Thoughts on health care

This morning, I'd like to point out two interesting stories on how the health care debate has become more irrational than rational. First, a WaPo op-ed decrying the imbalanced media coverage of health care, which may be leading to a perception that opposition is larger than it really is:

The most disturbing account came from Rep. David Price of North Carolina, who spoke with a stringer for one of the television networks at a large town-hall meeting he held in Durham. The stringer said he was one of 10 people around the country assigned to watch such encounters. Price said he was told flatly: "Your meeting doesn't get covered unless it blows up." As it happens, the Durham audience was broadly sympathetic to reform efforts. No "news" there. (source)

If the media do have a liberal bias, they're letting their bottom line trump that bias, focusing on sensational conservative outbursts that are perfect fodder for cable news' non-stop sound-byte recycling. This isn't unique to health care - it's always a problem when the media are driven by ratings. But it's a particular problem if people use media coverage as a readout of public sentiment - which many do.

That's not to say that a lot of Americans on both sides of the debate aren't rattled by the prospect of shaking up health care. The New Yorker has an article by James Surowiecki on the psychology of the status quo, and why the Obama team may have inadvertently provoked even more anxiety:

Behavioral economists have established that we feel the pain of losses more than we enjoy the pleasure of gains. So when we think about change we focus more on what we might lose rather than on what we might get. Even people who aren't all that happy with the current system, then, are still likely to feel anxious about whatever will replace it.

Such anxieties have certainly been stoked by the reams of disinformation that have been spread about the Obama plan. They may also have been exacerbated by the Obama Administration's initial emphasis on the way the plan would help hold down health-care costs. This approach was understandable: most people think health care is too expensive, so the ability to hold down costs seems like a selling point for the plan. The problem is that once you start talking about cost-cutting you make people think about what they might have to give up. And that makes them value what they have more highly. (source)

Surowiecki argues that we need to get people to more accurately assess the status quo. For example, most of us have insurance that is tied to our jobs - and everyone, especially those media stringers searching for sensational clips and high ratings, is feeling anxiety about keeping their jobs. So the idea that we're potentially losing a sure, secure benefit is an illusion - just like the media's depiction of the town hall meetings. No matter where you stand on health care, making decisions based on illusions is not good policy.

PS. It should also go without saying that biting other people's fingers off is not effective persuasive strategy. Sigh.

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Bravo! As a physician, patient,and parent, I see the need for healthcare reform (preferably universal coverage via a single payor, but I'm dreaming again).
Your healthcare is only as secure as your job. Lose your job? Not only do you lose your current coverage, but even if you get a new job, pre-existing illnesses may not be covered. Medical costs are the number 1 cause of bankruptcy in the country.
We had a huge town hall about this in Omaha a couple of weeks ago. Hundreds were turned away, but no one came armed, and no fights broke out. No national coverage, either.

The problem with the media's role in the healthcare debate is that they've focused excessively on covering the politics rather than the policies. If half the time spent covering these goofy barkers at the town halls were spent on serious analysis of the specific aspects of various healthcare reform plans, the public would be much better informed.

That said, the healthcare fracas has once again demonstrated that a third to half of all Americans are simply not reality-based. Delusions about how America has the best healthcare system in the world control the judgment of such people.

The health insurance reform circus. Sigh.

Karoli has an eye-witness account of the finger-biting incident. The "man in the orange shirt" is the bitee.

The man in the orange shirt hit the pro-reform guy (Iâm going to call him PR Guy just to keep the players straight). Hard. ( tweeted in real time) He punched him in the face, knocked him to the ground and into that thruway. As you can see from the photo, cars drive straight through that without stopping. The pro-reform guy could have been run over. He got up, tried to get back up on the curb, but Orange Shirt guy was in his face. Finger in his face, PR Guy standing, steps up to the curb, and thereâs a scuffle. Orange shirt seemed to have PR Guy in a hold, but again, I was across the street, so wonât state that as absolute fact. Next thing I see is PR Guyâs hat being tossed into the street, both yelling at one another, then Orange shirt walks away, PR Guy picks up hat and crosses to our side.

When he gets to our side, he tells a story in one sentence: âHe punched me hard, straight in the face, so I bit his finger off.â

Oh please. I'm a "liberal" (pro gay marriage, pro abortion, pro all kinds of other liberal things). I'm self employed. And I suffer from a chronic uncurable disorder that means I'm fucked if I want to get covered. And even with all that I look at what is proposed by the dems - and I vomit. Profusely.

This is NOT about wise and caring ways we can change laws to make health care more accessibly and more affordable for average Americans like me. If it was... it would feature a mindful, stepwise approach that included things like allowing for more competetion between insurers and tort reform along with adding a co-op or government options for those who cannot afford care.

Instead what we've got is the usual --- a lot of posturing, primping, preening and PR moments for those on both sides of our utterly out of touch "representatives".

An uncurable pox on them all...

SmartDogs, apart from tort reform which is being mostly addressed on the state level, the health care reform package is the opposite of what you describe. There is an insurance exchange proposal for better competition that includes standardized minimum benefits included coverage for pre-existing conditions. The proposals also include better incentives for primary care and prevention of disease as a means to cut cost as well as uniform records and billing procedures to further cut cost. The House of Representative's proposal includes a government option and at the very least that will need to be addressed during conference. We will be getting a more efficient system that covers more people. What exactly is wrong with it?