Horror Stories from Deadly GovernmEnt-Run Medical Systems
The debate over single-payer, a complete takeover of healthcare by the government, will be here in 2-3 short years. Before you take a stand on the issue, you owe it to yourself to open your eyes and see what government-run medical systems really look like.
The VA Demonstrates GovErnment-Run Medicine (Deadly GERMs)
Comment: Ever wonder what government-run, single-payer, national socialized medicine would look like inthe US? We don’t have to, it’s already here: the Veteran’s Administration. Here’s the American version of Sam’s Story–Doug was denied, delayed, dishonored, and discarded. And the bureaucrats who did it are all “sorry” two years later, but no one’s responsible, nothing’s changed, and the family has no place to even complain. VA-style pretend-care is what radical Obamacare supporters want, to replace their already-failed Obamacare disaster.
“…Doug, a Vietnam veteran … was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 2011.”
“In 2012, she tried to move his medical care to the Veterans Affairs hospital in Bedford.”
[...] “They waited about four months and never heard anything. Then Douglas Chase died in August 2012.”
“But two weeks ago, he got a letter, from the VA in Bedford, saying he could now call to make an appointment to see a primary care doctor.”
““It was addressed to my husband and I opened it,” said Suzanne Chase. “I was in complete disbelief.””
[Photo] “Suzanne Chase was denied funeral benefits for her husband because he was never treated at a VA hospital, even though he died after waiting four months for an appointment. (WBZ-TV)”
[...] “At the bottom of the letter, dated June 12, it reads: “We are committed to providing primary care in a timely manner and would greatly appreciate a prompt response.””
[...] “She wrote a letter to the Bedford VA two weeks ago, but once again, no response.”
““I am hoping if other people speak out, they can improve the system, so no one else dies waiting for an appointment.””
“When WBZ contacted the VA and told them about this I-Team story, the media person’s initial response was simply: “Oh, dear.” ”
I-Team: Acton Vet Finally Gets VA Doctor’s Appointment – 2 Years After He Died
By WBZ-TV Chief Correspondent Joe Shortsleeve June 30, 2014 6:04 PM
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Obamacare: One Size Does Not Fit All
Our son (now age 16) was born prematurely and as a result has a form of cerebral palsy (CP). We are quite fortunate in that he is cognitively normal and quite bright in fact – an A student in the 10th grade. As a result of the CP, our son has ongoing issues with very significant spasticity in his legs and to a lesser extent his arms and hands. This combined with teen growth must be managed surgically to prevent permanent deformity and to just make his life and independence more livable.
He has had 4 previous surgeries and has attended physical therapy every week of his life. Currently, he is scheduled for surgery in Texas. He will have significant tendon releases, muscle lengthening, and alcohol blocks (similar to botox) to provide relief to ever tightening muscles and resulting contractures. One of his hips is becoming particularly problematic.
We would have preferred to see his regular surgeon of the past 15 years who has been treating him since his infancy. However, due to Obamacare mandates, that doctor is no longer participating in any insurance plan and is fee-for-service cash only. He says the reimbursement rates are so low that he cannot afford to pay all of his expenses (hospital fees, staff, office space, malpractice insurance, and taxes) at that rate. We know this is accurate as our son’s last surgery of $30,000 was only “covered” by the insurance for $2,400. We were forced to seek out other options.
Both our son and my husband and I were quite distressed as starting over with someone new ensures all sorts of complications. So we prayed. Thankfully, a reasonable option is available, but not without undue stress, expense and complication. Fortunately(!) our son’s former surgeon had trained ONE other doctor in the entire country in the surgery that he invented. He is a surgeon in Texas and will be the one who will do his surgery (they are the only 2 docs in the country who do it) AND he is a participant in our insurance plan – so we should have continuity of care. We just have to go to Texas now instead of New Jersey. Now we will fly instead of drive, get a hotel room for 4 days instead of one and rent a car instead of drive our own. While we are beyond grateful to have this option – it is indeed an unnecessary hardship on top of an already complicated situation – and not without risks (i.e., flying after surgery, infection risks etc. that we have avoided all these years by being within driving distance).
