Category: MEDICAID

Warren, de Blasio: I Would Abolish Private Health Insurance

MIAMI, FLORIDA - JUNE 26: (L-R) Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio, former housing secretary Julian Castro and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) shake hands after the first night of the Democratic presidential debate on June 26, 2019 in Miami, Florida. A field of 20 Democratic …

By Alana Mastrangelo

Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio admitted they would abolish private health insurance during the 2020 Democratic Presidential Primary debate on Wednesday evening.

“Many people watching at home have health insurance coverage through their employer,” asked NBC’s Lester Holt, “Who here would abolish their private health insurance in favor of a government-run plan? Just a show of hands.”

Sen. Warren and Mayor de Blasio raised their hands in response to Holt’s question, admitting that they would abolish private health insurance in favor of cradle to grave, government-run healthcare.

Warren and de Blasio, however, are likely not the only candidates on stage who agree with abolishing private health insurance, but rather, the only candidates bold enough to actually admit it.

The Green New Deal, for example, would ban private health insurance, including employer-provided insurance plans. The Green New Deal was endorsed by Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ), and Representative Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke (D-TX), two presidential candidates who shared the debate stage with Warren and de Blasio on Wednesday night.

Moreover, over 100 Democrats have endorsed “Medicare for All,” a proposal that would also effectively do away with private health insurance.

Another Democratic Presidential candidate, Senator Kamala Harris (D-CA) — although not present on Wednesday night — has also admitted to wanting to eliminate private health insurance to replace it with a single-payer, government-run “Medicare for All” program.

Less than 24 hours later, however, Harris seemed to have thought better of her statement, quickly walking back her call to abolish private health insurance, and later insisting that “Medicare for All” would not eliminate the entire private health insurance industry.

While it is apparent that not every 2020 Democratic Presidential candidate may be comfortable with confessing their views on private health insurance just yet, the fact that some are willing to openly endorse socialist policies is a cause for concern, and a testimony to the radical shift the Democratic Party has taken over recent years.

 

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JOE BIDEN ADVOCATES “REAL PHYSICAL REVOLUTION” TO PUSH THROUGH HIS POLITICAL AGENDA

Joe Biden Advocates "Real Physical Revolution" to Push Through His Political Agenda

Imagine if a Republican had said this

JUNE 18, 2019

Presidential frontrunner Joe Biden advocated a “real physical revolution” to push through his political agenda during a speech at Trinity University in Washington.

Asked by host Joy Reid how he would get his proposals through a Senate controlled by the GOP, Biden said, “There are certain things where it just takes a brass knuckle fight.”

The former Vice-President then appeared to walk back his rhetoric, saying it was the president’s job to “persuade the public”.

“So you go out and beat them….you make the case — you make an explicit case,” said Biden.

However, he then suggested, rather than to just “go home,” it was better to turn to more extreme methods.

“Or let’s start a real physical revolution if you’re talking about it because we have to be able to change what we’re doing within our system,” said Biden.

Given how polarized America is right now, one wonders what the reaction would have been to a Republican making similar comments.

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Americans would be ‘delighted’ to pay more taxes for socialized healthcare – Bernie Sanders

CAP

In his latest push for universal healthcare, 2020 candidate Bernie Sanders argued that Americans would be “delighted to pay more taxes” if that meant guaranteed access to treatment.

Speaking to CNN’s Anderson Cooper on Wednesday night, the socialist stalwart made the case for bringing a European-style healthcare system to the US.

“I suspect that a lot of people in the country would be delighted to pay more in taxes if they had comprehensive health care as a human right,” Sanders told Cooper.

“Your kids in many countries around the world can go to the public colleges and universities tuition-free, wages in many cases are higher,” Sanders continued. “So, there is a tradeoff, but at the end of the day, I think… most Americans will understand that is a good deal.”

