"The “Blues” had been ruled tax-exempt by Internal Revenue regulations since their inception in the 1930s, apparently because they were regarded as community service organizations. The Tax Reform Act of 1986 removed BlueCross BlueShield plans’ tax exemption because Congress believed that “exempt charitable and social welfare organizations that engage in insurance activities are engaged in an activity whose nature and scope is inherently commercial rather than charitable,” and that “the tax-exempt status of organizations engaged in insurance activities provided an unfair competitive advantage.”

The 1986 Act, however, introduced the special deduction described above, in part because of their continuing, albeit more limited, role in providing community-rated health insurance. In particular, Section 833(c)2(c) links the special deduction for BlueCross BlueShield plans to the provision of high-risk and small-group coverage."

Source: http://subsidyscope.org/nonprofits/tax-expenditures/blue-cross-blue-shield/

Long story short: You cannot claim to be a not-for-profit charitable foundation and be an insurance company at the same time. The term "insurance" implies that the insurer will only devote a fraction of the money to providing true health care. While BCBS started off with good intentions and a very good idea, BCBS has turned into just another health insurance company paying millions in bonuses to CEOs, denying essential health care to applicants and customers while raising health fees by 50% in many states.

We don't need "health plans" or "health insurance". The people of the United States need true health care. Not a system that moves towards fee-for-service and discourages high quality health care, but a system that establishes integrated, comprehensive health care bringing together inputs, delivery, management and organization of services related to diagnosis, treatment, care, rehabilitation and health promotion. The first step in doing so is to make sure that health insurers spend at least 95% of all revenues on true health care, not the 80-85% proposed by the federal health care bill. The ultimate goal is getting rid off the middlemen and putting health care into the hands of health care providers, such as doctors and hospitals, who treat us as patients and not customers or numbers in accounting.

By Jenny Gold
Kaiser Health News, November 28, 2011

"Say you’re trekking through the desert in Mexico, minding your own business, when all of a sudden a scorpion scrambles up your boot and stings your leg. You hobble over to a nearby clinic, where you’re given a dose of anti-venom that brings you fast relief. The charge for the serum is about $100.

Now imagine instead that you happen to be hiking in Arizona, and the same type of scorpion stings you. You make it to the emergency room, where the charge for a dose of the same anti-venom costs can cost as much as $12,000, according to a survey by The Arizona Republic. Since patients need three to five doses, the cost can reach about $50,000.

The drug, called Anascorp, has been available for years in Mexico, but was just given FDA approval in August for the U.S. market. Anascorp is designed to treat the sting of the Bark Scorpion, a particularly poisonous species."

Source: http://capsules.kaiserhealthnews.org/index.php/2011/11/treating-a-scorpion-sting-12000-in-u-s/

Now why does the same drug cost 120x in the United States? It's because our system is absolutely broken. Every person, group or company adds an additional fee to the drug to reap off the benefits. The nurses want money, the doctors want something, the insurance wants a bite, the drug delivery wants something too, and so on. Anyone saying that this health care mess is working perfectly fine, needs serious help.

The high price will not only discourage people to take this drug when they need it, it also reduces sales discouraging the drug manufacturer to do further research finding cures for other venoms. The same drug landing in the single payer health-care system of Canada will probably cost slightly higher than in Mexico due to importing costs. Yet another reason why we need a fully revamped universal health care system, not the mess they passed back in 2010.

"After last year's sweeping healthcare reform law drew more than 30 lawsuits challenging its constitutionality, it seemed just a matter of time before the measure had a day of reckoning at the Supreme Court. On Monday, the court announced that day would come next year, in advance of the presidential election, when it has agreed to hear appeals on five of those lawsuits and to consider at least four separate legal issues. Two of them concern the limits of congressional power, a hot-button issue for those who fear that the new law endangers personal liberty. But as several lower courts have found, the measure fits within the constitutional boundaries already laid out by the courts."
Source: http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinionla/la-ed-health-20111116,0,4240404.story

Here we go again. Now the Supreme Court wants to take up the debate over the constitutionality of the individual mandate which is an essential part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act also knows as health care reform or "Obamacare". Of course the whole debate, stirred up by the Tea party movement, is beating around the bush failing to see the real issue here.

The real issue is NOT the individual mandate, but the fact that health care would still be not saving costs because the government has failed to pass mechanisms and powers that lower the cost of health care. Right now, the government is literally betting all its money on bulk purchase and special deals made with the health care industry that promised to save $2 trillion. But, just because the bill is not perfect yet does not mean that we need to repeal it. What bothers me the most about this attitude coming from the extreme pro-single payer left and the extreme right is that none of them have ever lived in a system with an individual mandate.

The most important thing is to have this bill as a foot in the door. We will build on this new system and who knows, by the end of the decade it might be a completely revamped system. But, nothing will happen when we keep demanding an absolutely ideal health care system in form of single payer or everybody paying out-of-pocket (which is an insane idea). Our first priority should be to provide health care for all. ". It doesn't matter if a cat is black or white, so long as it catches mice." - Deng Xiaoping.

A decision on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act will be done in mid 2012.

I feel embarrassed by these images. How can the wealthiest nation in the world spend $700 billion on war an destruction and not a single dime on providing universal health care for all Americans??

In an article called "Enough is Enough" by famous M.D. Mehmet Oz he talks about how he volunteered at this Free Clinic sponsored by CareNow. "The group was informally established by a team of first responders who’d learned the art of swooping in to help after hurricanes, earthquakes, wildfires and tsunamis. In May 2009, they held the largest free clinic ever, also in Los Angeles, and a breathtaking 8,000 people showed up. After that, CareNow was formally founded, with the goal of providing care when there is no natural disaster.
[...]
At what point, I wondered that day and still wonder now, will we finally say enough? The medically underserved are, most commonly, the medically uninsured, and they number in the tens of millions. Many don’t have jobs, but just as many do. Their companies may not offer health insurance, or they simply may not be able to afford the monthly payroll deductions that would be required to enroll."

Read more: http://ideas.time.com/2011/10/31/enough-is-enough/#ixzz1cxdqBlQY

The part in bold is what I and many single payer health-care proponents have been talking about for years. A true universal health care system that can negotiate prices will not only favor the patient, but also the employer who would not have to pay impossibly high payrolls forcing them between cutting medical benefits or firing people.
Our nation is third world when it comes to health care. This is a completely unacceptable state that must be changed as soon as possible with something that is more comprehensive, more aggressive and ultimately more affordable than the current wasteful public-private health-care system AND the subsidized private health-care system in the Affordable Care Act.