| Author | Message | ||
     Hdbobwithabuell |
AMA Expresses Concerns Over Health Care Debate The AMA Expresses Concern with Health Care Debate Take Action! Contact your Senators and Representative today! Millions of on-highway and off-highway motorcyclists -- as well as all-terrain vehicle (ATV) riders -- may be adversely impacted by the various heath care bills currently under consideration in Congress. The AMA opposes any legislation that may restrict the freedoms of millions of riders enjoying an active lifestyle. Motorcyclists and ATV riders cherish personal freedom and responsibility when it comes to enjoying their passion for riding. As Congress continues to deliberate on health care reform, the AMA needs your help in urging your elected officials not to abdicate the rights of the insured to an unelected commission or board, which will render final decisions regarding appropriate medical coverage for individuals who ride as a mode of transportation or for recreation (e.g., denial of a procedure). We must remain vigilant, thereby helping to ensure that motorcyclists and ATV riders will continue to be able to pursue their chosen recreational pursuit without the addition of unneeded prohibitions, limitations or mandates stemming from the health care legislation under consideration. There is precedent for us to be concerned with regarding any health care legislation coming from Washington. For example in 1996, Congress passed the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) that was intended to ensure non-discrimination in health coverage in the group market. However, when it came to implementing the law, the Department of Labor, the Internal Revenue Service and the Health Care Financing Administration - now the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services - issued a rule allowing insurers to deny health benefits for an otherwise covered injury that results from certain types of recreational activities, such as skiing, horseback riding, snowmobiling or motorcycling. Even though the AMA has fought this discriminatory rule with legislation, this indicates what could happen if a new health care bill is implemented by bureaucrats in Washington using biased data. To voice your concern regarding the various health care bills, it is imperative that you contact your elected officials. The fastest way to reach your members of Congress is to call them. You can find contact information for your elected officials on AmericanMotorcyclist.com, click on "Rights," then "Issues & Legislation," and enter your zip code in the "Find your Officials" box. Additionally, a prewritten e-mail is available for you to send to your officials by following the "Take Action" option and entering your information. All AMA members and anyone else who enjoys an active lifestyle is urged to contact their elected officials and to tell them to protect the freedoms that riders cherish from being dictated by Washington bureaucrats. | ||
| Johnnymceldoo |
Typical that an organization that stands up for personal freedom would be apposed to the bill. How dare they! | ||
| Cityxslicker |
Yep, I have been on the claims side of the bench when the bills go to audit. It is never pretty. On the other side of things; since when should sitting in an office cubicle cover you for risks that you willingly put your azz in front of by hang-gliding, parachuting, bungee jumping, skiing, racing, motorcycling.... and you see their cost / risk containment logic at work. | ||
| Reindog |
There is recourse as long as private health insurance exists. You can sue insurers but you won't be able to sue the government once they have control over your life. Why are people so willing to give up their liberty to this Socialist government? It defies all logic and reason. | ||
| Cityxslicker |
Sure you can sue them, you wont win. Its called a Named Policy exclusion, it specifically limits, reduces, or denies any coverage for recreational activities, those not incurred on the job, and any amature/professional racing. go read the tiny print in your policy. You will loose every time. DAMHIK | ||
| Ft_bstrd |
The HIPAA should have mandated 50 state portability as well as 50 state prior coverage inclusion without exclusion. You MUST have continuous coverage without a break of 12 months of more. You can keep coverage in any state and there can be no exclusions for activities. They came close, but not quite close enough. Individuals should be able to have choices for very high deductible plans that are both affordable and count for HIPAA continual coverage. Tax credits for premiums. Tax deductions above the credits. Make the market compete for premiums. Prevent a currently covered person from being excluded from the next carrier. Have a continuous coverage letter, no questions asked, you're on. No wait, no exclusions. There are market solutions, we just haven't tried them. Tort reform MUST be part of any solutions. | ||
| Cityxslicker |
Portability just means that they have to give you access to health coverage without consideration of denying you coverage because you had say a heart attach on your previous plan. It in no way guarantees the same level of coverage for services, deductible, maximum cap for coverage or named policy exclusions. Named policy exlcusions are key to any policy and are there, whether you read them or not is on you. I have worked on several boards and finance reconsideration boards that DENIED coverages because of underwriting rules. Each state has their own licenses, requirements and regulations for insurance and healthcare delivery. It is categorically incorrect to think what is covered in one state is automatically covered in another. HIPAA also was supposed to grant you certain identity protection, this will disappear in a National setting. Esp when they need to have access to all your health records, IRS files, bank accounts and property records. (theres a national ID card coming, and it will be loaded with data) | ||
| Cityxslicker |
the other big portion of portability is that if you change plans, you no longer have the initial enrollment waiting period. Typically when starting a job, medical enrollment and eligibility doesnt occur until after 90 days, with previous coverage, that wait period is usually waived, HIPAA codified it as a requirement. | ||
| Oldog |
