A new plan being tested in San Diego, New York and Chicago, will force some people to find new doctors, unless they want to foot the bill themselves.
The country’s biggest insurers – Aetna, Cigna, UnitedHealth Group, WellPoint – are responding to the new national health care law by reducing the networks of doctors and hospitals, in exchange for lower premiums to companies providing health insurance packages, according to The New York Times.
As reported by the Times, companies may be able to reduce their premiums by 15 percent. Something that initially appealed to small businesses unquestionably appeals to the bigger ones as well.
President Obama’s repeated affirmations of choice in health care reform (mockingly nicknamed “Obamacare”) can now be challenged by reform critics as the president’s attempt to gain favor with the American public. In this case though, it’s the insurance companies and not the government that’s restricting choice. In any event, public confidence in the president is at an all-time low, according to a poll done by the Washington Post/ABC News.
With health care becoming more expensive and the economy still sucking wind, to save money employers providing coverage can either cut out insurance offerings completely, which some small Massachusetts companies have already done, or offer much less considerate policies by dictating which physicians are accepted by insurance companies.
All of capitalism’s detractors require us to now equate “accepted” with “cheapest.”
If people continue to go to the doctor of their choice even when it’s outside of their new accepted network, meaning that they are willing to pay higher out-of-pocket medical expenses for assumedly better care, they’ll be covered by an insurance plan that doesn’t do them any good. The Times article called it a “tradeoff,” but from where I’m sitting that 15 percent tradeoff is merely arbitrary – it has nothing to do with saving money for the patient, and everything to do with preserving profits for the insurance companies.
For the consumer, there are really no good deals in the health insurance marketplace. A good product will cost more than a bad one.
From the very beginning, debate over health care reform has brought up issues of pricing, and by consequence, issues of choice within a free market economy.
As the Quizzle Wire previously reported, comparison shopping is starting to find its way into the realm of health care. The Transparency in All Health Care Pricing Act of 2010, a bill proposed in February, would create a medical marketplace built on competition for not only the best care, but the best-priced care by requiring hospitals, physicians, nurses, pharmacies, pharmaceutical manufacturers, dentists and insurers to publicly post their prices.
And with 30 to 40 million people expected to join health insurance exchanges in 2014, comparison shopping for health care will become much more prevalent. Insurance companies expect that many uninsured people looking for coverage will accept the limits on choice because of the lowered price.
But even if the price of products are lower, and even if they’re someday made publicly available, that doesn’t change the fact that purchasing choices are not being made by those doing the purchasing; it’s being made by profit-motives.
We can only wait and see if this catches on beyond three cities.
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