I find that people who become sick or have a baby born into their family with special needs or have a devastating injury and are suddenly cast into the morass of finding a health insurance company that will give them affordable access to the care they need are the most willing to listen to what this new law provides and does not provide. They have to listen to the facts, because their need is now.
I am also a big believer in personal stories, catching media attention of people in great need. If the American people can see one of their countrymen getting let down by a great injustice by this system we have, it touches their compassion. They want to help. They want to know what about our laws failed this person or this family.
MZ: I've found the same trend on a wide range of issues. It's a powerful myth of the elites that "the people" don't know and don't want to know the facts.
MH: Yes, and people are opening their minds up to the complicated facts of this law because they find out that one aspect of the law they counted on was something that the White House compromised on with Big Insurance in the years leading up to 2014. For example, many people still think that insurance companies must use 80 percent of the money we pay in premiums, towards our care. That was true when the bill was signed, but it is no longer true. Big Insurance demanded a pass on this requirement.
The White House tried to then negotiate down to 60 percent of our premiums getting used towards our health care but Big Insurance said that was still too much and they could not do it. So they are not. When someone hears a fact like that, something they counted on, a light goes off, and they want to hear more. That is the best way to counter the propaganda. Facts.
MZ: Based on your many interactions on this issue, do you believe Americans want a single-payer style system?
MH: It is a misconception -- as part of the propaganda -- that most Americans do not want single payer health care for all. The U.S. Government, along with Big Insurance, tried to scare us into believing that it was "socialism" or "communism." They tried to convince us that a taxpayer funded system would mean long waiting lines for those with grave illness.
They tried to use Canada as an example of a bad socialized medical system, but then Canadians began to post YouTube videos of how much they love their public health care system. They let Americans know via social media that they love their system. Canada's Medicare-For-All has had no opposition, on either the right or the left, and they want to keep improving it.
MZ: How is the insurance countering this reality?
MH: We are being led to believe that if more Americans were pushed onto Medicaid, all of the problems with the poor would be solved. But what most people do not want to see or do not know is that doctors do not have to take Medicaid patients, even if they are covered under their state program. It is hard to find a general practitioner who will take a Medicaid patient. It is almost impossible to find a specialist who will take a Medicaid patient in most states.
Doctors just do not get reimbursed enough to treat the poor through this state program. So what Obamacare does is move many more people onto Medicaid who are guaranteed to then be under-insured with their medical needs under-served. If a person on Medicaid needs a treatment or a specialist that does not exist in their state, they cannot go to another state to get that specialized care. They cannot go to another state to get any other type of medical care, except as an un-insured American, because Medicaid is only recognized within the state of residency. None of this would happen with a single payer system.
MZ: In the meantime, do you believe Obamacare can/will help?
MH: Obamacare will help some people and I'm glad for that. All most people have to do is to look out for themselves and their family. I have a friend whose 19-year-old daughter is a cancer survivor. Being able to stay on her parent's excellent health insurance until she's 26 is all my friend needs to care about. And for the poor who finally do get Medicaid, and can finally access some kind of health care, that is meaningful.
My perspective, however, is the big picture -- what is best for the 30 million people Obamacare was never meant to cover, according to the White House, and for the disenfranchised who are struggling to afford premiums, then deductibles, and then find they are under-insured and under served because they cannot afford to pay for medical care.
MZ: How would you describe "single payer" to a skeptic?
MH: A Single Payer system would mean that individual doctors' offices would not have to run business offices. All of the billing would be centralized, as it is with Medicare. Single Payer would be an improved Medicare for all Americans, regardless of one's economic or social background.
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