Republicans' healthcare plan, Karen Tumulty mislead about number of uninsured Americans

Posted Thu, May 21, 2009 at 10:50 am

Senators Tom Coburn and Richard Burr and Reps. Paul Ryan and Devin Nunes have released a GOP universal healthcare proposal called the "The Patients' Choice Act of 2009" that you can read about here. As with many others, it misleads about the number of Americans who are without healthcare. The number frequently heard is 45 to 47 million, but that's not true: per the latest Census Bureau statistics, there are only about 36 million Americans without healthcare. The remainder are legal immigrants or illegal aliens; in either case they're citizens of foreign countries and not Americans.

If a source gets something so fundamental wrong (for whatever reason), you can't really trust the other things they say.

The summary of their plan says:

It is time to publicly admit that the health care system in America is broken. Costs are rising at an unacceptable rate — more than doubling over the last 10 years, which is nearly four times the rate of wage growth. Too many patients feel trapped by health care decisions dictated by HMOs. Too many doctors are torn between practicing medicine and practicing insurance. And 47 million Americans worry what will happen to them or their children if they get sick.

In her report (link), Karen Tumulty of Time Magazine repeats their false claim (link):

However, that Republican bill does not purport to assure coverage to all - or even most - of the 47 million or so Americans who now lack it.

Tags: 
karen tumulty
time magazine
universal healthcare
paul ryan
devin nunes
tom coburn
richard burr

Comments

dchamil (not verified)

Fri, 05/22/2009 - 13:06

"Without health insurance" does not mean "without health care." As illegals are aware, emergency medical care at hospitals is available without regard to ability to pay.

Fred Dawes (not verified)

Fri, 05/22/2009 - 19:18

Yes dchamil you are right, but this is not really about so called health Care its about control and money, the money side will force millions to pay big money that is why the pigs in all levels of our so called government are putting for the big money people and when by law we all must buy this BS It will take big money our of the banks of the working people I.E. The working guys will have less for food and gas and name it. that is called control of you.

Bob Greene (not verified)

Fri, 08/21/2009 - 06:32

ONLY HALF-PREGNANT ? In quibbling about actual numbers of American uninsured, you present the spectacle of arguing you are only "half-pregnant". The fact of 35 million citizens plus 10 million aliens without insurance still means 45 million ready to visit and overload our system in the ER. And this does not include some 25 million UNDERinsured, who are effectively without coverage for proper medical treatment. It seems public discussion of health care reform has been diverted by a red herring debate on numbers. Even one million UN or UNDERinsured citizens is too many. The private insurance market made three promises-- cheaper healthcare, better quality healthcare, and healthcare available to more people. It failed miserably on all three goals. To hear the private insurers tell it, all they need to show their value is competition. The public option challenge is significant but fair competition, because public option must work with the costs of the same private practitioner network as the private insurers. The real challenge the private insurers face is their own history. In the early 1990's, this industry spent about three percent of each premium dollar on cost and profit. Today, as one of the "hot performers" of Wall Street, they insist on up to 20 percent for cost and profit. The explanation is private health care insurance, today, is less a healthcare activity than simply another enterprise putting profits first-- in this case, over patients.