If We Could Just Be More Judicious About Our Choice of Words…

I am posting this meaningful message taken from NAHU's B2B Internet discussion group.

As posted 2/7/2009 on NAHU B2B
by Tom Gibson - Senior Market Services - Camas, WA
(he is a NAHU member but not a CAHU member)

You would think that over 20 years of insurance reform and over a thousand state and federal mandates later someone might have realized that trying to cure our health care system through insurance reform wasn't the answer. A big part of why has to do with the very imprecise way most Americans speak. Unlike most other English speaking people we speak in such vague terms, using the same words to mean vastly different things that many people that don't speak English as a native language can't follow what an American is saying at all.

A case in point is the way we use health care and health care provider to mean either a doctor or an insurance company when in fact insurance companies are not health care providers in the strictest sense of the word. If you disagree with that statement then you have just made my point for me. Insurance companies do bundle contracts and providers together and kind of sell those like a product, but this leaves the indelible impression in a majority of people's minds that insurers and their agents are somehow involved in escalating prices and since most agents seem either fairly well to do, better off financially than most people that buy insurance there isn't any evidence to disabuse them of that notion.

It isn't really well understood that insurance has actually been the only brake on really wild runaway spending in lieu of a strong governmental organization that sets prices and standards of care. We have no real price controls or standards of care, just this free market illusion that all doctors should be respected and that the doctor is always right. I talk to Medicare beneficiaries every day and it is amazing how many people agree with this but how out of touch Congress is about this matter.

If we could just be more judicious about our choice of words I believe that would do more than all the lobbyists in Washington to change the nature of the debate about health care reform. According to CMS, administration expenses, and by that I assume they mean insurance and other administrative costs, are 14 cents of every health dollar spent. If we are paying twice as much for our health care system as several reports show that we are then insurance reform is a 10% solution for a 50% problem. Even someone that survived our public schools should have figured out that isn't going to work.

CAHU Steps Into Leadership Role to Help Shape California's Future

MD Sam Smith, CFP

CAHU VP, Public Affairs



On January 26th, the California Association of Health Underwriters was invited to give testimony at the first public hearing by California State Auditor Elaine Howle to solicit comments about the processes that should be established for individuals to apply to become members of the new Commission established by the California Voters First Act (Proposition 11). Representing CAHU was Sam Smith, Vice President of Public Affairs. Testifying along with CAHU was California Common Cause, the League of Women Voters of California, AARP, and Charles Munger, Jr., California visionary and philanthropist. The purpose of the hearing was to gather information to address the role of the State Auditor's office in the selection of the Commission and implementing the act that will establish an entirely new process for drawing legislative districts in the State of California after the 2010 census. CAHU members are encouraged to follow the progress of implementation of the California Voters First Act by visiting

http://bsa.ca.gov/bsa/prop11.php. Proposition 11 represents the California Association of Health Underwriter's first effort to effect how the future of California is shaped and CAHU's grassroots participation in the 2008 campaign its first foray in activist politics. Through this successful effort and the upcoming redistricting process we hope to have a more moderate and responsive legislature.

In another important area, CAHU was proud to be a Premier Sponsor at this year's California Women Lead Legislative Reception in Sacramento for new and returning legislators and potential future candidates. Leading the CAHU delegation for this important event was CAHU Legislative Vice Chair, Meg McComb, and accompanying her as CAHU representatives were Linda Rose Koehler, Sam Smith and CAHU lobbyist, Steven Lindsay. Joining the CAHU delegation as special guests were Kathay Feng, Executive Director of California Common Cause and Janice Hirohama, President of the League of Women Voters of California. Founded in 1974, California Women Lead is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to providing leadership and campaign trainings, networking opportunities, and policy discussion forums for women interested in or who hold elected and appointed offices. California Women Lead's mission, as women in government, is to inform and educate its constituencies as well as encourage and support women to seek public office. CAHU is proud to be a Premier Sponsor of California Women Lead!