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Death Panels in Arizona

CityGirl

Silver Member
SUPER Site Supporter
A huge number of Americans are afraid that President Barack Obama’s success in enacting health reform legislation means that “death panels” will soon be deciding whether they or their loved ones live or die. A just released Kaiser Health Tracking Poll reveals that health reform has now hit a lower level of popularity with Americans than at any previous time during the Obama presidency. Only a quarter of the public say they expect their own families to be better off under the health reform law, the lowest level of support for health reform since Kaiser began polling on this issue in early 2009
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The survey also confirms that “health care voters” were central to the Republicans’ success in the recent congressional election. Republicans attracted a lot of support by demonizing health reform and promising to make repeal a top priority. One of the key demons that Mitch McConnell, Eric Cantor, Darrell Issa, John Boehner, and other GOP congressional leaders will surely be invoking to “kill the bill” next year are death panels.
All of this GOP concern about death panels is bogus. And supporters of health reform need to say so.

The only political effort to implement death panels since Obama got his health reform bill passed has been in the state of Arizona. There the Republican-controlled legislature with the approval of GOP Governor Jan “there are headless bodies turning up all over our desert” Brewer has told 98 people waiting for transplants that they must die.

Those 98, who are either poor or uninsurable by private insurance due to pre-existing conditions, need bone marrow, lung, heart, and other forms of transplants. They were told by the state’s Medicaid program—Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System, or AHCCCS—that they qualified for coverage. But, this October 1, AHCCCS said it could not in fact pay for their transplants. Facing a billion-dollar-plus budget deficit, the Arizona legislature cut out all state funding for transplantation retroactively!
This means that people who were told they had a chance at life had the rug pulled out from under them without any warning. The Republican legislature not only acted as a death panel; it chose to balance the budget on the backs of the poorest and most desperate of Arizonians by welshing on a promise.

Just to be clear, the legislature and governor did not say there would be no more transplant funding going forward. They said they are telling those to whom coverage has already been promised to drop dead.

Those waiting for transplants who had put their faith in the promise of coverage did not get a chance to try and raise money to pay for a transplant. They could not try to move somewhere else to seek coverage. They had no chance to beg the legislature and the governor not to kill them. They simply woke up on October 1 and found that the most mean-spirited death panel imaginable had taken the most unjust course of action possible and pulled the funding rug out from under them.

A member of the Arizona House has suggested there might be a hearing on all this in January. But those needing transplants do not have the luxury of time. The waiting lists for hearts and lungs are short because those waiting die if they are not lucky enough to obtain an organ.

None of this death panel activity has evoked a word of protest from would be presidential candidates such as Sarah Palin, who first sounded the death panel false alarm about Obamacare; Newt Gingrich; or Mitt Romney. Nor has a single word of condemnation passed the lips of the incoming House GOP leadership.

Advocates of the long overdue effort to reform the ailing American health care system need to be ready to tell the American people that when it comes to their health, Republicans are more than willing to renege on their promises and send the weak and the frail to their graves. If the national GOP is serious about death panels there are 98 people in Arizona who would love to hear from them.

Arthur Caplan, PhD, is the Director of the Center for Bioethics and the Sidney D Caplan Professor of Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania.

http://www.scienceprogress.org/2010/11/death-panels-in-arizona/

Isn't this like the death panels Sarah Palin warned us about? But it is Republicans who are introducing them. Isn't this the way socialized medicine is delivered? I guess these people are the burning houses to which Mike Huckabee was referring.....
 

jpr62902

Jeanclaude Spam Banhammer
SUPER Site Supporter
Truly, this is a deplorable circumstance. These 98 folks have relied on Arizona's Medicaid program (and thus not pursued other means of coverage), only to have the proverbial rug yanked from beneath them by the Arizona legislature. Perhaps those in need of transplants have a promissory estoppel argument in a class action against Arizona.

Personally, I haven't been all caught up in the death panel fears, but I've been a little troubled by the gummint actively encouraging end of life counseling. It just doesn't pass my smell test. Perhaps I'm paranoid.

