Thousands Of Doctors Are Walking Away From Obamacare

BY TONY PERKINS

 December 10, 2013 (FRC) – The weather may be chilly, but it’s nothing compared to people’s reactions to ObamaCare. This month, the only thing falling faster than the temperature is the number of the new law’s supporters. Making matters worse, the policy’s biggest defectors seem to be the ones most crucial to it: the medical community.

Thousands of doctors are walking away from the exchange in a large-scale mutiny over the government’s reimbursement rates. In California, where 70% of the 104,000 physicians are refusing to participate in ObamaCare, practices stand to lose millions of dollars under the state’s bargain basement insurance rates. The Washington Examiner‘s Richard Pollack broke it down this way. “In other states, doctors receive between $500 to $700 to perform a tonsillectomy. In California [under the state exchange], they get $160.”

If you’re wondering what’s worse than a dysfunctional website, try a health care exchange without doctors! Or hospitals. With the government trying to drive down coverage costs, insurance companies have no choice but to exclude some of the more expensive facilities from their plans — including some of the top-ranked hospitals and cancer centers. In Ohio, for example, only one policy on the exchange gives patients access to the Cleveland Clinic. Other facilities are opting out for the same reasons doctors are — lower reimbursement rates.

The new revelations put the White House back on familiar ground: the defensive. “The President never said you were going to have unlimited choice of any doctor in the country you want to go to,”said former White House aide Ezekiel Emanuel and one of the architects of ObamaCare. In the latest twist on the President’s infamous promise, Emanuel insisted, “If you want to pay more for an insurance company that covers your doctor, you can do that.”

But after this week’s news on prescription drugs, who knows if patients will be able to afford it? According to health analysts, Americans will only be able to keep their medicine — if they have the money to pay for it. “Health plans are cheapening their drug formularies — just like they cheapened their networks of doctors,” explained policy expert Scott Gottlieb. “That’s how they’re paying for the benefits that President Obama promised — [like] leveling of premiums between older (and typically costlier) beneficiaries, and younger consumers.” For now, if a drug doesn’t appear on these new “formulary lists,” patients could be paying for it entirely out of pocket.

On the bright side, there’s still free birth control, right? Wrong. Congresswoman Renee Ellmers (R-N.C.) blew that myth to bits in an interview about the Left’s insulting outreach to women. “When they’re talking about free preventive care for women, I’m having a hard time understanding where the ‘free’ part is,” Ellmers told reporters. “What Democrats fail to mention is now the cost of insurance is… many times quadrupling, in cost, and deductibles are going up by thousands of dollars.” After all, men aren’t the only ones losing their health insurance and watching their premiums skyrocket. “[Democrats’] mindset is that the only issues women care about have to do with their bodies… [as if] the only thing women care about are free contraception and whether or not they have a right to abortion. As Republicans, we know women in this country are concerned with the path that we’re on right now and so many other issues, health being one of them…”

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