John Delaney: The Popularity of Medicare for All Is a Myth

[brooklynite]

New polling on single-payer Medicare for All again reveals that when people are told what Medicare for All actually is, support for it drastically drops.

Polling conducted May 31 – June 3 month by the Navigator Research reveals that 53% of respondents are opposed to a Medicare for All program that eliminates private insurance. The poll found that allowing people to buy in or keep private insurance has a net approval of +46%, while eliminating private insurance has a net approval of -6%.

Section 107 of the single-payer Medicare for All legislation authored by Senator Sanders (and cosponsored by Senator Harris, Senator Warren, and others) states that private insurance for any benefits covered by Medicare is illegal.

The pollsters found that “support for Medicare for All is driven more by branding with the term ‘Medicare’ than by specific knowledge of the program.” Similarly, a KFF Health Tracking Poll released today found evidence that “most Americans don’t realize how dramatically the Medicare for All proposals would revamp the Nation’s health care system.”

A Hill-HarrisX poll from February found that only 13% of respondents would prefer a health care system that covers all citizens and doesn’t allow for private plans.

“The supposed political popularity of Medicare for All is a myth,” said John Delaney. “People like Medicare and they like the phrase, but when people are told what this legislation actually does, most people don’t want it. Making private insurance illegal is bad policy and bad politics and the truth is, the leading supporters of Medicare for All know this – that’s why they attacked me. If the truth I dared to speak was actually politically unpopular, it would have made no sense for some people to demand that I drop out of the race, particularly since I had already proposed a universal health care plan that gives every American a health care plan for free, but allows for the continuation of private insurance. But instead, they don’t want there to be any debate at all. I’m not going to let that happen.”

Delaney’s universal health care plan, BetterCare, provides everyone with a government plan as a right, but allows people to opt out and purchase private insurance or supplemental plans

Interesting approach: opt out vs Public option opt-in.

[Turin_C3PO]

1. That's a good first step.

(Or second step, ACA was the first).

But I would eventually like to see a Medicaid for All system. I’m on Medicaid and it covers everything, I have no co-pays on doctors visits, lengthy hospital stays, or prescription drugs. Everyone should receive the care that I get. I know it would cost a lot, but we can afford it, IMO.

[DURHAM D]

3. How is it paid for?

[Turin_C3PO]

5. I'm not an expert on that.

But if a country like the UK can afford NHS, surely we can find the money to fund Medicaid? Look, I’m just uncomfortable with receiving benefits like I get with so many other Americans going bankrupt or having no healthcare at all.

[Celerity]

14. Why did Biden switch his public option from Medicare to Medicaid?

Medicaid will drastically increase resistance from healthcare providers as it pays them less than either Medicare or private insurance. It seems like a baked-into-the cake fail. Many doctors refuse to accept Medicaid.


https://www.healthcaredive.com/news/medicaid-reimbursement-not-expansion-status-affects-doctors-acceptance-o/552476/

For Medicaid to offer proper access to services, providers must actually accept the insurance, however. MACPAC found that lower rates of providers accept Medicaid than either Medicare or private insurance.

MACPAC contracted with the State Health Access Data Assistance Center at the University of Minnesota to analyze the 2014–15 National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey data. It found that only 71% of providers accepted Medicaid, which was compared to 85% for Medicare and 90% for private insurance. The percentages were much lower for psychiatry (36%) and slightly lower for primary care (68%).

One reason for the differences between Medicaid and other types of insurance is that Medicaid reimbursements are usually lower than Medicare. Those payments are typically much lower than private payers.

A recent Medscape survey found that more than 70% of physicians say they plan to continue to take on new Medicaid and Medicare patients, however. About 5% said they would not accept new Medicaid patients and 2% would stop treating some or all of those patients as well as refuse to take new ones.

[Turin_C3PO]

15. Huh I didn't know that.

Thanks for the link. I guess I’ve just been lucky that the doctors I see accept Medicaid.

