Jewish World Review July 11, 2003 / 11 Tamuz, 5763
Drs. Michael A. Glueck & Robert J. Cihak
Costly Medicare Changes, Without Real Reform
http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com |
In The Medicare Mess: Will President Bush call Congress' Bluff?, we described some of
the problems with the Medicare "reform" bills passed by the US House and
Senate last month. We also need to review how the bills shorten the fuse on
the demographic time bomb facing Medicare and other entitlements.
Since President Franklin D. Roosevelt established the first Social Security
entitlement in 1935, Americans are living longer, healthier lives. At the
same time, Americans are having fewer children on average than previous
generations. This has resulted in a demographic time bomb, with fewer than
four workers currently paying taxes into Social Security and Medicare for
every recipient. In 1950, 16 workers were putting money into the system for
each recipient.
In the latest temperature spike of this "entitlement fever," the U.S. Senate
and House passed separate bills late last month calling for a new Medicare
prescription drug entitlement. Will President Bush stick by his original
call to link such a benefit to reforms that provide more choice, including
private health plans, for Medicare recipients, and for competition among
Medicare insurance providers?
The bills that the House and Senate passed last month open up another huge
sinkhole in Americans' lives. They create another open-ended entitlement
which purportedly would cost "only" $400 billion over the next 10 years.
Similarly optimistic past predictions of the cost of other new federal
entitlements proved grossly low.
And rather than helping Americans, Congress' proposals will cause more pain
and suffering for Medicare recipients, doctors, taxpayers and their
children. Instead of reforming Medicare, lawmakers may bankrupt it. Andrew
J. Rettenmaier and Thomas R. Saving of Texas A&M, writing in the Wall Street
Journal, estimate the bills could create an additional unfunded liability of
$7.5 trillion, or $25,000 for every American alive today, adjusted for
inflation.
For all their cost, the measures don't include President Bush's proposal for
Medicare reform modeled after the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program
(FEHBP) provided to congressmen and other federal employees, as we noted in
the previous column. Bush would include a "Medicare Advantage" system which
would allow Medicare recipients to have health plan choices and insurance
companies to compete and offer innovative plans.
Even though a June 21 Zogby poll showed 82 percent of voters favor a private
health plan option for Medicare recipients, Congress is intent on precluding
that choice.
Given Congress' record, it's no wonder the legislation its branches passed
is inconsistent with the health-care choices that Congress gives itself and
the health-care choices the president says he wants for Medicare recipients.
Members of the House and the Senate will meet as a Conference Committee to
try to iron out the differences between the two bills. We hope President
Bush has the courage to defuse this entitlement booby trap while continuing
to seek genuine reform. More specifically, we hope he can convince the
Conference Committee to make some real reforms. If the Conference Committee
fails to significantly improve the legislation and Congress passes the
resulting bill, the President should veto the current mess and tell us why.
No wonder author Philip Gold calls the result of such political pressures on
American medical care a "Disaster by Design."
Michael Arnold Glueck, M.D., is a multiple award winning writer who
comments on medical- legal issues. Robert J. Cihak, M.D., is past
president of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons.
Both
JWR contributors are Harvard trained diagnostic radiologists.
Comment by clicking here.
07/04/03: The Painful DEA II: War on legal drugs ensnares too many doctors and not enough dealers
06/20/03: The Medicare Mess: Will President Bush call Congress' Bluff?
06/13/03: Diagnosis: School Insanity: A suit for sanity and school discipline
06/05/03: Soaring Medical Costs: Rational ignorance or rational enlightenment?
05/30/03: A Tale of Two Admirable Women: Jessica and Annika
05/23/03: Latest medical innovation: Cash
05/09/03: We feel your pain; Physicians have it too no thanks to the DEA
05/02/03: Medical Quarterbacking
04/25/03: CNN the "Conscience-Not Network"
04/21/03: Medical Miranda?
04/11/03: Are childhood vaccines shots in the dark?
04/09/03: The PETA Principle -- The lambshank Redemption
03/28/03: American conscience?
03/21/03: West Wimps or Wings: Treatment for Hollywood Hypocrisy
03/13/03: Worldwide schmaltz shortage looms --- all because of a featherless chicken
03/06/03: Legal metastases are killing us
02/28/03: Outside the Jury Box: Seeking Justice rather than a Lottery in Medical Liability
02/21/03: Workforce temperature rising; employer TLC in demand
02/14/03: Malpractice Insurance: They Reap What They Sue
02/12/03: Hawk, Dove or Groundhog: Diagnosis Critical List; Prognosis Uncertain
02/07/03: How about tax cuts for the "rich" and "poor"?
