New York Times: Yeah, ObamaCare has made the healthcare system a mess in 2014

Hotair ^ | 01/12/2014 | Ed Morrissey

[SeekAndFind]

The Associated Press first reported this developing and completely predictable problem earlier in the week. What happens when you pass a law that (a) causes the health-insurance cancellation for millions and then (b) forces them and millions more to use a disastrously-built web portal as a middeman to replace that coverage? Answer: You end up with millions of people flooding into providers without any idea whether they have coverage or whether their doctor will accept it.

The New York Times confirmed this issue … for its Saturday edition, of course:

In addition to the difficulties many face in proving they have coverage, patients are also having a hard time figuring out whether particular doctors are affiliated with their health insurance plan. Doctors themselves often do not know if they are in the network of providers for plans sold on the exchange.

But interviews with doctors, hospital executives, pharmacists and newly insured people around the country suggest that the biggest challenge so far has been verifying coverage. A surge of enrollments in late December, just before the deadline for coverage to take effect, created backlogs at many state and federal exchanges and insurance companies in processing applications. As a result, many of those who enrolled have yet to receive an insurance card, policy number or bill.

Many are also having trouble reaching exchanges and insurance companies to confirm their enrollment or pay their first month’s premium. Doctors’ offices and pharmacies, too, are spending hours on the phone trying to verify patients’ coverage, sometimes to no avail.

“The system wasn’t really built to handle this kind of glut of new patients,” said Dr. Curtis Miyamoto, a radiation oncologist at Temple University Hospital who is president of the Philadelphia County Medical Society. “So it’s resulting in us having some delays in getting people verified, and therefore delays in their care.”

That’s leading to decisions like this being forced on the once-insured:

In Langley, Wash., north of Seattle, Erin Waterman was able to see a primary care doctor on Jan. 3 with a temporary identification card printed from the website of her new insurer, LifeWise Health Plan of Washington. But when Ms. Waterman, 47, tried to fill a prescription for a new asthma inhaler, the pharmacy could not verify her coverage even though she had paid her first month’s premium on Dec. 23.

Ms. Waterman was given the option of paying full price — $187, instead of the $50 co-payment required under her new plan — and eventually being reimbursed. But she decided to wait, and hope that she does not have an asthma attack in the meantime.

By the way, asthma attacks can kill. In 2010, asthma attacks killed over 3400 Americans, according to the CDC.

Be sure to read it all. This issue extends well beyond whether an enrollment has been successfully concluded. As mentioned above, providers themselves aren’t even sure whether they’re in network on which plans, which means that their ability to get reimbursement is under question on every patient that comes through on anything other than a group plan. And even if they know that, providers aren’t sure which procedures and treatments will be covered, thanks to a massive amount of confusion over the mandates in ObamaCare.

This, of course, is just the appetizer. When the employer mandate hits this fall, it will similarly scramble the coverage of tens of millions of Americans who end up in the ObamaCare exchanges when their employers simply decide to opt out of subsidizing the rapidly-escalating premiums in health insurance, and we’ll get a crisis orders of magnitude larger one year from now.

With that in mind, Sen. Thad Cochran called for a New Year resolution to repeal ObamaCare in the GOP’s weekly address to the nation yesterday, and questioned the honesty and integrity of the White House and its statistics on “enrollments”:

“The Affordable Care Act was supposed to be fully operational by January 1 of this year, but here we are two weeks into 2014, and the administration continues to struggle to implement the law’s burdensome mandates,” Cochran said in theweekly Republican address. “The law is not living up to the promises made by its supporters, and it is questionable whether the law will meet its fundamental purpose – to significantly expand health insurance coverage.”

The administration and congressional Democrats have recently been touting the law’s expansion of coverage to roughly nine million Americans – three million young adults who have been able to stay on their parents’ plan, two million consumers who have enrolled in the private insurance exchanges and four million low-income consumers who have been inducted into an expanded Medicaid program.

Cochran, however, argued there may be less to those figures than meets the eye.

“The administration’s enrollment numbers don’t paint a pretty picture,” he said. “They don’t tell us how many of the enrollees have actually lost existing coverage and were forced into the exchanges; and the numbers don’t tell us whether applicants have actually paid their premiums and received coverage. There is ample reason to be skeptical that those numbers will improve substantially.”

