ObamaCare Surprise: Medicare Death Panels Kick in January 1st…
Even though the “end-of-life” care language was dropped from ObamaCare before it passed because of the outcry, Obama reinserted it through the regulation-writing process without telling anybody. This guy is as shady as it gets…
(NY Times)- When a proposal to encourage end-of-life planning touched off a political storm over “death panels,” Democrats dropped it from legislation to overhaul the health care system. But the Obama administration will achieve the same goal by regulation, starting Jan. 1.
Under the new policy, outlined in a Medicare regulation, the government will pay doctors who advise patients on options for end-of-life care, which may include advance directives to forgo aggressive life-sustaining treatment.
Congressional supporters of the new policy, though pleased, have kept quiet. They fear provoking another furor like the one in 2009 when Republicans seized on the idea of end-of-life counseling to argue that the Democrats’ bill would allow the government to cut off care for the critically ill.
While the new law does not mention advance care planning, the Obama administration has been able to achieve its policy goal through the regulation-writing process, a strategy that could become more prevalent in the next two years as the president deals with a strengthened Republican opposition in Congress.
Posted by ZIP on Saturday, December 25, 2010, at 11:28 pm | 
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SURPRISE!
not.
But Thebluesite said this was all a lie how could he be the liar?
/Sarc
Mr. Boomer, we’ve just staffed your case; and it was decided that it’s economically unfeasible to try and keep you alive any longer. Have a nice day.
Any of you belong to the AARP? The record shows, they supported and still support obastardcare socialized medecine.
Roll up your sleeve, this won’t hurt a bit!
Bartholomew Roberts
When Newt and the RINOs took control in 1994, they couldn’t even kill off PBS. Yet look what these criminals in the democRAT party have been able to ram through in just 2 short years.
I am truly disgusted.
This death of this country is being accomplished slowly by a thousand little cuts.
can’t wait for the recordings of people going to council with these doctors to hit the net. Unless O rushes the Net Neutering through.
these sleazeballs are nothing but dictators that have got to be dealt with severely.
So.. When can we expect apologies from the full-of-shit media to Sarah Palin for pointing this out when it was going on? Never, I presume.
Starve the Beast.
We must/
It’s time to cull the herd and the herd is us.
The House had better get very busy defunding this obamacare crap…
Just settled down for a few minutes before i turn out the lights and I mean
in not the same way this POS has in mind……
Just how much more will the people take before we literally turn these
bastards out to pasture for good…..
Liberals are a plague on America……
Wouldn’t expect anything less from this asshat. A more lothesome human, does not exist in the USA.
From now on Federal HealthCare should be called “Obamacide”
Of course, there was one problem with that assertion: Liberals have no qualms about lying to the American people. They do it all the time.
That’s how they deal with the fact that many of their views are unpopular: They just lie about what they want to do. It’s such a common occurrence that liberals often just assume liberal politicians who say things that differ from the liberal line are lying.
That’s how it is with death panels. When a bill with death panels in it was in front of the American people, liberals claimed to be against death panels. But isn’t it funny that since Obamacare became law, stories about liberals who support death panels keep dribbling out?
See, that’s how it works. They lie to get you to support their position, then they start talking about it a little bit, and then eventually, liberals start talking about it en masse like everyone knew what they were getting into right from the start.
Hound this monster and his fiendish czars out of office NOW. Two years is too long to wait.
Oh yeah, consultation with a doctor about future procedures is the same as a death panel. Idiots.
Has anyone mentioned the parallels of obamacare end of life counseling/death panels to kool-aid induced suicide by the leftist People’s Temple cult? Obama is a communist and to a communist life has NO meaning. Obama will push abortion and death panels at any cost. I would recommend everyone find a doctor who has a religious background and not a secularist doctor who would push you to end your life for the greater good of the state.
Idiots
Projecting there rupaula?
and like not having an abortion is the same as condoning a christofascist theocracy……….Lefty asswipe
@ Rupaula:
In a way, you are correct, there won’t be any “death panels”.
Hospitals now have a government medical database in place to determine treatments available to patients. Doctors that don’t follow the treatments determined by the database risk losing their license and potential imprisonment. Now doctors are encouraged to offer end of life options to patients, to pad their salaries.
It doesn’t take a wild imagination to realize that this is a slippery slope that’s only a simple database update away from a nightmare. If the patient agrees to the EOL option, how much are the bureaucrats really going to care about extending that patient’s life another 6-12+ months? That’s money that could be better spent on raises for Federal union workers, welfare programs, and other prime voting blocks. Then there’s the whole global warming/overpopulation issue, an idea that is especially popular among the so-called intellectual class, ie. bureaucrats, doctors, nurses, etc. Less people == good, in their bizarre world.
