Published: July 06, 2009 08:05 am      

STUMPTALK: The number of uninsured Americans is a hoax

The widely claimed number of uninsured Americans is dishonest and misleading. A study released by the Employment Policies Institute (EPI) on June 23, 2009 shows that 43 percent of the claimed 47 million uninsured Americans can afford medical insurance and elect to remain “voluntarily uninsured.”

At least 18 million of the uninsured are under the age of 35 and earn more than enough to purchase health insurance that would cost less than $100 per month. Many of the uninsured qualify for health care coverage through SCHIP, Medicaid or other existing government programs but for whatever reason, about 11 million simply refuse to take advantage of these taxpayer-funded programs. About 2 million of the remaining Americans receive health care as inmates in our prison system since they use jail, penitentiary or prison mailing addresses. Many of the remaining uninsured would never obtain insurance even if it were offered; they are illegal residents, prostitutes and drug addicts. All of these residents currently receive good medical care in emergency rooms or free clinics.

The actual number of Americans who desire and cannot obtain health insurance is estimated to be about 8 million. By law, emergency rooms must provide health care to patients; not differentiating between legal or illegal and these patients receive the same high quality health care as those who have insurance. Being without health insurance does not mean being without health care.

In the 20 years before Medicare was implemented in 1965, the cost of a day in the hospital increased only three fold. In the 20 years following Medicare the cost of a day in the hospital increased eight times more than the cost of inflation. The decreased payments made by government to health care providers have caused the providers to increase the costs to everyone else.

Many doctors are required to hire extra office staff simply to complete the forms required to satisfy government regulations. Many of today’s doctors would not recommend their sons and daughters follow them into the medical profession and we already have fewer doctors than we need.

Common sense tells us that the only way to improve the “efficiency” and reduce the cost with the current number of doctors is to reduce the number of procedures performed by doctors. Government medical care will be restricted and those covered by government insurance would have to wait for care, and in some cases, will be denied needed care due to their age when the bureaucrats decide they are too old and are going to die anyway.

Why do so many Canadians, English, and Middle East citizens come to America for care if their system is all encompassing and so outstanding? We will not be able to go to Canada or Great Britain for our care.

If the federal government is capable of improving our health care system, then they should improve the current Medicare, Medicaid, SCHIP, and Veterans Administration programs before changing the current health care system for others.

Our American health care system has produced more improvements in care, medical procedures and techniques than any other system in the history of the world. We need to improve our current system, not totally destroy it.