its weaker members, and do the "killing" themselves!

Not literally, you understand. Just "Murder by Spreadsheet", brought to you by your friendly insurance company.

But hey, their hands are clean! Look, they just washed them! snark.

back before Reagan and "health care for corporate profit" (debut HMOs), Blue Cross/Blue Shield non-profit organizations and non-profit hospitals provided good care and insurance for nearly everyone.  The ultra rich could buy their gold-plated insurance, but BCBS covered most others and it was affordable.

Then, the "Reagan Revolution" (attack the poor, afflict the afflicted, comfort and enrich the wealthy) took place.  Enter HMOs who told corporations they could insure employees for a fraction of the BCBS cost.  Supposedly, for-profit corporate insurance was "more efficient" than te non-profits.  Boom!  

Every corporation ran into the open arms of private, for profit, insurance companies. BCBS began to collapse, be sold off, converted to profit, etc.  

What was the hidden secret?  Yes, HMOs could insure EMPLOYEEs very cheaply, but that's because they were employees.  The very fact that the people were working was self-selecting: the population base of company employees was also the most healthy population base.  

What was left out of that base? Children, unemployed, elderly, the infirm. And those are the high medical cost populations.

So, corporations got cheap health rates (for a few years) while everyone else was thrown into the gutter.  

Remember that everytime you hear the name "Reagan."  That single concept will explain his entire legacy:  Corporate Profits over concern for the weak, poor, young and elderly.
And it repeats and repeats in every issue you can raise about Reagan, for example:

Iran/Contra:  deny elected socialists government office in Central America to insure corporate profits for US multinational companies. Since Congress outlawed direct aid to the CIA-backed Contras, sell arms to Iran (enriching corrupt Republican companies) to obtain cash for Contras. Prop up corrupt military dictatorships for the same reason.

I'd just like to add that Bush's new plan is, imho, a blatent attempt to incent (currently) healthy individuals to go from their employment-based plans to individual coverage which they can deduct.  

Very business-friendly in general, not just insurance-company-friendly.  Employers want nothing so badly as to divest themselves of the risk and expense of carrying sick individuals, or individuals with a history of being sick or a potential to get sick, on their plans.  In fact, they mostly want out of the health-insurance benefit expectation alltogether.  

Once enough healthy and wealthy individuals and families have opted out in order to enjoy that tax benefit, the employment-based system - already primed to collapse like a house of cards - will do just that.

So we need to start framing this for what it is: Bush's attempt to free big business from any insurance benefit obligation without offering anything in the way of providing coverage for people who really need it and/or can't get or afford it.

I am insured through my college. If I wasn't a full-time student, I would not have been covered. At 43, I'm too fucking old. My husband's 54, and has just been diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma. I couldn't have added him to my policy if I wanted to: he's too old. And if we could, and he fell ill while insured by the college's insurer, we would have had to pay 10% of all the costs he incurred while they were figuring out what he had anyway. In a weird way, being destitute and a candidate for MediCal is better than being insured in his case.

I had to wait 6 months to be covered for the blood pressure meds I'm on, and I have to do my birth control through FamilyPACT which is a special service in California because it's not covered by the college's insurance. The fact that I don't get my insurance through an employer and it's paid for by student loans (oww my aching bunghole) means I still get my mental health services through the County.

We are through the looking glass with health care in America. We are OVERDUE for single-payer here.

I did a diary asking Canadian and European Kossacks to talk about their health care experiences on Sunday. It was really interesting if 100% statistically invalid.

http://www.dailykos.com/...

It's already expired, but it's still quite interesting.

I just got laid off last week, so I don't really know where I am (literally and figuratively).

But I HAD pretty good insurance. My sister is a Nurse Practitioner and she looked over it for me once and was amazed at the coverage. It even covered mental health and elective abortions! (It was an international company that is more enlightened than most.) But I was afraid to use it for fear I still couldn't afford it for even simple things.