Through willing acquiescence or coercion, we’re at a point where it’s no longer a safe assumption that those in decision-making positions want to see us get the treatment that will give us those extra weeks/months/years to spend with our families. Hospitals and staff that perform “efficiently” will be rewarded, inefficient ones will be restaffed or shuttered, and as with the TSA and other agencies today, any medical personnel who tries to make waves will face harsh consequences from unaccountable bullies and thugs.
Not too long ago the government “suggested” that mothers with difficult births receive medication for postpartum depression. That has turned into an open door for CPS to tear newborns away from their parents, via the “best intentions” of medical staff and overzealous government workers. Imagine how much fun it’ll be when they extend that level of “best intentions” to the the health care options available for the rest of us.
Actually, you won’t need to imagine. It happens in a week. No death panels, just an response from a computer that determines your fate, enforced by a physician who’s at risk of losing their livelihood if they don’t comply.
The scary part of this is the realization that in most of these “death panel” situations, this will all happen quietly, without any fanfare, without you or your family knowing that the decision to withhold treatment has even been made. It’s not in your doctor’s best interest to announce the computer’s decisions, and for most people, the EOL counseling will happen early on (cancer, heart, dialysis patients), potentially reducing your lifespan throughout your illness, even when options might have kept you alive for a fairly long time. Your EOL decision will become a self-fulfilling prophesy.
This is all stuff that seemed positively insane just a decade ago, yet is very real today.
the next time there is a governor’s meeting with this asshole in the WH, why doesn’t one of them directly confront him with this. Nikki Haley somewhat did, but that was done with kid gloves….. I mean an open confrontation…. hey idiot, do you want govt approval of lack of medicine or not? then YOU are responsible for the outcomes for the lives of these Americans! Directly question him, and confront him.
Foot in the door my fellow patriots,a mere foot in the door.
From the way he controls the lives of citizens, obama must really believe he is the Messiah.
I personally think he is the anti-christ!
The next POTUS has to do everything through regulation to do undo the evil Obama and Cass Sunstein’s regulations.
It seems so easy why haven’t other presidents used regulations to pass their agendas?
Because none of them, even Jimmy Carter, wanted to take America down.
We need to take Obama down!
Thus the reason for the States to convene a Constitutional Convention to put real life restraints on Federal power which has grown to simply crush the Republic form of government. If you sit back and think about what it takes to get just one regulation “repealed”. If that’s not enough, then think about rooting out all the left wing activists populating these agencies create. If that’s not enough, consider how hard it is go get 61 votes in the Senate. If that’s not enough, think about how hard it is to override a veto. And, if that’s not enough, think about SCOTUS saying the CO2 you exhale is a pollutant to be regulated by themselves (through the Federal agencies). It’s a stacked deck.
We must have the States put the public back into Republic.
Obamas goal is to control our lives an he will do anything to achieve this goal even if it means becoming president for life
Yeah. A short life.
This scares the shit out of me.. what happens to my Mother who has been sick as a dog for the past 2 months ? She is back in the Hospital right now. Are they going to turn her out as of Jan first with the Sorry we cant do anything more for you excuse?
What about my Son .. If there is a chance to help cure Autism will he be able to get it or will the Doctors just turn jim away too?
You would think that if Republicans wanted to totally mischaracterize a health care provision and demagogue it like nobody’s business, they would at least pick something that the vast majority of them hadn’t already voted for just a few years earlier. Because that’s not just shameless, it’s stupid.
Yes, that’s right. Remember the 2003 Medicare prescription drug bill, the one that passed with the votes of 204 GOP House members and 42 GOP Senators? Anyone want to guess what it provided funding for? Did you say counseling for end-of-life issues and care? Ding ding ding!!
http://www.senate.iowa.gov/democrats/time-grassley-voted-for-end-of-life-care-legislation-in-2003/
We already have end of life counseling and care in the form of Hospice.
This is how it worked when my father was told he was dying and treatment was no longer effective.
If you are terminally ill, your doctor can make a referral to Hospice. Medicare will pay for Hospice, or at least they did when my father way dying. What Medicare did not pay for, Hospice wrote off.
When I worked for a LARGE insurance company, every plan paid for Hospice, either at home or at a facility.
Hospice is a wonderful organization. After the care they provided to my father and our family, they get every donation dollar I can spare. My father wanted to die at home, and Hospice provided his medications, equipment, and visiting nursing care. After my father passed away, they offered my mother grief counseling for 1 year after his death.
I am suspicious that they want to fix something that is not really broken. What kind of information will be given to the patients? Will the counseling provided include the costs of treatment vs. success of such treatment? Will Grandma then think twice about ending treatment that may save her life because she may leave bills for her family? The referral to Hospice was done during an office visit, and was paid for by Medicare. Now the doctor can charge an extra fee for a referral and charge it up to counseling? The language in this thing is incomprehensible…it refers to older bills which have to be cross-referenced to decode exactly how far this end of life provision goes. Is counseling going to be mandatory or optional?
