Saturday, February 13, 2010

Fox Expert Lies About Clinton’s Care

Let me start with some good news.  Past President Bill Clinton is now at home after two stents were successfully installed in a coronary artery.

Trying to take political advantage, Faux Noise falsely claimed that he would not have gotten such care had HCR passed.

Fox-sheep This morning, Fox & Friends covered President Bill Clinton’s hospitalization by asking if the President would have been treated for his heart problems “if the health care reform had gone through.” “Would he have gotten those stents?” host Brian Kilmeade asked in-house health reform expert Peter J. Johnson Jr  [Faux Noise delinked].

Johnson admitted that “under a lot of protocols he would have gotten those stents,” but suggested that if the government adopted best practice methods using comparative effectiveness research, “perhaps hundreds of thousands of people like the president” would receive a cheaper, less effective, treatment:

JOHNSON: If the government decides to adopt the Peter Orszag, budget director, architect of health care, method and put in regulations that say there is a gold standard, there is a best practice based on the literature, perhaps hundreds of thousands of people like the president, I’m not going to make a determination…if the new standard is save money, best practices, does President Clinton or you or I who needs it get the stent under the new regimen of health care effectiveness?

Watch it:

 

Conservatives have long used comparative effectiveness research (CER) to further their claim that health care reform would ration treatments based on cost, impose a one-size-fits-all standard for medicine, and keep doctors from prescribing more expensive and effective procedures. But this line of thinking misunderstands the purpose of CER and ignores legislative language that specifically prohibits the government from applying research findings to coverage decisions. CER is a recommendation, not a mandate. (See pg. 1652 of the Senate bill or pg. 769 of the House bill).

Rather than making arbitrary decisions based on cost, CER — which compares clinical outcomes of alternative therapies used to manage the same condition — would provide doctors with unbiased information about the most effective treatments, help doctors and patients make better informed decisions, and improve the quality of care. Properly conducted CER will actually promote faster adoption of personalized care, not one-size-fits all medicine...

Inserted from <Think Progress>

The GOP and their ministry of propaganda know only how to lie.  In response, we must arm ourselves with the truth.

4 comments:

JUDI M. said...

Well, I hate to bring this up: but insurance companies
already do that. Having done insurance billing and coding for years, I know the insurance companies want you to try this, try that, and maybe this BEFORE they let the doctor do what he feels is correct in the first place. They waste the doctor's time, the patient's time and money all to avoid doing anything. Then they'll probably deny it any way. What a crock FOX is.

Tom Harper said...

This is one of the Right's favorite talking points: that "socialized medicine" means all hospitals will be like post offices or DMV offices. There'll be no more doctors; all medical procedures will be performed by faceless bureaucrats who don't care because they can't get fired. And they like to tie it to a famous person; Clinton in this case. "Bill Clinton would have DIED if we had socialized medicine!"

Rush Limbaugh said the same thing after he was released from the hospital: "I don't think I would have survived this if we had socialized medicine." And I was thinking "so what's your point?"

Lisa G. said...

Tom,
Hawaii has had socialized medicine for 40 years - mandated by state law. If you have a job and work over 20 hours per week, your employer is required to provide health insurance. When Rush said he got the "finest medical care in the world" he was right - socialized medicine! BWahahahaha.

TomCat said...

Lisa, Murdoch's Faux Noise are why Republicans win elections.

Thanks Judi. Your personal insight makes it real on a level we can all see.

Tom, remember when they said that about Steven Hawking? He came back and said it was Britain's socialized medicine that had kept him alive for most of his life.


True, Lisa, but I can prove Hawaii's medical care is not perfect. Rush survived. ;-)