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HK

wrote:
On Wed, 13 May 2009 16:03:28 -0400, HK wrote:

As far as I know, no one is seriously suggesting there be one "payer"
(the feds) for everyone's health insurance. I still favor the same sort
of coverage available through the FEHBA, with many plans from many
insurance companies available under a federal umbrella

They are still calling this "single payer" and pointing at UK and
Canada where it is a government program.
Government programs always scare me because they become political.

As long as "politically correct" is referring to things you don't like
(like smoking), you have no problem with government sanctions against
the offenders "for the good of the program" but what happens if some
future government tries to make other lifestyle choices "politically
incorrect" and sanction them?
What happens when they decide gay people are more predisposed to AIDS.
Would a future government want to abort babies that were genetically
predisposed to being expensive to the program?
Would they try to sterilize people with DNA markers indicating genetic
diseases?
I just do not trust politicians with too much power and money is
power. This is going to be big money.

On the other hand, if they actually did a study they might find
smokers actually cost the program less since they die before they live
long enough to get cataracts, artificial hips and the other expensive
things that are common with old people.
I have had several family members die in the last several years. My
mother and father died from smoking related diseases (69 & 79) and did
not really use that much "medicine". My non-smoking grandfather died
of "old age" (complications of prostate cancer) at 99 and used a
****load of medicare over 44 years. He had both eyes done, hip, knee,
2 cancer surgeries and doctor visits at least once a month for a
couple decades. Just his drug bill for those 44 years was probably
more than my parent's total lifetime medical bills. Smokers tend to
avoid going to the doctor since he preaches at them.

A component may be single payer, but that doesn't mean many other
options will be eliminated.

BTW, the program for federal employees is single payer but not the way
you might think. While there are dozens and dozens (maybe hundreds) of
health plans federal employees may choose from, payment for these plans
is made by the federal government by withholding form the wages of
workers and, of course, by the government paying its share of the
premiums. The feds then forward payments to the administrators of the
health plans, typically to a lock box.