I've observed the insesent complaints on various cancer blogs and discussion boards about private insurers "denial of coverage" on the backs of injuried and diseased human beings during their fight with the great crab.
In one case, the patient was denied a CT scan. As the poster said, "because their private insurer is practicing medicine and deciding that such a thing is not medically necessary." Without the CT scan, there was no way for the doctor to definitively tell if a swollen leg is cancer related or a blood clot. The physician couldn't make a diagnosis based on the best avialable technique to make that diagnosis. A good case of a corporate bureaucrat coming between a patient and their doctor.
Another poster presented the case that their private insurer used to cover Pet Scans. Unfortunately, some study came out stating that Pet Scans aren't more effective than CT Sancs to find colon cancer. With that one study, the private insurer had decided not to cover the Pet Scan, even against the physician protest.
And one more described their situation while fighting prostate cancer that had metastasized to the hip bones and a clinical trial using hormone therapy and Helical Tomo Therapy was looking to be the best opportunity to fight the cancer. The studies showed that is was really helping people with bone cancer, it is very precise treatment that does much less damage to surrounding tissues. However, private insurer had denied covering the Helical Tomo Therapy treatment. They said it was just too expensive and the hormone therapy should be enough for the patient.
These are just a few of the numerous complaints happening across the United States. One poster goes on to say, "It would appear to me that we in the USA are rapidly closing in on having all of the drawbacks of socialized medicine, with none of the purported benefits. It is partly privately financed, but the controls are given over to remote corporate bureaucrats who determine who shall live and who just isn't worth it."
Most Americans are aware that what is good for the health care system as a whole often looks very different when it's their own health at stake or the health of someone in their family. Do we Americans view health care as a communal resource that should benefit everyone or do we view it mainly from the standpoint of "what's in it for me"? Do they view themselves as citizens working together for a "greater good," or as patients and consumers of health care, worried about retaining access to all that medicine has to offer? The longer we delay, the higher health care costs rise, while more and more Americans lose their health insurance.
The private insurance health care system controls costs by dropping coverage for many workers, a safety valve of uninsured to dump out of the system. If you can increase prices and have relatively inelastic demand (force people to drop out), you'll find enough people stay paying into the system so that the total amount paid in goes up.
In another five years, the $10,000 cost of family insurance will be $15,000 and more and more employers will have dumped people either into higher-deductible health plans or into the uninsured pool. The continued increases in health care costs will impact virtually everyone before it will create a constituency that will support universal health care.
In the meantime, you'll continue to have a corporate bureaucrat between you and your doctor.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/200...re-healthcare/