Health Care reform - HR 3200 review, Part 3

If you take blood pressure medicine, make sure you have taken it before reading today's post. You may need it. Today's highlights are below and here's the link to the bill again - http://edlabor.house.gov/blog/2009/07/americas-affordable-health-choices-act.shtml.

• P. 401 thru P. 402 line 10 provides for the Secretary of Health & Human Services to conduct a study to make Medicare services available for people who are "limited English proficient" (LEPs). This section will pay for interpreters for payment processing and may require health services providers (i.e. - doctors, hospitals) to provide interpreters, also. Is this the government's way of making Medicare available to illegal aliens ?? The other question is how limited does a person's English have to be to qualify ?? No guidelines are set within the bill.
• P. 405 line 14 thru P. 407 line 16 provides for grants to eligible service providers to improve communication with LEPs. The government will determine who qualifies as "eligible" and also give priority in the grant process to "applicants who have developed partnerships with community organizations" (i.e. - ACORN).
• P. 414 line 13 thru 16 says that participants in the LEP program will have NO co-payments. If this program is indeed for illegal aliens, it will be free to them.
• P. 415 line 17 thru 20 says that $16 Million will be appropriated to administer this program. That's $16 Million of our tax money that could potentially go for health care for illegal aliens.
• Starting on P. 415 line 5 and going thru P. 430 line 15 is the section that has everyone upset about Advance Care Planning. People say this is where government controlled euthanasia will come into play. There is NO specific mention of euthanasia in here. However, here is what it does say :

1. The government WILL mandate an Advance Planning Consultation (APC) with your doctor every 5 years if you are on Medicare. This includes living wills and durable powers of attorney. Furthermore, the government WILL dictate what must be in these documents. You HAVE to do it - NO choice - period.
2. These APCs WILL be done more frequently as a patient's health declines.
3. The terms "life sustaining treatments or similar orders" and "end-of-life services" are used regularly throughout this section. Some believe this wording sanctions euthanasia for the elderly and chronically ill even though there is NO specific mention of such. However, the terms and wording mentioned above could be interpreted in a way that makes it possible. It's not a risk I'm willing to take. How about you ??

• P. 469 thru P. 473 discusses Community Based Home Medical Services and monthly payments to these non-profit entities. Could this be "ACORN Health Care Services" or "The ACORN Clinic" or something similar ?? It's possible. Is there anything regarding Obama that they don't have their hands in ??
• P. 483 line 10 thru P. 488 FINALLY .... MORE GOOD NEWS !! Co-insurance will be waived for Medicare preventive services including prostate cancer screenings, colorectal cancer screenings, diabetes management training, glaucoma screenings, cardiovascular screening blood tests, mammography screening, vaccines, and others things.
• P. 489 line 19 thru P. 492 says the government will cover Marriage Counseling and Family Therapy as well as define and develop it. Let me get this straight - many members of the Congress and Senate have been caught committing adultery and been divorced multiple times, but yet they are gonna tell the rest of us how to be good spouses ?? Plus, they fight and bicker constantly and are the most dysfunctional group of people in the country, and they're gonna try to fix dysfunctional American families ?? Yeah, right. Good luck with all that.
• P. 502 begins talking about the creation of the Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research and this concludes on P. 524. The Center will build registries and data networks from YOUR electronic medical records. Also, they will collect YOUR other secure data from any department or agency in the U.S. whether it's public data or private. Then, the Center will recommend ways that will allow the public to access YOUR data. This could lead to widespread identity theft. Here's the real kicker - there will be NO "fiscal year limitation" on funding for the Center. Maybe the Federal government is gonna print money for them, too.
• P. 525 thru P. 619 is devoted to nursing home regulations. Nearly 100 pages or one-tenth of the bill. Why so much ?? Are they planning on putting all of us in one ?? Or, maybe they just wanted to be thorough ... for once.
• P. 551 line 6 thru 22 says the government will conduct a "study" (a.k.a. audit) of nursing homes to determine which ones are "undercapitalized" (a.k.a. broke) and then address options to help them including more regulation. Uh, the Federal government has trillion dollar budget deficits, is printing money to pay its bills, and it's gonna tell nursing homes how to keep from going broke ?? I'm sure that will work out REAL well.

Well, we're done for today. Now we're through 60% of the bill which is further than most of the Congressman that will be voting on the thing. Two days to go. Hang in there. We're getting close to completion.