The only word I can think of after reading the Time Magazine article on Hospital charges is Holocaust. Even if the hospital is a so called 'non profit'. The people who run all of these groups are the most unethical people alive. Their greed is monumental. You really need to understand they they are the new modern day equivalent of a slave holder in their disdain for human beings. I am serious. Read it.
How can a non profit hospital and insurance companies possibly defend themselves against this pricing for healthcare? Take Presbyterian hospital for example. They send these bills to the insurance company to be paid. The insurance company is owned by Presbyterian and it just folds all of that into their rate structure. It is the old shell game. Same with the profit making Lovelace hospital system. They send their bills to their own insurance company. The only time charges are negotiated is when the hospital and insurance company are not related. Or when Medicare is involved. But, if you are underinsured or uninsured then you enter slavery. You pay many times what Medicare would pay.
No wonder health care is devouring so much of our national wealth. I don't blame the Docs, nurses, and other employees for this. I blame the CEO's and Boards for having only profit in mind.
How can a non profit hospital and insurance companies possibly defend themselves against this pricing for healthcare? Take Presbyterian hospital for example. They send these bills to the insurance company to be paid. The insurance company is owned by Presbyterian and it just folds all of that into their rate structure. It is the old shell game. Same with the profit making Lovelace hospital system. They send their bills to their own insurance company. The only time charges are negotiated is when the hospital and insurance company are not related. Or when Medicare is involved. But, if you are underinsured or uninsured then you enter slavery. You pay many times what Medicare would pay.
No wonder health care is devouring so much of our national wealth. I don't blame the Docs, nurses, and other employees for this. I blame the CEO's and Boards for having only profit in mind.
4 comments:
Mr. Baker,
Noun
Destruction or slaughter on a mass scale, is a definition of holocaust. The destruction of peoples financial lives by hospital's greed is certainly real. Just read up on it.
P.S. I should have noted that I'm sure that Jim Baca meant nothing wrong.
As for Mr. or Ms. Anonymous - the word holocaust was an obscure word with largely religious significance until it was adopted in the '60s by Jews who sought a word to describe what occurred in Europe in 1939-1945 - though it had seen some use earlier in reference to the genocide of Armenians during World War I. Many Jews reject the term, by the way, because it suggests that those who were slaughtered were somehow sacrificed in a religious ritual. The critics' alternative, the word used in Israel and preferred in Europe, is the Hebrew word "Shoah" - catastrophe. In modern English, 'holocaust' refers only to mass murder, almost always by the Nazis. This isn't a question of ownership, it's a question of what words signify.
I just learned today that Lovelace wants to enter into a "bed-sharing" agreement with UNM Hospitals. I'd bet that agreement would only benefit Lovelace's bottom line.
Personally I agree with the use of the term holocaust. Certainly hundreds of people die each day who do not seek medical attention for things because they know they can't afford it. For the very poor, one broken leg can ruin them financially for the next 20 years. It has a cascading effect. With all the hospitals New Mexico boasts, you'd think they'd maybe have some competitive pricing but I suppose they're all in cahoots together. There really is NO reason why health care should cost as much as it does.
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