Nation's health insurance is still one big mess

Want to start a lively and passionate discussion?

Dumb question these days when the 2016 presidential election contains all the elements necessary for a debate.

Nope, one need only mention, as Wikipedia calls it, “the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), commonly called the Affordable Care Act (ACA) or, colloquially, Obamacare,” and the wheels get turning and sparks flying.

But why are we still talking about the now six-plus year-old ACA when such a “target rich” landscape exists out there already?

There’s the email questions that follow Hillary Clinton, the wonder of what next will fly out of Donald Trump’s mouth, or what Bernie Sanders plans to make “free?”

The fodder for this discussion came last week with the big, bold headlines that Texas is among a number of states that are asking for significant increases in healthcare insurance premiums, nearly 60 percent Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas was saying.

The company was hoping to stifle losses of $416 million in 2014 and $592 million last year, the story said. But Texas is not alone. Oregon is seeking an 18 percent increase and Washington about four, both well under Vermont’s 44 percent request.

Remember the claim along the campaign trail in 2008 that Americans would realize $2,500 a year in savings under the ACA?

And as much as criticism of the ACA might be thought to be personal — at President Barack Obama who made the it his legacy issue the past eight years — if anything it’s very much fiscal.

The Texas situation is just the latest news that should tell you:

A: We still have a crisis in how we pay for healthcare in this country and,

B: There are many things which point to a how a government-run health insurance program just does not work in a nation of some 330-million people.

In Ohio, the state is taking over InHealth nonprofit co-op health insurer created under the Affordable Care Act. InHealth banked $32 million this year to pay claims, but have found that they were $28 million short. Ironic that InHealth’s failure is the 13th of 23 such ACA co-ops.

But also in the news recently, Moda Health of Oregon is suing the federal government for $180 million it said it was promised as compensation for policies it offered at a discount. They are just one of a number of similar companies seeking damages.

Elsewhere in Oregon there’s the debate over whether charges need to be filed in the $305 million spent — and now wasted — in the botched launch of its Cover Oregon healthcare website.

Funny how we love to point fingers at insurance companies for wanting to turn a profit when government can light enormous piles of our money on fire like this?

The effort to give America an answer to horrifically costly health insurance to cover equally costly care has not gone well on many fronts.

One only has to recall back in the winter of 2009 how the ACA became law with Senate hocus-pocus on Capitol Hill. With the help of a “cloture” vote that bypassed the 60-percent majority needed for passage, the law was approved largely along partisan lines on Dec. 24 just before holiday recess.

That vote came in advance of newly-elected Republican Sen. Scott Walker of Massachusetts being seated in the next Congress, likely providing the necessary delay to the ACA and keep the sides talking and maybe fine-tuning towards a better plan.

Some point to Canada and many nations in Europe where single-payer (a.k.a. government run) health care is popular and is that “better plan.”

But remember Canada has a tenth of the population of the United States, and administering quality care to Denmark’s 5.6 million people, or England’s 64 million is hardly the logistical nightmare it is here.

The Veteran’s Administration is used as an example of how a single-payer system works. But headlines about wait times — the vets whose ailment progressed more quickly than their place in line — far surpass success stories. Seems the media, which trumpeted the many virtues of the ACA, would have it in their best interests to save face by discovering the good news at the V.A.

All of which begs to the need for solutions other than those conceived with the clock approaching midnight.

What we need more of is less of what has made such a mess of things. Less government and fewer insurance companies promising they have the fix — which obviously neither does.

A good question is how do we get the conversation started that works on a solution and not start more fires?