An Epidemic That Costs Us Billions of Health Care Dollars

Tongues are wagging in the wake of the FEMA flood relief handouts in Milwaukee this week; it has been suggested that the overwhelming turn out for free food vouchers has implications for a Single Payer Health System as in the P.J. O'Rourke quip: "If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free!"

So the blocks of long lines of folks who suddenly had flooded basements in Milwaukee shocks you? Liars. Thieves. Thugs. Buffoons. Mostly inner city folks of color so it must be a racial thing, right? I'm not so sure.

Let me call attention to health insurers who routinely miscode claims thus underpaying policyholders; small (and sometimes not so small) annoying 'errors' that could be remedied through a call to customer service if that didn't require three hour waits on hold. Or, how about doctors and health systems that routinely fraudulently over bill or charge for services never rendered. Or how about insureds who overstate or misstate health conditions so that they may then be covered by their policies. Come on, we've all done that, haven't we?

If all these other dishonest folks were also conspicuously lined up on a sidewalk to collect their unjust rewards, the multiracial lines would be miles not blocks long. Fraud and abuse in health care is no less epidemic than the decline of basic morality throughout our society. It costs us by some estimates 40% or more of every health care dollar. I could not suggest a remedy.