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That’s a truly stunning number. 90 million will be on either SCHIP or Medicaid (not Medicare … Medicaid) if the Senate Finance version of health care becomes ObamaCare according to the Heritage Foundation:
But of those 29 million with new insurance coverage, almost half (14 million), will get their coverage through the welfare programs Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). That is equivalent to adding every resident of Ohio and Nevada to the welfare rolls.
In other words, for half of those Americans who are being promised health reform, they are going to be stunned to find themselves in a welfare office applying for Medicaid. Under the current baselines for Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), there will be 76 million individuals served by these programs for at least some part of the year in 2019. If the SFC proposal becomes law, the number on Medicaid/SCHIP will top 90 million.
So why does the government want to push so many people into SCHIP and Medicaid asks Heritage? Because it is cheaper than providing them with competitive (and private) health care coverage (and access). Medicaid pays about 20 to 25% less than private insurance. As you might imagine then, it is hard to find doctors or hospitals which accept Medicaid patients. The obvious question then is how are those who do going to handle this huge influx of patients? The obvious answer is “not very well”. Shorter office visits and longer waits for appointments are inevitable.
And here’s another hidden truth:
The majority of individuals moved into Medicaid will be young and healthy. Keeping them on welfare rolls will shift even more costs to individuals and families buying private health insurance, as doctors and hospitals recoup their losses from Medicare/SCHIP by charging more to the privately insured. In effect, the congressional policy seems to be to expand dependency by discriminating against individuals based on their income.
Emphasis mine. With the addition, then, of a public option – the Democrats “single payer” Trojan Horse – companies would begin dumping employees coverage in favor of a cheaper “fine” for doing so. The rest is fairly inevitable. “Choice and competition” would then become redefined post-modern terms having nothing to do with their traditional meanings.
I listened to Sen. Judd Gregg yesterday talking about legislative tipping points. He said that at some point in the life of a bill, its passage become inevitable. He says some form of health care legislation is going to pass and Democrats will use whatever parliamentary tricks necessary to do so. That’s now beyond question. What its final form will be is the only question. That said, it’s worth remembering the words of Cheri Jacobus when considering the final form of the bill and what passage of this monstrosity will eventually mean to our freedoms and liberty:
A little bit of government control over health care requires even more government control over healthcare in order to make it all “work.”
Of course that’s “work” as defined by government which has no relevance whatsoever to cost, efficiency or quality. Especially when they are in full control. The unfunded future liabilities of current government programs make that abundantly clear. So given their track record you have to ask: how did they suddenly become the experts in how to make this system better? Counter-intuitive, isn’t it?
One-third of the country on medical welfare. It just staggers the mind. The rhetorical questions, being studiously ignored by the media and Congress, abound – who will pay for this? What choice will we really have? Where is the real competition? By what right do you make us participate in this (“right”, not power)? Why can’t we opt out? Etc.
I think we all know the answers.
[Crossposted at QandO]
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