Agency predicts health care bill will cost $829 billion

Majority Leader Harry Reid announced on the Senate floor Thursday, that the Senate Finance Committee will vote on its long-awaited health care bill next Tuesday. The health care reform is predicted to cost $829 billion over the next ten years, this budget was put together by nonpartisan budget analysts. Although this number sounds like a major hit to the U.S. economy it would actually save around $80 billion during the ten year period. Senator Max Baucus, who has been in the news recently about his own version of the health care reform, said his bill would cost roughly $900 billion over a ten year period. Baucus’s plan has been discredited by most politicians including those in the Democratic party.
With such a high cost on this bill, much debate has come about, including a new one that Republicans are accusing the Obama administration of trying to add more on to the proposal. Sen. David Vitter, R-Louisiana, said he was "afraid that part of the strategy from the Obama administration and their allies on the health care bill is to change the target so quickly and to compress the debate time as we go down the path that there is not going to be full opportunity to digest the final version of what we're voting on." Republicans believe that Obama is using this current plant to get it past the finance committee and that he will eventually add more to it that will raise the cost. Most people believe that the current plan is the only one that will remain under a 1 trillion dollar cost.
I believe the current proposal is the best we have seen so far. If the finance committee approves this, it is on the right path of making it all the way through the house. I would hope that Obama would not add more to the plan that would make it cost more because I don’t think our country and economy could afford it right now.

This article can be found here: http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/10/07/health.care/index.html

Too Much Information?

According to an article from NewsOK.com, starting November 1st a new law in Oklahoma will require abortion doctors to give information on their patients, including age race, marital status, number of previous pregnancies and the reason they are seeking an abortion. This information will then be given to the Oklahoma State Department of Health, where it will later be turned into a yearly report. This bill has been met with resistance from Pro-choice advocates, their reasoning being that "the measure violates a constitutional requirement that legislative measures deal only with one subject." Not only does the bill deal with more extensive information gathering, but it also prohibits abortions based on the gender of the fetus and redefines several abortion related terms. Those opposed to the bill are calling the details "bundled abortion restrictions." Defenders of the bill argue that all aspects include the same subject, abortion.

Getting more information on those seeking abortions may provide useful history and insight for those in the field. However, many see this as an invasion of privacy and being taken advantage of by the state.

Furthermore, differences between state legislatures and the federal government can make issues such as abortion complicated and messy. Who should these decisions be left up to in the recent health care legislation? Should the federal government be more involved in regulating these matters or should if be left up to a state by state basis?

The rest of the article can be found here:
http://newsok.com/women-challenge-oklahoma-abortion-law/article/3404987

The Danger of Fertility Treatments

An article published on Saturday, October 10, 2009 in the New York Times entitled “The Gift of Life, and Its Price,” discusses the complications associated with fertility treatments. In today’s society, with the popular television show Jon and Kate Plus 8 and celebrities like Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Lopez having twins, giving birth to multiples seems like a safe, and even popular thing to do. Using fertility treatments is increasingly common as women are waiting to have children later in life. However, many risks are associated with fertility treatments, causing dangers to both mother and baby.

The article discusses various ways fertility treatments can be abused. Doctors may not follow industry guidelines by implanting more than one embryo in the uterus at a time. Since females are designed to only be able to carry one fetus at a time, being pregnant with twins is dangerous. It strains the mother, as she cannot provide enough nutrients for the babies, and it strains the babies as they are cramped in a womb that is not big enough for both of them.

Multiples are almost always born prematurely, which can lead to birth defects, mental retardation, and even death. Premature birth also leads to longer hospital stays for the mother and child, which causes higher medical bills.

Of course couples want to have their own children. Sometimes fertility treatments are their only option. Do you think the government should regulate fertility doctors’ procedures when it comes to fertility treatments? Should fertility doctors only be able to implant one embryo at a time?

Malpractice Reforms Save Money, but at What Cost?

In an article written by Lori Montgomery in The Washington Post, “CBO: Medical Malpractice Reforms Could Save Up to $54 billion” she discusses how the Congressional Budget Office is set to impose a range of limits on medical malpractice lawsuits. Obama’s new health care reform attempts to lower malpractice insurance premiums for medical providers. The money saved comes from limiting the number of procedures, tests, and data that must be shown in court to defend themselves. This clause within the health care reform is important, not only because it saves billions of dollars, but Republicans are backing this decision having stressed for months that the health care package needed limits on malpractice lawsuits.

However these incentives and bipartisanship does not come without a few strings. First, there is a cap of $250,000 on awards for nonecomonic damages; pain and suffering.
Second, a cap on punitive damages of $500,000.
Third, there is a modification of the “collateral source” rule to allow evidence of income from such sources as health and life insurance, workers’ compensation, and automobile insurance to be introduced at trials or to require that such income is subtracted from awards decided by juries.
Fourth, a statute of limitations, one year for adults and three years for children, from the date of discovery of an injury. This means that an injured person must respond and file a lawsuit within a certain time frame. If something were to occur as a direct result from a malpractice, after the time window, they are simply out of luck.
Finally, replacement of joint-and-several liability with a fair-share rule, under which a defendant in a lawsuit would be liable only for the percentage of the final award that was equal to his or her share of responsibility for the injury.

