According to LNP’s account “Changes ahead at Highmark”, the health care insurer announced this week that “after losing $318 million in the first half of this year on these plans, it’s going to offer fewer of them and expects a general shift toward including fewer providers in the networks, The Wall Street Journal reported.”
(Lest we overly mourn on its behalf, for the same period Highmark’s revenue exceeded expenses by $229 million and it has $6.6 billion in cash.)
The losses are caused by the previously uninsured and thus under treated who have now gained access to health care through the Affordable Care Act, a/k/a “Obamacare.” Treating sick people is a desirable goal for society, unless one is misanthropic enough to root for their early demise.
Although Highmark can well afford it, the solution is not to thrust the responsibility for subsidizing care on to health care companies or for them to raise their rates on the “exchanges” to discourage sick people from signing up, but rather for the nation, as represented by government, to come forth with proper subsidies.
After a bumpy few years, as health care becomes widely available, poor people will have been treated at an earlier stage just as is the case for the rest and, at that point in time, their health needs will not be significantly different from the general population.
Again, treating sick people is an imperative for any decent country. The trick is how we bring that about. Since “Medicare for everyone” is not an option for the USA due to vested interests, the Affordable Care Act is the next best choice.
While its early benefit has been bringing health care to a larger portion of the population, gradually its wise programs will better direct the health care system, bringing about better care for almost everyone and containing overall health care cost, if not actually reducing them.
The USA’s current health care expenditures of 18% of the Gross National Product is outrageous expensive, as compared to other prosperous countries with ‘single payer systems’ that provide much better care for their population from 9% to 11% tops of their Gross National Product.
For those who want to know why this country’s infrastructure is decaying rather than modernizing, the extra 7% to 8% in health care costs is the main culprit. Inefficient and mediocre health care is consuming the funds that otherwise would go towards investment by business and government.
