Justin's Political Corner
A Fox News analyst invoked the discredited “death panels” myth to stoke fears that cancer clinics are turning away patients as a result of the 2010 health care reform law, even as those clinics say they are being forced to turn away patients because of automatic across-the-board budget cuts that took effect last month.
On April 5, Fox News analyst Peter Johnson, Jr. appeared on Fox & Friends to discuss the story and blamed not only sequestration, but President Obama’s health care reform law, saying: “This is about people dying as a result of Obamacare and as a result of the sequester.” Johnson then claimed that Medicare growth reduction, which is in the Affordable Care Act (ACA), would lead to similar problems for Medicare patients. Later, Johnson used this situation to push the right-wing myths about “death panels” under the ACA.
ohnson’s claim that the ACA resulted in cancer patients losing chemotherapy treatment is groundless. The Post’s Kliff explained in her post how sequestration is solely responsible for this reduction in care.
Johnson’s claim that the ACA will cause reductions in care for Medicare beneficiaries is also false, and haslong been pushed by right-wing media. The ACA does not cut Medicare benefits - it actually reduces future payments in areas seen as inefficient or wasteful, and health care experts have said that it shouldn’t negatively affect the quality of care for Medicare beneficiaries.
Finally, Johnson’s “death panel” fearmongering stems from a baseless right-wing myth that has persisted since mid-2009.
An emotional Debbie Wasserman Schultz recounted the story of how she overcame breast cancer to illustrate how Obamacare’s provisions banning insurance discrimination for pre-existing conditions will affect her.
“In 2007, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. In 2008, right before the convention, I had one of seven surgeries that year,” she said. “I was fortunate. I had good insurance and great doctors. Today, I stand before you as a survivor! But like every breast cancer survivor, I now have a pre-existing condition.”
H/T: TPM LiveWire
Following the Supreme Court’s ruling to uphold the Affordable Care Act, Republicans are renewing their attacks against reform law by claiming that it will harm health care. On Sunday, Carly Fiorina — a Mitt Romney surrogate and a cancer surviver — fear mongered against the law, telling CNN’s State of the Union, that Obamacare would have undermined her access to medical services:
FIORINA: As a cancer survivor, I will also say this. It terrifies me that the survival rates for breast cancer, which is what I had, are so much worse in the U.K. and Canada. Why? Because they don’t focus on prevention and aggressive detection in the same way we do.
CROWLEY: There’s prevention in the new bill, right?
FIORINA: The new protocols that have come down as a result of Obamacare would have been very deleterious to my personal health.
From the 07.01.2012 edition of CNN’s State Of The Union:
But Fiorina is wrong that the Affordable Care Act would have limited access to breast cancer screenings or hurt her cancer treatment. For one thing, Obamacare requires insurers to cover preventive services — like mammograms — at no additional cost and so far, more than 45 million women have taken advantage of the provision. Additionally, the health care reform law ensures that insurance companies cannot deny coverage because of pre-existing conditions, so cancer survivors — like Fiorina — cannot be denied coverage. The law also ensures that patients do not have to pay co-pays for cancer screenings.
Richard Mourdock, the Tea Party favorite who ousted Sen. Dick Lugar (R-IN) in Indiana’s Republican Senate primary last month, told a local Indiana newspaper that, contra Obamacare’s protections, employers ought to be able to deny health insurance to people with cancer.
During a freewheeling interview with the News and Tribune, Mourdock said health care will be the “biggest issue” this election. The Indiana Republican, who opposes the Affordable Care Act, argued that businesses should be permitted to deny coverage to employees with cancer “if they want to keep their health care costs down.”
If Mourdock ultimately wins his election in November, don’t expect him to compromise on his opposition to businesses being required to insure cancer patients. The day after Mourdock won the Republican nomination, he announced on MSNBC that “bipartisanship ought to consist of Democrats coming to the Republican point of view.”
MILWAUKEE, Wisconsin — Attacking Planned Parenthood was so 2011. This year, conservatives may have a new target: the American Cancer Society.
Fliers calling on “patriots” to “boycott the American Cancer Society” were in abundance at the Americans For Prosperity’s Defending the American Dream Summit in Milwaukee last weekend. It also urged churches and Christian schools to stop participating in the American Cancer Society’s annual Relay for Life fundraiser for cancer research.
According to the flier, people should boycott the American Cancer Society because the group supports “the Marxist Obamacare plan” and is insufficiently “pro-life.” The American Cancer Society spends approximately $130 million each year to fund cancer research, helping save countless lives in the process.
More deranged conservative boycotts of companies that do good things.
