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I don't doubt that. But MCare premiums are low enough that many can afford
Medigap insurance, which spreads the cost of care between the Feds and
private insurers without overhauls, vouchers or any need to touch the base
program. I keep seeing ads for a dental chain in the DC area that says,
specifically "New Medicaid Patients Welcome" - I don't know what their scam
is, but I know that some doctors MUST be taking MCare/Caid patients because
the current level of payouts (no time to look it up) is huge. They may pay
less, put they certainly pay a lot of doctors.

As a possible harbinger of what is in store, a survey of ER docs
released in the last week 97% say that they are seeing MCaid patients in
their baliwick for general care because no physician would accept them.


I moved not long ago, so had to line up a new family doc, my least
favorite task in life. I'm a retired nurse and have never had a doc who
didn't do something goofy to me or my kids, so I'm already on the
defensive. I found a family doc who is the son of a nurse I once worked
with, figuring that if SHE brought him up he knows how to do the right
stuff ) In my inquiries, I found that he was the only doc in his
group of four taking new Medicare patients, and only if they have
supplemental insurance! Holy cow! I knew it was getting tough for
docs, but now what....with the boomers coming on and no family docs to
take them, will we go back to physicians who actually enter the
profession to serve, set up an office in their home, and actually know
their patients? I could go for that, along with only generic meds, no
transplants, no heroics and leaving my life choices up to ME.

I often wonder what "healthcare" would cost without the competitive
advertising, walnut/marble lobbies and waiting rooms, two drugstores on
every corner, and someone actually monitoring what is wasted on "home
health care". Seems like the ethics are disappearing from medicine,
nursing and life in general, in favor of making a buck any way one can.