|
As the White House girds for battle over the president's health care plan, the GOP is dutifully trotting out the same bromides they have tossed around since the Truman Administration. Bureaucrats in DC will tell you which teeth you can brush, Michael Moore will choose your doctor, and unemployed Bulgarian apparatchiks will move en masse to the US to manage our economy. Harry's government doctor will remove the wrong kidney during surgery and Louise will repeatedly be urged to have abortions. I suppose they figure, 'hey, this nonsense has always worked before. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.'
But broke their rhetoric is, right along with our health care system. I couldn't help but think of just how broken both the GOP's creaky scare-tactics and the US's health care system was when I was treated to some remarks from the Republicans leader in the House, John Boehner.
|
|
Hearing Boehner say dumb things is hardly new, and the specific dumb things he said weren't new either. After raising the histrionics bar with the assertion that the President Obama's plan will 'be a police state like we've never seen,' the minority leader circled back to a favorite GOP talking point - the DMV.
Apparently, Rep. Boehner believes that if the Obama plan is enacted into law, the health care system will soon operate like the DMV. This reminded me of the last time I actually went to the DMV. Last summer my wife received a note in the mail informing her that she had to get a new driver's license. A couple of days later, I picked her up around lunch time and we proceeded to the DMV on South Willow here in Manchester. There was, as we expected, a lunch hour crowd. Taking our place in line, we chatted about not much and awaited my wife's turn. Within about twenty minutes, we were out the door with her new license - complete with new photo - with plenty of time for a buffet lunch at our favorite Indian place.
Now let's contrast this with a recent experience my wife had with a specialist she sees. She has been going twice a year to this doctor for about 5 years and is supposed to receive a letter through the mail every six months reminding her to schedule a visit.
But last fall nothing came. Realizing she was about due for a visit, she called the office. With this call, she learned that she would have to contact her primary care physician for a new referral, according to the rules issued by her insurer. This, naturally, led to a series of calls to her PCP and the specialist's office.
That hurdle cleared, she asked if she could still make an appointment for November. They would be happy to fit her in, the voice on the other end of the line said, 'how about May of next year? Sorry, I'm afraid that's the earliest we have available...' She acquiesced. And this 'mail notification' system is now used system-wide by her provider so she has had to add to her calendar a reminder to call and remind other specialists we see to mail us reminders.
Consider this, Mr. Boehner. The health care industry, their lobbyists, and your GOP colleagues have built such an insanely bureaucratic and inefficient system that you have successfully fallen behind the service levels routinely achieved by New Hampshire's DMV.* Good work. But you can make it up to us - support the president's plan. Or, failing that, could we just join your government paid health plan?
* Maybe the situation is different in Boehner's home state of Ohio, you say? The last time I was in an Ohio BMV, I was in and out in 35 minutes during lunch hour at a downtown location in a city three times the size of Manchester. Conversely, the last time I was in an Ohio emergency room, I waited 5 hours to see someone. That hospital, however, was nice enough to give me a pass for a first-run movie as thanks for my patience.
UPDATE: Another amusing story about the system the insurance companies have built. Today my wife and I went into a chain eyecare place to make an appointment for new specs and contacts. The optometrist seemed very nice, but he was not a member of our health plan - the chain, however, was. So we now must go to a different location to get checked by an optometrist, get a Rx and then come back to the first place to have it filled. Not a horror story, but another example of how much better off we could be...
|
