so does that make it ok for healthcare providers to deny coverage for procedures or medication that has been prescribed due to an illness or ailment impacting a patients quality of life?
No it doesn’t but I can understand why they don’t greenlight everything. This all is a glaring example why we need single payer health care and doctors that earn a flat rate and not get paid per procedure (there is a name for this, i don’t know it).
It’s self fulfilling though. Doctors offices are at the whims of their agreements with the insurance companies to stay afloat. They pad the bill (charging maximum for everything) because the insurance company will only pay percentages on most procedures. Then they usually write off the rest (or close to it). Doctors are incentivized to prescribe certain drugs over others, and other such meddling.
Healthcare costs are as high as they are specifically because of private insurance. The evidence is in every single other developed country that has state-provided healthcare. It’s overall cheaper, and often better.
Insurance companies default to denying claims because they know, if the barrier is high enough (denial after denial), people will simply stop asking for the procedure (or whatever), so they don’t have to pay anything. Then their earnings go up, and they pad their pockets.
To say “insurance company bad” oversimplifies the problem. That’s why it’s foolish to base opinions on memes. Where there’s lots of money, greedy people will find a way to get at it or as I like to say “shit attracts flies”. In my work I deal with private companies that are paid with public dollars. What I see going on has jaded me hardcore. Publicly funding the health care system will be a disaster without overhauling the whole system.