Right now, if you do not have a living will and you are unable to make decisions regarding your care, your next-of-kin is responsible for deciding how far your doctor will go to save or preserve your life. What does this legislation have to say about that? Who will end up making the decisions regarding your life and care if you are unable to and cost is the main factor? I mean, after all, they took the end of life counseling out of the bill, and are now secretly putting it back in now that it is passed and is law. What are the bureaucrats going to change about this in the future? This is cut and paste government at work here.
One more thing…if its so wonderful, why is putting it back in the bill being kept such a secret? If there is nothing to hide, why worry about so-called fear mongers?
A little off topic here but,
I’ve noticed that the Caduceus is used for the Medical Industry. Actually, the Caduceus was used to represent commerce, not Medicine. Asclepius’s rod is the symbol for medicine. The caduceus was mistakenly adopted by the U.S. Army for their medical units, it was an error back then and is still in error now.
Just pointing out small things that tend to mean hidden messages. Because, afterall, isn’t ObamaCare more about MONEY than it is about MEDICINE?
No death panels will apply to our elite rulers. When Rose Kennedy was dying at 104 yrs. old no one suggested she should be let go. Everything was done to try to prolong her life.
I’m stepping out of my element to leave a comment here but someone needs to start waving a flag of reason.
Advance directives are so much a part of good medical care these days that they are included in the admission packets of many hospitals. My post retirement work for the last seven years has been among seniors in a variety of circumstances. Whether in independent living arrangements, assisted living, CCRT, or long-term care environments the need and importance of advance directives is as recognized as the need for durable medical equipment, handicapped access and proper nutrition.
I have no illusions that anything I leave in a comments thread will change anyone’s already made up mind, but I urge readers to do a little homework of your own. Yellow pages, local senior centers, hospitals, community colleges, CCRT or assisted living facilities are all good places to start. Consult with directors, chaplains, teachers, and any other resource people you wish and ask them about advance directives. How are they different from DNRs? What is the meaning of “living will” and what are your state’s laws regarding end-of-life issues (and yes, they are regulated by the states, not the federal government). Talk with a few people from various hospice providers, a growing enterprise which has been a part of Medicare benefits for years.
I have watched many families in denial cause dying relatives weeks and months of unnecessary protracted suffering when palliative care was available. Does anyone know, for example, that some people get discharged from hospice because they improve to the point that they no longer can be considered “terminal”? And who has given thought to questions like “If you have a terminal condition and are unable to communicate your wishes, do you have a designated individual with power of attorney for medical care who can make medical decisions on your in accordance with your wishes?” What if that person has died or is no longer available… is there a backup? What if you’re in another state (or another country) and have a life-threatening medical problem? What assurance do you have that you will never lose consciousness or be among the growing number of people with senile dementia or Alzheimers?
Don’t want to ruin you day before the New Year starts, but someone needs to get your attention. Thanks for reading. I won’t trouble you further.
(And before I forget… this inflammatory regulation simply insures that if and when a physician takes valuable professional time to answer questions asked by a patient or family member about the fine points of a final directive, he or she will be paid for their time instead of having to work pro bono. Seems reasonable to me.)
Obama and his congressional and union allies have lectured us that socialized medicine is the cure for the nation’s ills, but I have a question.
If socialized medicine, obamacare, is so great for the nation, why permit anyone to be exempted from it?
It turns out that as of the end of November, Obama’s Health and Human Services secretary has issued over 200 waivers to major labor unions such as the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Union and Transport Workers Union of America and major companies such as McDonald’s and Darden Restaurants, which operates Red Lobster and Olive Garden.
Keep in mind that the power to grant waivers is also the power not to grant waivers.
Such power can be used to reward administration friends and punish administration critics by saddling them with millions of dollars of health care costs.
Further round up; great Zerocare illustration (from Rush) using Gollum:
http://www.frugal-cafe.com/public_html/frugal-blog/frugal-cafe-blogzone/2010/12/26/health-care-death-panels-resurrected-by-team-obama-hey-liberals-sarah-palin-was-right/
Sebelius will likely tap Dr. Jack Kevorkian to head a new department in HHS to oversee this initiative.
Much ado about nothing.
It already exists and is not a bad thing.
Right wing dickheads: the PATIENT and his/her FAMILY are in charge of this process. THEY DECIDE what kind of advance directive to put in place. This is a good thing, giving people some measure of control over what will happen to them if (when) they get too sick and debilitated to be able to speak for themselves.
All this regulation does is make the service available to people. They can have the conversation or not, as they wish. But they don’t have to pay for it – it can just happen as a normal part of the yearly FREE wellness visit.
Ya’ll are a bunch of idiots, I swear.