ObamaCare updates: Death Panels revisited

Krauthammer On the revelation that the Obama administration has issued a rule giving Medicare payments to doctors who provide end-of-life counseling:

Well, I think what’s scandalous is that essentially the same idea was encompassed in a provision in the original law, in the original bill. I think it was article 1233, which was passed in the House and rejected in the Senate explicitly because of the uproar that was aroused by it. …

To then enact it through Medicare, through an administrative regulation, unilaterally, when the Congress had looked at it and rejected it, I think is [an] incredible example of administration arrogance and a way of going around what was clearly expressed as the will of the people. I think this is the kind of thing — exactly the kind of thing — you want to bring up in hearings so people will know what’s going on, [as] they may not have heard about it.

Death panels resurrected by Obama Administration

Death panels, one of the most controversial aspects of the bill known as 'Obamacare' will go into effect January 1st, despite having been removed during Congressional debate earlier this year.

Sarah Palin first coined the term 'death panels' in discussing one of the most controversial aspects of the proposed 'Obama care' legislation back in August 2009. The basic concept of the so-called 'death panel' in the original legislation came from the following reasoning: the bill included funding through Medicare for doctors consulting with patients on options for end-of-life care long before they were ever sick. Similar to a living will, this results in an 'advanced directive' in the event that they become too incapacitated to make their own medical decisions. Since 'Obamacare' introduced unprecedented federal oversight of the health-care industry, including amassing data on the cost-effectiveness of medical treatments, opponents of the legislation feared that doctors would have a financial incentive to reduce cost and thereby discourage patients accessing care.

There has been much debate over the phrase 'death panel'. For instance, third-party group Politifact.comgave the phrase their 'lie of the year' award. That said, no one on either side of the issue can dispute the fact that Palin's comment galvanized opposition to the legislation, especially the proposed 'end of life' counseling. The controversy became so heated that in order to ensure passage of the legislation, those sections were removed from the final bill.

According to a report by the New York Times, however, the Obama Administration is set to enact the exact type of counseling removed from the legislation. A newMedicare regulation, set to go into effect January 1st, "will pay doctors who advise patients on options for end-of-life care, which may include advance directives to forgo aggressive life-sustaining treatment." According to the article, including interpretations offered by many third-parties quoted in the article, the new regulation is more or less identical to the highly controversial language removed from the Congressional bill.

Given the original controversy, this is clearly a controversial decision. Of even further controversy, however, is that fact that the White House is essentially side-stepping an act of Congress. Debate over the bill clearly indicated that this language would have to be removed, yet regulations formed around its implementation have de facto added this into law.

Nor will the issue go unnoticed by the larger public, despite the distractions of the holiday season. The Times featured this on page 1 of the Sunday edition, having previously appeared on the website on Christmas Day. The headline "Obama Returns to End-of-Life Plan That Caused Stir" comes off as somewhat innocuous-sounding, but the issue was the lead topic on the prominent conservative-leaning Rush Limbaugh Show by today's substitute host Mark Belling. Being featured in two such prominent media outlets is sure to bring the issue attention.

HULIQ will continue to follow the issue to see if it develops into the same sort of controversy it did during the original debate, especially what the reaction from Congress will be.

http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=8004931906890597215

Those ‘Death Panels’? Bush’s Fault

By Doug Powers • December 27, 2010 04:22 PM

**Written by Doug Powers

There was probably a five-hour meeting at the White House on how to spin this, which culminated in somebody throwing his hands in the air and saying “Let’s just do what we always do and blame Bush — everybody okay with that? Good.”

From The Hill:

The Obama administration is trying to quiet talk about so-called “death panels” after The New York Times reported Sunday that a new Medicare regulation includes incentives for end-of-life-care planning.

The Medicare policy will pay doctors for holding end-of-life-care discussions with patients, according to the Times. A similar provision was dropped from the new healthcare reform law after Republicans accused the administration of withholding care from the sick, elderly and disabled.

However, an administration spokesman said the regulation, which is less specific than the reform law’s draft language, is actually a continuation of a policy enacted under former President George W. Bush.

“The only thing new here is a regulation allowing the discussions … to happen in the context of the new annual wellness visit created by [healthcare reform],” Obama spokesman Reid Cherlin told The Wall Street Journal.

So if you have a problem with it, Sarah, call Dubya instead of the White House.

http://michellemalkin.com/2010/12/27/death-panels/

Rich Lowry: HERE COME THE DEATH PANELS

Bureaucrats trumping our democracy

The text of ObamaCare is dry and legalistic, except when it summons the maj esty of the King James Bible to intone imperiously, "the secretary shall . . . "

The secretary in question is the secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius, who "shall" and "may" do all manner of things to complete the great unfinished canvas that is ObamaCare.

As George W. Bush might say, Sebelius is "the decider." In the discretion she's granted to remake American health care, she rivals Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton and Oprah Winfrey as the most powerful woman in America.

The New York Times reported the other day that HHS has created a version of the "death panels," in Sarah Palin's famous coinage, that were stripped out of the law after an uproar in 2009. Why did we bother having that fight, with all its fiery accusations, if Kathleen Sebelius and her underlings could simply act at their discretion?

The first thing to know about death panels is that they aren't death panels. They are shorthand for consultations between doctors and patients to set up advanced directives governing decisions over end-of-life care. These consultations are innocent enough, even desirable. Unless you worry that ObamaCare's inevitable drift into price controls and rationing will twist them into something more sinister.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/here_come_death_panels_rOgtOinGhJgRdmCYR9JtcK#ixzz19TGC46Tb