[Celerity]

17. It can get rough if you are out in a rural area and all the nearest doctors refuse to take it.

[democratisphere]

2. Private healthcare only continues to enable wall street price gouging healthcare.

Private health Insurance must be completely replaced with a single payer all inclusive price controlled system.

[Docreed2003]

4. I know Delaney was pilloried here recently for his comments

But his approach to universal healthcare seems to be a more logical and attainable goal, at least in the present.

[Merlot]

6. So people with private insurance (through their employers) will have to deal

with some inconvenience when their employer drops their health plan? How sad!

Maybe those people should consider the inconvenience that millions face without access to health care. Those people need to recognize that their selfishness means other people will die.

The height of IGMFU.

[genxlib]

10. Regardless of how you feel about them

Those people vote. Making their life more difficult will just result in more losses and further backsliding on policy issues. And that is before the avalanche of money that is going to get activated against any such effort

Proceeding against the will of the people will leave us worse off than we are now.

[Merlot]

11. Sometimes you have to proceed "against the will of the people"

It's human nature to be afraid of change, so changes need to come in the least painful way possible, and with much education. But change does need to happen.

[genxlib]

13. Medicare as an optional buy-in would be an enormous change

Mandatory Medicare with the elimination of private insurance would be way more disruptive. It certainly would not be the "least painful" way.

Even for Medicare itself, it has a much better chance to be successful as it takes in people over time. instantly growing by an exponential factor would be much harder.

I am in favor single payer but I don't see it as practical to make in one giant leap.

[Voltaire2]

19. Most everyone will end up with vastly

better and less expensive insurance.

[Hortensis]

7. Of course, Sanders' extreme version, making workplace insurance illegal,

including taking it away from the 160,000,000 who have it now, and everyone else, was doomed from the outset.

But other candidates, noting the great enthusiasm generated by the familiar comfort of the Medicare for All label, have come up with variations.

Note, though, that they are all in effect the ACA's incremental second step toward universal coverage. Canceling the ACA and beginning a new, incredibly complex program (it won't really be just an expansion of Medicare, which is very inadequate compared to the ACA) that will take years to fully implement* may not be the best way to add on to the ACA, though.

The only virtue I could see to an MfA variation is if it could have an even stronger legal foundation, noting though that the Republicans intend to destroy Medicare itself, and Medicaid, and are ripping away at them right now, along with the ACA.

* Probably about 7 for Sanders', beginning with researching, writing and passing an 8-foot-high bill.

[bigbrother05]

8. Sounds like push polling, we are inundated with Medicare Supplemental ads

The RW want folks to think that single payer would ban all private insurance, but that is an extreme position that would never pass in Congress. Even the UK with NHS allows for private plans and service outside of the program.

The idea behind Medicare for All is a basic plan common to all folks then there could be supplemental plans based on individual needs. Plans should be built around the gaps, not as replacements. If a company wanted to be competitive for employees, they could offer a plan to reduce/eliminate copays for example.

The proposal bans redundant coverage, not supplemental. Delaney is offering the insurance equivalent of charter schools that tap public funds to offer what could turn out to be substandard care. Imagine Catholic Care that looks cheaper but doesn't adequately cover women's health needs. Or Christian Scientist Care that doesn't cover surgery.

Big Med/Pharma want to gin up fear to avoid negotiating costs with anything that looks like Medicare.

[unblock]

9. i don't understand why there wouldn't be private insurance for supplemental coverage

so anyone gets public insurance through medicare for all and can get proper coverage for good medical care.

then well-off people can also get supplemental coverage for things that might not be covered under medicare.

say medicare pays for one physical a year, but supplemental covers a second physical a year for those who feel the need.




in practice, i can't imagine there wouldn't be some private insurance component of any solution in america.

[Politicub]

12. John Delaney is a myth. At least for me.

I have to google his name whenever I see it because he's so easy to forget.

[AJT]

16. Sounds like Australia's system. You have single payer as a right,

but you can buy private insurance, which replaces your single payer. FYI, the single payer isn't free, there is a premium and a small copay. People need to understand it's not free. The savings is in efficiency and not having the expense of a for profit industry involved.

[Gothmog]

18. K&R