Obama Health Reform and Wait Times Visualization (In Lego!)

In 2006, Massachusetts passed health care reform that implemented a number of policies that are now being mirrored in the Obama health reform plan. The president has repeatedly claimed that his plan will lower health care costs but not decrease health care quality. This visualization looks at how the Massachusetts plan has panned out in terms of cost and wait times.

Sources:

Wait Times - Merrit Hawkins and Associates 2009 Survey of Physician Appointment Wait Times: http://www.merritthawkins.com/pdf/mha2009waittimesurvey.pdf

Cost of Insurance Premiums - AHIP Center for Policy and Research Individual Health Insurance 2006-2007: A Comprehensive Survey of Premiums, Availability, and Benefits - http://www.ahipresearch.org/pdfs/Individual_Market_Survey_December_2007.pdf

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• President
• Obama
• healthcarereform
• massachusetts
• news
• commentary
• analysis
• grassroots
• legos
• lego
• visualization
• waittimes

[ZOMGsnails]

I live in Georgia. I saw an allergist last week within 3 days of making an appointment, which is not a strange occurance. All around the state we have walk-in clinics that can see you within an hour of stepping into the building... and still people want this reformed?!

[fart1fart1]

@scott72able I started to call bs too until I looked at page 9 of the source document. he took the average wait times of all the practices, dermatology, family practice, ect and averaged them. when you average the practices for wait times you get 11.2 days for Atalanta and 49.6 days for Boston. Not sure about the month vs year payment. will have to take your word for it.

[Charlie12241]

@ZOMGsnails That's only Georgia.

[whoo689]

...Exactly HOW would having almost everyone covered by insurance in a particular state somehow "increase waiting times"? Have you even thought this through, 10000 pennies?

[MLParchive]

@ZOMGsnails Maybe in oregon...I had to wait 5 months for my last appointment...in oregon...

[comicsintraining]

@phatboi1221 And why would then 78.4% of the United States claim to be Christian then?... Check your facts before you tweak..

[phatboi1221]

@TommyCraw Did you just call the United States a Christian country? How the fuck could you say that? The US is the most diversely populated of all the countries, including Race, Ethnicity, and Religion. It's called the "Melting Pot" for a reason. Don't try to generalize the US with that Christian trash. We humans created God, not the other way around.

[Rbombsaway2]

@TheIvanMidnight

so he left out an s. it's called a typo. don't have a heart attack, grammar nazi.

[TheIvanMidnight]

Univeral...learn to spell!

[aSheeple]

@geekalpha also every citizen of mass has the same base coverage and any other insurance is supplemental, while GA's numbers are offset by a large number of people with bare minimum insurance that's inferior to the basic Mass. coverage.

[geekalpha]

Apples and Oranges. $200 cost does not include co-pays and the like. Private health insurance is not all-inclusive, so the comparison is deceptive.

When you run the numbers for average health care costs: Mass: $622 and GA: $466, which is a ratio of 1.33:1, which is incidentally the ratio of total cost of living between the two states.

Your data does not support your implied conclusion.