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Archive for the ‘Healtcare’ Category

By SUZANNE SATALINE
source: Wall Street Journal

Faced with mounting debt and looming costs from the new federal health-care law, many local governments are leaving the hospital business, shedding public facilities that can be the caregiver of last resort.

A patient and care giver at Central Peninsula Hospital in Soldotna, Alaska, where the government is considering a partnership with the for-profit LHP Hospital Group of Texas.

Officials in Lauderdale County, Ala., this spring opted to transfer their 91-year-old Eliza Coffee Memorial Hospital and other properties to a for-profit company after struggling to satisfy an angry bond insurer.

“We were next to knocking on bankruptcy’s door,” said Rhea Fulmer, a Lauderdale County commissioner who approved the deal with RegionalCare Hospital Partners, of Brentwood, Tenn, but with trepidation. She said the county had no guarantee the company would improve care in the decades to come. “Time will tell.”

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This is from a post at Documenting Reality.com forums. It’s a quick read yet very eye opening.

I got this email from a friend….WTF?

Should you want to verify this, go to http://www.thomas.gov/, click on Bill Number, enter “HR 3590″
in the search box and look for “CRS Summaries.” This is what you’ll find.

Title IX Revenue Provisions—Subtitle A: Revenue Offset

“(Sec. 9002) Requires employers to include in the W-2 form of each employee the aggregate cost of applicable employer-sponsored group health coverage
that is excludable from the employee’s gross income (excluding the value of contributions to flexible spending arrangements).”

In other words:

Starting in 2011—next year—the W-2 tax form sent by your employer will be increased to show the value of whatever health insurance you are provided.
It doesn’t matter if you’re retired. Your gross income WILL go up by the amount of insurance your employer paid for. So you’ll be required to pay taxes on a larger sum of money that you actually received. Take the tax form you just finished for
2009 and see what $15,000.00 or $20,000.00 additional gross income does to your tax debt. That’s what you’ll pay next year. For many it puts you into a
much higher bracket. This is how the government is going to buy insurance for fifteen (15) percent that don’t have insurance and it’s only part of the tax increases, but it’s not really a “tax increase” as such, it a redefinition of your taxable income.

Also, go to Kiplinger’s and read about the thirteen (13) tax changes for 2010 that
could affect you.

Why am I sending you this? The same reason I hope you forward this to every single person in your address book. People have the right to know the truth because an election is coming in November. So vote intelligently, based on your values.
But also adjust your tax withholding, or increase your savings, so that you aren’t surprised and put in a jam when your federal income taxes are due on April 15, 2012.

Fight organized crime! Re-elect no one.

source: Eclipptv

HOW THE INSURANCE COMPANIES ARE USING SPECIAL SOFTWARE TO FIND SLIGHTEST FAULTS IN PAPERWORK OR ANYTHING THEY CAN TO DROP PEOPLE THAT GET SICK

source: Augusta Chronicle
Program would offer accessible health clinics on site

I have highlighted some segments as they strike me as words and phrases used to sell the public on more government interference in the people’s lives.
NMC

School could become more than just a place to learn. Add getting a physical, mental health check and even dental work to the list.

In a couple of years at Glenn Hills High, officials say, a pilot program could allow such medical treatment by way of a school-based health clinic– a first of its kind in Richmond County and one of just a few statewide.

“If students can get served in the school, they don’t need to take a day off to go to the doctor for a checkup. … The primary objective is to enhance accessibility,” said Richmond County student services director Carol Rountree.

The goal is to expand such an offering to other schools in Richmond County and throughout the state, but first officials are looking to obtain a state grant for planning purposes through a collaboration with the Richmond County Board of Health and the Urban Health Program, Department of Pediatrics at Emory University.

The Richmond County school board recently agreed to allow the school system to apply for the maximum state grant available — $15,000 — to be used for a year’s planning. The school system should know by July whether it has won the grant money, Rountree said.

After that, the system would again need to apply for a three-year grant to help fund operations for the clinic at Glenn Hills, to include Board of Health and other medical professionals who would serve as staff.

The local effort is part of a larger statewide Comprehensive School-Based Health Clinic Program. Its goals are to increase access to quality health care and improve the delivery of health services and the health of the state’s children, according to the program’s Web site.

Currently, officials say, there are just two school-based health clinics in Georgia, and the goal is to increase that number to 12 in the next five years.

At Glenn Hills, Rountree said, the clinic would operate during school hours but also might be available in the evening for parents and others who live in the Glenn Hills community.

