Bev Veals, undergoing chemo at Duke Cancer Center, was in the hospital when she learned that the president’s “reform” was forcing her into a higher-cost health plan. Photo: AP
Last week, Karen and I were invited by close friends to a Shabbat meal at their lovely home. One of the nice things about Shabbat meals is that you never know who you’re going to end up sitting next to. Most luncheons are joyous affairs where old friends reconnect, and strangers become new friends.
Karen and I were seated next to a couple whom we had never before met. The standard introductions were made. We learned the couple were from San Francisco. She, a high-powered attorney; he a clever CPA. They were visiting friends in Los Angeles.
Always curious about people, I engaged the couple in lively conversation. As a screenwriter, you never know from where your next story will come.
But Karen, I immediately sensed, was pulling back from the give and take. I wondered what was showing up on my wife’s people-radar that was causing this negative reaction.
And then I found out.
The San Francisco couple informed us that:
1. Barack Obama is Israel’s BFF.
2. All politicians lie.
3. America should give ObamaCare “some time.”
Seraphic Secret makes it a rule to be a gentleman. Which, under the circumstances, translated into showing proper respect for our hosts and their gracious hospitality.
I could have shot down every absurd proposition set forth by the San Francisco leftists, but I just dug into my food like a man starving; swallowed not just salad, but my self-respect. The Shabbat table is no place for partisan politics. Perhaps, because the leftist couple are not Orthodox they do not comprehend the notion of a peaceful Shabbat meal. And even if they did, they, like all true believers, believe that because they are so correct in their ideological fervor, a peaceful Shabbat translates into an opportunity to enlighten the unenlightened.
Anyhoo.
This post is dedicated to the Jewish couple from San Francisco who displayed, not only incredibly bad manners at lunch, but also revealed the blind ideological fervor and heartlessness which is at the heart of the postmodern Democrat party.
ObamaCare is supposed to be a huge boon for anyone with a pre-existing condition. Count that another promise broken: It’s actually denying care because of pre-existing conditions.
Millions of Americans with cancer and other chronic illnesses will wind up paying more for lifesaving care, if they can get it all.
To keep costs down, the White House designed ObamaCare plans as cut-rate HMOs. The low profit margins have forced insurers to downsize the number of doctors and hospitals in their networks — and to slash what they cover for out-of-network treatment.
So most ObamaCare plans don’t include the vast majority of the best cancer doctors and cancer centers. That’s a huge problem for these patients. As Dr. Scott Gottlieb, a former Medicare official, writes: “Cancer patients often need the help of specialized doctors and cancer institutions that won’t make it into many of these cheapened networks.
All across the country, leading cancer centers — including New York’s Memorial Sloan Kettering — are excluded by the largest plans. In Washington state, the largest exchange plans exclude world-class cancer care for kids such as the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance. California’s state-of-the-art
Cedars-Sinai cancer center isn’t in any ObamaCare plan. Only a few plans include the Mayo Clinic.
For the record, our son Ariel Chaim ZT’L, received heroic care for his cancer at Cedars-Sinai, under a wonderful insurance plan which will, no doubt, suffer immeasurably under Obamacare, unless it is repealed.
And if you want a doctor outside such networks, you’ll generally have to pay the full cost of care.
Many people will get better coverage at a lower cost under ObamaCare (after all, the feds are spending hundreds of billions on it). But most cancer patients will wind up paying more for less.
Take Michael Cerpok, a leukemia survivor in Fountain Hills, Ariz. Right now, his monthly premium is about half his monthly take-home pay. But the ObamaCare law forced his insurer to kill that plan for one that fits the law’s rules.
Now he’ll have to pay more for drugs, and his Mayo Clinic doctor is no longer in his network.
Last year, his treatment bill was more than $350,000, but thanks to insurance his out-of-pocket was only $4,500. Now, to keep his doctor, the one who has kept him alive for seven years, Cerpok will have to pay $26,000 out-of-pocket.
ObamaCare also stints on drug coverage, severely limiting the medicines plans cover. Many pre-Obama plans just charged a co-pay of about $50-70 a month for cancer drugs. Under ObamaCare, thousands of cancer patients will have to pay more than $2,500 a month for medicines.
Horribly, ObamaCare is limiting access to new medicines just as a revolution is delivering far better treatments. More than 40 new treatments target the genetic source of tumors, as opposed to older therapies that kill cancer cells after they spread. On average, ObamaCare plans cover only 10 targeted therapies, and insurers don’t have to add new breakthroughs until 2016.
A study by Avalere Health found that up to 90 percent of ObamaCare plans will force cancer patients to cover half the cost of new drugs until they hit the out-of-pocket maximum. By comparison, only 29 percent of non-ObamaCare employer-based plans do so.
Many patients will just give up. Another Avalere study found that people are four times more likely to stop using innovative therapies if they have to pay $500 or more.
South Carolinan Bill Elliott, 50, and a late-stage lung-cancer survivor, is looking at doing just that. He reports that premiums for his family will jump from $150 to $1,500 a month. His doctor isn’t in the ObamaCare network and neither are his medicines, so he’s thinking about stopping altogether, “pay the $95 or whatever fine and I’m just going to let nature take its course,” because he doesn’t want to burden his family.
Forget the Web site and other disasters: The ugliest part of ObamaCare is how it denies life-saving coverage to cancer patients. That isn’t a “glitch”; it’s a cruel and key feature of the law.
Reader Interactions
Comments
Bill Brandtsays
My stomach is turning just imagining myself at that table 😉
They are true believers.
The more I have heard about this roll out the more I am realizing that it was made by people who thought they were smarter than the marketplace – itself previously affected by other government mandates.
The question is what the hosts thought of their friends from SF.
