Bush's "Ownership Society" push for the elderly...on their deathbed.

[gatorboy]

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB114109255909784910-Hdvl_PjgjJvKiWpE2ExUtK1xyl0_20070227.html?mod=public_home_us_inside_today

WASHINGTON -- President Bush's "ownership society" is coming to one corner of Medicare: Live long enough, and a patient could have his or her own oxygen equipment and hospital-style bed at home.

Congress paved the way this month with a budget bill mandating a "rent-to-own" rule requiring that Medicare home-care beneficiaries take title to their rented beds after 13 months. Now, Mr. Bush wants to apply the same standard to oxygen equipment in hopes of saving billions of dollars and empowering the elderly to bargain for cheaper respiratory-therapy services.

The administration contends that the rental payments now are a waste of scarce government funds, and that the situation has reached a point where relationships must be altered. Instead of renting, Medicare would in effect buy the equipment for a beneficiary, who then could bargain for services -- oxygen supplies and maintenance -- separately on the basis of service and price.

<snip>

"Republican delusions that health care can work like any other market apparently know no bounds," says Robert Berenson, a senior fellow at the Urban Institute and a top Medicare administrator under President Clinton. "They now even extend their notions of an ownership society to people in their last months of life."

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Sure you may not have long to live...But you can OWN your oxygen equipment now. Pass it on to love ones. But you still have to rent the oxygen. :crazy:

[alphafemale]

1. Catch is with renting comes repair and service

People will lose their service agreements and will have to buy new equipment (or die) instead of being able to swap out like they do now.

Nice, huh?

:mad:

[Warpy]

2. My mother had a rented hospital bed for 2 years

an electricl model, a nice one. Rent to own wouldn't have been a great idea in her case, since my dad couldn't wait to get it out of there so he could have "his" room back once she died. That bed was dismantled and hauled off six hours after she died. If he'd had to sell it, he'd have simply tripped over it and cussed nonstop for the next 3 years.

It wouldn't have been much use to him, either, since he was in good health up until his final illness on Xmas eve. He never returned to his house after he went into the hospital.

Most of those rental beds are pretty old, 20+ year old models that have been discarded by hospitals in favor of newer, safer, computerized models with a Star Treky design flair. Their resale value isn't great. This rent to own provision only means the rental outfits will now be able to upgrade their own equipment as they "lose" beds to renters.

The heirs get stuck with the old beds with no market for them.

[Skidmore]

3. Well, it applies to the not so elderly too. I just rented to own

a CPAP machine last year before I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer and had my thyroid removed. Now that I can breath again, I have an expensive machine that I don't need in my closet. I've been told that if I sell it, insurance will not pay for another one should I need it again at some point in the future. So, it's collecting dust in its case in my closet when someone else who needs it could be getting some use out of it. It's wasteful to the max. Are they going to let people sell these units on a secondary market?