Once again, this was easily predicted before Obamacare was ever rammed down our throats.
Consumers who signed up for Blue Cross Blue Shield health plans through the Affordable Care Act’s insurance marketplaces these last two years tended to be sicker and incurred greater medical costs than people with BCBS coverage through their jobs.
The enrollees in those individual health plans in 2014 and 2015 had higher rates of diabetes, depression and heart disease, according to a report released Wednesday by the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association.
Medical costs for individuals who obtained coverage through the ACA’s insurance exchanges were, on average, 22 percent higher than those with employer-based coverage in 2015, according to the association. Average monthly medical spending per member was $559 for individual enrollees in 2015, for example, versus $457 for group members.
So it’s a bad thing we’re extending insurance coverage to sicker people who consume more care?
That headline, which reads more like a gripe, confirms my suspicion about what motivates opposition to the Affordable Care Act — poor people receiving medical care for which they are not worthy.
Pike,
This gets to the dangerous tipping point. Do the rest of us deserve to pay for health care of chronic heroin addicts, alcoholics, or pot smokers?
Why should the responsible pay for those who are willfully and purposely irresponsible with their life choices?
(And I don’t have a problem with health coverage for conditions through no fault of their own.)
Why be responsible, then?
Of course they are sicker than those who have had coverage through their employer for years! You don’t get the Carnac the Magnificent Award for your prediction. It ignores or begs the question of whether basic health care should be a right. Without it we absorbed many of those without coverage in our own policies with higher hospital charges but many more didn’t receive treatment and died. As a society is that acceptable?
Kevin, you’re right. This is a dangerous tipping point that has caused you to show your true colors. Like the pharisees of old you judge the poor and determine them unworthy of care because they do not practice religion and its rituals as you believe they should.
Hmmm… who was it who said in Matthew 10 “7 And as you go, preach, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ 8″Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. Freely you received, freely give. 9″Do not acquire gold, or silver, or copper for your money belts,…”
Remember Kevin, “1 Do not judge so that you will not be judged. 2″For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you.…” (Matthew 7)
Dave,
Do we keep treating the compounding medical ailments of the drug addict even after his 4th, 5th, of 6th broken promise to quit?
Romans 12:9 says, “[ Love in Action ] Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good.”
It is never good to prop up, shield, or aid drug addiction in any fashion.
If one knows they have health care no matter what their bad choice, it can aid the addiction and their ultimate destruction.
Christ also wants us to discern good from bad.
Phillipians Chapter 1: 9-11
9 And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, 10 so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, 11 filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.
I’m with you on the helping one’s fellow man, the least of these.
However, we have to discern when HELPING becomes ENABLING of the bad choices that may lead one’s body and soul to destruction.
Obamacare lacks any discernment of any kind in this respect.
Also, you take Matthew 7 out of context. (as many do). It is best to read John 8:1-11. Showing a lack of mercy where someone is reforming their ways and seeking forgiveness is the proper context for Matthew 7. Love has to be SINCERE. A drug user intent on continuing his destructive ways with no willingness to reform, or seek forgiveness, and witholding aid that could further his addiction, is not judging, but DISCERNING under Romans 12:9.
It’s fine to show mercy to drug user, but if your mercy helps them toward more destructive behavior or aids more drug use, that is a lack of biblical discernment on your part. You would be rejecting Romans 12:9 by clinging to what is evil. Matthew 7 is not a license to abandon biblical discernment in deciding how to help.
That is the problem with government run programs, the program lacks simple biblical discernment, which may hurt some people, more than it helps.
kev:
“That is the problem with government run programs, the program lacks simple biblical discernment, which may hurt some people, more than it helps”.
And just as as it should be. The last thing we need is religion dictating what a government program should, or shouldn’t do. I believe the constitution guarantees that religion isn’t involved.
Baldy,
So we should pay for the medical care of the alcoholic, and the drug user, taking the income of others, and freeing up more of their income for their destructive habits?
That is not compassion, that hurtful and destructive.
Baldy,
So Christians have no right to proper biblical discernment under Obamacare?
Aside from being offensive, it is also insensitive, and lacks compassion, especially for Christians to properly exercise their faith on many fronts. 1st Amendment is suppose to guarantee freedom of religion, not deny one’s ability to exercise religion.
Wow, I didn’t know that the free exercise of religion was telling a drug addict after the third or fourth relapse to crawl into the gutter and die.
Guess that’s why I’m an agnostic.
kev:
We pay for it anyway when they come to an emergency room without any insurance. Hospitals add that to our bills.
No. Physicians and hospitals shouldn’t make any treatment or care decisions based on religion. Other cultures call those that do witch doctors and shamans. Medical treatment should be based on sound scientific and medical knowledge. If you want your care based on religion rather than science, pay for it yourself.
Kev,
Two problems:
1. You assume these additional people now receiving health care under ACA are all drug addicts which is highly unlikely.
2. Your discernment smells strangely close to passing judgement.
Crying about drug addicts being rewarded by having their lives saved by health care is merely a “red herring” to cover for the fact you, and other conservatives, would just as soon see the poor die quietly rather than have to pay for their care through any tax moneys.
Pike,
Did I say “crawl back in the gutter?”
What I was getting at is: aid of any kind to a drug user or alcoholic can make their destructive behavior much, much worse, both for them and their families.
i’m saying love needs to be sincere, not reckless. Freeing the drug user or alcoholic to fuel their addiction is reckless and not live for one’s fellow man.
Obamacare is one of a litany of welfare programs destroying the least of these. More discernment is needed than socialist indifference.
Baldy, Dave,
Let me put it this way, as a church example:
You have someone that can’t pay rent because they made a bad choice (gambling, drugs, whatever). They will be evicted without help. They are repentant about their bad choice and promise to change. You help them.
Six months later. Same thing happens. Do you help them? Maybe. They promise same repentance. After prayer and consideration, you are convinced, and help them.
8 months later. It happens again. Do you help them? At this point, they have lied twice. They will be evicted without help. Do you continue to shield them from the CONSEQUENCE of their bad choice again?
Consequence may be the only thing that may truly reform at that point. Mercy sometimes means allowing the person to be sharpened by discipline through feeling the consequence for their ongoing sinful choices.
In the socialist world, we keep on aiding bad choices with no consequence?
That is not love, that is destruction, lack of mercy, and indifference.
Dave, I also do not assume all additional people on program are drug users. However, the consequence of socialist destruction to those with addiction can be disasterous.
So you are criticizing me for having some biblical discernment on helping vs enabling those making bad choices….so that criticism would NOT be judging on your part under Matthew 7?
You do not want to judge good vs. bad help when it comes to addicts, but are willing to judge those Christians that are discerning about making sure the help to addicts is not destructive?
Baldy has an “h” word for that.
kev:
There is no “h” in “class discrimination”. That is what you are doing, ya know?
And who picks up the tab for the homeless person that you kicked to the curb? As the Fram oil filter guys used to say, “pay me now, or pay me later”.
Baldy,
The class discrimination would be on your part. You don’t give a person bent on destructive choices access to make more destructive choices.
So you “care” by shielding addicts from economic consequence of their bad behavior? Paid for by the responsible?
That is destructive both for addict and family of addict…and innocent bystanders if they kill someone with their car, for instance.
I care about the consequence to the innocent, even if you don’t.