Rountree said the Board of Health has already incorporated some services at Richmond County schools, offering flu shot clinics this year and in some cases conducting dental screenings.

“We already have a lot of collaboration going on,” she said. “It (the latest effort) is just finding a way to expand on it and to bring some additional services to students and families.”

source: PBS
It wasn’t pretty, but it worked. Inside the backroom deals and hardball politics that finally got Obama his health care bill.

Are tea parties, bloggers, and other patriot groups being infiltrated? This article might give a clue.

source:Yahoo News

Last night, as the clock approached midnight and the long House debate on health care reform was finally winding down, Rep. Bart Stupak stepped to the microphone on the floor of the chamber to deliver his remarks. As the famously anti-abortion congressman was denouncing a measure to kill the deal he’d struck earlier in the day for President Obama to issue an executive order reiterating that no federal funds would pay for abortions, a voice suddenly shouted “Baby killer!” from the GOP side of the House floor.

See Full Story and Video Here

source: Reuters

As the Congress once again rallies to pass healthcare reform legislation, momentum is growing in many states to pass laws to block the changes — a move that could lead to a legal battle over states’ sovereignty.

Bills and resolutions have been introduced in at least 36 state legislatures seeking to limit or oppose various aspects of the reform plan through laws or state constitutional amendments, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

“There’s going to be a big free-for-all lawsuit about this,” said Michael Bird, legislative counsel for the NCSL.

The House of Representatives is to due vote on Sunday on a sweeping healthcare overhaul that would require all Americans to have health insurance, but would give subsidies to help low- and middle-income workers. It would also ban insurance practices like refusing coverage to those with pre-existing medical conditions.

Opposition efforts at the state level “in general … seek to make or keep health insurance optional, and allow people to purchase any type of coverage they may choose,” the NCSL said.

Democratic House leaders on Friday voiced growing confidence of winning a close vote. If the bill passes the House, it would then only have to pass the Senate by a simple majority under the planned procedure on the legislation.

Mirroring the partisan politics that have dogged the federal legislation, state measures to block healthcare reform are more likely to arise and succeed in states where Republicans control at least one legislative chamber and the governor’s office.

So far, only two states, Idaho and Virginia, have enacted laws, while an Arizona constitutional amendment is seeking voter approval on the November ballot. No anti-health care reform legislation has emerged in Democrat-dominated states like Illinois and New York, according to the NCSL.

Idaho Governor C.L. “Butch” Otter signed a bill on Wednesday allowing the state’s attorney general to file a lawsuit opposing federal healthcare legislation requiring individuals to buy medical insurance.

Otter sees federal legislation as overreaching and bound to add to medical expenses of state governments, spokesman Jon Hanian said .

“He’s concerned we can’t afford it,” Hanian said, adding that Otter, a Republican, is disappointed in how the Democrat-led U.S. Congress is handling the legislation.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs on Thursday dismissed as political positioning the complaints by states that the healthcare overhaul may endanger their independence or be too costly.

In the latest version of the bill, all states would receive extra funding to cover Medicaid costs that are expected to rise under the reform, including 100 percent federal coverage for new enrollees under the plan through 2016. Medicaid is the healthcare program for the poor jointly administered by the states and federal government.

Still, states are concerned that the burden of providing healthcare will fall to them without enough federal support and that the reforms infringe on their powers under the U.S. Constitution’s Bill of Rights.

For example, Texas Governor Rick Perry, a Republican, says the proposal will double the number of Medicaid recipients in his state and cost an additional $24.3 billion over the next decade.

TENTH AMENDMENT ARGUMENT

Many states cite the 10th Amendment, which says “powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states,” as proof that the U.S. government cannot set their healthcare laws.

Gibbs did not accept that complaint. “What we’re about to pass and sign into law will meet Constitutional muster,” he said.

Robert Natelson, a constitutional law professor at the University of Montana School of Law, said it would be easier for states to argue for standing to file a lawsuit that claims the federal government has overstepped its constitutional powers.

“The legal question is, Does this health care bill exceed the federal government’s powers or it is invalid for other reasons?” he said.

Michael Boldin, founder of the Tenth Amendment Center, a think-tank on the relationships of the states and federal government, pointed to previous state movements to nullify federal laws in areas such as medical marijuana and Real ID, a federal standard for driving licenses. In the case of marijuana, Boldin said 14 states allow its use for medical purposes despite a prohibition in federal law that has been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.

A similar situation may arise with healthcare reform, where there could be mass noncompliance with the law without any real consequences, Boldin said.