> The worst piece of legislation ever to be passed in the United States of America.
I don't think it competes with, just for two obvious, off-the-top-of-my-head examples, either the Indian Removal Act or the Alien and Sedition Acts.
> I have seen many patients lose their doctors because the doctors were not contracted with Covered California.
Covered California is the California state health insurance exchange, it does not contract with doctors at all. The individual health insurance plans offered by private companies on the exchange contract with doctors.
> The reason the doctors do not contract with Covered California is because at face value the plan appears to be just like the usual say PPO plan.
Covered California is not a plan, PPO or otherwise. It is the exchange on which plans are offered. A number of different plans, PPO and otherwise, are offered on the exchange.
> The problem with the government effectively taking over Health IT by way of forcing Electronic Health Records to abide by bureaucrats definitions for "meaningful use" is a completely different disaster that has resulted in marked decreases in productivity and worse care for patients.
"Meaningful use" of EHRs is voluntary; the government involvement is providing incentives for meaningful use within the Medicare and Medicaid programs, not penalties outside those programs.
(EDIT: clarification of the meaningful use comments)
The government reduces Medicare payouts by a fixed percentage, starting at 1% in 2014 going up until it reaches 9% in 2022, to any participant who doesn't meet meaningful use requirements. The only way to opt out of the requirement is to completely opt out of medicare. That rather sounds like a nonvoluntary penalty carrying program to me.
IMHO, that's a feature, not a bug. Though it is unfortunate that some doctors have to be dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century; I'd be really suprised if such doctors were better, by any reasonable metric, than one that had needed no prodding for EHR.
> Those legislation mainly affected people who weren't US citizens, though.
Certainly the Sedition Act's repression of free speech was not restricted to, nor primarily targeting, non-citizens; it principally targeted domestic dissent. (The first prosecution under that act -- or any of the Alien and Sedition Acts -- was of an opposition-party Congressman for writings critical of the administration.)
Not that "worst for American citizens" was the original claim, anyway.
I don't think it competes with, just for two obvious, off-the-top-of-my-head examples, either the Indian Removal Act or the Alien and Sedition Acts.
> I have seen many patients lose their doctors because the doctors were not contracted with Covered California.
Covered California is the California state health insurance exchange, it does not contract with doctors at all. The individual health insurance plans offered by private companies on the exchange contract with doctors.
> The reason the doctors do not contract with Covered California is because at face value the plan appears to be just like the usual say PPO plan.
Covered California is not a plan, PPO or otherwise. It is the exchange on which plans are offered. A number of different plans, PPO and otherwise, are offered on the exchange.
> The problem with the government effectively taking over Health IT by way of forcing Electronic Health Records to abide by bureaucrats definitions for "meaningful use" is a completely different disaster that has resulted in marked decreases in productivity and worse care for patients.
"Meaningful use" of EHRs is voluntary; the government involvement is providing incentives for meaningful use within the Medicare and Medicaid programs, not penalties outside those programs.
(EDIT: clarification of the meaningful use comments)