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Doctors agree to collude with insurance monopolies - and that will bring down costs how? |
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The American Medical Association is now saying it is willing to collude with insurance industry near-monopolies in an effort to prevent real competition and choice from entering the marketplace in the form of a public health insurance option:
Nielsen also said doctors and insurers need to change their “wildly adversarial” relationship marked by lawsuits over reimbursement rates and other issues. That’s prevented sharing patient data and ranking doctor performance that could help improve care and hold down costs, she said.
“Doctors are dispirited and depressed and it is going to take a lot to try to make them listen to their better angels and have trust where trust has not been rewarded in the past,” Nielsen said in a speech at the meeting, held by America’s Health Insurance Plans, the industry’s trade group.
Obama said in a June 3 letter to the Senate Finance and Health committees that a government plan would help reduce the number of uninsured people.
“This will give them a better range of choices, make the health-care market more competitive and keep insurance companies honest,” Obama wrote.
That, right there, is the basic conflict. The AMA (which hardly represents the view of all doctors) and the insurance industry say we should trust them. They will use their market monopolies to make sure everything is ok for us, the little guy. Should we trust them? Or should we force them to make everything right by us by making them compete.
I think the history of the insurance industry and the AMA speaks for itself.
(also posted at the NOW! blog)