But let's be brutally matter of fact. Organ transplants are a unique area in medicine, because there are not enough donors to meet the demand of those needing transplanted organs. Natural rationing, as it were. While these 98 folks are now sadly facing terminal circumstances, there are 98 others who now have a chance.

Yes, reforms are needed, but this particular politicization of the healthcare issue is without merit, IMHO. If these very same 98 folks were insured by those corporations granted exemptions from Obamacare cap limit bans, it's unlikely they would get their transplants under Obamacare, either.
 

CityGirl

Silver Member
SUPER Site Supporter
I see this as further evidence that democrats and republicans are 2 sides of the same coin.with ust enough difference in appearance to keep the country divided whilst they perpetrate their common agendas.
 

muleman

Gone But Not Forgotten
GOLD Site Supporter
Agreed they are one and the same. Until we get term limits to break the old boys grip we have little chance of real change. Hope we can kick a bunch more out in 2012. As to the death panels they are doing the same thing to those on medicare without really publicizing it. They just keep raising the premiums till you have to make a choice of food and heat or health insurance and meds. That way their conscience is clear what they are doing to those who paid in all their lives to watch it get handed to those who never did. The redistribution on the backs of retirees is so wrong, yet they push it as their humane system while screwing us older folks.
 

mak2

Active member
if your doctor does not do End of life counselling he is negligent in his practice. Most do, the ones who dont are either incopetent or dont do it because they dont get paid.
 

Ross 650

Well-known member
Site Supporter
Howdy,
if I ever go to a doctor and he starts talking about end of life, he damn sure better be talking about his life and not mine!!!! Have a goodun!!!!
 

mak2

Active member
Howdy,
if I ever go to a doctor and he starts talking about end of life, he damn sure better be talking about his life and not mine!!!! Have a goodun!!!!

If you have cancer with no hope of recovery and you are in great pain, do you want to be put on a ventilator and kept alive, no matter what? There are some people like that, but few.
 

CityGirl

Silver Member
SUPER Site Supporter
I think there is a misconception about end of life care. Everyone should be thinking these things out before they get really sick. The purpose of end of life care discussions is to keep you from being a Terry Schiavo. Now, if living out the remainder of your existence in the condition that Terry was in is okay with you then by all means don't have this conversation however, many don't relish the thoughts of putting themselves and their families through that kind of experience.

We have been exposed to too much Emergency 911 and people think that medicine can rescue people from the jaws of death and restore them to full function. The reality is that this is the exception and not the rule. In most cases of cardiac arrest, there is disruption of circulation long enough to result in some degree of brain damage. "Successful" resuscitation refers only to whether a pulse and circulation was restored. A "successful" resuscitation does not mean the individual is restored to their previous level of functioning.

CPR facts and statistics from the American Heart Association

  • About 75 percent to 80 percent of all out-of-hospital cardiac arrests happen at home, so being trained to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) can mean the difference between life and death for a loved one.
  • Effective bystander CPR, provided immediately after cardiac arrest, can double a victim’s chance of survival.​
  • CPR helps maintain vital blood flow to the heart and brain and increases the amount of time that an electric shock from a defibrillator can be effective.​
  • Approximately 95 percent of sudden cardiac arrest victims die before reaching the hospital.​
  • Brain death starts to occur four to six minutes after someone experiences cardiac arrest if no CPR and defibrillation occurs during that time.
  • If bystander CPR is not provided, a sudden cardiac arrest victim’s chances of survival fall 7 percent to 10 percent for every minute of delay until defibrillation. Few attempts at resuscitation are successful if CPR and defibrillation are not provided within minutes of collapse.​
  • Coronary heart disease accounts for about 550,000 of the 911,000 adults who die as a result of cardiovascular disease.​
  • Approximately 330,000 of all annual adult coronary heart disease deaths in the U.S. are due to sudden cardiac arrest, suffered outside the hospital setting and in hospital emergency departments. About 900 Americans die every day due to sudden cardiac arrest.​
  • Sudden cardiac arrest is most often caused by an abnormal heart rhythm called ventricular fibrillation (VF). Cardiac arrest can also occur after the onset of a heart attack or as a result of electrocution or near-drowning​
End of life conversations are about the persons desires when their bodies are giving out as a result of aging or terminal illness. Do you want everything done including being placed on life support? ( forms of life support are ventilators for breathing, dialysis machines for chronic kidney failure and often times people end up on both...this equipment can be adjunct to get you back to health or they can be the only thing keeping you alive. Your family needs to know what you would want them to do if you are being maintained by machinery with no hope of recovery)Do you want to depart this world with people pumping on your chest, cracking ribs, shoving tubes down your throat and into other orifices and shocking you? If you have a terminal illness, does this type departure sound good to you? If you are old, does this sound natural to you? What about dignity and comfort and being surrounded by loved ones?​


