"HOW"S [[ YOUR ]] Healthcare costs being affected by " Obama?"

[Terry]

Will your health care costs rise under Pres. Obama's new law?


In some states, health care costs are increasing, in spite of new laws aimed at cutting costs.


Democratic candidates up for election are spending three times more advertising against President Obama's health care law than they are for it.

The president told Americans over and over again during the heated health care debate reform would mean lower health care costs. But so far, the opposite is happening.

Let's start with California, where regulators have now cleared all four of the state's major insurers for rate hikes. These four companies control 90 percent of California's individual health insurance policies.

The Los Angeles Times reports that Aetna was the last company to be approved, with rate hikes averaging 19 percent.

The company is defending the rate, saying they're necessary to keep up with rising health care costs – like hospital care, prescription drugs and doctor's visits.

They say the maximum increase for some of its members will be 30 percent. Thirty percent! Some policy holders are rightfully worried that they soon won't be able to afford health insurance.

Meanwhile, in Connecticut, regulators have approved rate hikes of more than 20 percent for the state's largest health insurer, Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield

The Hartford Courant reports increases will vary depending on the plan, but costs will go up due to rising medical costs and the benefits from health care reform. This includes things like covering young adults until they turn 26 and covering the full cost of preventive care like mammograms and colonoscopies.

These rate changes mostly affect new customers buying individual plans, not those who are already insured through an employer.

[WhatMeWorry?]

The real question is how much did your rates rise before Obamacare?

Context Context Context

[RatSass]

No, the real question is how long will people continue to make excuses for this jerk in the white house!

[Mara Lynd]

Mine haven't changed yet, but will decrease in cost both for the premium and co-pay w/out a change in coverage next year.

[Mr T]

I have no idea.  My health has been screwed since 1965, when I had head and neck radiation 18 times for acne.  It's been a long downhill ride, sometimes fast and sometimes chronic.  Haha, I said chronic. ::D:

My regular insurance, that I used to pay for when I could work even part-time, was cancelled in 1991 after I had cancer for the nth time and was given two years to live.  Ha ha.

My work-ability got smaller and smaller, and in 2003 I couldn't go on, and in 2004 I applied for disability.  In 2006 I guess I won, and I got Medicare.

[Mr T]

America has no more money.  We can't afford me.  I'm no-one.  I'm being re-evaluated, and I'm pretty sure they will decide I should go do something useful and stop being a drag on the system.  Bad me. ::(:

This will mean that I will lose the Medicare.  Since I am uninsurable, I guess I would fall into that group that they don't seem to be funding and I can't afford  anyway because I can't work.  I guess that means that I will have to pay a penalty? 

[flybananas]

hm. No relief here, but no losses either. Had to take hubz to the er for another DENTAL infection. Now that he can't take cillins or keflex, all he can get is the expensive stuff. How's that going for you's guys that pay for it? Cuz we can't.

On the other hand, kids and i still have ndn health care all the way up in mcloud.

My adult son let himself slip out of ndn dental coverage and has to do the *get back in the system tribal dance* with wisdom teeth that are KILLING him.

Next?

[Whoo]

America has no more money.  We can't afford me.  I'm no-one.  I'm being re-evaluated, and I'm pretty sure they will decide I should go do something useful and stop being a drag on the system.  Bad me. ::(:

This will mean that I will lose the Medicare.  Since I am uninsurable, I guess I would fall into that group that they don't seem to be funding and I can't afford  anyway because I can't work.  I guess that means that I will have to pay a penalty?

No my dear, that means you can join the ranks of people on charity medical through OU.  It is slow, and a day at the doctor is just that (well, a half day, anyway), and by the time you are approved for another 6 months it is almost time to renew your paperwork again, but at least if something needs to be done, you can get it done. :-\

[Mr T]

Will I still have to pay the penalty, do you think?  Darn these people.

[Mr T]

Oh, Nanners, poor Hubz!  I know how that feels.  Ouch.

I know keeping ones' actual teeth is a big deal here in America, at least for now.  Soon people won't be able to afford it, just like the giant vet bills they can no longer afford.  Things that look like a moral imperative when you have credit cards kinda change when you have to pay cash.  Especially when you have to choose between hip replacements for yourself, or for the dog!

I spent 30 years and many thousands of dollars trying to keep on top of the teeth situation.  The radiation fried the capillaries that bring oxygen to the jaws, and turned my salivary glands to toast.  The teeth never had a chance, but no-one knew that until the nineties, when they started heavy radiation for brain tumors and suddenly all the poor patients were losing their teeth horribly in the middle of a disastrous situation.

[Mr T]

Nowadays they recommend that you have all of your teeth out before you begin the radiation, so everything can heal normally, which it won't if you don't.   Sometimes it is horrible, being a people.


I had infections for decades.  I almost didn't graduate from high school because I missed 37 days in junior year and 42 days senior year.  I spent much time and money on the disaster, in the sixties and seventies and eighties and most of the nineties.  When medical science caught up, and they said it was pointless, I was terrified/horrified/embarrassed/relieved.  Very, very relieved.

It took two years for us to save up all of the money.  First we bought the "new teeth", and then we finished saving for all the extractions.  On March 1, 1998, we finally did the deed.  I haven't had one day of infection in over 12 years.

Truly it is the best of times and the worst of times.  While I hated having the darn things, I could eat again!  Imagine a cheeseburger, without having to cut it into tiny pieces!  I could smile and talk!  No more pain, no more infections, no more nothing.  Believe you me, the clean pain of 28 extractions was so so so much better than the pain before them.  Plus, I haven't had to spend a penny on doctors and dentists and antibiotics.  The best of times won.  :smile:

[flybananas]

oh, man.  What you went through, T.  CRAZY. 


what's worse, is no one wants to take responsibility and care of the damage some "experimental treatment" caused.
GRRRR

I'm trying to get hubz to get on some kind of plan.  some dental plan, but he keeps declining to do so.  So he gets this big infection and off to the er.

and the longer he puts off his dentition the more i worry about his heart.  :(

the one that's driving him nuts right now  LOOKS like it would be a simple extraction.  now the other one is broken off and needs oral surgery to remove the root.

[Terry]

...W O W ! ...
Did 'i' ever :::  ::O:    :confused:  ::D:

[flybananas]

not the responses you were expecting, terry? I can't quote you on my fone. Whats got you confused?

[Mr T]

Welcome to the ACTUAL state of health care in America,  not just the POLITICAL state of health care in America.  They are two very different things.

On the political side you have a lot of money circulating through rich thin healthy people who don't eat the food "products" produced by their companies.  You have a lot of money circulating through insurance executives, who have great family coverage.  All of the money passes at least twice through the congresspeople and the senators.  Tons of the money went to the Wall Street dude who bet billions against the housing market of his own country and won big, and he purchased property in the Hamptons and tore down a 7,000 year old double-dune without applying for permits and erected a cement wall to keep the commoners away. 

On the other side you have us.  We see the "greatest health care in the world" but we don't have access.  It isn't great if you are standing outside with your nose pressed to the window.