The Texas Tribune reports that a growing trend among doctors (especially among specialists) is refusal to accept Medicare and Medicaid patients. This is due in large part to the layers of bureaucracy and rolls of red tape which come attached to these patients — in other words real expenses in terms of time and labor — for which the health care providers are not compensated.
“In essence, physicians are donating their services every time they see someone on Medicare or Medicaid,” said Dr. Susan Bailey, a Fort Worth allergist and the incoming president of the Texas Medical Association. “It just becomes a matter of whether or not you can keep your bottom line healthy.”
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“Why should I take [Medicaid or Medicare] patients who could be seen at a clinic, at [the public hospital]? My practice is full already,” Dr. William Jones said. “Nowadays, everyone thinks they’re entitled to health care — they want the same type of care Michael Dell gets, but for free.”
So, the doctors can’t bear the financial burden of the red-tape and some of them decide to stop admitting new medicaid/medicare patients, because they’re losing money on every single one of them. Anyone with even a cursory understanding of economics could’ve told you that this is exactly what you were going to get when you start socializing health care.
I’m no omniscient, but I told you exactly that about Massachussets’ health care failure: the end result is a system which fails to provide the only thing it’s designed to provide, while permitting the government to exercise even greater amount of control over our lives, as our freedoms and our dignity are surrendered or usurped.
Well, guess what Massachusetts is mulling over as we speak?
At least one state is considering sticks, not carrots. Massachusetts, which has seen wait times for primary care doctors grow since the state made health insurance mandatory three years ago, is debating forcing doctors to accept Medicaid and Medicare.
Every state-socialized system ultimately succumbs to this.
Proponents of Obamacare or whatever you want to call this abomination straight-up mocked me when I presented the slippery-slope argument, that such a system doesn’t work, can’t work, and won’t work, and eventually the system will have to conscript primary care providers, physicians, etc. “Oh don’t be ridiculous,” they said.
When the doctors start turning down these programs, the Governments will start holding medical licenses for ransom (Texas is also toying with this concept), compelling doctors to perform services under threat of losing their license and consequently, their livelihood. This is more than a simple racket, this is slavery.
What else would you call it? Actually, I don’t care (a rose by any other name…).
This is what socialized medicine is all about: it denies people the choice and ability to take care of themselves, the absence of which is then touted as evidence that socialism is needed because people won’t take care of themselves (because they aren’t allowed to take care of themselves). And if that’s not bad enough, we now have evidence that they’re really going to try and enslave people to keep the charade alive.