Cochran’s other complaints about the law had a familiar ring: that it’s booting people off of health plans they liked despite the president’s promise that people could keep their current insurance; that it’s forcing people to change doctors; that many consumers are finding their prices going up under Obamacare.

“If the law can’t keep its most basic promise, it should be repealed,” he concluded. “We should go back to the drawing board and draft commonsense, bipartisan legislation that will work better for all Americans, without spending billions of taxpayer dollars to support these failing policies.”

Let’s hope we don’t have to make this New Year’s resolution again for 2015.

[ExTexasRedhead]

DeathCare must be used to expose every RAT traitor running in 2014 and 2016. Eunuch RINOs must also be voted out.

[AnAmericanInEngland]

“The system wasn’t really built to handle this kind of glut of new patients,”

The system can't handle the glut of patients? So, if all Americans purchased insurance, without obamacre being implemented, the system wold only handle some of them? Or, maybe the system was screwed to start with, if a net addition of a couple million new healthcare insurance subscribers is overloading the system. Best healthcare system in the world?

[TheGipperWasRight]

I’m confused. I thought opposition to Obamacare was code word for racism. Has the NYT been overrun by racists?

[nascarnation]

Well the media has important things to investigate now, like NJFatboy’s traffic cones.

[Cen-Tejas]

I agree with the close of the article that zerocare must be repealed and then a do over takes place. But, that “do over” must occur when Boehner and Cantor and Reid and Pelosi and hundreds of dims and rinos are out of their current offices if not out of congress completely.

Just let Cruz, Lee, Palin, Carson dictate a healthcare bill. Bet they could do it on 2,700 less pages than Pelosi, Reid, Axelrod, Jarrett, Schumer et al used.

[Sooth2222]

In Los Angeles, Hilary Danailova, who is almost eight months pregnant, said she had to pay $630 for an ultrasound on Thursday after failing to get an ID card or any confirmation of coverage from her new insurer, Anthem Blue Cross. Ms. Danailova, 38, said she signed up just before Christmas and sent her first month’s premium of $410 by overnight mail on Jan. 3. She has repeatedly tried to reach Anthem to see whether the company has processed her payment.

Did she consider calling her bank, and asking if they cashed the check? (It's been about 30 years -- but isn't $410 for obstetrical care an awfully good price? Is the business model of Obamacare to buy apples for $1000, sell them for $1 and make the profit on the volume?)

[autumnraine]

Its about new policies. Most (before) were renewals and not much processing. Millions of new policies at once would surely overwhelm the system .

[SunkenCiv]

...but what possible difference, at this point, does it make? Besides, it’s been in force a whole year/two years/three years now, and it’s settled law...

Thanks SeekAndFind.

[Drew68]

Or, maybe the system was screwed to start with, if a net addition of a couple million new healthcare insurance subscribers is overloading the system. Best healthcare system in the world?

The idea was that a bunch of young, healthy people would buy Obamacare and then not need to use it because, well, they're young and healthy.

[spokeshave]

And just wait till they start issuing orders to the doctors to match client with the care required....and prescriptions....don't forget all those complex prescription orders.

I see not just amputations on the wrong limb....but on the wrong patient.

So take a look at how it works in the UK

and don't expect quick response for a broken arm:

And so you have an acute appendix....?

Mark Wattson, 35, from Swindon may have been the victim of botched surgery after he had to have his appendix removed twice

To his shock, surgeons from the same team told him that not only was his appendix still inside him, but it had ruptured - a potentially fatal complication.

In a second operation it was finally removed, leaving Mr Wattson fearing another organ might have been taken out during the first procedure.

The blunder has left Mr Wattson jobless, as bosses at the shop where he worked did not believe his story and sacked him.

Mr Wattson told of the moment he realised there had been a serious mistake.

'I was lying on a stretcher in terrible pain and a doctor came up to me and said that my appendix had burst,' he said.

'I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I told these people I had my appendix out just four weeks earlier but there it was on the scanner screen for all to see.

'I thought, "What the hell did they slice me open for in the first place?"

