Vaccination Boondoggle - Why spend so much tax dollars?

[+OverSword]

7 minutes ago, Tatetopa said:

A good question.

Not really, I mean, I know why I'm paying them, apparently the idiots in government don't.

[+OverSword]

3 minutes ago, Gromdor said:

Did you read the article on how it is funded?  The vaccines have already been paid for before they were even developed.  They all belong to the tax payers.  I am not kidding when I said Trump and the previous administration went the full on socialized medicine route.  The insurance company isn't even in the loop.

And do you understand it was paid for by tax debt.  Do you understand that a good portion of that could be recovered by utilizing our insurance that we pay for and lower the debt?  Do you get that all vaccines were paid for by some method before the insurance companies were billed and that's how it's always been?

Edited May 4, 2021 by OverSword

[aztek]

i got my first shot too,. last week, a hospital in Brooklyn gladly took my insurance, but if i did not have it, they would give me the shot for free. 

[Gromdor]

1 minute ago, OverSword said:

And do you understand it was paid for by tax debt.  Do you understand that a good portion of that could be recovered by utilizing our insurance that we pay for and lower the debt?

No it wouldn't.  We pay both taxes and insurance.  It doesn't matter if you take money from my left hand or my right hand.  Either way you are taking money out of my hand.  Taking money from my left hand and putting it in my right hand to pay doesn't make it cheaper.

[+OverSword]

Just now, Gromdor said:

No it wouldn't.  We pay both taxes and insurance.  It doesn't matter if you take money from my left hand or my right hand.  Either way you are taking money out of my hand.  Taking money from my left hand and putting it in my right hand to pay doesn't make it cheaper.

And now they took it twice.  Cheese and rice you're hopeless.

[toast]

49 minutes ago, OverSword said:

(...) why would they proceed to waste even more paying for expensive vaccinations that would be covered by the insurance that the VAST majority of us pay for and not utilize the insurance to offset costs?

I dont think the vaccines are paid by tax money finally:

Quote

COVID-19 vaccination providers can:

Seek appropriate reimbursement from the recipient’s plan or program (e.g., private health insurance, Medicare, Medicaid) for a vaccine administration fee

However, providers cannot charge the vaccine recipient the balance of the bill

Providers may also seek reimbursement for uninsured vaccine recipients from the Health Resources and Services Administration’s COVID-19 Uninsured Program.

CDC

To me it looks that the government decieded for a lean way to get the vaccination program rolling as soon as possible without time los on (endless) bureaucratic negotiations on the how+who-have to-pay-when+whom. Thats lean management: do not waste time on trivialities, do what needs to be done and do it now.

Quote

How much you want to bet it won't go through because without our money they can't afford to do research on more and different lifesaving drugs ...

Pharmaceutical R&D isnt the job of a government, its the job of pharmaceutical companies. Of course, basic research is mostly funded by tax money and governments fund commercial pharmaceutical projects as well, see C19.

Quote

... and guess which industry donates tens of millions to both political parties?  I guarantee you our drug prices will go nowhere but up.

The US has a very strong pharmaceutical industry but dozens of other countries have a strong pharmaceutical industry as well and the products of these companies get sold in the US as well because its a key market. So the high prices of drugs in the US are not connected to the (US) origin but to a specific pricing policy.

 

[spartan max2]

This is interesting.

I suppose even though the government bought the vaccine that it would be more practical to make insurance buy those vaccines from the government when their members get vaccinated.

Since that's really suppose to be insurances job and we pay premiums. The government can then use that recouped cost on other things.

And uninsured people could just get the vax for free from the gov. 

 

Edit: I honestly can't remember if they asked for my insurance or not.

Edited May 4, 2021 by spartan max2

[toast]

1 hour ago, OverSword said:

Another thing I heard on the news this morning was that about 20,000 doses went unused in my county yesterday, which means they destroyed them.  I wonder how much money that is per dose?

Between 4$ and 19$ per dose depending on the manufacturer.

But the question is: why they were destroyed? One reason could be that the cold chain wasnt matched as per guidelines.

[+Liquid Gardens]

1 hour ago, OverSword said:

why would they proceed to waste even more paying for expensive vaccinations that would be covered by the insurance that the VAST majority of us pay for and not utilize the insurance to offset costs?

Weird, I know that they're vaccinating everyone even if they don't have insurance which is a good thing, but they took and charged my insurance for the vaccination.  "Expensive"?  They've already charged my insurance $17 for my first shot, I think actually that's the cheapest injection I've ever received in the last couple decades.

1 hour ago, OverSword said:

How much you want to bet it won't go through because without our money they can't afford to do research on more and different lifesaving drugs and guess which industry donates tens of millions to both political parties?

