Medicare, so you think we live in a free country?

By: Hubert Crowell

I have recently gone on Medicare, which by the way I had no choice as my insurance company would have dropped me. I received a Medicare Summary Notice of one of my doctor visits and was shocked. The doctor charged $195.00 for the visit and Medicare cut it to $94.21, of which I was to pay 20%. The doctor took a loss of $100.79!

I guess that I should just sit back and say so what. But lets think about this for a minute. Do you really think that the doctor can give away his services like that, NO! The more Medicare customers he has the higher he will have to raise his rates to non-Medicare customers to cover the loss. Now you know he has added in a little extra overhead.

Next the insurance companies see the increase in the doctor services and guess what, they raise the insurance premiums to cover the added cost with a little extra for the overhead.

Now that the premiums are so high that companies start passing on the extra cost to employees by cutting their benefits.

Some who cannot afford the high insurance premiums, let their insurance drop, but that is OK, because the government tells the hospital that they must accept a person at the emergency entrance even if they do not have insurance. Guess what, the hospital now raises their rates to cover the added cost of providing free service. And of course the insurance rates again will go up.

Why should government be allowed to dictate to anyone what they can or cannot charge, or for that matter that the hospital must accept those who cannot pay. We already have socialized medicine in this country and it goes under the name of Medicare.

Why would anyone want to enter a profession that the government dictates how they run their business? I guess that if there are not enough doctors, then the government will draft people into public service to become doctors. Just maybe the government will take over all businesses and then everyone will work for the government.

I don't know if we can ever turn this thing around, but just maybe we can slow it down a little when it comes election time.