'I feel that if the surgery had been done correctly in the first place I wouldn't be in the mess I am today. I'm disgusted by the whole experience.'

Mr Wattson first went under the knife on July 7 after experiencing severe abdominal pain for several weeks. He was discharged but exactly a month later he had to dial 999 after collapsing in agony. Mr Wattson

Mr Wattson was readmitted to the Great Western Hospital in Swindon after his appendix ruptured.

Nurse will see you now

130,000 elderly patients killed every year by ‘death pathway’, claims leading UK doctor

by Thaddeus Baklinski Thu Jun 21, 2012 10:02 EST Tags: euthanasia, patrick pullicino, uk

LONDON, June 21, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) - An eminent British doctor told a meeting of the Royal Society of Medicine in London that every year 130,000 elderly patients that die while under the care of the National Health Service (NHS) have been effectively euthanized by being put on the controversial Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP), a protocol for care of the terminally ill that he described as a “death pathway.”

Sit back and enjoy your Obamacare.

[Liz]

Who needs the NY Times tell all? O/Care is a debacle b/c Dems are hiding it as an election issue.

Nanzi Pelosi Says Dems win in 2014 Focusing on The 3 R’s: Recruiting, Raising Cash, Raising Issues.

Hmmmmmmm.....Nancy plumb "forgot" to mention "Obamacare"--- the signature legislation of their president. Dems once said they were so s-u-r-e Americans would love Obama's wonderful healthcare plan, that O/Care is a winning Democrat issue.

=================================================

Lately, Dems seem to have gotten the heebie jeebies about Obamacare. Is this why? (cackle)

As far back as 2008, at the presidential debate in Nashville, Democrat candidate Obama advanced his signature plan that was ultimately enacted (by an historic straight Democrat party-line vote) into the "Affordable Care Act :

OBAMA: "No. 1, let me just repeat, if you’ve got a health care plan that you like, you can keep it. All I’m going to do is help you to lower the premiums on it. You’ll still have choice of doctor.”

Repeated over and over ---- with the promise that every American family would be saving $2500.00 on healthcare costs.

LOCK-STEPPING PARTY LOYALTY NOT SEEN SINCE 1940's ERA EUROPE Obama And The Dumbos marched in lockstep. The persistent Dumbocrat drumbeat ---- in obeisance to Obama ---- kept ringing reassuringly in our ears: "If you like your plan, you can keep your plan."

==================================================

SEN. HARRY REID (D-Nev.): “In fact, one of our core principles is that if you like the health care you have, you can keep it.” (Sen. Reid, Congressional Record, S.8642, 8/3/09)

SEN. RICHARD DURBIN: “We believe — and we stand by this — if you like your current health insurance plan, you will be able to keep it, plain and simple, straightforward.” (Sen. Durbin, Congressional Record, S.6401, 6/10/09)

SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY): “If you like your insurance, you keep it.” (U.S. Senate, Finance Committee, Bill Mark-Up, 9/29/09)

SEN. PATTY MURRAY (D-Wash.): “Again, if you like what you have, you will be able to keep it. Let me say this again: If you like what you have, when our legislation is passed and signed by the President, you will be able to keep it.” (Sen. Murray, Congressional Record, S.6400, 6/10/09)

SEN. MAX BAUCUS (D-Mont.): “That is why one of the central promises of health care reform has been and is: If you like what you have, you can keep it. That is critically important. If a person has a plan, and he or she likes it, he or she can keep it.” (Sen. Baucus, Congressional Record, S.7676, 9/29/10)

SEN. TOM HARKIN (D-Iowa): “One of the things we put in the health care bill when we designed it was the protection for consumers to keep the plan they have if they like it; thus, the term ‘grandfathered plans.’ If you have a plan you like — existing policies — you can keep them. … we said, if you like a plan, you get to keep it, and you can grandfather it in.” (Sen. Harkin, Congressional Record, S.7675-6, 9/29/10)

THEN-REP. TAMMY BALDWIN (D-Wis.): “Under the bill, if you like the insurance you have now, you may keep it and it will improve.” (Rep. Baldwin, Press Release, 3/18/10)

