“About 90 minutes before the Michigan Supreme Court ruled Monday the cuts in payments to healthcare givers of badly injured motorists don’t apply to those injured before June 2019, one of those survivors died in a Farmington Hills hospital following a two-year struggle to maintain his quality of life and health. Sixty-four year old Brian Woodward spent the past 24 months of his life being shuffled between three nursing facilities and 22 hospital beds after the 2019 auto insurance reform law slashed payments to his home health care aides by 45%.” It was surprising the state could make a law retroactive for people who had been protected with long term healthcare and were suddenly set adrift with far less coverage. The healthcare coverage was cut
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Bill Haskell considers the following as important: Healthcare, Journalism, June 2019, Michigan, politics
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“About 90 minutes before the Michigan Supreme Court ruled Monday the cuts in payments to healthcare givers of badly injured motorists don’t apply to those injured before June 2019, one of those survivors died in a Farmington Hills hospital following a two-year struggle to maintain his quality of life and health.
Sixty-four year old Brian Woodward spent the past 24 months of his life being shuffled between three nursing facilities and 22 hospital beds after the 2019 auto insurance reform law slashed payments to his home health care aides by 45%.”
It was surprising the state could make a law retroactive for people who had been protected with long term healthcare and were suddenly set adrift with far less coverage. The healthcare coverage was cut by 45%. People like Brian could no longer afford the resources he needed and no one would work for less.
However, there is more to this story than is being told in this newspaper story; “Livengood: Paralyzed man dies 90 minutes before Michigan court restores his home care.” Nobody was giving a thought of who might be impacted. It is one of the first time I have seen a bill being applied retroactively.
I was living in Michigan when this was taking place. Before we left Michigan, funds for that year were refunded to us. When they decided to do away with the insurance contingency fund, we received another couple of checks in Arizona.
Well for one thing, the Republican house and the senate were in the majority. I had called my Democrat leader in Livingston County (the richest county in Michigan [except for me]) and asked her if Whitmer would really sign the bill. She said yes, as they would pass it without her signature.
Then they started talking about the costs of healthcare insurance decreasing and I blew them out of the water on the issue. I started to talk about single payer. Crickets . . . Either they thought I was a loon (which was probably true), or they were afraid to rise to the challenge, or they figured I would be ignored if they ignored me. The latter seems more plausible. I did not go away and the county person knew it.
Whitmer was in a corner more ways than just with Republicans. It was hard to recruit people to come to Detroit and work. Of course, they could have a long commute from Livingston, Macolm, or Oakland counites. They could live in Birmingham, or Rochester, etc. It was claimed to be the expensive auto insurance which was thought to be swaying a recruit’s decision. The company never thought they should or might add a stipend for a couple of years. Instead . . . Or they did not want to do so.
“Quicken Loans founder Dan Gilbert is not waiting any longer for legislative Republicans and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to hammer out a compromise on no fault automobile insurance reform.
Worried that time is running out to mount a successful petition drive should the negotiations fail, the head of the Rock Ventures empire had formed a ballot committee, hired the state’s top election lawyers, and would be out on the street gathering signatures within a matter of days.”
This is another you know who, who bought Twitter and is tweaking away on it. He was not to be reasoned with on this issue.
“Gilbert’s team was crafting a citizens initiative for a law that would closely mirror the bills passed by the Republican-controlled Michigan House and Senate over the past two weeks.
He had to collect 340,000 signatures within six months. Once the names are gathered, the measure will go to the Legislature for an up or down vote. If the House and Senate then approve the initiative on a simple majority vote, it becomes law without the need for the governor’s signature.
If they don’t, the proposal will automatically go on the 2020 fall ballot for voters to decide.”
In 2019, here was what was thought:
Older motorists with Medicare coverage who opt out of personal injury protection would be fully covered for hospital, pharmaceutical and physician services, the agency said. But they would have limited coverage for long-term care, so those costs would likely be shifted to Medicaid after an injured motorists spends down their savings to qualify.
Likewise, Medicaid recipients who purchase policies with $50,000 in medical coverage and require extensive care after a car crash “would see their medical costs shifted from automobile insurance and the (Michigan Catastrophic Claims Association) to Medicaid,” the agency said. Over time, the largest component of this cost shift would be nursing home and attendant care.”
Personal injury attorney Steve Sinas, legal counsel for the Coalition for Protecting Auto No-Fault, said the reform plan is “nothing to celebrate” and called it a “sad day for Michigan.”
“The people of Michigan might possibly get some marginal savings on their auto insurance, but they’re giving up so much more than they are getting. Medical coverage for auto accidents will be much more limited going forward, and the insurance industry will have greater control over people’s medical care,” he said. “The future auto accident victims of Michigan will experience the deeply flawed nature of these reforms.”
In the past 27 years I lived in Michigan, the automotive insurance companies would never reveal how much funds were in reserve for the catastrophically injured. People nr knew what they were paying for in auto insurance and the costs of which far exceeded Medicare. In the end, much of the funding was given back to people who had auto insurance. Going forward, many people chose the cheap plans. Those that chose the PIP total protection plans surprise legislators.
As we can see, sixty-four-year-old Brian Woodward fell by the wayside and no government plan was there to help him in a manner he needed . . . extensive healthcare. MSC ruling is a no-sh*t moment in time which came too late.
It’s official: Whitmer signs historic no-fault auto insurance reform, detroitnews.com.
Finley: Gilbert launches no-fault ballot initiative, detroitnews.com.
It’s official: Whitmer signs historic no-fault auto insurance reform, detroitnews.com.
Livengood: Paralyzed man dies 90 minutes before Michigan court restores his home care, detroitnews.com.