Though Sanders cited Germany as an example of an ideal healthcare system, there are some key differences between the German model and the ‘Medicare for All’ plan advocated by Sanders. The German system is a multi-payer system funded by private and public sources. ‘Medicare for All,’ at least in its current iteration, is a single-payer system that would bar employers from providing competing private alternatives and could eliminate America’s $600 billion private insurance industry.

Medicare for All is a generous package that comes with a hefty price tag. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget – a supposedly non-partisan think tank – puts the price at $28 trillion, or nearly ten percent of the US’ GDP. Sanders’ own estimate turns out a cost of $13 trillion over ten years, still a roughly 30 percent increase in federal spending and an outlay more than 18 times larger than even the US military’s astronomical annual budget.

Americans largely support the idea of Medicare for All, with 70 percent in favor of a single-payer system, according to a Reuters poll taken last August. However, support for such a system drops off to 37 percent once they learn it would necessitate a massive tax hike to implement.

Bernie Sanders blasts Trump as ‘socialist for rich & powerful’

CAP

The sheer cost to the taxpayer of overhauling the US healthcare system has been trumpeted by conservatives to dismiss Sanders’ proposal. To date, Sanders has not managed to clarify exactly how this money would be raised. A paperreleased by his office in April suggested foisting some of the tax burden on employers, applying a premium to middle class households, increasing taxes on the wealthy, and imposing levies on financial institutions and offshore accounts.

Sanders maintains that these tax hikes would cut the country’s overall healthcare expenditure and leave the average American family “in a better financial position than they are under the current system.”

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CALIFORNIA TO PROVIDE HEALTH BENEFITS TO ILLEGALS

California to Provide Health Benefits to Illegals

90,000 illegals to receive treatment at $100 million cost to taxpayers

Market Watch – JUNE 10, 2019

California will become the first state to pay for some adults living in the country illegally to have full health benefits as the solidly liberal bastion continues to distance itself from President Donald Trump’s administration.

Democrats in the state Legislature reached an agreement Sunday afternoon as part of a broader plan to spend $213 billion of state and federal tax money over the next year. The legislature is expected to approve the deal this week.

David McNew/Getty Images

The agreement means low-income adults between the ages of 19 and 25 living in California illegally would be eligible for California’s Medicaid program, the joint state and federal health insurance program for the poor and disabled.

Read more

Matt Bracken breaks down how reports of increased illegal immigrant traffic from Mexico into the U.S. include a growing number of migrants from Africa, who happen to be leaving a severe Ebola outbreak back on their home continent.

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NY State paid out $63k for erectile dysfunction meds for SEX OFFENDERS, audit finds

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An audit of New York state’s Medicaid program has found that more than $63,000 was paid out on sexual and erectile dysfunction drugs for registered sex offenders over a period of six years.

The audit found that Medicaid had made improper payments of $933,594 for “drugs, procedures, and supplies” to treat erectile dysfunction between 2012 and 2018, which is illegal under state and federal laws. “There are clear rules about what conditions Medicaid will cover when it comes to erectile dysfunction drugs,” state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said in a statement.

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Of the 47 sex offenders who’d received the treatments, 30 of them were classified as “level-2” or “level-3” offenders. Risk of reoffending is determined as “moderate” for level-2 offenders and “high” for level-3 offenders.

DiNapoli said the problem of Medicaid being used to treat sexual dysfunction issues had been identified by the comptroller’s office in 2005, when it found that Medicaid had paid for Viagra for 198 recipients who were classified as level-3 sex offenders. That review sparked an overhaul and led to reforms in the system on both a national and state level, but the latest audit confirms the problem persists.

In a response to the audit, the state’s Department of Health dismissed the findings, arguing that the drugs in question “can also be used to treat other indications” including hypertension and enlarged prostates. The department claims less than $8,000 of the figure was questionable, out of a $60 billion state program.

DiNapoli rejected the response, however, saying in many cases recipients had no other relevant diagnosis.

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