The medical lobby is already peddling lies about Medicare-for-all
August 16, 2018
Excerpts:
Medicare-for-all is getting some real momentum behind it, with several more supporters winning congressional primaries on Tuesday night. The medical industry — drug companies, insurance companies, medical providers, and others — has thus been gearing up to preserve the fat profits they enjoy under the horrendous status quo. They've formed a group called The Partnership for America's Health Care Future (PAHCF) to run a propaganda campaign against universal health care.
Their main argument is pretty clearly going to be centered around loss-aversion. "Most Americans support commonsense, pragmatic solutions that don't interrupt the coverage they rely upon for themselves and their families," PAHCF spokesman Erik Smith told The Hill. (Jonathan Chait and Paul Krugman have made similar points.)
But this argument is garbage. Medicare-for-all would mean vastly more people enjoying good health care, and dramatically fewer people getting kicked off their insurance overall.
So why is the medical lobby mobilizing against this bill? It's simple: money. America's total health expenditures are roughly twice that of the OECD average — nearly 5 points of GDP (or about $900 billion) higher than Switzerland, the second-most expensive country. A great deal of that spending comes in the form of big corporate profits, pointless administrative busywork, and hugely excessive doctor salaries (especially for specialists). Sanders' Medicare-for-all bill would pay for expanded coverage and increased treatment access by wringing out some of those inefficiencies — on net, provider payments would be cut by about 11 percent.
This medical lobby effort against the idea is nothing more than greed.
http://theweek.com/articles/790380/medical-lobby-already-peddling-lies-about-medicareforall