There are choices.
Basically, you can tell your physician you want everything done. You would be classified as a "Full Code".

You can tell your physician you want everything done but in the event you stopped breathing or heart stopped beating you don't want to be resuscitated. You would be classified as "No CPR" .

You can tell your physician that you don't wish to continue treatment and wish to be kept comfortable. You will be classified as Care and Comfort Only and depending on your condition you may be able to be at home under hospice care of transferred to a hospice facility.

Mak2 is right. A doctor who doesn't have these conversations is negligent.
 

Doc

Bottoms Up
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
Well said CG and some mighty good info!!!!! :tiphat: :clap: :clap:
 

Cowboy

Wait for it.
GOLD Site Supporter
I,m probly out of line , but my first question would be , how many out of the 98 people are here legally , Sorry but if the organ I was born with needs to be replaced , I,m fucking done & damn sure dont expect others to pay for it if I cant afford it IF I decided I wanted to live longer .

I know several people that have been in the need of transplants , some could even afford it & chose to just let nature take its coarse .

I,m sure theres exeptions , but FFS if its your time , I cant see dragging it out for years at the cost of others & putting yourself or your family through the grief .

Once again I,m sorry , it just dont make sense to me to go through all the suffering & put others through it just hanging onto that last little glimmer of hope . Just my honest opinion . :flowers:
 

loboloco

Well-known member
Actually, people are confusing some terms and actions here. Denial of coverage is not a 'death panel', it just means you gotta pay for it yourself(TANSTAAFL).
'End of Life Counseling' would be better termed 'Right to refuse treatment'.
death panels, as currently viewed are government panels that refuse or reduce the treatment, as in a single payer system, without a recourse of seeking OOP treatment.
I don't see death panels as being a threat here currently, but since there is a definite desire by many misguided souls to want a single payer system here, it is a long term concern.
 

CityGirl

Silver Member
SUPER Site Supporter
But the term Death Panel is effective in getting folks to view the thread!:shifty:
 
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CityGirl

Silver Member
SUPER Site Supporter
This is quite a dilemma in our country. Especially in a nation that proclaims it is founded on Christianity...that the value of the life of an individual boils down to cost. Only those who can afford it can have it....It almost puts it in the realm of survival of the fittest....both physically and financially fit.

I can't help but think of Matthew 25:34-40,45.
Holy Bible NIV said:
“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

37 “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’ 40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ 45 “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

This is an interesting observation from a poster on Transplant Buddies
Jack R said:
Stunning when you think about the fact the Arizona has 135 inmates on Death Row (I'm not discussing the pros or cons of the Death Penalty) and we spend tens of millions on their legal appeals, housing medical, over a period of 20 some years YET in the blink of an eye the same STATE condemns and pulls the rug out from underneath average citizens thus condemning them to Death.
The IRONY is stunning!http://www.transplantbuddies.org/tbx/messages/3/344214.html?1290788404

In this country, ICUs are loaded with elderly patients whose bodies are failing as a natural course of aging and we maintain them on life support. We will put a dialysis catheter in a 99 year old and start them on dialysis for kidney failure but we will deny a transplant to a younger person who would be able bodied with a new organ? Not many, regardless of age, physical condition, income are willing to have care withheld if there is the least bit of hope to continue to draw breath.
 
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