theres a national ID card coming, and it will be loaded with data) no it will be an implanted, perhaps an rf type device, you eventualy will have to accept this or you will not be able to buy or sell any thing, get or hold a job. there may be a visible barcode or similar mark tatooed some where on you say forhead or right hand pay attention kids 1 world government is coming as is one world currency.. the latest rumor was that at some point you will be required to have a DNR order and after say 75 you may not be able to get health care..from the state, We reap what we sow..... | ||
| Bigdaddy |
Oldog has riddled it correct. RFID is coming to a hand/forehead near you. It's not like this is even a secret, but we've become a tribe of scoffers that refuse to believe. | ||
| Greenlantern |
Whatever happened to our United States of Awesome movement? | ||
| Moxnix |
Vive Le French Care? By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Wednesday, August 26, 2009 4:20 PM PT Health Systems: Health care in France is often held up as a model the U.S. might follow. Yet the French have their own problems that show there's no such thing as a free lunch — or a free doctor's visit. ".................a Frenchman making a monthly salary of 3,000 euros has 350 of them deducted for health insurance. Then the employer throws in an additional 1,200 euros. This raises the cost of labor to prohibitive levels and puts a brake on economic growth. This helps explain why French unemployment hovers around 10%. France imposes an additional tax levy to cover the constant deficits that national health insurance runs. The French Parliament raises this levy, which applies to all forms of income, every year. Altogether, Sorman writes, "25% of French national income goes toward what's called Social Security, which includes health care and basic retirement pensions for all." Drugs developed in America at enormous expense do cost less in France, which decides what drugs are to be used and at what prices. American patients in effect subsidize the French, who take the same pills at half the price because American pharmaceutical companies don't want to lose the French market. French taxpayers fund a state health insurer, Assurance Maladie. Assurance Maladie has run in the red since 1989, and this year's shortfall is expected to be 9.4 billion euros ($13.5 billion) and 15 billion euros in 2010, about 10% of its budget. Regardless of the cost, does the French system produce better outcomes? Not always. Infant mortality rates are often cited as a reason socialized medicine and single-payer systems are better than what we have here. But according to Dr. Linda Halderman, a policy adviser in the California State Senate, these comparisons are bogus. Official World Health Organization statistics show the U.S. lagging behind France in infant mortality rates — 6.7 per 1,000 live births vs. 3.8 for France. Halderman notes that in the U.S., any infant born that shows any sign of life for any length of time is considered a live birth. In France — in fact, in most of the European Union — any baby born before 26 weeks' gestation is not considered alive and therefore doesn't "count" in reported infant mortality rates. France reimburses its doctors at a far lower rate than U.S. physicians would accept. As David Gratzer, a physician and senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, wrote in the summer 2007 issue of City Journal: "In France, the supply of doctors is so limited that during an August 2003 heat wave — when many doctors were on vacation and hospitals were stretched beyond capacity — 15,000 elderly citizens died." After the tragedy, the French parliament released a harshly worded report blaming the deaths on a complex health system, widespread failure among agencies and health services to coordinate efforts, and chronically insufficient care for the elderly. It's hard to imagine that happening here, where hospitals have enough air-conditioned beds and doctors that aren't on vacation. Fact is, most Americans like their health care. There are ways to provide expanded coverage at lower cost, such as pushing individually owned health savings accounts, malpractice reform and allowing insurance to be bought across state lines. We needn't be forced to sacrifice quality for cost. Nor do we need to look to the French for a better solution. They don't have one." http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=3 36178343967257 | ||
| Cityxslicker |
I see the RF implant going to the rich communitees that want to keep the rif and the raff out. The are already common in France. the Beach goers dont want to be troubled with carrying money on the Riveria, so they have been lining up to be chipped for the last 5 years. The national data card has been in play for over 10 years in the military with the smart ID, that has the reader chip in it. The transition was pretty much seemless. You may see it go to an imbed on soldiers for medical data so they know your full history just by a scan.... but I suspect there are some Hillbillies down south that will resist any implanted chip with tooth, nail, and ammo. My relatives down there were still off the grid last time I heard. | ||
| Gsilvernale |
Tatoo/RFID - Mark of the beast - 7 years to Apocalypse when this happens. | ||
| Cityxslicker |
I got a week detention and couldnt attend my graduation from higshcool because my senior thesis was that the social security number was already in a sense a cradle to grave 'tattoo' number that controlled your life, credit, retirement and was on parr with Hitlers Nazi numeral tattoos for the Jews. This was 1987. The end is always nigh. My history teacher was not amused. My principle did not like the calls from the student/teacher council. My junior thesis was on Banned books  | ||
| Ferris_von_bueller |
Apocalypse sounds good to me. I'm tired of fighting the avalanche of stupidity. | ||
| P_squared |
Junior thesis on banned books...Senior thesis on SSN being equivalent to Hitler's tatoos for Jews. History teacher not amused? 1 week of detention? I'm assuming public school? That there is some downright humor! Coming from the guy who wrote his Senior speech on the life & times of Kermit the Frog as a form of protest against the curriculum and insane rules. | ||
| Cityxslicker |
Yep, public Highschool, its my understanding that they no longer do a senior thesis because its too hard and too much of a burden on students.  suck it up, it was only twenty pages, not counting footnotes and bibliography. |
