Insurance Reform Bill Passes House!

Today, President Barack Obama is slated to sign the recently passed Insurance Reform Bill before it goes to the Senate.

While this bill (and the companion fixes and concessions) isn't perfect, it's most certainly a step in the right direction.

The idea here is that insurance companies are not doctors, and their bottom lines as for-profit corporations shouldn't be allowed to interfere with effective and efficient practices of medical experts.

Currently, insurance companies simply refuse to cover certain individuals who need it most due to 'pre-existing conditions'. They often drop people they deem as high risk or who make claims. Many customers who have paid insurance premiums for years are often refused tests, surgeries or other expert-recommended procedures which directly interferes with treatment and/or sometimes causes great financial hardship. Just as often, paying-customers and medical staff are given the run-around or denied coverage before or after-the-fact, forcing appeals, more red-tape and invariably, higher premiums for everyone.

The system as it is now is broken. Every other civilized country in the world which has Universal healthcare does it cheaper and better than America. France, which spends less than half of America does on healthcare, covers every single person in the country and has much lower administrative costs overall too.

This recent bill that cleared the House of Representatives wasn't even a public option though. It's a very small step and the first of many more necessary in the path to Universal healthcare. Call it symbolism, or an overly-politicized bill with too many concessions, insurance reform is a good thing and it's a harbinger of bigger and better chance to come.

The penalty for insurance companies who deny or drop people due to pre-existing conditions is minimal in this bill, but it's just the start. What starts out as a minimal fine to an insurance company for denying people insurance will most likely change as Americans get used to the idea of the public option.

In Germany under the current healthcare system founded way back in 1883 by the 'Iron Chancellor', Otto Von Bismarck, civilians keep private insurance their entire lives, with fixed insurance costs set by the government to prevent the rampant abuse. German citizens have a choice of some 200 insurance companies, all who compete for the government monies and offer incentives such as fast payment, elective surgery and even spa-time to de-stress. It seems this health-insurance is the closest to what many working-Americans have under their employer's group plan, the difference being that in Germany, any citizen, working or not, can get insured. My guess is that the German Bismarck system would be the most seamless for Americans to move into when Universal healthcare becomes a reality in the states.

Regardless of what kind of healthcare or public option America eventually adopts, we can guarantee that the insurance-company abuses will continue as long as we leave the healthcare of any U.S. citizens in the hands of for-profit insurance companies. Ideas such as profit and bottom-line are completely at-odds with the best-interests of Americans seeking healthcare. Our tax money should go to actually paying for healthcare as is routinely done in every other developed nation, not as some privatized racket where insurance companies play a shell game with your coverage and in-effect, your life.

America has historically been known for its innovation. It's about time a few Americans had the courage and conviction to finally work toward insurance reform and hopefully, into a real Universal healthcare system like every other civilized first-world (and sometimes third-world) country. America is the richest nation in the world, but ranks a miserable 37th in healthcare and 22nd in infant morality.

What's happening now is a baby step toward reform with real teeth, and the fact that some Americans are freaking out just shows the depth of their ignorance with how healthcare systems work in other countries. Sadly, America is saddled with Republicans, otherwise known as religious wacknut extremist xenophobes...but it's nice to see that real change can happen in spite of their collective fear-mongering and ignorance.

Just as religion has been on the wrong side of almost every American civil-rights issue, Republicans are on the wrong side of this issue as Bush was on the wrong side of the pro-choice and stem-cell research debate. Modern Republicans understand that Jim Crow laws are inhumane and wrong now, but try telling them that back then. Likewise, this too, shall pass, and Republicans will wonder why we didn't do it sooner, once universal healthcare in America is ubiquitous and unremarkable and more importantly, one of the hallmarks of a civilized people.

Sometimes, people have to be dragged, kicking and screaming into social-progress. I am looking forward to real Universal healthcare, regardless of marital or job status in the near future, but it's gotta start somewhere.

Congratulations to the House for passing this bill. Now we need to get it past the Senate and educate Americans about why Universal healthcare makes sense. Universal healthcare will make us a kinder, more civilized, healthier and happier country, and will finally bring us in line with other first-world natons in the 21st century.

Nobody said it would be easy, but it is necessary.

-dB-