Silent no longer, Doctors and Major Medical Publications get behind Single Payer!!!

Proposals floated by Republican leaders won’t achieve President Trump’s campaign promises of more coverage, better benefits, and lower costs, but a single-payer reform would, according to a commentary published today in Annals of Internal Medicine, one of the nation’s most prestigious and widely cited medical journals.

In today’s Annals commentary, Longtime health policy experts Drs. Steffie Woolhandler and David Himmelstein warn that the proposals would slash Medicaid spending for the poor, shift the ACA’s subsidies from the near-poor to wealthier Americans, and replace Medicare with a voucher program, even as they would cut Medicare’s funding and raise the program’s eligibility age.

Point by point, single payer continues to save money and free people and businesses from crippling bills:

Single-payer reform could provide comprehensive first-dollar coverage to all Americans within the current budgetary envelope because of vast savings on health care bureaucracy and profits.

1. $504 billion annually on health care paperwork and profits, including $220 billion on insurance overhead

2. $150 billion in hospital billing and administration

3. $75 billion doctors’ billing and paperwork. They estimate that an additional $113 billion could be saved each year by hard bargaining with drug companies over prices.

4. The savings would cover the cost of expanding insurance to the 26 million who remain uninsured despite the ACA, “plugging the gaps in existing coverage.

5. Abolishing copayments and deductibles.

6. Covering such services as dental and long-term care that many policies exclude.”

The lead author of the commentary, Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, said: “We’re wasting hundreds of billions of health care dollars on insurance paperwork and profits. Private insurers take more than 12 cents of every premium dollar for their overhead and profit, as compared to just over 2 cents in Medicare. Meanwhile, 26 million are still uninsured and millions more with coverage can’t afford care.

Dr. David Himmelstein, the senior author, said, “Polls show that most Americans—including most people who want the ACA repealed, and even a strong minority of Republicans – want single-payer reform.

And doctors are crying out for such reform. The Annals of Internal Medicine is one of the most respected and traditional medical journals. Their willingness to publish a call for single payer signals that it’s a mainstream idea in our profession.”