Where I’m from it was always considered very poor manners if you didn’t keep your politics or religion to yourself at all social functions. If you didn’t you were asked to leave (I myself have seen it) sometimes by even by people who shared your beliefs. Also there was NO ambiguity in the request to leave.
The exchanges in St. Louis do not include the Barnes-Jewish network which includes the Siteman Cancer Center. As someone that has been there, done that, Karen and you are well aware what a change can do to treating cancer.
I’ll say it again, if the exchanges were up and running the media and democrats would be dancing in the streets saying what a great thing Obamacare is for the country. Just pay no attention to the politicians behind the curtain handing out our money as fast as possible. The media are still mocking Cruz and Lee even though it should be clear how correct they were and still are.
And I wish people would tell the truth about pre-existing conditions. Bob Beckel and other liberals always say Obamacare has helped them because they have pre-existing condition and can get covered. But it already was the law that if you were already covered under a plan you could not be turned down for a PEC. So are these clowns saying they have not been covered all these years?
The sooner Obamacare is sent to the fires of good intentions the better.
You were there and had to make the decision but I generally handle things a little bit differently. If someone at a friendly social event is saying something I disagree with politically I gently tell them that politics probably isn’t appropriate at this time and place. If they persist I tell them I strongly disagree but won’t be engaging them at this time, perhaps via email would be a better venue.
My concern is if you let their statements stand you allow them to influence the undecided and demoralize your allies.
“The only thing needed for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”
I faced a similar situation yesterday at my mother’s 80th birthday party. Her second cousin, part of her newly-found biological family, and his wife were sitting next to me and the table talk turned to bad software, which led to the Obamacare website issues. The wife said to me that she thought the website had been sabotaged. I quickly turned the conversation elsewhere (fortunately, our hometown football team was winning big at that very moment which made it easy to divert attention).
You could have asked “on what basis do you think it was sabotaged? – here is a good article today at Chicagoboyz.net – entitled “building the airplane during take off”
I could have, yes. But we have met these new relatives only twice, it was my mother’s first ever birthday party, and also the first ever time that a blood relative other than her children was present at her birthday. I was not going to let anything cloud the event. So I deflected the conversation instead of going into it deeper.
“Many people will get better coverage at a lower cost under ObamaCare (after all, the feds are spending hundreds of billions on it). But most cancer patients will wind up paying more for less.”
“Who gets the best health care under socialized medicine? Healthy people!”
This was something Yaron Brook said in a speech, he is president of the Ayn Rand institute. Also, his father was a doctor in Israel, and apparently the advice his father used to give really sick people who could afford it was, “Go to America.” Somehow I don’t think they give that advice anymore, or if they do, they won’t be giving it much longer.
My stomach is turning just imagining myself at that table 😉
They are true believers.
The more I have heard about this roll out the more I am realizing that it was made by people who thought they were smarter than the marketplace – itself previously affected by other government mandates.
The question is what the hosts thought of their friends from SF.
“Smarter than the marketplace.” Isn’t that the first item in the list describing a statist?
Where I’m from it was always considered very poor manners if you didn’t keep your politics or religion to yourself at all social functions. If you didn’t you were asked to leave (I myself have seen it) sometimes by even by people who shared your beliefs. Also there was NO ambiguity in the request to leave.
Where I’m from
Where is that?
Why the calumny against Richard Nixon?
I’m wearing my Nixon-Lodge button all week this week.
The exchanges in St. Louis do not include the Barnes-Jewish network which includes the Siteman Cancer Center. As someone that has been there, done that, Karen and you are well aware what a change can do to treating cancer.
I’ll say it again, if the exchanges were up and running the media and democrats would be dancing in the streets saying what a great thing Obamacare is for the country. Just pay no attention to the politicians behind the curtain handing out our money as fast as possible. The media are still mocking Cruz and Lee even though it should be clear how correct they were and still are.
And I wish people would tell the truth about pre-existing conditions. Bob Beckel and other liberals always say Obamacare has helped them because they have pre-existing condition and can get covered. But it already was the law that if you were already covered under a plan you could not be turned down for a PEC. So are these clowns saying they have not been covered all these years?
The sooner Obamacare is sent to the fires of good intentions the better.
You were there and had to make the decision but I generally handle things a little bit differently. If someone at a friendly social event is saying something I disagree with politically I gently tell them that politics probably isn’t appropriate at this time and place. If they persist I tell them I strongly disagree but won’t be engaging them at this time, perhaps via email would be a better venue.
My concern is if you let their statements stand you allow them to influence the undecided and demoralize your allies.
“The only thing needed for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”
-Edmond Burke-
I faced a similar situation yesterday at my mother’s 80th birthday party. Her second cousin, part of her newly-found biological family, and his wife were sitting next to me and the table talk turned to bad software, which led to the Obamacare website issues. The wife said to me that she thought the website had been sabotaged. I quickly turned the conversation elsewhere (fortunately, our hometown football team was winning big at that very moment which made it easy to divert attention).
You could have asked “on what basis do you think it was sabotaged? – here is a good article today at Chicagoboyz.net – entitled “building the airplane during take off”
I could have, yes. But we have met these new relatives only twice, it was my mother’s first ever birthday party, and also the first ever time that a blood relative other than her children was present at her birthday. I was not going to let anything cloud the event. So I deflected the conversation instead of going into it deeper.
“Many people will get better coverage at a lower cost under ObamaCare (after all, the feds are spending hundreds of billions on it). But most cancer patients will wind up paying more for less.”
“Who gets the best health care under socialized medicine? Healthy people!”
This was something Yaron Brook said in a speech, he is president of the Ayn Rand institute. Also, his father was a doctor in Israel, and apparently the advice his father used to give really sick people who could afford it was, “Go to America.” Somehow I don’t think they give that advice anymore, or if they do, they won’t be giving it much longer.