Carly Fiorina on Opposing Obamacare as a Cancer Survivor
Rising premiums aren’t helping cancer patients.
Carly Fiorina appeared on CNN this week with Jake Tapper who asked her how she could oppose Obamacare as a cancer survivor. Tapper respectfully pointed out that she’s a survivor of breast cancer and asked about the provision which requires coverage of pre-existing conditions.
Fiorina responded by saying that while she supports coverage for people with pre-existing conditions, Obamacare isn’t helping many of those people.
Transcript via Frank Camp of the IJ Review:
Fiorina: “I absolutely endorse that goal–I did at the time. But guess what? None of that has worked. Demonstrably, if you look at the results of Obamacare… health insurance premiums are up almost 40% now.
That isn’t helping anyone with cancer, I can assure you that–”
Tapper: “But the expansion of the pool allows the insurance companies to pay for the people with pre-existing conditions.”
Fiorina: “…Who helped write Obamacare? The health insurance companies, and the drug companies. And guess what’s happening? Those companies are consolidating. That’s called crony capitalism.”
Watch the full exchange below:
Fiorina’s point about rising premiums is correct.
Just yesterday, this report appeared in USA Today:
Families brace for steep hikes
Health insurers across the country are seeking premium increases of 20% to 40% or more.
American families, promised they would save $2,500 a year on health insurance premiums, are bracing themselves to see just how much their costs will increase again next year.
Health insurers across the country are seeking premium increases of 20% to 40% or more. Some carriers requested only modest increases, largely because they priced premiums in line with expected medical expenses in the first year. But many others found enrollees are sicker and more costly than anticipated.
And of course, there’s that whole “keep your doctor” thing.
We all know how that worked out.
Featured image via YouTube.
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Comments
When Roberts discovered that ObamaCare is a tax, it was obvious it was here to stay. The government isn’t going to give back power over the masses. Healthcare is the industrial military complex of the new millenium. Just like the lucky ones who invested in the giant military contractors in the 50s and 60s, buying the right medical company stock right now will set you or your kids up nicely in 30 or 40 years.
You’re right, Government will NEVER give back power. But we can TAKE it back. Support Article V in your state.
Or don’t worry about picking and buy one of the soaring health care index funds.
We have Ted Cruz consistently saying he will get rid of obamacare. My guess is that he is the only candidate who would make a serious attempt to do so, and he could succeed in major part if he has the right congress.
On the other hand, the almost uniform current embracing of required coverage for “pre-existing conditions” makes drafting a complete alternative to obamacare difficult, which may prove your point. Required coverage for “pre-existing conditions” is not compatible with the free market and personal responsibility.
34 states already had special set-aside “high risk pools” prior to the creation of Obamacare. It would have been easier to put high-risk pools into place in the 15 states that didn’t already have them than to nuke the whole system like they did.
That is exactly right. And high risk pools should not be designed to permit unlimited coverage for pre-existing conditions. Mandating such coverage simply lets sick people avoid paying for insurance, until they become very sick. That system is not really insurance at all.
Not quite sure what you mean by that. Of the people I know who were covered under Florida’s high-risk pool because they were unable to get insurance elsewhere due to “pre-existing conditions”, one was born with congenital heart defects; one was a survivor of childhood cancer; and one had hemophilia. Private health insurance companies wouldn’t touch them, yet they all earned too much to qualify for Medicare/Medicaid. Would you have someone who survived leukemia as a child or who was born with a dodgy heart disqualified from ever being allowed to buy health insurance, for the rest of their lives?
Thank you for including the video.
Prior to Obamacare, at least 34 states already had high-risk pools for people with pre-existing conditions who needed private health insurance and couldn’t get it elsewhere.
In Florida, you just had to provide evidence that you’d been turned down by three health insurance companies, and you could buy in. So there was a little bit of red tape there, but once you were in it worked pretty well.
Obamacare killed the state-based high-risk pools. Now we don’t need them, because “everyone” can get insurance from a private carrier, but monthly premiums have soared and you’re forced to buy coverage for conditions you may not have wanted to before (pregnancy, drug rehab, etc).
It would have been far more sensible (and cost effective) to simply expand the concept of high-risk pools to all 50 states, rather than to so comprehensively destroy the health insurance system as we knew it.
“In 2007, 34 states had individual high-risk pools providing health insurance coverage to 201,047 people at a total cost of $1.8 billion. High-risk pools have extended coverage to those with preexisting health conditions who do not have access to affordable employer-sponsored insurance, do not qualify for public assistance, and have not been able to secure affordable coverage in the individual market because of their health status. Plan eligibility requires individuals to demonstrate that they either have been denied coverage in the private market or were offered coverage with an excessively high premium.”
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3020190/
You should get more likes. That was very informative. I think Fiorina could have answered better with this info.
She could have, but this is the wrong venue for an answer this information-heavy. Tapper would have cut her off, and not wrongly so: he and CNN have a schedule to keep.
It’d work better in a campaign speech, where she’d get 20-30 minutes uninterrupted to cover whatever she wants. Or a debate, where she can work it into a 2-minute uninterrupted answer.
The key word is “uninterrupted”. That just doesn’t happen on talk shows and interview sessions.
It wouldn’t have actually taken up a lot of air-time:
Tapper: “But the expansion of the pool allows the insurance companies to pay for the people with pre-existing conditions.”
Fiorina: “Well, Jake, well before Obamacare, 34 states including California already had high-risk pools for people with pre-existing conditions who didn’t qualify for health insurance policies on the open market. It would have been less disruptive to the vast majority of Americans who were happy with their health insurance and didn’t need these kinds of specialized policies to simply expand high-risk pools to the remaining 15 states.”
Back when the Deemocrats were lying about ObamaDoggle…excuse me…PRIOR to its passage, I did a search for “pre-existing condition insurance”. What I found was a very lively niche market with very competitive features, including price.
Wanna bet if ObamaDoggle passed away tomorrow we’d see that condition again before the end of 12 months?
Gawd I love the way she takes these insipid progressive questions (eg. “What does that have to do with you opposing paid maternity leave?”) and just uses them as a cudgel to smash the ignorant prog drones over the head and make them out to be the morons that they are. “I don’t opposed paid maternity leave, you idiot, I oppose the federal government MANDATING paid maternity leave. Do you understand the difference you imbecile?”
I thought she handled herself well with Tapper. Especially the bit right at the end:
There’s a difference. I’m glad she sees it, and I’m glad she’s willing to push the issue and help others understand that difference.
There are a lot of low-information voters out there who already believe that if the government doesn’t force your employer to buy your birth control pills, that’s the same as banning birth control. So I can see a lot of people falling for the “If you don’t support mandatory paid maternity leave, that’s the same as wanting to ban maternity leave“ trope. I hope that that reply of hers gets some traction.
Yep, and they’ll sit there and argue with you about it while they sip on their Venti caramel-mocha latte with two pumps.