SEN. MARK BEGICH (D-Alaska): “If you got a doctor now, you got a medical professional you want, you get to keep that. If you have an insurance program or a health care policy you want of ideas, make sure you keep it. That you can keep who you want.” (Sen. Begich, Townhall Event, 7/27/09)

SEN. MICHAEL BENNET (D-Colo.): “We should begin with a basic principle: if you have coverage and you like it, you can keep it. If you have your doctor, and you like him or her, you should be able to keep them as well. We will not take that choice away from you.” (Sen. Bennet, Press Release, 6/11/09)

SEN. BARBARA BOXER (D-Calif.): “So we Democrats want people to be able to keep the health care they have. And the answer to that is choice of plans. And in the exchange, we’re going to have lots of different plans, and people will be able to keep the health care coverage they need and they want.” (Sen. Boxer, Press Release, 2/8/11)

SEN. SHERROD BROWN (D-Ohio): “Our Democrat bill says if you have health insurance and you like it, you can keep it…”(Sen. Brown, Congressional Record, S.12612, 12/7/09)

SEN. BEN CARDIN (D-Md.): “For the people of Maryland, this bill will provide a rational way in which they can maintain their existing coverage…” (Sen. Cardin, Congressional Record, S.13798, 12/23/09)

SEN. BOB CASEY (D-Pa.): “I also believe this Democrat legislation and the bill we are going to send to President Obama this fall will also have secure choices. If you like what you have, you like the plan you have, you can keep it. It is not going to change.” (Sen. Casey, Congressional Record, S.8070, 7/24/09)

SEN. KAY HAGAN (D-N.C.): ‘People who have insurance they’re happy with can keep it’ “We need to support the private insurance industry so that people who have insurance they’re happy with can keep it while also providing a backstop option for people without access to affordable coverage.” (“Republicans Vent As Other Compromise Plans Get Aired,” National Journal’s Congress Daily, 6/18/09)

SEN. MARY LANDRIEU (D-La.): “If you like the insurance that you have, you’ll be able to keep it.” (MSNBC’s Hardball, 12/16/09)

SEN. PAT LEAHY (D-Vt.): “[I]f you like the insurance you now have, keep the insurance you have.” (CNN’s “Newsroom,” 10/22/09)

SEN. BOB MENENDEZ (D-N.J.): “If you like what you have, you get to keep it” “Menendez is a member of the Senate Finance Committee, which is expected to release a bill later this week. He stressed that consumers who are satisfied with their plans won’t have to change. ‘If you like what you have, you get to keep it,’ he said.” (“Health Care Plan Would Help N.J., Menendez Says,” The Record, 6/19/09)

SEN. JEFF MERKLEY (D-Oreg.): “[E]nsuring that those who like their insurance get to keep it” “The HELP Committee bill sets forward a historic Democrat plan that will, for the first time in American history, give every American access to affordable health coverage, reduce costs, and increase choice, while ensuring that those who like their insurance get to keep it.” (Sen. Merkley, Press Release, 7/15/09)

SEN. BARBARA MIKULSKI (D-Md.): “It means that if you like the insurance you have now, you can keep it.” (Sen. Mikulski, Press Release, 12/24/09)

SEN. JAY ROCKEFELLER (D-W.Va.): “I want people to know, the President’s promise that if you like the coverage you have today you can keep it is a pledge we intend to keep.” (U.S. Senate, Finance Committee, Hearing, 9/23/09)

SEN. JACK REED (D-R.I.): “If you like the insurance you have, you can choose to keep it.” (Sen. Reed, Town Hall Event, 6/25/09)

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-Vt.): “‘If you have coverage you like, you can keep it,’ says Sen. Sanders.” (“Sick And Wrong,” Rolling Stone, 4/5/10)

SEN. JEANNE SHAHEEN (D-N.H.): ‘if you have health coverage that you like, you get to keep it’ “My understanding … is that … if you have health coverage that you like you can keep it. As I said, you may have missed my remarks at the beginning of the call, but one of the things I that I said as a requirement that I have for supporting a Democrat bill is that if you have health coverage that you like you should be able to keep that. …under every scenario that I’ve seen, if you have health coverage that you like, you get to keep it.” (Sen. Shaheen, “Health Care Questions From Across New Hampshire,” Accessed 11/13/13)

