The definitive explanation of the consequences of Obamacare ...
With Obamacare …
There will not be enough facilities, diagnostic devices and physicians to deal with an additional 30 million new patients being forced into the system. You will face a penalty/tax administered and enforced by the Internal Revenue Service if you opt-out of the system.
To serve this increased patient load, the system must, of necessity, ration healthcare to deal with the coming scarcity of resources. This can be done by delay in providing care, denial of care or death occurring before treatment.
Boards, Commissions and Panels …
To those who do not believe that “death panels” currently exist, one need only look at the curent organ donor program which is a prioritized list of recipients for scarce organs. Where an anonymous panel uses published criteria to select who receives the life-saving organ; leaving others to do the best they can until they perish. Unfortunately, under Obamacare, this level of triage will be pushed lower: moving from organ transplants to procedures involving the replacement of artificial limbs, knees, and implantable devices such as pacemakers, defibrillators, left-ventricle assist devices.
In addition to triage relating to medical necessity, it appears that there may be an additional social component based on a citizen’s (I almost said comrade’s) value to society. Thus disadvantaging both children and the elderly. But predominantly the non-working elderly who have left the labor marketplace and contribute little or nothing to tax-based revenues.
The chart that explains it all …
To contain costs, various panels, commissions and boards will use “best practices,” one-size fits all treatment protocols as the new "standard of care." For those in a category known as the "statistical norm,” healthcare will be of little issue . For those slightly outside that statistical norm, access to healthcare may be somewhat harder to obtain. And the real outliers, people needing specialized, individualized and costly medical care will be “out of luck.”
The chances of you obtaining an expensive drug protocol to prolong your life by a month or so will become increasingly slim or non-existent.
Of course, the rich, the politically-connected and those with high-power positions will always be able to circumvent the system and obtain quality healthcare whenever and wherever needed.
An example is the late Apple CEO Steve Jobs whose leftist, hippie behavior delayed his cancer treatment, against medical advice, in favor of a more holistic dietary approach.
But when even he could not deny that he required an organ transplant, he gamed the system by listing himself in numerous state registries and kept a private jet on standby should he be given clearance for an out-of-state procedure. <Source>
Had Jobs been an ordinary person, his preexisting conditions would have probably precluded his liver transplant. And had Jobs been treated under Obamacare, he may not have been treated at all.
The big blue pill …
The solution to the problem posed by exponentially-expanding patient base and limited resources is to expand end-of-life counseling and the increasing use of Palliative care which replaces aggressive medical treatment with efforts to keep the patient comfortable in the last stages of his life. Even if it means existing in a drug-induces haze. Look for assisted suicide legislation to become even more popular.
About those insurance companies …
Whoever decided to appoint insurance companies as the gatekeepers to healthcare and incentivized them to control costs should be vilified for destroying the art and science of medicine. Six-minute patient visits are an abomination. Artificially restricting the practice of qualified nurse-practitioners as "doctor's assistants is likewise abhorrent.
There will be no limits to the power of private insurance companies that continue to act as gatekeepers to healthcare access. Especially since they will be funneling campaign funds to the politicians making the rules to insure their continuing profits and fat executive bonuses. One need only look at the outrageous costs involved with durable medical equipment (collecting $1,000 for a $100 device) to understand how perverted the system has become.
Bottom line …
With Obamacare, costs will not be contained any more than the current system fights significant medical waste, fraud and abuse. And the healthcare system will grow more corrupt – to the point of encouraging a black market in medical treatment and drugs.
The Marxists have always believed that the Earth’s population consists of relatively unexceptional and replaceable units. Units who must be controlled by an enlightened ruling elite for the benefit of a collective society. And who must be culled by birth control, abortion, disease and homosexuality in order to reduce man’s footprint on the environment and the potential depletion of resources in the future. A theory which has long been discredited – but exists in the hearts of modern Marxists, Communists and Anarchists.
Perhaps Obamacare is the ultimate population control device using disease and death as tools to reduce the impact of people on the environment?
-- steve
“Nullius in verba”-- take nobody's word for it!
"Acta non verba" -- actions not words
“Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance.”-- George Bernard Shaw
“Progressive, liberal, Socialist, Marxist, Democratic Socialist -- they are all COMMUNISTS.”
“The key to fighting the craziness of the progressives is to hold them responsible for their actions, not their intentions.” – OCS "The object in life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane." -- Marcus Aurelius “A people that elect corrupt politicians, imposters, thieves, and traitors are not victims... but accomplices” -- George Orwell “Fere libenter homines id quod volunt credunt." (The people gladly believe what they wish to.) ~Julius Caesar “Describing the problem is quite different from knowing the solution. Except in politics." ~ OCS