I wish I could bet a billion dollars on that.  My limited understanding also is that a lot of the 'research', at least preliminarily, is actually done by government and maybe universities too.

[ChrLzs]

1 hour ago, OverSword said:

All other paperwork would be the insurance carriers responsibility.

And who pays for that?  Yes, nothing is truly free, but you can argue about the distribution of who pays for what and whether it is fair, until the proverbial cows come home (there's a subtle Edward Jenner joke in there..).

Thing is, it is way way more complex than any thread at UM would cover - it involves lots of compromise and shortcuts, all to do with the 'better good', saving idiots from themselves, rolling out the vaccine as quickly as possible (when you're dealing with millions of doses, just 3 lines extra paperwork and the time taken to crosscheck is NOT a small thing) and a whole lot of other logistical and social questions.

I don't pretend to understand even 10% of all that - sometimes it's best to just leave it to those you voted for.......

And if not, time to walk the walk and run for office. 

[+OverSword]

1 hour ago, toast said:

I dont think the vaccines are paid by tax money finally:

COVID-19 vaccination providers can:

Seek appropriate reimbursement from the recipient’s plan or program (e.g., private health insurance, Medicare, Medicaid) for a vaccine administration fee

However, providers cannot charge the vaccine recipient the balance of the bill

Providers may also seek reimbursement for uninsured vaccine recipients from the Health Resources and Services Administration’s COVID-19 Uninsured Program.

In order to do that they need your insurance information.  Only you can provide your insurance information and they aren't even trying to get it.  So yes, it's paid for by borrowed tax dollars.

1 hour ago, toast said:

Pharmaceutical R&D isnt the job of a government, its the job of pharmaceutical companies. Of course, basic research is mostly funded by tax money and governments fund commercial pharmaceutical projects as well, see C19.

Yep.  Couldn't agree with you more.  However that is the reason lobbying pharma companies give when asking the government not to regulate drug prices, all the while donating more that (I believe) any other industry to both the republican and democratic parties.

1 hour ago, toast said:

The US has a very strong pharmaceutical industry but dozens of other countries have a strong pharmaceutical industry as well and the products of these companies get sold in the US as well because its a key market. So the high prices of drugs in the US are not connected to the (US) origin but to a specific pricing policy.

And so they will just tax those imports accordingly to support our domestic businesses.  If that's not it can you give a reason why import drugs are expensive here?  could it be that your own greedy companies also take advantage of the USA?

[+OverSword]

1 hour ago, spartan max2 said:

This is interesting.

I suppose even though the government bought the vaccine that it would be more practical to make insurance buy those vaccines from the government when their members get vaccinated.

Since that's really suppose to be insurances job and we pay premiums. The government can then use that recouped cost on other things.

And uninsured people could just get the vax for free from the gov. 

 

Edit: I honestly can't remember if they asked for my insurance or not.

They may have if you went to your doctor or a hospital, but if you're like the majority ans went to a mass pop-up clinic then no.

[+OverSword]

1 hour ago, toast said:

Between 4$ and 19$ per dose depending on the manufacturer.

But the question is: why they were destroyed? One reason could be that the cold chain wasnt matched as per guidelines.

Yes and no. and it happens daily, the local morning news announces XXX amount of vaccine was wasted yesterday while I'm waiting for the weather report.  It's because they have more doses than they can distribute.  Shipping them to mass vaccination sites without the capacity to correctly store them guarantees that some will be wasted.  Too many people that don't understand or simply don't care because they are under the illusion that it's free some nobody but people like me that get frustrated at government waste (not democrats or republicans obviously) are irate about this.  

[+OverSword]

58 minutes ago, Liquid Gardens said:

Weird, I know that they're vaccinating everyone even if they don't have insurance which is a good thing, but they took and charged my insurance for the vaccination.  "Expensive"?  They've already charged my insurance $17 for my first shot, I think actually that's the cheapest injection I've ever received in the last couple decades.

 

Where were you vaccinated LG?

[toast]

6 minutes ago, OverSword said:

In order to do that they need your insurance information.  Only you can provide your insurance information and they aren't even trying to get it.  So yes, it's paid for by borrowed tax dollars.

Maybe they agreed on a kind of flatrate to keep the administrative costs low.

Quote

Yep.  Couldn't agree with you more.  However that is the reason lobbying pharma companies give when asking the government not to regulate drug prices, all the while donating more that (I believe) any other industry to both the republican and democratic parties.

Let create a party!

Quote

And so they will just tax those imports accordingly to support our domestic businesses.  If that's not it can you give a reason why import drugs are expensive here? 

