It's been clear to anyone paying attention that the October "rollout" of Obamacare has been a turbulent, confusing disaster. Sloppy IT systems and technological failures combined to cripple Obamacare's sign-up systems. Security flaws put Americans at risk for identity theft.
In an almost comical understatement, President Obama summarized these massive failures as "a few glitches." I think that Luke Chung, IT expert and president of database solutions firm FMS, explained the situation much more accurately:
"What should clearly be an enterprise quality, highly scalable software application felt like it wouldn't pass a basic code review. It appears the people who built the site don't know what they're doing, never used it and didn't test it."
Chung went on to call it a "technological disaster."
Think about what this ineptitude means in the bigger debate about Obamacare. The administration spent 3½ years and $698 million of taxpayers' money to develop this software. They've known since earlier this year that the system wasn't ready to support the rollout of the exchanges. Yet they proceeded anyway, apparently unconcerned about their faulty software costing Americans millions of hours of frustration and lost productivity.
These same bureaucrats continue to assume more and more control of our medical care. What does their incompetence say about how they will handle making life-or-death medical care decisions?
Like a parasite taking over its host, Obamacare will commandeer almost 20% of our economy, crowding out private options. With 2014 fast approaching, what should we expect in its next phase?
Here's my list Top Ten list for 2014:
1. The expansion of Medicaid, with increased cost burden for taxpayers.
Medicaid is a combined state-federal program initially designed to help the neediest among us. But it has burgeoned to cover medical costs for about one in every five people. Today, Medicaid pays for two of every five babies born in the United States, and three of every five people in long-term care facilities in the US.
Obamacare will add another 20 million new Medicaid dependents. According to the Kasier Family Foundation, that Medicaid expansion will add an average of 13% to state budgets in costs for 2014 alone.
Even though Medicaid was designed to help the poor, studies have consistently shown that Medicaid recipients receive worse medical care than people without any health insurance at all! Medicaid patients have longer waits to see a doctor, fewer specialists to choose from, and poorer medical outcomes overall. A particularly morbid piece of evidence is that on average, Medicaid patients die sooner after surgery than people who have no medical insurance.
Essentially, Obamacare is forcing 20 million more Americans into second-class medical care with Medicaid.
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I disagree with a portion of this article.
ReplyDeleteHaving worked in healthcare, in the insurance and billing realm, here in Maryland, I disagree that Medicaid patients are not cared for properly.
I was surprised and disgusted at everything Medicaid paid for.
It seemed like EVERYONE was on Medicaid, and then there were a few cases of patients who should have qualified and did not for what ever reason.
Most Medicaid patients had the mentality of using the system for what they could get out of it because they knew they could and were "entitled" to.
On the rare occasion, that something was not covered, patients would have a tirade.
Here in Maryland there seems to be a very liberal attitude towards doling out what ever a patient wants as far as Medicaid goes.