Let's review this carefully.
To go straight to the chapter and verse: under Section 59(B)(a) of HR3200, the bill making its way through the House, and Section 151 of the bill that passed out of a Senate committee, every American would be required to buy health insurance.
And not just any insurance: to qualify, a plan would have to meet certain government-defined standards. For example, under Section 122(b) of the House bill, all plans must cover hospitalization; outpatient hospital and clinic services; services by physicians and other health professionals, as well as supplies and equipment incidental to their services; prescription drugs, rehabilitation services, mental health and substance-abuse treatment; preventive services (to be determined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the United States Preventive Services Task Force); and maternity, well-baby, and well-child care, as well as dental, vision, and hearing services for children under age 21.
If your current (private) insurance doesn't meet this criteria, they have five years to adjust, and then you'll have to switch to the government plan if the proper changes haven't been made .
The Lewin Group, an independent actuarial firm, estimates that under the House version of the bill, as many as 89.5 million workers will simply lose their current employer-provided plan and be forced into government-run insurance.
Guess those 89.5 million don't matter? Additionally, if any significant changes are made to your current policy, again you get dumped into the government-run program.
If you have a HSA, which I do, you're screwed.
Finally, the bills would all but eliminate Health Savings Accounts (HSAs), currently used by nearly 10 million Americans. Section 122 of the House bill and 311 of the Senate bill set minimum payout levels for any insurance policy. Insurance payouts must cover 70 percent of claims under the House bill and 76 percent under the Senate bill. And the bills also prohibit any deductibles or co-payments for preventive care.
But virtually none of the high-deductible insurance plans in existence today, and required to accompany an HSA, can meet such a standard. They are simply not designed to work that way. The result will be that a plan designed to those specifications would offer few if any advantages over traditional insurance and would not be competitive in today's markets.
As a result, insurers warn they would stop offering high-deductible policies.
So, I NOW have to change my policy, or I'm going to get dumped into the public option.
Think my "outrage" is manufactured? Want to call me a tea-bagging, Rush-listening, Fox-watching robot? Go ahead, but your inability to address my honest concerns, my authentic outrage, makes you look like a Kos-reading, Olberman-watching, Randy Rhodes listening idiot.
h/t : SeaNm
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