Pharma companies calculate the prices according to the prosperity/purchasing power of a country if there is no regulation. BTW, here in Germany prescription drugs are price regulated, non-prescription drugs not.

Quote

could it be that your own greedy companies also take advantage of the USA?

See above.

[+OverSword]

39 minutes ago, ChrLzs said:

And who pays for that? Yes, nothing is truly free, but you can argue about the distribution of who pays for what and whether it is fair, until the proverbial cows come home (there's a subtle Edward Jenner joke in there..).

The insurance company.  Look man, I'm a licensed health insurance agent in the state of Washington.  The only product insurance companies produce is paperwork.  

44 minutes ago, ChrLzs said:

Thing is, it is way way more complex than any thread at UM would cover - it involves lots of compromise and shortcuts, all to do with the 'better good', saving idiots from themselves, rolling out the vaccine as quickly as possible (when you're dealing with millions of doses, just 3 lines extra paperwork and the time taken to crosscheck is NOT a small thing) and a whole lot of other logistical and social questions.

Mmmm...Not really.  We pay for insurance and insurance pays for vaccinations.  If we pay for insurance and then the government (citizens since that's where the government get money) pays for the vaccinations instead of the insurers then we pay twice since the insurers are paid to do that.  There was never a reason to have tax dollars involved here.  

Put it this way, you pay taxes for your healthcare in Oz.  Now pretend like they just taxed you twice for services you would have received from only being taxed once.  

In the USA the government has no business interceding in things like this.  Do you suppose that big pharma wasn't researching vaccines for this dying to be the first before trump said something?  **** no, they were going to invest in this scam no matter what.

[+OverSword]

1 minute ago, toast said:

Let create a party!

I'm already in a different party

[+Liquid Gardens]

21 minutes ago, OverSword said:

 

Where were you vaccinated LG?

At Meijer's in Michigan, they're primarily a Michigan company but they do have some other stores in surrounding states, their stores are usually 'super-stores' like Target or Walmart but maybe a little more grocery focused.  Was able to get vaccinated there 2 weeks before I heard from either the county health department or my local hospital.  Getting second shot tomorrow actually.

Edited May 4, 2021 by Liquid Gardens

[+OverSword]

6 minutes ago, Liquid Gardens said:

At Meijer's in Michigan, they're primarily a Michigan company but they do have some other stores in surrounding states, their stores are usually 'super-stores' like Target or Walmart but maybe a little more grocery focused.  Was able to get vaccinated there 2 weeks before I heard from either the county health department or my local hospital.  Getting second shot tomorrow actually.

Does that store run flu vaccinations annually?  

Edited May 4, 2021 by OverSword

[+Liquid Gardens]

13 minutes ago, OverSword said:

If we pay for insurance and then the government (citizens since that's where the government get money) pays for the vaccinations instead of the insurers then we pay twice since the insurers are paid to do that.

I'm not sure why they didn't charge your insurance for the cost of the vaccine, I'm seeing pretty much the same stuff on the internet concerning insurance for Washington as Michigan.  I'm not seeing anything for Washington that says 'don't bother providing your insurance card'. 

[+Liquid Gardens]

1 minute ago, OverSword said:

Does that store run flu vaccinations annually?  

Not positive but likely.  I usually go to health dept but Meijer's has a pharmacy, and most of the big-name pharmacies around here do give flu shots.

[+OverSword]

Just now, Liquid Gardens said:

Not positive but likely.  I usually go to health dept but Meijer's has a pharmacy, and most of the big-name pharmacies around here do give flu shots.

So I will guess that places such as hospitals, doctors offices, drug stores, etc. where they are already set up to work with the insurance carriers they do so but if you go to a mass vaccination clinic maybe not.

[+OverSword]

Man these guys make a really good point about this vaccine being developed with US tax payer dollars.  Since that's the case then what's the hold up on releasing the patent so that cheap manufacture for these vaccines can begin all over the world and save some lives in developing countries??

 

Please watch:

 

 

 

 

Edited May 4, 2021 by OverSword

[Autochthon1990]

I wouldn't call fighting a public health crisis a waste of money, or giving cash to the average american who's been hurt by the pandemic a boondoggle...

[+OverSword]

11 hours ago, Autochthon1990 said:

I wouldn't call fighting a public health crisis a waste of money, or giving cash to the average american who's been hurt by the pandemic a boondoggle...

Me neither. What I would call a boondoggle is putting $2,400 of tax payer money into the bank account of people like me that missed not one cent of pay from my job during the pandemic which is most people. Also paying drug companies to do something they were all going to do anyway probably a waste of money.  The more I think about it the more it just seems like it was a way for trump and other politicians to appear to be doing something about covid. Boondoggle.