All of this is so unnecessary – because of Obamacare. And who has benefitted?????? Not the doctor involved, not our son, and not us. How has this improved our medical scenario in any way? How has the promise of being able to keep our doctor been kept? How has this reduced costs or bent the cost curve down? The impact has not been minimized on this family and in fact has caused us actual harm … financially anyway. We hope that the skill of this new doctor is as amazing as the surgeon we are used to. All we can do is pray for God’s leading, provision and protection. but I’m one angry mom at having been forced into this position – and for what????
-from a Virginia Mom
By WBZ-TV Chief Correspondent Joe Shortsleeve June 30, 2014 6:04 PM
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My ‘Single Payer’ Experience
By Mary D. (Philadelphia)
I had an experience that made me wonder what life would be like if the government took over healthcare completely. I started having a lot of questions about how people might be treated under a single payer system.
Long ago and not so far away I worked for the City of Philadelphia in one of the biggest departments which had one of the strongest unions. I had applied years before and was on a waiting list for a long time.
Upon being hired I was informed that I could wait six months and choose the city’s health coverage, or I could join the union and have health coverage right away.
Having recently become a single mother, I was anxious to provide every good thing for my child. So naturally I joined the union for their health coverage. I was totally ignorant about health coverage and pretty much unaware of unions other than they fought for you to get better wages and working conditions. So health coverage is health coverage, right? I mean it was either Blue Cross & Blue Shield or the union, what difference did it make? Why wait?
I didn’t know it but, prior to my coming on board, the union’s health plan was the envy of the world. You could go to any doctor you wanted for whatever treatment you needed and your bill was 100% covered. Can you imagine?
But then entered “the creeping”. Things changed. Bills weren’t getting paid. Union officials were being indicted and sent to jail. By the time I signed on, the union had its own clinic and its own hospital. Nepotism and the hiring of doctors from anywhere but America became the rule. You were now required to go to the union’s facilities.
Some friends and acquaintances I had made were getting out of the union plan as soon as they could. That would be during the once-a-year open enrollment period.
One day I came down with something. I felt miserable! I had a fever, my body ached everywhere, I was congested and had a cough that hurt. So, I called in sick, then dragged myself out to go to see the doctor, who, naturally, would be at the union’s clinic.
Keep in mind, I felt very ill and weak. So I walked to my corner to catch a bus. The bus finally came and I rode it to the subway stop. I took the subway to Market Street, where I got on the El. I rode the El to within about two or three blocks of the clinic, then walked to the clinic.
Apparently everyone had the same illness I did. It was packed. We waited, and waited. Then we waited some more. After that we waited even longer. People were restless and annoyed and in pain. Finally, someone dressed in a lab coat came into the room and announced that the doctor was not in. She told us we would have to get on a bus, which they would provide, and go to the union’s hospital. (This would incur a ride of about 40 minutes and of course, more waiting.) If you didn’t go, you could not get a doctor’s note for work excuse.
Sitting there wishing I could just crawl into bed and sleep, I realized if I had a different insurance plan, or just paid cash, I could have just gone around the corner from my house to my family doctor, someone who knew me well. Then I thought, what if this was my little daughter who was so sick, and I had to drag her here and, having no choice, be required to travel with her even further? And would she even get treatment when we got there?
I went home, crawled into bed and when I was better, as soon as I could, I got other coverage. I was free!
Remember, the President said Obamacare is just a transition to a single payer system (i.e., the Federal Government). Obamacare is a BIG step in that direction. If Hillary Clinton’s healthcare plan of the 1990s is any indication, doctors will not be allowed to treat outside the single payer system. It will be illegal. Hillary wanted to throw both you and your doctor in jail for going outside the system.
Suppose we get single payer. What will you do under single payer when you are unhappy with the care you are receiving and there IS nowhere else to go? When your only option is the government clinic? Or when you are misdiagnosed and mistreated by incompetent doctors with questionable degrees? Or when they decide your treatment is too expensive and no doctor is allowed to take your money or give you charity care? When the government machine chews you up and spits you out? When you have no say in the treatment of your own child or parent, REGARDLESS of what is available or your own means and potential resources – WHERE WILL YOU GO THEN?
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VA Needle-Sharing Spreads Deadly Germs to Patients
“A major procedural botch at a Veterans Affairs (VA) hospital in Western New York may have been responsible for exposing at least 700 diabetic patients to hepatitis B, hepatitis C, and even HIV….”
