DCA National Advocacy Director Roy Gedat with direct care workers Julie Bell and Vicki and Ray Erickson in DC
Act now! Contact your elected representatives
The health care reform bills being hashed out in both houses of Congress offer the best chance to date to improve health care coverage for millions of Americans — including the approximately one million direct care workers who cannot afford health insurance. There was considerable momentum behind this reform effort earlier this year, but it is now in danger of stalling unless voters speak up to make it happen.
The DCA has added a letter to its Legislative Action Center so you make a difference.
If you want Congress to extend health care coverage to millions of uninsured Americans and offer more support to the direct care workforce, click on the link above and follow a few easy steps to forward our letter to your elected representatives.
You can send the letter as is or change it to add personal information, or to emphasize the issue that is most important to you.
Be careful what you wish for. While I too support healthcare reform so that health insurance is affordable for all and so that there is access to health care for all, this is not the bill to do it.
As the owner of a home care agency I see two options for us if this passes–bankrupcy to pay the 8% payroll penalty tax and still my workers have no insurance (they won’t be covered by the government plan as we are not a small business just a small profit business) or cut direct care worker wages by about $2 per hour to cover the 8% penalty tax (and my workers still have no insurance).
This bill is not the way to go and it scares me that people that have no knowledge of business are deciding that businesses can afford to cover their employees with health insurance and just choose not to. A soluton needs to be found that addresses the needs of workers and business–not just mandating more regulation and cost onto business that ends up costing jobs and wages to the workers.
I see plenty of options to reduce health care costs and reform insurance that won’t hurt anyone:
• Tort reform in mandatory to limit malpractice and liability insurance rates.
• Limit or stop advertising for class action suits for every drug that has side effects—they all do and consumers must make an informed choice about whether it is better to take them and risk a side effect or not to take them and continue with the pain or illness.
• Penalize Medicaid recipients for using the hospital emergency rooms as a primary care physician as most private insurance plans presently do. If it isn’t an emergency, they pay a fee. Presently they pay $1 to do to their primary care physician and nothing to go to the emergency room.
• Require Medicaid waiver recipients to pay a token fee to receive services such as $.10 to $.25 per hour. This would open the waiver programs to more qualified individuals as many present consumers would decrease their services rather than pay .10 per hour for a companion.
• Stop pharmaceutical companies from advertising on television. Let an individual’s doctor make the choice on what medications are best for their patients.
• Streamline billing procedures to stop duplication of services i.e. a single trip to the emergency room can result in bills from 1. The hospital, 2. The physician on duty, 3. The laboratory for blood work, 4. The X-ray equipment, 5. The physician who specializes in reading the X-ray…
• Designate levels of coverage that are standard throughout the industry. This would help consumers know what they have and also limit the time necessary for employers to research the best plan for the best price.
• Insurance pricing should be standard—not based on one individual’s health history or a limited number in an employer group. Rates can be regional so that the risk is spread throughout a larger group protecting the insurance company’s profits and an individual’s right to obtain insurance at a reasonable cost.
• Just as Medicare Part D penalizes individuals qualified to join but who choose not to, individuals should be required to purchase health insurance or be penalized when they don’t and then later on need to purchase a policy or become insured by the state.
• Prohibit insurance companies from denying coverage to anyone but also require rewards for consumer’s who take measures to lower their health risks.
• Education campaign to teach Americans how to eat right, exercise and lower their need for health care.
Again, be careful what you wish for, you will be worse off with the passage of this bill. I suggest we work together to support a plan that would actually help everyone.
Dear Lori:
Thank you for your thoughtful response on this critical matter. While the proposed legislation does not solve all the problems with our health care system, the DCA finds that the health care reform bills passed by the Senate HELP committee and the 3 versions of H.R. 3200 under consideration in the House will result in a health care system that works better for direct care workers and our country as a whole than our current system does.
Some of the outcomes that you anticipate home care agencies being faced with if this bill is passed are not outcomes that are desired by the DCA. We are especially concerned about wage decreases and job losses for direct care workers as well as any reductions in long-term care services that could result from health care reform. That is why we are advocating for additional measures that will help stabilize the direct care workforce to be included in this legislation.
In response to your suggestion that we work together, we are happy to do so. The current reform bill is not a magic bullet that will solve all the problems with our health care system and the DCA is committed to working with all stakeholders to build a better health care system for us all.
Respectfully,
David Ward
Director of Policy and Planning
Direct Care Alliance