The question is, are these tradeoffs proposed by lawmakers worth the potential $54 billion saved? Or is this another way for malpractice to continue without as severe repercussions?

Can Anti-Abortion Protesters Make a Difference?

Pro-life activists have been taking enormous strides in getting to the heart of legislators and pregnant mothers considering abortion policy. Their tactic is blunt and visual with images of mutilated babies. They go around neighborhoods and schools displaying these images in big posters with text from the Bible and quotes that are meant to convict and offend. The article goes into detail of a select few personal stories of anti-abortion protesters and what they do. There is also a multimedia that shows pictures of protesters and gory images of dead fetus chopped up in pieces.

Just last month, a protester named James Pouillon was shot dead in a small town Michigan because of his obscene images and strong anti-abortion belief. This incident did not discourage his comrade protesters to stop, but did the opposite. Mr. Pouillon's protesting comrades became even more bold and dedicated to their "service" because of his death. They even used his death as another protesting aid.

Chet Gallagher, a former Las Vegas police officer, joined the anti-abortion protesting because of his Christian belief. When he was serving as a police officer, he was assigned to arrest anti-abortion protesters, but refused to do so because of his belief. He was resigned from his position due to his bold action for his belief and ended up joining the anti-abortion group. The group praised him for his firm action in his spiritual belief over the human law.

Deborah Anderson was abused and raped as a child from her foster parents. Her biological mother was planning on getting an abortion for her, but could not find a clinic at the time. She sees herself as a blessing and feels the need to impact the community about abortion.

These are three of many anti-abortion protesters' testimony. They are explicitly anti-abortion each from their personal experiences. The question is how effective these protests are in affecting policy decisions. There are multiple instances where pregnant mothers are planning on getting an abortion and get convicted not to when they see these protesters standing up for what they believe in, but can it do the same thing at the Congressional level? ACT-UP had a significant effect up top, but can anti-abortion protesters do the same for abortion?

MENTAL Health Reform

In the past week there has been an article in The Baltimore Sun by Meredith Cohn regarding health reform, but more importantly a change in provisions for the mentally ill. The article provides real-world examples of mentally ill people who have suffered from the lack of insurance. For example, Deneice Valentine suffered from stress and major depression, but after losing her health insurance she took a downward spiral. She lost her home in Baltimore, custody of her children, and the ability to care for herself. These types of stories provide an emotional appeal to the issue of mental health because these are everyday people just like us. While the reform for mental health care would be very beneficial for the mentally ill it is also very costly. According to Cohn, "the bill for health care reform is expected to be in the hundreds of billions of dollars." In terms of how it would affect people individually, there would be a 1 to 3 percent raise in premiums for everyone. While the idea seems great for raising money so that stories like Deneice Valentine's don't occur again it also puts a serious toll on others. For example, if a person only makes $9 dollars an hour then this 1 to 3 percent mandate for health reform is quite costly for that person, but they will be forced to pay it. Numerous statistics are provided to reinforce the seriousness of the issue. Some statistics include the fact that an estimated one in four uninsured Americans suffer from a mental health condition. With those kind of statistics, shouldn't there be a urgency to change the current mental health policy? Even more so, shouldn't there be a reform that helps the mentally ill, but also isn't too costly for those who aren't making as much?

The High Price of Being a Gay Couple

A recent article in the New York Times, The High Price of Being a Gay Couple, argues that over a lifetime the average gay couple pays far more in living expenses than the average straight couple. These higher costs are due to extra health-care and tax fees they bear mostly because they are unable to marry (aka are unmarried).

This analysis was done by creating two hypothetical couples, one lesbian couple and one straight married couple. Income, health, residence, education, and children were all kept the same. With Roberton Williams of the Tax Policy Center they concluded that same-sex couples pay a total of $41,196 to $467,562 more than the average straight couple on health-care, social security, taxes, child bearing, pensions, and spousal I.R.A’s.

Explanation for the range in costs:

Worst scenario: the “lower earner’s employer did not provide health insurance and her partner’s employer didn’t cover domestic partners.” This is a common practice – especially for government employees – resulting in the uncovered domestic partner having to buy private health insurance while her partner and children are still covered. This costs the lesbian couple $211,993 more than the married couple.

Best case: they only had to pay $28,595 more. If both partners could attain employer-provided health-care and the higher earner could provide domestic partner coverage for the five years she stays at home to raise their children (same for married couple). But why the $29,000 additional fee if the married couple is also attaining spousal coverage for those five years? Just that. It’s for spouses only - there are additional taxes for domestic partnerships. “A nondependent partner’s coverage is taxable income, and she can’t use pretax dollars to pay the premiums.
What do you think some of the implications are if coverage for domestic partners is left off the bill?