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It's hard to imagine anything more toxic to the cause of healthcare reform than tying it to support for vigilante murder.
UnitedHealth overcharged cancer patients for drugs by over 1,000%
101–110 of 323 posts
Re: UnitedHealth overcharged cancer patients for drugs by over 1,000%
#102Earlier quoted context omitted.
Medicare administrative costs are around 2% of total program spending [1] compared to typically >10%. While what you're saying on the surface may be true from the numbers you are comparing, the fact of the matter is that healthcare costs are becoming more and more expensive during a time when many are experiencing a cost of living crisis. The US gets a bum deal on costs and outcomes and while we can argue on which sp…
I think this is a statistical artifact. Medicare preferentially selects the cohort of customers most likely to demand services from providers (that's the premise of the program). Fixed fees in, floating costs out. If you extended Medicare to 30 year olds, that 2% would, mechanically, soar; the same inputs from customers, but drastically lower service delivery.
The same statistics are similar for Medicaid too but also missing the forest for the trees in that for profit seems to be the main differentiator with the US vs. other parts of the world. There are plenty of models around the world that show this works and it works well.
First it's the government can't do this, then it's the government wouldn't do this because of this reason while ignoring that the US healthcare system is spending more than any other country and missing the mark on outcomes. Every other developed country in the world has figured this out. While not perfect, they're paying less and broadly getting better outcomes.
Re: UnitedHealth overcharged cancer patients for drugs by over 1,000%
#103Nothing is shocking about the insurance industry anymore since they’ve been pulling this kind of thing for years. To me the most shocking thing is the people who defend them. I understand the drive to make money and build huge businesses: what confuses me is that we treat human health the same as things that don’t directly impact the health of people. It seems to me that there are endless opportunities to get insanel…
In many ways, the problem is that we do treat health care different. What other industry will actively reject attempts to ask about prices? What other industry just sends out bills with no contractual basis and exaggerated fraudulent amounts made up after the fact? What other industry do you need to buy "insurance" to even be able to financially communicate with service providers? What other industry does the government provision social services by telling businesses that they must serve some of the most expensive customers for free, and then ensures monopolies so those large losses can be made back from every other customer? What other industry is it impossible to obtain services until a professional declares that you "need" them, at which point it's supposed to be close to free?
These massive profits are because of the so-called "regulation" that has continued to keep market dynamics away, new entrants out, and the industry supremely entitled (from doctors to billing departments). The political debate continues to be sidetracked by doubling down on this mistaken idea of thinking constructive outcomes can simply be declared in law. What needs to happen is to focus on making healthcare a competitive market where patients have agency, while also providing direct financial subsidies when people need them.
Re: UnitedHealth overcharged cancer patients for drugs by over 1,000%
#104Nothing is shocking about the insurance industry anymore since they’ve been pulling this kind of thing for years. To me the most shocking thing is the people who defend them. I understand the drive to make money and build huge businesses: what confuses me is that we treat human health the same as things that don’t directly impact the health of people. It seems to me that there are endless opportunities to get insanel…
It shows that the US never had a world war on the continent. All the other countries treat health care as a matter of national security. The US’s primary concern is mark to market in pension funds.
> shows that the US never had a world war on the continent. All the other countries treat health care as a matter of national security
I forgot about the world-class healthcare the populations of Africa, the Middle East and the war-ravaged parts of Asia enjoy.
I agree there is probably a link between war and healthcare. But the link flows through civic pride and identity, and population-wide familiarity with the horrors of war, more than it does from any sense of military preparedness. (That said, I've never seen an American politician try to sell universal healthcare as a national security imperative. Hmm...)
Re: UnitedHealth overcharged cancer patients for drugs by over 1,000%
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
> While what you're saying on the surface may be true from the numbers you are comparing, the fact of the matter is that healthcare costs are becoming more and more expensive during a time when many are experiencing a cost of living crisis. Which has almost nothing to do with the amount of profits derived from private health insurance - that's only ~1.2% of spending. Maybe it used to be ~0.8% - that delta is not movi…
But has everything to do with the need to take a closer look at the entire system and how we can do things better. I feel like focusing on this part of my comment vs. the bum deal part is disingenuous since non-US countries have figured out how to do it for cheaper with better outcomes without the main focus being the up and to the left drive for profit that our current system mandates.
