Analysis of Obamacare/Reid Bill Reveals Considerable Rationing
The National Right to Life Committee released an analysis of the Obamacare/Reid Senate bill which reveals several provisions relating to rationing of lifesaving medical treatment. The conclusions are as follows:
- Senior citizens could face severe limitations on their ability to use their own money to avoid denial of lifesaving treatment against their wishes.
- State commissioners governing the new health insurance exchanges created by the bill would be given the power to deny people the option of choosing plans less likely to deny treatment by limiting what people would be allowed to pay for such policies.
- “End-of life Counseling” has been replaced with a “Shared Decisionmaking” provision. The bill funds and promotes “patient decision aids” to “help” patients make treatment decisions.
- A Medicare Advisory Board is established to force Medicare payments below the rate of medical inflation. This could cause health care providers to skimp on care for Medicare patients or to leave the Medicare program altogether.
Medical Ethics Director Burke J. Balch of NRLC states that “The Reid Bill contains important elements that would greatly impact the ability of patients to receive unrationed medical care. These elements, combined with inadequate funding — a scheme of robbing Peter to pay Paul under which half of the funding comes from cuts in Medicare spending — would result in rationing lifesaving treatment for senior citizens.”
Barbara Lyons