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blue bits. red rocks.
Wednesday 30 September 2009

Massachusetts mandated that everyone buy health insurance. And this hasn’t made premiums affordable. To reduce premiums, policies have things like very high deductibles and large co-pays. In the case of a single person making just over $30,000 a year, if you add up the premiums and deductible, she or he will have to shell out over $5,000 before any insurance kicks in. This simply isn’t affordable. Massachusetts subsidizes insurance premiums for everyone who makes less than 300 percent of the federal poverty line. This guarantees a constant flow of money into private health insurance companies, while it exacerbates the state’s budget deficit. And to address the deficit, Massachusetts has cut safety net health care! They have taken hundreds of millions of dollars out of programs that would have helped poor and low-income patients–the very people most need the care and whom the reform should have most helped. Dr. Andy Coates

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