Susan G. Komen for the Cure is the country’s best-known and best-funded breast cancer organization. Known for it’s iconic pink ribbon and annual Race for the Cure event, the organization has invested nearly $2 billion in cancer education and research since its founding in 1982.But today, bowing to political pressure, Komen for the Cure announced that it is severing its partnership with Planned Parenthood and will stop providing hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants that allow their centers to perform breast exams on women who could not otherwise get them.
Since anti-abortion activists and their Republican allies ratcheted up their crusade against Planned Parenthood last year, they’ve targeted any and all allies of the organization to try to make inroads, including the cancer charity. Planned Parenthood provides birth control, STD testing, and cancer screenings to low-income women.
In a press release Planned Parenthood said it was deeply saddened and disappointed by the decision:
Planned Parenthood Federation of America today expressed deep disappointment in response to the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation’s decision to stop funding breast cancer prevention, screenings and education at Planned Parenthood health centers. Anti-choice groups in America have repeatedly threatened the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation for partnering with Planned Parenthood to provide these lifesaving cancer screenings and news articles suggest that the Komen Foundation ultimately succumbed to these pressures.
“We are alarmed and saddened that the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation appears to have succumbed to political pressure. Our greatest desire is for Komen to reconsider this policy and recommit to the partnership on which so many women count,” said Cecile Richards, president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
In the last few weeks, the Komen Foundation has begun notifying local Planned Parenthood programs that their breast cancer initiatives will not be eligible for new grants (beyond existing agreements or plans).
Komen’s pretext for ending the alliance is the spurious congressional investigation into Planned Parenthood led by Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL). Democrats say the far-reaching investigation is a political witch hunt and abuse of government resources.
Komen’s new Senior Vice President of Public Policy, Karen Handel, not only has a long anti-choice history, but pledged to eliminate grants for Planned Parenthood to provide breast and cervical cancer screenings when she ran for governor of Georgia in 2010.
Perhaps it’s time Komen renamed its event “Running Away from the Cure.”
How committed to preventing breast cancer are you if you stop funding breast exams because of pressure from the religious right and Republicans in the House?
From AP:The nation’s leading breast-cancer charity, Susan G. Komen for the Cure, is halting its partnerships with Planned Parenthood affiliates — creating a bitter rift, linked to the abortion debate, between two iconic organizations that have assisted millions of women.
The change will mean a cutoff of hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants, mainly for breast exams.
Planned Parenthood says the move results from Komen bowing to pressure from anti-abortion activists. Komen says the key reason is that Planned Parenthood is under investigation in Congress — a probe launched by a conservative Republican who was urged to act by anti-abortion groups. Aun, the Komen spokeswoman, said such pressure tactics were not the reason for the funding cutoff and cited Stearns’ House investigation as a key factor.So Komen is claiming it’s the House Republicans who convinced it to kill funding for breast exams.
I’m all for helping to cure breast cancer - who isn’t? (well, I guess House Republicans aren’t) - but I’m not so sure I’d want to give my money to a fundraiser that is helping the Republican party turn Planned Parenthood into the next ACORN. The Republican attempt to destroy Planned Parenthood is going to have larger implications for women’s health than one race, albeit one very large race.
The Republican war on Planned Parenthood has reached 20.
During a town hall in Keene, New Hampshire this morning, Rick Santorum told a mother whose son survived cancer that people with pre-existing conditions should pay more for health care coverage because they make poor health care choices. While specifically exempting the woman’s child from personal blame, Santorum insisted that the sick cost more to insure and insurers should charge them higher premiums:
MOTHER: The comments I heard you make in New Hampshire, comments that you support insurance companies’ right to refuse to insure people with pre-existing conditions and that you also agreed with higher premiums for people who are sick, well my son graduated college and I pray that he gets a good job. Why is it alright for him to possibly be denied health care insurance or have to possibly pay a fee that he would not be able to afford or for a company not to hire him because he was five years old and he had cancer? …
SANTORUM: Insurance works when people who are higher risk end up having to pay more, as they should. In your case, your son obviously did nothing wrong. Obviously there are a lot of other people that increased their health risk that did do things wrong and as a result, it resulted in higher health care costs.
At today’s event, Santorum claimed that the pre-existing conditions clause in the Affordable Care Act — which will prevent insurers from denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions or charging them more for coverage — would increase health care costs because people would wait until they’re sick to purchase coverage and refuse to heed the mandate. But as the Massachusetts health law demonstrated, the mandate will likely encourage younger and healthier people to purchase coverage before they fall ill and help reduce the number of so-called “free riders.” Reform also expands the risk pool so the costs of the sick people are paid for with the premiums of the healthy. Once they fall ill, their costs will be borne by the next generation of healthy beneficiaries.
I’m not saying that in some overtly mean way as if she were a cause of cancer. I mean that someone is going to listen to her lies about vaccines and they, or their children, will get cancer. It’s going to happen.
-Joe