SEN. DEBBIE STABENOW (D-Mich.): “As someone who has a large number of large employers in my state, one of the things I appreciate about the Democrat chairman’s remark is — is the grandfathering provisions, the fact that the people in my state, 60 percent of whom have insurance, are going to be able to keep it. And Mr. Chairman, I appreciate that. That’s a strong commitment. It’s clear in the bill … I appreciate the strong commitment on your part and the president to make sure that if you have your insurance you can keep it. That’s the bottom line for me.” (U.S. Senate, Finance Committee, Bill Mark-Up, 9/24/09)

SEN. JON TESTER (D-Mont.): “‘If you like your coverage, you’ll be able to keep it,’ Tester said, adding that if Medicare changes, it will only become stronger”. (“Tester In Baker To Discuss Health Care,” The Fallon County Times, 11/20/09)

SEN. TOM UDALL (D-N.Mex.): “Some worried reform would alter their current coverage. It won’t. If you like your current plan, you can keep it.” (“What I Learned: About Health Care Reform This Summer, By Your Lawmakers In Congress,” Albuquerque Journal, 9/8/09)

SEN. SHELDON WHITEHOUSE (D-R.I.): “..it honors President Obama’s programs and the promise of all of the Presidential candidates that if you like the plan you have, you get to keep it. You are not forced out of anything.” (Sen. Whitehouse, Congressional Record, S.8668, 8/3/09)

Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) the 60th vote on Obamacare: "people who are happy with their current plan, wouldn't need to change it."

FRANKEN YOUTUBE SOUND BITE http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCZmAYYNz8Ihttp://www.youtube.com/watch? v=UCZmAYYNz8I

[Liz]

"Those Democrats leering over my shoulder owe me bigtime. This
healthcare bill insures we have a permanent Democratic majority."

" All except those Tea Party types, swallowed hook, line and sinker my promises that they could:
(1) keep their existing health plans,
(2) keep their own doctors that they like,
(3) keep their 25-year-olds on the family health plan,
(4) never be denied coverage for a pre-existing condition,
(5) sign up instantly on my tech-savvy government Web site,
(6) buy insurance only after becoming seriously ill."
(7) save $2,500 in annual premiums in the bargain....
(8) All without any new taxes."

"Them sonovagun Tea Partiers will rue the day they criticized my wonderful bill."

[Liz]

OOPS, THOSE TRANSPARENCY-LOVING OBAMATONS NEVER FIGURED ON ACTUAL "DISCLOSURES"....in a required SEC filing, Humana insurers disclosed to investors, "as a result of Dec 2013 federal and state regulatory changes allowing certain individuals to remain in their previously existing off-exchange health plans, the Company now expects the risk mix to be more adverse than previously expected."

The change Humana is referring to is Obama's unilateral "administrative fix" aimed at allowing individuals to remain enrolled in plans that had been cancelled--imposed by Obama's signature healthcare law mandates. Obama announced the "fix" after a storm of criticism over his broken promise that anybody who liked their plan could keep it.

UT, OH---DEMOCRAT TROUBLE AHEAD Paranoid about his wife's chances in 2016, Bill Clinton publicly called on Obama to "honor the commitment he made" that people should be able to keep their health care plans.

But State Insurance Commissioners w/ the power to do so, could not fix it.

When that fixit failed, the Clinton camp began distancing itself from Obamacare. The massive problems associated with O/Care are raining down on the not-amused American electorate.

[Vaduz]

The hacks will have to murder ObamaCare to stay in business now the truth is out and all of Obama&CO are on the chopping block.

[sheana]

She would have had to pay that $630 anyway since her deductible is probably $5k. I really wish newsies would do some research before they report.

[Organic Panic]

But does Sandra Fluck still get her free birth control. We are forgetting what is really important. If a few million people lose their insurance, costs go up, care goes down is that such a high price to pay for ensuring a college slut doesn’t get punished with a baby?

[Sooth2222]

Is the ultrasound routine health screening? Then it would be 100%

Obamacare is like a car insurance policy that covers oil changes and car washes, but has a $10,000 deductible and then pays 60% of the bill after that. The reason nobody sells car insurance like that is that nobody would actually buy it.