Our expanding waistline will continue to expand our healthcare expenditures

Every reporter in the country is reporting on this new survey regarding consumer-driven health plans.  All are drawing to the conclusion that traditional plans provide better care.

First, I started reading more about the organization who published this current survey and found they published a consumer directed survey back in 2003.  After reading a quote I wondered if they even understand how insurance is paid for. Here is the quote from their website referring to a surveythey did in 2003.

"High-deductible plans can undermine the two basic purposes of health insurance: to reduce financial barriers to needed care and to protect against financial hardship. This report, based on the Commonwealth Fund Biennial Survey of Health Insurance (2003)"

First and foremost,  healthcare is EXPENSIVE PERIOD.  Doctors are very expensive and hospitals cost even more. The idea of "affordable healthcare" is an oxymoron.  For the average American, 80% of us, our goal for affordable healthcare is to stay healthy and avoid the healthcare system.  Reduce financial barriers is FALSE,  all we do is SHIFT
the financial burden from one payer to another. I guess if someone else is paying the bill, we should not worry about the cost. The only variable we as consumers can reduce is CONSUMPTION.  From the start I can see this organization is SHORT SITED and is not looking at the WHOLE PICTURE.  Secondly high deductibles do protect from
financial hardship.  If one fails to exert financial self-control by not "saving" for a major medical problem (only a 3-5% chance) the system should not be blamed for ones failure to take personal responsibility for themselves and their family.  

Looking at the survey, which was limited to the "summary",  I see flaws in the summary.  First the body polled is limited to 1254 internet users who signed up to be polled by Harris Interactive. Pool is to small and limited.  In this pool only 184 had an HSA.  
In order for a survey to equally compare a user of a traditional plan to a user of an HSA,  one must find an equal comparison.  No where in this survey does the survey address cost distribution.  Cost is the number one problem with healthcare.  A fair comparison is to compare consumers equally. Consumer "A" Traditional Plan Cost=Z and Consumer "B" Consumer-Directed" Cost=(x+y)=Z  "X" being defined as HDHP and "y" being contribution to savings.  If a survey does not apply this formula and compare equally,  the results will not reflect the true power of CDHP's.

A second undertone I read into many of the articles reporting on this new survey, is the word "they".  The battle lines are being drawn between "Us" the consumer and "they" the evil employers of this country.  I would like to just comment,  it is "we".  Many of them can do with out "us", but can not do with "them".  Our nation will survive if "we" all pull together.

There is a cost to everything, and healthcare is no exception.  No matter if "we" or "they" pay the bill, affordable healthcare will only be obtained when Americans reduce the demand for the services offered by the healthcare industry and take personal responsibility for our health and finances.

Just remember, our expanding waistline will continue to expand our healthcare expenditures.  



Everyone needs to read the article by Radley Balko from the Cato Institute.  He hits the mark on many good points.  First and foremost, he is wrong when if comes to obesity in this country.  It is our number one problem facing our healthcare industry.  He was wrong or he skirted around the fact that high blood pressure and high cholesterol has risen over the past 10 years.  This rise parallels the rise in obesity.  We are only able to control the consequences of our actions by use of drugs and additional healthcare dollars.  I disagree with Mr Balko regarding the governments roll in protecting the citizens of this country.  The food industry is no different the healthcare industry, each one would benefit from more transparency.  

I am for free markets, but I feel the playing field should be EVEN.  We all know the power of advertising and public persuasion, so I just ask for the facts in every advertisement.  As a father who works every day to dispel the marketing efforts of our food industry (which amounts to BILLIONS spent every year), I can attest it is a very difficult task to get your children to desire healthy food at every meal.  It is sad when your 2 year old can recognize the ‘Golden Arches” while speeding along at 55 mph.  I limit TV viewing and stops at fast food restaurants, but still my kids are bombarded with commercials that promote GARBAGE Food.  Less than one out of ten commercials promote anything beneficial to my children’s health.  Food manufactures should voluntarily share the nutritional benefits in every form of advertisement so my kids could then make an educated decision to either avoid or support the product being promoted.  We need to level our the playing field for the sake of future generations.  Mr Balko looks into the way we “define” obesity and tries to minimize the gain.  I look to a another industry to shine some light on just how big we Americans are, the garment industry.  Using myself as an example and using garments that I acquired 25 years ago, I have been able to see first hand the way the garment industry has changed sizes to address the expanding of Americans.  In high school,   I was 168 lbs and wore a 32” waist.  I wore a large to X-large shirt or jacket.  Today I weight 170 lbs and ware a 32” waist, BUT I ware a Small to Medium shirt or jacket.  The garment industry uses averages not dimensions when determining S-M-L-XL.  I still have a large jacket from 25 years ago that today would be sized as a SMALL.  This is empirical evidence that we have expanded over the past 25 years.   The question is, can we stop the expansion or will we just continue to let it run out our control like the rest of the factors facing this nation.

Mr Balko does support the HSA and the effects it will have on consumer discretion.  We all need to be personally responsible for our actions and we also should be provided the tools in order to do so.  I closing,  we all have to take responsibility for ourselves and our families if we are going to control the exploding cost associated with the declining health of our nation