No Death Panels? Are You Sure About That?

Haven't updated in a while as I've been studying for a board exam, but I just couldn't pass this one up. Surprisingly, this article is from a year ago and I never heard about it until now. I think it may have flown under a lot of radars, but it needs to be brought to the People's attention. By now, everyone's heard of death panels, but most of us figured the death panel would be included as a cryptic provision buried deep in one of the 2,000 page health reform bills. NOT SO! In fact, it's known as the Federal Coordinating Council for Comparative Effectiveness Research, and it's already been implemented and funded through $1.1 billion from the 2009 stimulus bill. Remember Ezekiel Emanuel?

"Unlike allocation by sex or race, allocation by age is not invidious discrimination; every person lives through different life stages rather than being a single age. Even if 25-year-olds receive priority over 65-year-olds, everyone who is 65 years now was previously 25 years. Treating 65-yearolds differently because of stereotypes or falsehoods would be ageist; treating them differently because they have already had more life-years is not." -Ezekiel Emanuel, MD, PhD

"Conversely, services provided to individuals who are irreversibly prevented from being or becoming participating citizens are not basic and should not be guaranteed. An obvious example is not guaranteeing health services to patients with dementia." -Ezekiel Emanuel, MD, PhD

He's on the panel along with a number of newly-minted bureaucrats entrusted with our health. His title is 'Special Advisor for Health Policy', and he'll be working directly with Obama to make the statist's dream of diminished physician and patient autonomy a reality. Isn't it strange how the statist is so concerned about "wasted money" in health care while he's out there racking up unfathomable debt through his own fiscal irresponsibility and gluttony? How this bureaucracy found its way into a "stimulus" bill defies logic, but that shouldn't surprise anyone with this administration and congress running things.

Feb. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Republican Senators are questioning whether President Barack Obama’s stimulus bill contains the right mix of tax breaks and cash infusions to jump-start the economy. [I guess we already know the answer to those questions, don't we?]

Tragically, no one from either party is objecting to the health provisions slipped in without discussion. These provisions reflect the handiwork of Tom Daschle, until recently the nominee to head the Health and Human Services Department.

Senators should read these provisions and vote against them because they are dangerous to your health. (Page numbers refer to H.R. 1 EH, pdf version).

The bill’s health rules will affect “every individual in the United States” (445, 454, 479). Your medical treatments will be tracked electronically by a federal system. Having electronic medical records at your fingertips, easily transferred to a hospital, is beneficial. It will help avoid duplicate tests and errors.

But the bill goes further. One new bureaucracy, the National Coordinator of Health Information Technology, will monitor treatments to make sure your doctor is doing what the federal government deems appropriate and cost effective. The goal is to reduce costs and “guide” your doctor’s decisions (442, 446). These provisions in the stimulus bill are virtually identical to what Daschle prescribed in his 2008 book, “Critical: What We Can Do About the Health-Care Crisis.” According to Daschle, doctors have to give up autonomy and “learn to operate less like solo practitioners.”

Keeping doctors informed of the newest medical findings is important, but enforcing uniformity goes too far.

Hospitals and doctors that are not “meaningful users” of the new system will face penalties. “Meaningful user” isn’t defined in the bill. That will be left to the HHS secretary, who will be empowered to impose “more stringent measures of meaningful use over time” (511, 518, 540-541)

What penalties will deter your doctor from going beyond the electronically delivered protocols when your condition is atypical or you need an experimental treatment? The vagueness is intentional. In his book, Daschle proposed an appointed body with vast powers to make the “tough” decisions elected politicians won’t make.

The stimulus bill does that, and calls it the Federal Coordinating Council for Comparative Effectiveness Research (190-192). The goal, Daschle’s book explained, is to slow the development and use of new medications and technologies because they are driving up costs. He praises Europeans for being more willing to accept “hopeless diagnoses” and “forgo experimental treatments,” and he chastises Americans for expecting too much from the health-care system.

Daschle says health-care reform “will not be pain free.” Seniors should be more accepting of the conditions that come with age instead of treating them. That means the elderly will bear the brunt. [I wonder how quickly he will accept his own mortality when faced with health problems. The statist is always looking for new ways to force others to make sacrifices.]

Medicare now pays for treatments deemed safe and effective. The stimulus bill would change that and apply a cost- effectiveness standard set by the Federal Council (464). [Safe, effective, and cost-effective? Sound familiar? You got it...death panels!]

The Federal Council is modeled after a U.K. board discussed in Daschle’s book. This board approves or rejects treatments using a formula that divides the cost of the treatment by the number of years the patient is likely to benefit. Treatments for younger patients are more often approved than treatments for diseases that affect the elderly, such as osteoporosis. [Strange...I never learned any of these formulas in medical school.]

In 2006, a U.K. health board decreed that elderly patients with macular degeneration had to wait until they went blind in one eye before they could get a costly new drug to save the other eye. It took almost three years of public protests before the board reversed its decision. [...and liberals call themselves compassionate.]

If the Obama administration’s economic stimulus bill passes the Senate in its current form, seniors in the U.S. will face similar rationing. Defenders of the system say that individuals benefit in younger years and sacrifice later.

The stimulus bill will affect every part of health care, from medical and nursing education, to how patients are treated and how much hospitals get paid. The bill allocates more funding for this bureaucracy than for the Army, Navy, Marines, and Air Force combined (90-92, 174-177, 181).

Hiding health legislation in a stimulus bill is intentional. Daschle supported the Clinton administration’s health-care overhaul in 1994, and attributed its failure to debate and delay. A year ago, Daschle wrote that the next president should act quickly before critics mount an opposition. “If that means attaching a health-care plan to the federal budget, so be it,” he said. “The issue is too important to be stalled by Senate protocol.”

On Friday, President Obama called it “inexcusable and irresponsible” for senators to delay passing the stimulus bill. In truth, this bill needs more scrutiny.

The health-care industry is the largest employer in the U.S. It produces almost 17 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product. Yet the bill treats health care the way European governments do: as a cost problem instead of a growth industry. Imagine limiting growth and innovation in the electronics or auto industry during this downturn. This stimulus is dangerous to your health and the economy. [Hat tip to Betsy McCaughey]

The art of politics has become a complicated magician's act of smoke and mirrors. A chasm has formed between the people and their elected representatives. Our desires, dreams, and aspirations are no longer shared by the Washington elite inner-circle. At break-neck speed, they are implementing legislation to enslave us while empowering themselves. Just last week, Obama introduced a "deficit commission" to make the "difficult" decisions he can't make for political reasons (tax hikes on those earning less than $250,000, anyone?). Obviously, it's too late to block this abominable "stimulus" bill, but it isn't too late to block future funding for this and other ill-conceived bureaucracies. We MUST stay vigilant, we MUST continue to voice our opposition, and we MUST do everything in our power to depose the statists who are destroying our nation on November 2.