California: due to Obamacare, we will FORCE doctors to take new patients - Granite Grok

California: due to Obamacare, we will FORCE doctors to take new patients

Rather than mere head count, officials say they are scrutinizing what capacity physicians have to accept new patients… “Does the doctor have room for one more patient or 40 patients? It’s about available seats,” Lee said. “We want to make sure every network has enough doctors.”

Translation: if The State believes that certain doctors are “slacking off” (betcha they accuse them of wanting to make the Government look bad, or be unpatriotic, or wanting to hurt other patients, or some such nonsense), I bet that the docs are gonna get a visit (“Er, nice practice youse got here – pity if something were to happen to it”).

What if the doctor doesn’t WANT to take more patients – that they happy with their income the way it is and wish to not work harder but rather enjoy life?  Or will this be the Progressive way: we must take from others (in this case, the doctors’ time) to give to others – the epitome of Tyranny?  And what would future docs think of this?  I was waiting for this to happen – I knew that just legislating that 50 million more people by government fiat was going to be a disaster.  What we are seeing here in NH with Anthem’s “narrow network” was just the first BIG disclosure that the Federal Nationalization of Healthcare (aka, Obamacare) was going to be in trouble.  While here in NH, those that believe that Citizens should be able to choose their docs have been trying to slow this down, CA has gone whole hog in getting Obamacare implemented (emphasis mine, reformatted)…

…and running into the EXACT same problem – Kiss your Doc goodby because they may not be in that “skinny network’!

Sidenote: Glad to see that NH CongressCritter Annie Kuster is just dandy with this notion, dontcha know!

 On yesterday’s Closeup, Kuster was asked about Obamaare and Anthem (the “Obamacare Monopoly”) now restricting access.  She QUICKLY breezed over the serious question by McElveen about the  individual market and was dismissively of the plight of some of our citizens: “Because we are a smaller state”…..and then switches it around that this will be GREAT for Bigger states! Well, small solace for us, but CA is not exactly tiny…she continues:

 We’re talking about individuals that had no access to healthcare insurance before and frankly, I think they would take what we call the skinny network over no doctor at all and getting health insurance

So, is this a case of be thankful for the breadcrumbs we in the federal Government has caused to fall off the table?   Even if they have to travel hundreds of miles to get it – after all, it’s “only time”. Sorry, but that’s the mindset of a Socialist in a socialist system.  Good to know, Annie, that other’s people valuable time is of no consequence to you.  Elitism at its finest.  Ruling, not governing.

Continuing on with the CA healthcare rationing to be:

The doctor can’t see you now.

Consumers may hear that a lot more often after getting health insurance under President Obama’s Affordable Care Act.  To hold down premiums, major insurers in California have sharply limited the number of doctors and hospitals available to patients in the state’s new health insurance market opening Oct. 1.

These diminished medical networks are fueling growing concerns that many patients will still struggle to get care despite the nation’s biggest healthcare expansion in half a century.  Consumers could see long wait times, a scarcity of specialists and loss of a longtime doctor.  “These narrow networks won’t work because they cut off access for patients,” said Dr. Richard Baker, executive director of the Urban Health Institute at Charles Drew University of Medicine and Science in Los Angeles. “We don’t want this to become a roadblock.”

But remember!  NH CongressCritters Annie Kuster says this is fine, and our other CongressNitWit Jeanne Shaheen must jumping up and down in glee, as she’s been restricting healthcare provisioning her entire career!

…To see the challenges awaiting some consumers, consider Woodland Hills-based insurer Health Net Inc. Across Southern California the company has the lowest rates, with monthly premiums as much as $100 cheaper than the closest competitor in some cases. That will make it a popular choice among some of the 1.4 million Californians expected to purchase coverage in the state exchange next year.  But Health Net also has the fewest doctors, less than half what some other companies are offering in Southern California, according to a Times analysis of insurance data.  In Los Angeles County, for instance, Health Net customers in the state exchange would be limited to 2,316 primary-care doctors and specialists. That’s less than a third of the doctors Health Net offers to workers on employer plans. In San Diego, there are only 204 primary-care doctors to serve Health Net patients.

San Diego County has about 3.1 million people in it.  That’s over 15,000 people for each doctor – how’s that gonna work out?

…In response, California officials have been pressing Health Net and other insurers to add more doctors since companies filed their initial rosters in May. The state exchange, Covered California, says it will monitor enrollment closely once it begins next month and it’s prepared to step in if problems arise.

I don’t throw the word “Facism” around like the Left does – it actually has a meaning and a definition – an economic one which we’ve been marching closer to over the last few decades.  However, Obamacare is gonna be a Shuttle ride to it – and we all know how the Shuttle ended up.

At what point is enough, enough?  Are you getting convinced that “The Bigger the Government, the smaller the citizen” is really meaningful now?

Yeah, this will work out really well:

“Our interest is in assuring everyone enrolled in a plan has ready access to the clinicians they need,” said Peter Lee, executive director of Covered California. “That means if a plan can’t serve patients, we’ll close it down from taking new enrollment. That is in some ways the nuclear option.”  Rather than mere head count, officials say they are scrutinizing what capacity physicians have to accept new patients. And to assist consumers, California will enable people to search for specific doctors online during enrollment to determine what, if any, health plans they will be part of in Covered California.

So, if everyone that Government has thrown into this new ill conceived Socialist program can’t get access, read the above again.  If they close a program, what happens to everyone else?  And like the Germans did recently when Obama returned to Berlin and accused him over the NSA spying with Stasi 2.0, is California going to have its own Stasi to snoop on doctors “Ve vill MAKE you see morrre peeps!” for Stasi 2.5?

And once again, we revisit Obama’s promise:

“Health Net will get a lot of business with those rates,” said Glen Futterman, a health insurance broker in Woodland Hills. “But no one mentions you might not be able to see your doctor.”

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