I had a problem with one of my knees a while back and I am still paying for the MRI to tell me that there really wasn't anything they could do except put me on meds (VIOXX!) forever. I also got a good screwing over by the doctor and insurance company in what can only be described as a scam on their parts. They got me in to the office and performed procedures knowing full well what insurance I had, then when they billed it, I got some cockamamie story about their insurance person forgetting to pay the bills for my company and their agreement lapsed, so even though I had coverage they couldn't take it and now I'm liable for everything.

So I never went to the doctor for anything ever again -- even when I was really sick with the flu. I might have be able to afford the co-pays for visits and meds, but I couldn't have paid all the extra charges for tests and things they tack on all the time and think nothing of it. So even though I had pretty good insurance, I haven't had a check up or a well-woman exam in almost 5 years. Who knows what's going wrong inside me?

And now it really doesn't matter anyway -- my insurance went away when my job did.

I wish I could marry a Canadian.

I had health Insurance in the 90s and had to take meds that were running around $300 a month. They raised rates relentlessly to cover the costs ( you will pay for those meds one way or the other). I missed a bill, and was a day late past the grace period. I was immediately canceled. No appeal. Bye , you're history.

I was able to get a short term major medical policy with company that filed for bankruptcy, 1 month after I canceled. Gee Guys, sorry. That missed premium must have hurt. Seriously, Imagine if something happened.

Then I slowly jumped from a crappy policy to a less crappy policy until I got to just a crap policy. I manage my health care. I take my BP at home and send out for Cholesterol exams. I try to keep the numbers below optimal. I beat down 250 Total Cholesterol by taking massive amount of Niacin , exercise and diet to  a total of 137. I haven't had a a triglyceride reading for awhile. But I feel like I'm in ok shape for an old fart. My weight is at college level-thin. I don't smoke or drink.

The drugs that I was on I could no longer afford so I researched the equivalents and told the Doc here's what I want. Got the generics and get em from Costco  for $18.00 a month. The same drugs sell for $560 ( 90 day supply) at Wal Greens.

Folks if you are using your health Insurance cards and getting your drugs for low co-pays at that convenient corner chain drug store you are part of the problem because they are marking drugs up 2000% - except for patented drugs- and making a bloody fortune because they know people only care about their co-pay and if they have to take 5 minutes out of their day to pick up a script.

The Insurance company gets the bill and they keep jacking their rates up. Until they get so high you get informed at your jobs that your coverage has either been discontinued , you have been laid off or you get a choice to pay a monster rate or do without.

The Insurance problem isn't all the Insurance companies. Its the Pharmacies, it's the people who don't bother to price drugs out until they finally are faced with the prospect of not having a copay. Then they become some real mean shoppers like I am.

It's the Doctors who prescribe expensive patent protected drugs becuase the drug rep just filled up his tank with gas and it's patients who don't ask their doctors for equivalents and insist on buying the cool new advertised overpriced re-patented drug that was re-labeled and got a cool new color and the price went up 200% after they paid the generic company a few hundred mil to hold off for 3 or 4 years.

I don't know what the percentage of the overall health care bill is occupied by drugs, but based on personal experience I have a feeling insurance rates would become more affordable if drug companies, doctors, patients and pharmacies weren't confident that insurance companies would be covering the bill.

One of the many ways of bringing drug prices down is  to stop listening to that R&D bullshit from the drug companies. Give them short hard and fast patents and regulate the fuck out of them. Then move on to all the other offenders.

We all share a bit of blame for the sad state of our system. It would be nice to blame it all on the Insurance companies - sure they deserve some- but it's way past time that we start taking a holistic look ( no pun intended) at the whole system that keeps those rates rising relentlessly until no one can afford it. Ask an insurance company what would happen if they discontinued Health insurance and I don't think you would see too many tears.

Consider this- The Insurance rep who sold me the current policy doesn't get her first commission for the sale for one year. If I turned in a bunch of claims I imagine they would find a way of cutting it down to 0

Until Costco was able to get some of the ones I needed, I was getting them from Canada.