Guaranteed Healthcare

So you're uninsured.

But like so many, you're hanging in because, in a few years, you'll be eligible for Medicare.

Help has arrived. Finally, as a citizen of the richest country on the planet, you'll be able to access healthcare.

You'll be enrolled in Medicare, one of our most cherished social programs, a program designed to protect the most vulnerable among us, America's senior citizens.

 Not so fast, I'm sad beyond words to report.

You've watched to video at the beginning of this diary.  Now watch another video, heed the bleak words of the new president of the AMA, Dr. Nancy Neilsen.

Dr. Nielsen is ringing the alarm that the country is ''at the brink of a Medicare meltdown.'' To her huge credit, she's also naming names, and fingering those responsible for this latest healthcare atrocity.

The usual criminals as you might suspect. At the top of the list, the for-profit insurance industry (AHIP), and their political lapdogs. They are directing the money toward the private Medicare Advantage schemes, and sapping the lifeblood from traditional Medicare.

Make no mistake, it's a deliberate Medicare meltdown.

But as I often say, don't take my word for it. Here's what the always brilliant Don McCanne from PNHP has to say.

"The political defeat of the measure to prevent Medicare pay cuts
for physicians was not partisan. Enough Republicans joined Democrats in the
House to form a veto-proof majority in support of the legislation. Though
many Republicans also joined the Democrats in the Senate, they came up one
vote short on cloture. Sens. Obama and Clinton interrupted campaign
activities to vote, but Sen. McCain was a no-show.

This was a victory for conservative/libertarian ideologues who wish to
destroy the traditional Medicare program and replace it with private health
plans. Their first step was to use taxpayer funds to overpay private
Medicare Advantage plans so that patients would be attracted by the greater
benefits that could be offered (benefits that in all fairness should be
offered as well to those remaining in the traditional program). The next
step is to reduce compensation in the traditional Medicare program so that
physicians will bail out. Fee reductions of about 40 percent are scheduled
over the next couple of years, which should accelerate the physician exodus.
That would convert Medicare into an underfunded Medicaid-type welfare
program, with patients fleeing to the private options.

The eventual surprise that Medicare Advantage beneficiaries are not
anticipating is that it will be converted into a defined contribution
program with the costs of health care inflation being shifted to the
patients' portion of the Medicare Advantage premium and to other
out-of-pocket cost sharing.

Fortunately, many Republicans do support the social solidarity represented
by Medicare. They are offended by the efforts to waste taxpayer funds on the
excesses of private insurers in a nefarious plot to destroy the best health
care financing program we have (though it needs further improvement).
Joining with the Democrats, these Republicans will surely do the right thing
when they return from their recess. Sen. McCain will also have another
opportunity to dispel the claim that he offers us only four more years of
Bush policies."

The destruction of FFS traditional Medicare must not happen.  A flourishing Medicare program is central to what we're fighting for: Guaranteed Healthcare--cradle to grave, single payer.

 Everyone in, no one out.