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Note the US statistic:Meanwhile....
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How Canada became the centre of a measles outbreak in North America
Confirmed cases of measles in Canada are nearly three times higher than in the US, despite Canada's far smaller population.www.bbc.com
A case of measles has been confirmed in an adult in western Iowa, according to a release from the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services. The person who has contracted the disease is fully vaccinated and is not linked to the previously reported cases of measles in the state.
Insurers are cutting benefits and exiting from unprofitable markets, and Wall Street is cheering them on. Once rewarded by investors for rapid expansion in the lucrative privatized Medicare program, companies are now being applauded for showing restraint amid rising medical costs and lower government payments.
Something that has puzzled me is the silence of healthcare organizations in the US. During COVID, when things were absolutely batshit crazy in hospitals, they were largely silent....Hospitals going bankrupt because private insurance isn't going to cover the inflated costs of care to offset the emergency department care.
And of course, millions of people just dying or getting so sick that inevitably they end up in the emergency department bankrupting hopsitals.
But that's not how this works. The US is not the only bank in town.And again the US looks to kill off research and development for cancer vaccines and research.
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Medicare Advantage is privatized insurance. It is sold to seniors as "a more affordable Medicare" that offered additional benefits like dental coverage.
For the private insurance companies like United Healthcare, it has been a moneymaker because the government pays not only the cost of the services, the government also has provided a capitated bonus per patient on top of what Medicare pays for the service.
The Big Beautiful Bill cut some of those capitated payments, and now the private insurance companies want to pull out of the Medicare Advantage program or cut back on some of those "additional benefits" that they used to entice seniors to sign up for Advantage plans.
This is getting into the weeds but Medicare has several components. One of those components, Medicare part B, covers outpatient and ambulatory services (e.g. physician office visits). Medicare Advantage (part C) replaces Medicare part B. If a patient goes into the hospital for care, traditional Medicare (part A) still pays.I thought Medicare Advantage was a big plan to nudge seniors off traditional Medicare to private insurance. The insurance lobbyists worked long and hard for this.
This is getting into the weeds but Medicare has several components. One of those components, Medicare part B, covers outpatient and ambulatory services (e.g. physician office visits). Medicare Advantage (part C) replaces Medicare part B. If a patient goes into the hospital for care, traditional Medicare (part A) still pays.
Advantage (aka Medicare part C) was promoted during the Clinton Administration under the guise that it would "lower cost". Congress was on a mission to balance the budget. In the 1997 budget bill, they created "Medicare+Choice" under the belief that having private insurance companies introduce managed care cost controls into Medicare would lower the cost of outpatient services paid by Medicare.
That has not proven to be true. The government pays about $10 billion more per year for Medicare Advantage than they would if the subscriber were enrolled in traditional Medicare B. That's what the 2025 bill claims to target- it cuts payments to private insurance companies who provide the administration of Medicare Advantage.
^ Still amazed that the insurance companies didn't put up a real fight.
