poorhouses where the indigent went to die. Then came the advent of effective medicines, especially antibiotics, along with a revolution in medical schools.
Suddenly, says economic historian Melissa Thomasson, "hospitals are marketing themselves as places to have babies." The professor at the Miami University in Ohio says that in the early part of the 20th century, hospitals were able to focus on happy outcomes.
Health care became much more effective, and much more expensive. Clean hospitals, educated doctors and real pharmacological research cost money. People proved willing to pay for care when they were really sick, but it wasn't yet common to go for checkups or survivable illnesses.
By the late 1920s, hospitals noticed most of their beds were going empty every night. They wanted to get people who weren't deathly ill to start coming in.
"The war economy is an entirely different ballgame," Thomasson says. The government rationed goods even as factories ramped up production and needed to attract workers. Factory owners needed a way to lure employees. She explains that the owners turned to fringe benefits, offering more and more generous health plans.
The next big step in the evolution of health care was also an accident. In 1943, the Internal Revenue Service ruled that employer-based health care should be tax free. A second law, in 1954, made the tax advantages even more attractive.
Thomasson cites the huge impact of those measures on plan participation. "You start from 9 percent of the population in 1940 to 63 percent in 1953," she says. "Everybody starts getting in on it. It just grows by gangbusters. By the 1960s, 70 percent [of the population] is covered by some kind of private, voluntary health insurance plan."
Thus employer-based insurance, which started with Blue Cross selling coverage to Texas teachers and spread because of government price controls and tax breaks, became our system. By the mid-1960s, Thomasson says, Americans started to see that system — in which people with good jobs get health care through work and almost everyone else looks to government — as if it were the natural order of things.
But to Thomasson and other economic historians, there's nothing natural or inevitable about it. Instead, they see it as the profound result of historical accidents.Accidents Of History Created U.S. Health System
If you want to understand how to... more
-
-
by Dana Goldstein
New research reveals many fast-growing professions for women lack health insurance.
The Baucus bill slams single moms in the midst of a recession, when many are scrounging to make ends meet.
More @ linkby Dana Goldstein
New research reveals many fast-growing professions for women lack... more
-
-
The commercials made by the health insurance industry focus on the emotions of the viewers rather than actual facts. This commercial does this as well, only in the name of the American people. I don't think it's possible that MoveOn.org could make a better commercial or spread a clearer message.
By the way, to those who don't think this commercial represents the majority of Americans: the majority of Americans SUPPORT the Public option.
_______________________________________________________________________
October 21, 2009, 5:37 pm
Heather Graham Sprints for the Public Option
By Maria Newman
MoveOn.org has created a new ad in support of the public option that features a fit Heather Graham in running clothes, sprinting against overindulgent insurance company representatives.
The ad will appear on national cable television and on the Internet, although the organization says it does not know yet in what markets.
MoveOn says the ad is part of a week-long campaign to counter messages from insurance companies and its lobbying group, AHIP, against the public option. “It reinforces the message that the public option is the best way to lower costs for American families and keep private insurance companies honest,” MoveOn said in a statement.
In the Heather Graham ad, several insurance representatives are standing at a running track, one of them stuffing his face with a huge sandwich, and another one pouring champagne from a bottle into his mouth. Ms. Graham, the only one in running clothes, stretches at the starting line before twisting her body into what appear to be some serious yoga poses, and then she takes off running down the track, with the startled looking insurance people soon taking off after her.
A voiceover says about the public option:
"Some in Washington say this is unfair competition. But competition is as American as apple pie."
MoveOn joins a list of other organizations taking to the airwaves on cable and the Internet to encourage more public support for the public option.
As Congress starts to pare down what will be in the final health bill, several groups have been creating ads that feature well-known people. One, by Brave New Films, features Robert Reich, secretary of labor in the Clinton administration, who says the public option plan is “not very scary or complicated.”The commercials made by the health insurance industry focus on the emotions of the... more
-