“It is the institutionalized equivalent of needle-sharing… An inspection conducted in November 2012 found unlabeled insulin pens on medication carts throughout the hospital…”
[…]
““Is this situation isolated to the VA Medical Center in Buffalo or is it reflective of a systemic problem in patient labeling that has endangered veterans throughout the VA healthcare system?” asked Rep. Brian Higgins (D-N.Y.) in a letter to Veterans Affairs Secretary Shinseki. Rep. Shinseki and other members of a regional congressional delegation are currently seeking an investigation to get to the bottom of the issue.”
Over 700 people exposed to HIV, hepatitis at VA hospital that reused insulin pens
Jonathan Benson
February 06, 2013
http://www.naturalnews.com/038982_HIV_insulin_pens_VA_hospital.html#ixzz2KC0yFD00
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Medicaid Single Payer FAIL in Hawaii
Comment: Central planners never get it through their thick heads that people won’t react to their grandiose schemes as intended. Unless, of course, you force people and ram it down their throats. Before you say, ‘Yeah, do it!’, just remember: The state machinery you create to bend people to your will today will bend you and coerce you tomorrow.
“Hawaii is dropping the only state universal child health care program in the country just seven months after it launched.”
“Gov. Linda Lingle’s administration cited budget shortfalls and other available health care options for eliminating funding for the program. A state official said families were dropping private coverage so their children would be eligible for the subsidized plan.”
“The Republican governor signed Keiki Care into law in 2007, but it and many other government services are facing cuts as the state deals with a projected $900 million general fund shortfall by 2011.”
Hawaii Ends Universal Child Health Care 7 Months After Start
October 18, 2008
Associated Press
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,440561,00.html
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Michelle Obama at UChicago Hospital: Dump the Poor
Comment: Think Obamacare is about helping people who need medical care receive it? Think again. It’s all about people in power misusing government to take stuff from people they don’t like and give it to people they do.
“While a top executive at the hospital, Mrs. Obama helped engineer the plan to offload low-income patients with non-urgent health needs.”
“In truth, it was old-fashioned cost-cutting and favor-trading repackaged as minority aid. Clearing out the poor freed up room for insured (i.e., more lucrative) patients…
“…a young boy covered by Medicaid had been turned away from the University of Chicago Medical Center… Mrs. Obama’s hospital gave the boy a tetanus shot, antibiotics and Tylenol, and shoved him out the door. The mother and son took an hour-long bus ride to another hospital for surgery.”
”…close to ‘patient dumping,’ a practice made illegal by the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act ….”
The Obamacare Horror Story You Won’t Hear
Michelle Malkin
June 19, 2009 http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/06/19/the_obamacare_horror_story_you_wont_hear_97070.html
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Real-life Horror Story: Mark & The Socialized Medicine Men
The U.S. already has several government-run medical systems. Best-known is the one for the U.S. military. Most people who have had major health problems in this system have horror stories, the kind that get huge malpractice judgments in the civilian world. In the single-payer world, however, the victim is lucky to escape without reprisal for embarrassing the government.
Mark was in the Navy. He got an unexplained, but easily-treatable, infection. The doctors bungled it, and kept bungling. Mark got very sick, and almost died; government doctors covered it up by declaring there was no problem and denying health care. (For good measure, Mark got kicked out of flight school and wasn’t allowed to see his file.)
The savior: the much-reviled free market health care system . Mark had no choice but to turn to civilian medicine. He paid for it out of his own pocket, gratefully; otherwise, he would never have gotten treatment, medication — or relief from a painful problem.
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Healthcare Costs Crowding Out State Services in Massachusetts
The Obamacare-type plan in effect in Massachusetts is a disaster for that state:
“Massachusetts enacted a health reform law that was the model for the ACA. And the numbers don’t lie: Health costs now make up 54 percent of the state’s budget (up from 21 percent in 2001), health spending has increased 59 percent while spending on education is down 15 percent, police/fire down 11 percent and roads/bridges down 23 percent. Massachusetts now spends more per capita on health care than anywhere in the industrialized world. Its latest solution to contain costs is to limit access or ration care via a health policy commission which will be the state’s arbiter of care.”
Michigan smartly avoids ‘exchange’
By Dr. Matt McCord
anesthesiologist, secretary for the Michigan Chapter of Docs4PatientCare, which seeks to repeal Obamacare
December 3, 2012
http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20121203/OPINION01/212030306/1008/opinion01/Michigan-smartly-avoids-exchange-