01/31/03: AIDS Bug Chasers
01/24/03: Libertarian moment or movement?
01/17/03: It's not just 'sue the docs' anymore
01/03/03: A pox on the critics; diagnosis sour grapes
01/03/03: If protesting is good for your health; then at least let's root for the home team
12/20/02: Obesidemic (obesity epidemic) or not?
12/20/02: Time for voluntary informed smallpox vaccinations
12/13/02: The real reason the state opposes homeschooling?
12/06/02: Conscience of a former conservative: Portrait of a political metamorphosis
11/27/02: Thanksgiving dinner hazard?
11/22/02: Time to think outside the box and inside the nucleus
11/15/02: The military should be protected from abusive environmental laws in times of war
11/11/02: Does Kyoto Treaty pose more harm than global warming?
10/31/02: Deep thoughts on Baseball, the World Series and Life: How about them Anaheim Angels?
10/23/02: "Pediatric rule" guinea pigs
10/23/02: Once the World Series ends, we need to create a Donnie Moore Day of Remembrance: Sports and mental health
10/18/02: Congress to senior patients: Do as we say not as we do for ourselves
10/11/02: Using pollution "scare labeling" to political advantage
10/04/02: The Great Asbestos Heist: Did Litigation and Junk Medical Science Helped Bring Down the World Trade Center?
09/27/02: The imminent rise of civic feminism: A far healthier national alternative in war and peace
09/20/02: A Ray A Day" to replace the daily apple?
09/13/02: Beware of celebrities hawking drugs
09/06/02: Avoid 9/11 overdose: Give blood to begin "September of Service," SOS
08/28/02: From Doubleday to strikeday: Baseball's collective anxiety attack
08/23/02: Should she or shouldn't she?: An alternative view on treating menopause with HRT
08/16/02: Cooking up defenses against germ warfare
08/02/02: Medicine, crime and canines
07/26/02: Lies, pathologic lies and the Palestinians
07/19/02: Medicare Drug Follies … as in "now you see it, now you don't"
07/12/02: Anti-Profiling: A New Medically False Belief System
07/08/02: Don't procrastinate, vaccinate!
06/28/02: The scientific advances on the safe and effective deployment of DDT are being ignored, or denied. Why?
06/21/02: Sex and the system: In seeking healthcare men are different from women
06/14/02: The FDA, drug companies and life-saving drugs: Who's the fox and who's the hen now?
06/07/02: Medical Privacy Lost: A hippo on the healthcare back!
05/24/02: To clean up America's game: A (soggy) ground rule
05/10/02: Free speech is good medicine
05/03/02: Medicine's Vietnam
04/26/02: Attack on alternative medicine could lead to alternative lawsuits
04/12/02: Insure the 'crazies'?
04/09/02: No Time for Litmus Tests: In War We Need a Surgeon General and NIH, CDC, and FDA Directors
04/02/02: The scoop on soot: A dirty rotten shame?
03/22/02: Too many beautiful minds to waste: The first annual Caduceus Movie
03/15/02: Terror and transformation: Defense essential for health & state of mind
03/08/02: Diagnosis: Delusional
03/06/02: The great matzah famine
03/01/02: Is new Hippocratic Oath hypocritical?
02/15/02: Why the recent moaning about cloning?
02/08/02: Searching for Dr. Strangelove
01/15/02: Score one for the value of human life
01/04/02: Medical-legal-financial wake-up call
12/28/01: Who's afraid of a 'dirty bomb'?
12/21/01: End of medicine?
12/14/01: More heroes: Docs deserve a little credit after 9/11
11/16/01: Do we need 'Super Smallpox Saturdays'?
11/09/01: Why the post-9-11 health care debate will never be the same
11/01/01: Common sense good for our mental health
10/26/01: Your right to medical privacy --- even in terror time
10/12/01: Failed immigration policy ultimately bad for nation's mental health: Enemy within leads to epidemic of jumpy nerves
09/28/01: Can legal leopards change their spots: A treat instead of a trick
09/21/01: Civil defense again a civic duty
08/30/01: Shut down this government CAFE
08/23/01: School Bells or Jail Cells?
08/15/01: Time to take coaches to the woodshed
08/10/01: Blood, Guts & Glory: The Stem of the Stem Cell controversy
© 2002
|