THE WELCH COMPANY
440 Davis Court #1602
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415 781 5700
rodwelch@pacbell.net
S U M M A R Y
DIARY: June 4, 2009 03:34 PM Thursday;
Rod Welch
Medical bills cause 60% of US bankruptcy filings.
1...Summary/Objective
....Medical bills underlie 60 percent of U.S. bankrupts: study
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SUBJECTS
Bankruptcies 60% Medical Billings Charges Payments Bill Collection S
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0704 - Summary/Objective
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070501 - Follow up
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0708 - Progress
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070901 - Article in Reuters reports...
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070903 - Kaiser and UCSF have tried to force Millie to pay for medical costs
070904 - which are covered by Millie's insurance policy with Kaiser. On 070830
070905 - UCSF billings presented gross overcharges of 300%, in that the charge
070906 - should be 20% and UCSF charged 56% ref SDS 2 QW8M
070908 - ..
070909 - Basic problem is Kaiser fails to require providers to disclose charges
070910 - in advance of services, contrary to requirements of good management,
070911 - reported on 070829. ref SDS 1 SF52
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070914 - Example of improper medical billings forcing people into bankruptcy,
070915 - reported in article published by AARP, reported on 071018 1641.
070916 - ref SDS 3 CS5P
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070920 - Medical bills underlie 60 percent of U.S. bankrupts: study
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070924 - By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor Maggie Fox, Health And
070925 - Science Editor
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070928 - Thu Jun 4, 2009 11:54 am ET
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070930 - http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090604/ts_nm/us_healthcare_bankruptcy
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070933 - 1. WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Medical bills are behind more than 60
070934 - percent of U.S. personal bankruptcies, U.S. researchers
070935 - reported on Thursday in a report they said demonstrates that
070936 - healthcare reform is on the wrong track.
070938 - ..
070939 - 2. More than 75 percent of these bankrupt families had health
070940 - insurance but still were overwhelmed by their medical debts,
070941 - the team at Harvard Law School, Harvard Medical School and Ohio
070942 - University reported in the American Journal of Medicine.
070944 - ..
070945 - 3. "Unless you're Warren Buffett, your family is just one serious
070946 - illness away from bankruptcy," Harvard's Dr. David
070947 - Himmelstein, an advocate for a single-payer health insurance
070948 - program for the United States, said in a statement.
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070951 - 4. "For middle-class Americans, health insurance offers little
070952 - protection," he added.
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070955 - 5. The United States is embarking on an overhaul of its healthcare
070956 - system, now a patchwork of public programs such as Medicare for
070957 - the elderly and disabled and employer-sponsored health
070958 - insurance that leaves 15 percent of the population with no
070959 - coverage.
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070962 - 6. The researchers and some consumer advocates said the study
070963 - showed the proposals under the most serious consideration are
070964 - unlikely to help many Americans. They are pressing for a
070965 - so-called single payer plan, in which one agency, usually the
070966 - government, coordinates health coverage.
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070969 - 7. "Expanding private insurance and calling it health reform will
070970 - fail to prevent financial catastrophe for hundreds of thousands
070971 - of Americans every year," Dr. Sidney Wolfe of the Health
070972 - Research Group at Public Citizen said in a statement.
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070975 - 8. About 170 million people get health insurance through an
070976 - employer but President Barack Obama says soaring healthcare
070977 - costs hurt the economy and force businesses to drop medical
070978 - insurance for their workers.
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070981 - 9. CANCELED COVERAGE
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070983 - "Nationally, a quarter of firms cancel coverage immediately
070984 - when an employee suffers a disabling illness; another quarter
070985 - do so within a year," the report reads.
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070988 - 10. Obama told Congress on Wednesday he was open to making
070989 - mandatory health insurance part of the overhaul.
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070992 - 11. Neither Congress nor Obama are considering the kind of
070993 - single-payer plan advocated by Public Citizen, Himmelstein and
070994 - his colleague Dr. Steffie Woolhandler.
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070997 - 12. "We need to rethink health reform," Woolhandler said. "Covering
070998 - the uninsured isn't enough.
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071001 - 13. "Only single-payer national health insurance can make
071002 - universal, comprehensive coverage affordable by saving the
071003 - hundreds of billions we now waste on insurance overhead and
071004 - bureaucracy."
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071007 - 14. The researchers studied 2,134 random families who filed for
071008 - bankruptcy between January and April in 2007, before the
071009 - current recession began.
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071012 - 15. They used public bankruptcy court records and surveyed 1,032
071013 - people by telephone.
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071016 - 16. "Using a conservative definition, 62.1 percent of all
071017 - bankruptcies in 2007 were medical; 92 percent of these medical
071018 - debtors had medical debts over $5,000, or 10 percent of pretax
071019 - family income," the researchers wrote.
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071022 - 17. "Most medical debtors were well-educated, owned homes and had
071023 - middle-class occupations."
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071026 - 18. The researchers, funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation,
071027 - said the share of bankruptcies that could be blamed on medical
071028 - problems rose by 50 percent from 2001 to 2007.
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071031 - 19. Patients with multiple sclerosis paid a mean of $34,167 out of
071032 - pocket in 2007, diabetics paid $26,971, and those with injuries
071033 - paid $25,096, the researchers found.
071034 -
071035 - 20. (Editing by Bill Trott and Jackie Frank)
071036 - Copyright c 2009 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved.
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