Private Insurance Plans and Medicare: The Disappointing History

This week [June 2003] the House of Representatives is voting on legislation that would dramatically restructure the Medicare program so that it relies on private insurance plans. Under the proposal, the traditional Medicare program, which now covers almost 9 of 10 beneficiaries and guarantees them choice of almost any provider and standardized benefits, would be forced to compete with private insurance plan HMOs and PPOs. In this competition we can expect private plans to do almost anything to win: refusing to offer coverage in some parts of the country, especially rural areas; offering coverage in other areas one year only to withdraw later; forcing beneficiaries to scramble to find new sources of coverage; and limiting the number of doctors in their networks. The intention of the bill is to push more Medicare beneficiaries to enroll in private insurance plans.

The Dismal Failure of Medicare Privatization

Executive Summary

The Bush Administration, Congressional Republicans, and a number of Democrats are proposing to privatize the Medicare program. Twenty years of experience with Medicare Health Maintenance Organizations (HMOs) reveals that privatized Medicare has been a dismal failure. Especially in California, which has lived with privatized Medicare more than any other state, giving private insurance companies power over the health care of senior citizens:

.. Reduces choice;
.. Increases costs to patients and government; and
.. Puts insurance company business decisions above medical decisions between patient and physician.

A pdf copy of The Dismal Failure of Medicare Privatization is available online.

Download Copy of: Josephine Butler United States Health Service Act

Download pdf Copy of: Josephine Butler United States Health Service Act.  Table of contents below…

107TH CONGRESS
1ST SESSION H. R. 3080

To establish a United States Health Service to provide high quality comprehensive
health care for all Americans and to overcome the deficiencies
in the present system of health care delivery.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OCTOBER 10, 2001
Ms. LEE introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee
on Energy and Commerce, and in addition to the Committees on Education
and the Workforce, and Ways and Means, for a period to be subsequently
determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such
provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned
A BILL
To establish a United States Health Service to provide high
quality comprehensive health care for all Americans and
to overcome the deficiencies in the present system of
health care delivery.

Proposed Modifications to Dellums Bill, April 8, 1997

April 8, 1997

To:     Vic Sidel

Frank Goldsmith

From:  Len Rodberg

Re: Proposed Modifications to Dellums Bill

I have reviewed the Dellums Bill, looking especially at those sections which our more recent experience suggests should be modified.  I don’t believe the core of the plan  — the provision of services in publicly-funded, prospectively-budgeted facilities by salaried personnel — should be changed.  However, there are a few things I would propose be changed, as follows:

THE ORIGIN AND RATIONALE OF THE DELLUMS BILL

DESIGNING A COMMUNITY-BASED NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE PLAN:  THE ORIGIN AND RATIONALE OF THE DELLUMS BILL

by Leonard S. Rodberg*

During the health reform debate of the 1970s, the Health Service Act — generally referred to as the Dellums Bill — was first introduced into the Congress. Every two years since then, as each new Congress has convened, this legislation has been reintroduced.  More recently, it has been introduced, as HR 3000, by Rep. Barbara Lee (D.,CA), Congressman Dellums’ successor. (Copies may be obtained by writing to Rep. Lees’ office.)

To help prepare for renewed activism around health care reform, I will review here the design of that legislation, describing its objectives and the basis of its design. This will provide one starting point for thinking about national health programs. The issues we were addressing in the mid-70s remain the most critical problems facing medical care today, and the design put forward then remains a valuable guide to a progressive approach to health policy.

9502: Toward a Comprehensive, Universal National Health Program

9502: Toward a Comprehensive, Universal National Health Program The American Public Health Association, Recognizing that equal opportunity to attain and maintain good health should be the central goal guiding the financing and provision of health care; and Having developed comprehensive criteria for a national health care program that would remove financial, organizational, and social impediments to achieving this goal;1 and

7018: A National Program for Personal Health Services

7018:  A National Program for Personal Health Services To resolve the widely recognized crisis in our country’s health care, the American Public Health Association recommends a national health care program to include democratically constituted consumer-majority policy-making bodies at every level of administration and with: 1.  Universal coverage for all civilian residents of the United States 2.  Comprehensive benefits

7809: National Health Insurance

7809: National Health Insurance The American Public Health Association, Noting that it has for the past 30 years, endorsed removal of economic and organizational barriers to health care for the American people; and Noting that it has, for many years, supported a universal system of financing health care for the entire population and major changes in the organization and delivery of health services; and Noting that the resolution adopted at the 104th Annual Meeting in 1976 in favor of a national health service is an Association statement of the appropriate health goal for the nation; and

Proposed Revisions in the United States Health Service Act

February 3, 1999

To:  Rep. Barbara Lee

Staff of Rep. Barbara Lee

APHA Medical Care Section Council

From: Len Rodberg and Ellen Shaffer

Re: Proposed Revisions in the United States Health Service Act

The original Dellums Bill, in the form of HR 1374 from the 105th Congress, has been reviewed by an informal working group communicating largely via e-mail. The group came up with a number of small-scale changes in language as well as a number of large- scale concerns about the overall structure of the bill, and of the health system which it would create. We believe the language changes can be made immediately, but the larger questions require much more detailed examination and review of alternatives before they can be implemented.

THE JOSEPHINE BUTLER UNITED STATES HEALTH SERVICE ACT

THE JOSEPHINE BUTLER UNITED STATES HEALTH SERVICE ACT

—

HON. RONALD V. DELLUMS

in the House of Representatives

THURSDAY, APRIL 17, 1997

* Mr. DELLUMS. Mr. Speaker: I rise to honor the memory of Josephine Butler by introducing the Josephine Butler United States Health Act. This legislation is named after a heroic African-American fighter who lived in this Nation’s Capital. The Josephine Butler United States Health Service Act seeks a comprehensive, universal national health care system based on health care for people, not profits; on community control of health care, not corporate control; commits to the proposition that a health care system in the richest Nation in the world should be available to everyone living in this Nation, and that such a health care system must be dedicated to the whole person, their family, and their community.