What's a Good Source for Understanding the Health Care Bill?

Now THAT's the $64,000 question, isn't it? But that's what my friend Susan (aka WhyMommy) from Toddler Planet asked me and I didn't have a good answer at the ready.

Sure, you can read the original 615 page bill if you're battling insomnia. Oh, and don't forget to search for the boxes upon boxes of amendments that have gotten tacked on, too. Aside from the actual language of the bill, there are some things important to understand in this battle -- and yes, it is a battle.

Insurance companies, and the legislators who take money from them, want you to think they're protecting competition by opposing the current legislation. They are not. Competition should be a great thing, right? It's supposed to keep prices down and keep companies honest. That works unless you have an industry that's become a monopoly. Like cable TV and satellite radio companies, insurance doesn't have a lot of competition and at this stage of the game they're not trying to protect competition, they're afraid of losing money. If they really want competition, why would they be afraid of another option -- public or otherwise?

A recent report shows how much the Bush administration has contributed to our somewhat desperate health care situation by running a Justice Department that permitted and blessed merger after merger that did nothing but reduce insurance industry competition. Why is no one in the mainstream media picking up on this angle?

Fortunately, when WhyMommy tweeted her question about where to look for a reader-friendly alternative to the massive bill itself, another friend, Kristen from Mommy Needs a Cocktail responded with this link from the Congressional Budget Office, which gives a bottom line cost. Also, take a look at a similar summary from the AARP. And my fellow MOMocrat Melissa pointed to the summaries from the House committees involved in working on health care reform.

Who says moms in the blogosphere aren't political?

If you poke around on the web, you can find even more summaries like these. But those opposing the bill are hoping you won't. Some people don't WANT us to understand this bill. They're hoping that we'll just listen to the talking heads (or as I like to call them, the shouting heads) and be alarmed when the uber-right wingers falsely claim that the health care bill is really just about abortion funding and encouraging sick, elderly people to die sooner.

When it comes to offering viable alternatives from the Republican view, I only hear crickets chirping. The GOP doesn't seem to be doing anything constructive to help the millions upon millions of people who just need to be able to see doctors for themselves and their children without going into personal bankruptcy.

As for the Democrats, yesterday, Senator Harry Reid's office facilitated a conference call with Senators Chuck Schumer and Robert Menendez to talk about efforts the Democrats are making to ensure that this legislation doesn't "wither in the vine," especially as a result of the pending August recess. Senator Schumer says that the Senate Finance committee is planning on announcing a bipartisan agreement on the bill by September 15th, and according to Schumer, it will be focus on three things:

"First is bundling. [I included the link -- it was not in the original transcript of the conference call.] The intention of the committee to begin a slow, but steady move away from the fee-for-service model that's at the root of rising costs in the health care system. And until we get away from fee-for-service and find a better way of paying, we're not going to reduce costs as much as we need to. And that's where our focus has been, and bundling is one way to do it.

Second is accountable care organizations. This is going to make doctors more accountable for quality and cost. And that's a lot better than creating an incentive for increasing the volume of services.

Third, value-based purchasing. We're going to look at episodes of care, emphasize best practices to make sure hospitals and doctors are being rewarded for things based on health -- health outcomes. And there's a lot of consensus, as I mentioned, on this among both Democrats and Republicans. It's bringing us closer and closer to a bipartisan agreement."

Something has to change to provide decent health care for everyone. Short of taking away our lawmakers' health insurance and forcing them to live the lives of many of their constituents to convince them of this, wouldn't an actual bipartisan compromise make sense?

MOMocrat Joanne Bamberger also likes to write about her addiction to all things political at her place, PunditMom. 

Comments

[Melissa]

Joanne, great post.

A couple of quick things: The House Energy and Commerce Committee did adopt 50+ amendments to the bill. However, most of the amendments are 1-2 pp in length and readily available on the committee's website in PDF. Just go to the committee's website, click on mark-ups, then full committee and browse by date.

You can do the same with Ways and Means and Education and Labor, the other House committees that passed the bill this July.

I'm working on a post re: abortion funding and health reform.

[WhyMommy]

Thank you, Joanne!