> But has everything to do with the need to take a closer look at the entire system and how we can do things better.
People do that literally everyday.
If there was a silver bullet, we'd take it.
Re: UnitedHealth overcharged cancer patients for drugs by over 1,000%
#106Earlier quoted context omitted.
I feel people defend them by opposing any other approach to solving this. Politicians in particular say things like "preserving customer choice", which I think just means having the ability to select among all the terrible insurance companies who will treat you poorly.
And shouting about "death panels" in public healthcare systems, as if the private insurance companies don't have people whose whole job is denying as many claims as possible
Yeah. The biggest difference is you can elect the public healthcare death panels, or call your senator or representative to lean on them. There's not a thing you can do about the private insurers' death panels.
Medicare may turn you down for an organ transplant because there are only so many to go around and you're not the best candidate. Private insurance may turn you down because "shareholder value".
Re: UnitedHealth overcharged cancer patients for drugs by over 1,000%
#107Nothing is shocking about the insurance industry anymore since they’ve been pulling this kind of thing for years. To me the most shocking thing is the people who defend them. I understand the drive to make money and build huge businesses: what confuses me is that we treat human health the same as things that don’t directly impact the health of people. It seems to me that there are endless opportunities to get insanel…
It shows that the US never had a world war on the continent. All the other countries treat health care as a matter of national security. The US’s primary concern is mark to market in pension funds.
>It shows that the US never had a world war on the continent. All the other countries treat health care as a matter of national security.
Sounds like https://xkcd.com/1122/
For instance, Canada, which also arguably "never had a world war on the continent" has public healthcare. What gives? What about all the central/south american countries that don't have public healthcare?
Re: UnitedHealth overcharged cancer patients for drugs by over 1,000%
#108The only solution is to regulate. But if we had politicians with spine, they would enact retroactive fines and jail time, and pierce the veil to go after the executives and owners who profited to recoup these unjustifiable costs that can only come due to anti competitive practices.
And let’s not forget, United Healthcare’s subsidiary Change Healthcare held the breach notifications for MONTHS from affected people. They only got sent out recently, and the company not only refuses to compensate victims in any useful way, but won’t even tell them what information of theirs was compromised (hint: medical records). This affected 100 million patients, many of whom have NEVER been customers of Change or United: https://techcrunch.com/2025/01/15/unitedhealth-hid-its-chang...
Re: UnitedHealth overcharged cancer patients for drugs by over 1,000%
#109> CVS Caremark, by comparison, argued the FTC was guilty of “cherry picking” its analysis by focusing on generics, which represent a tiny fraction of client spending over branded specialty drugs in an attempt to mislead.
So it sounds like the report may be a bit misleading - what is being alleged here is that PBMs overpriced over the generics. So it's like if Coca-Cola set the price of their can at $50, and NoName at $0.50. So you be are being "overcharged" at the grocery store when you buy the Coke and not the NoName.
It's not actually clear from the report that the PBMs actually profited from overcharging. Furthermore, if the doctor prescribes a name brand drug, it's not always the prerogative of the PBM to switch the prescription on behalf of the customer.
Re: UnitedHealth overcharged cancer patients for drugs by over 1,000%
#110Nothing is shocking about the insurance industry anymore since they’ve been pulling this kind of thing for years. To me the most shocking thing is the people who defend them. I understand the drive to make money and build huge businesses: what confuses me is that we treat human health the same as things that don’t directly impact the health of people. It seems to me that there are endless opportunities to get insanel…
It shows that the US never had a world war on the continent. All the other countries treat health care as a matter of national security. The US’s primary concern is mark to market in pension funds.
There are plenty of countries with 'socialized' healthcare that had no wars in their territories.