HHS SAYS: TASTES GOOD AND IS GOOD FOR YOU!

WOW - good news for all except chocolate Easter bunnies.

Eric Ding,  a Harvard School of Public Health epidemiologist, reports that Flavonoids are antioxidants, commonly found in fruits and vegetables. A systematic review and pooling of randomized trials found that consumption of cocoa rich in flavonoids (i.e., dark chocolate)  may improve risk factors for heart disease and diabetes.

The release states that “Higher cocoa flavonoid consumption reduced systolic blood pressure, reduced LDL cholesterol, the bad cholesterol, increased HDL cholesterol, the good cholesterol.”

The 72 Cent Dollar

Suppose someone on the street corner made you a proposition. He would give you 72 cents for every dollar in your pocket. What would you think?  What would you say?  What would you do?

So when Mr Ryan offers to privatize Medicare, which means that between 25 and 30 cents of each dollar would be used by the insurers for administrative overhead (which includes millions in executive salaries) what do you think.  What do you say. What are you going to do?

When I last checked, Medicare's administrative overhead was about 3 cents on a dollar.  That sounds like a much better deal for you than privatization.  But it just isn't as good a deal for political campaign funds- which may be why the proposal has been floated. Make your thoughts known to the people who act as if the rest of us are stupid.

ACCOUNTABLE CARE ORGANIZATIONS (ACOs)

THIS REQUIRES YOUR ATTENTION and COMMENT

The DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid
Services, has published its proposed rule (19528 Federal Register / Vol. 76, No. 67 / Thursday, April 7, 2011 / Proposed Rules) which would implement section 3022 of the Affordable Care Act which contains provisions relating to Medicare payments to providers of services and suppliers participating in Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs). Under these provisions, providers of services and suppliers can continue to receive traditional Medicare fee-for-service payments under Parts A and B, and be eligible for additional payments based on meeting specified quality and savings requirements.

This long complex document (127 pages)  will have a profound effect on quality, access to, and the cost of health care for all Americans. If the only commentators are hospital systems, physician groups, trade organizations, financial interests, lawyers and others whose economic interests will be served through having their input adopted, your family's and community's interests will not be well served.

Read it. Discuss it. Submit comments. Be heard. Or don't complain when your family's health care needs are subverted by other interests which focus on cost, profit and system control.

Playing Both Ends Against The Middle

America's older population seem to present a problem for one political party. After all, our older citizens no longer work to produce taxes which Congress can spend on pork or the military-industrial complex. Seniors vote. Seniors occupy housing which real estate interests might prefer to sell or rent to younger, employed and more affluent working people. The elderly soak up Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid dollars as they live longer and demand the care and help (for which they long paid taxes) promised to them by a series of presidents dating back to FDR. The elderly are experienced and smart enough to doubt the nonsense that politicians shovel their way and clearly express their disbelief. And some seniors, reaching the ancient age of 50+ refuse to get out of the way so that employers can plug fresh faced 29 year olds into their jobs using their  "fresh blood" to reduce employment  health insurance and other costs, raising corporate profits so that executives get the bonuses that might otherwise be paid to older shareholders in the form of dividends.  As that political party looks at the subsidies that the elderly require it points a finger and shouts - "you are bankrupting us!"

And the very young are a a problem, too.  They have to be fed, clothed, housed and educated before they can join the military in Iraq (or some other country involved in America's wars) or unsuccessfully seek employment in an economy which has been butchered by the financial services and other industries. Some of the young actually have a continuing need  for health care, requiring the federal government and states to ante-up for subsidized payments through Medicaid.  The political party that points to the financial burden of the elderly, unflinchingly demand that the health care needs of the young and their families should not be America's responsibility, it should be the sole burden of the young and their families.  If their families are  unable to shoulder that burden because they are "not worthy" they should not be able to discharge their debts in federal bankruptcy.

But the middle - where corporate America and other major political party donors reside - there are no problems at all that a further tax cut cannot ameliorate.  In the middle, inventive financial interests are exercised to produce virtual markets which sell products that no-one understands, sees, or can explain. Jobs are shipped overseas to nations that provide little or no health benefits to their workers.  That same political party that objects to subsidizing the cost of health care and social support for the young and the elderly have no problem at all in providing its big-business financial supporters with large tax subsidies which cost-shifts health and social expenses from the most able to pay to those who do not have the resources to pay.

Playing both ends against the middle is an old game.  Is our public smart enough to realize that no person or family is immune to the ravages of these tactics?  If they "do it" to older Americans, some day all who are now young will suffer. If they do it to young Americans and their families, the young and their families will suffer and their elderly parents will deplete their savings to help them. And if corporations continue to be highly subsidized though America's tax code, we will all suffer and our health system will disintegrate. Except for those wealthy enough to be able to take care of themselves and support the political party which deems them "worthy".