Secretary of Health and Human Services JudyAnn Bigby is the leading "healthcare reform" propagandist in Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick's administration. She is probably single handedly responsible for the movement to (return to 1980s-era) HMOs (now called accountable care organizations or ACOs) and capitation (now called global payment systems or GPSs) in Massachusetts on a mandated basis. I personally have no problem with the HMO/capitation (ACO/GPS) idea; I've been on it for 30 years. I just object to it being mandated. Mandates come from goo-goos who are interested in controlling people's lives, because they believe government (them) knows better than you and I.
But I have a big problem with the Bigby propaganda blitz in favor of ACO/GPS. Bigby said in 2008 that hundreds of thousands of people die in the United States every year because of lack of healthcare insurance. That's typical of the crazy claims being blasted at Massachusetts residents by the state government, most of it with Bigby's name on it or associated with it. I'm not sure what she meant in the linked-to speech by "hundreds of thousands per year." Left-wing think tanks like the Urban Institute have estimated under 200,000 out of more than 20,000,000 deaths could be attributed to lack of insurance over the 10 years from 2000 to 2009.
Statistically that's probably high, because the Urban Institute methodology doesn't seem to correct for accidental or homicidal death and seems to make the odd assumption that all deaths are amenable. (See this recent blog post on August 2010 DPH report about amenable death rates.)
But the real problem is that Bigby's claims are also illogical. In reality, no one died because of lack of insurance. Most people died over the age of 65 of course and they have health insurance, Medicare. Most of the remainder died because of bad luck or bad genes. Some died because they won't go to the doctors regularly or until they are really sick. That's true of both the insured and uninsured. Health and human services groups like Bigby's could probably do a better job of outreach and free screenings, etc. But individuals themselves also have to take more personal responsibility (but goo goos don't want that) to get screenings and checkups.
Now Bigby is out with another ridiculous and illogical blog post. She says: "The problem with health care in Massachusetts: The way we pay for it." Maybe we should pay for our groceries with credit cards instead of debit cards. Maybe my bank would let me mow the lawn in return for paying cash for my mortgage. Now that I think of it, I didn't take the insurance contract from my oil dealer this winter that would have pegged my price at $2.85 a gallon. Is it because I don't have that insurance that oil prices are now up to $3.25 a gallon?
Chief Deval Patrick goo goo Bigby is nuts. I would argue that there is nothing wrong with healthcare in Massachusetts other than -- like everything else in Massachusetts -- it's expensive. Our healthcare certainly has nothing to do with how we pay for it.
-- Dennis Byron