Medicare Will Cover End-Of-Life Care, Resurrecting ‘Death Panel’ Outrage

President Barack Obama speaks in the Rose Garden of the White House, Thursday, June 25, 2015, in Washington, after the Supreme Court upheld the subsidies for customers in states that do not operate their own exchange... President Barack Obama speaks in the Rose Garden of the White House, Thursday, June 25, 2015, in Washington, after the Supreme Court upheld the subsidies for customers in states that do not operate their own exchanges under President Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster) MORE LESS
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WASHINGTON (AP) — Medicare says it plans to pay doctors to counsel patients about end-of-life care.

That’s a turnabout for the idea that sparked accusations of “death panels” and fanned a political furor over President Barack Obama’s health care law six years ago.

The policy change, effective Jan. 1, was part of a massive regulation issued Wednesday.

It suggests that what many doctors view as a common-sense option is no longer seen by the Obama administration as politically toxic.

Counseling would be entirely voluntary for patients.

Some doctors already have such conversations. But an opening to roughly 55 million Medicare beneficiaries could make that far more common.

Before former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin ignited the “death panels” outcry, there was longstanding bipartisan consensus about helping people to better understand their end-of-life choices.

Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  1. Medicare Will Cover End-Of-Life Care, Resurrecting ‘Death Panel’ Outrage

    As far as I am concerned the outrage is with idiots who think there is something wrong with have a chat about your final weeks/days or even years and having your HC coverage pay for it. I know I have already broached the subject with my family, almost 30 years ago now, and just recently had “the talk” with my current Doctor. There is one thing that is notably different between today and the first conversation with a Doctor in 1987. In 1987 while my Doctor was all aboard with my directives, he alerted me to the fact that many staff had “religious” objections. At that time how the laws were written allowed some sanctimonious busybody to inject themselves into my wishes. All they needed to do was to call the State Anonymous Hotline and everything but what I wanted would occur.He actually had one such Nurse escorted from the Hospital when she keep questioning directions etc he had written on my chart. I brought this and other concerns up with my current Doctor and she stated that while it still occurs the laws have been revised to place my desires first and everything else a far second.

  2. “Medicare Will Cover End-Of-Life Care, Resurrecting ‘Death Panel’ Outrage.”

    The way Republicans yammer on about the cost of Medicare and Social Security, you’d think euthanizing the sick and elderly would be in their 2016 platform.

  3. Avatar for meri meri says:

    I’m sure the Democrats will certainly not be a bunch of cowards who will roll over and let the GOTP control the narrative.

    Because I’m sure they’ve learned that lesson by now. Right?

  4. Be warned - He’ll counsel the ill and then take their guns. You can look it up!

  5. Rather than argue whether such counseling should occur, we should be working very hard to get the details right.

    I am concerned that if a doctor decides you are suffering your final illness and counsels you to discontinue treatment, he’ll probably be right 100% of the time, while if he counsels you to hang in there, you might die and he’d be wrong. Doctors really, really want to be right all the time, and with schemes to pay for outcomes rather than treatment, it may affect his bottom line if he continues to treat a patient with a small chance of living much longer.

    The big problem with end-of-life decisions are all the people who want to have a say, directly or indirectly, because they have a financial interest in having you die sooner rather than later. I am concerned that in a nursing home they control everything about your life, and they can make you wish you were dead. After they’ve drained your estate to zero, they have an incentive to do so. Even now, I saw the care my father got become much worse after the home had drained all his money with a $12,000/month fee and were only getting his Social Security and Medicaid to pay for his care. I don’t doubt for a minute that if they could have, somebody would have been by every day (especially when no family was around) to “suggest” that maybe he didn’t want to live any longer.

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