HIDING PRESIDENTIAL HEALTH

 

[Published in Newsmax]

It is a heinous act to conceal presidential infirmity.

The recent Wall Street Journal article unmasked what most already knew. President Biden is no longer capable of leading.

This is not the first time a president’s medical condition was hidden from the public. Democrats have done it four other times.

Grover Cleveland

On June 19, 1893, the president’s personal physician diagnosed a cancerous lesion in Cleveland’s mouth. This triggered an elaborate series of subterfuges to hide the president’s condition and the required surgery.

Delaying a special session of Congress until August 7, 1893, opened a window of time for the president to be treated. Cleveland boarded a private yacht in New York on July 1. His medical team rendezvoused under cover of darkness.

The surgery was performed on the yacht. A second surgery was performed at the president’s summer retreat at Gray Gables. A special prosthetic was installed in the roof of Cleveland’s mouth to fill the surgical hole and mitigate any speech difficulties.

Reporters questioned the president’s movements. White House aides spun cover stories that kept things covered-up until August 29, when a story ran in the Philadelphia Press newspaper.

The story was attacked as anti-Cleveland propaganda and faded from public interest. It was not until Francis Cleveland, the president’s widow, authorized the truth to be told in 1917.

Woodrow Wilson

On October 2, 1919, President Wilson suffered a serious ischemic stroke. He started experiencing neurological problems on September 25, 1919.

The president’s personal physician, Admiral Cary Grayson, kept the severity of the stroke hidden. He refused to officially diagnose any disability.

Dr. Grayson and the president’s wife, Edith Wilson, began a series of subterfuges to conceal the president’s incapacitation. They hid behind patient-physician confidentiality, asserting it superseded national security.

With the assistance of Dr. Grayson, Edith began her “stewardship.” She delegated Executive Branch operations and most decisions to Cabinet secretaries. She selected what and when key matters should involve the president’s limited decision-making capabilities.

The full details of Edith Wilson’s role as “regent” were not known until her memoir in 1939.

Franklin Roosevelt

On August 21, 1921, Franklin Roosevelt (FDR) was diagnosed with polio at age 39.

While his underlying condition was well known, the full extent of his chronic physical limitations was concealed and replaced with the story of a heroic recovery.

FDR’s public appearances were choreographed to limit media coverage. No photos were allowed showing his transfers to and from vehicles and railroad cars.

He always had a physically strong aide to help him stand and walk. The Secret Service actively blocked photographers and destroyed any photographs that showed his disability.

In November 1943, after a marathon of meetings related to the Tehran Summit, FDR was diagnosed with hypertension and congestive heart failure. The official physician continued to pronounce the president’s health “excellent in all respects.”

However, in June 1944, a consulting physician privately stated, “I do not believe that, if Mr. Roosvelt were elected president again, he has the physical capacity to complete a fourth term.”

This dire prognosis was kept from the public.

FDR, clearly weakened and in his final months of life, attended the Yalta Summit February 4-11, 1945. It was at this Summit that Eastern Europe was handed over to Soviet domination. Roosevelt died of a cerebral hemorrhage on April 12, 1945.

John F. Kennedy

President Kennedy (JFK) endured back pain from injuries sustained in the sinking of PT109. What was less known was his degenerative autoimmune polyglandular syndrome, known as Addison’s Disease.

This genetic disease affected his adrenal and later his thyroid gland.

JFK needed drugs and surgery to treat Addison attacks during the 1950s. A surgery performed in 1954 triggered severe infection. It was life-threatening, and he received Last Rights.

Repeated infections impaired JFK throughout 1961, including during the Bay of Pigs and Berlin Wall crises.

During the 1960 presidential campaign, media inquiries about JFK’s Addison’s Disease met with denials. Spokespeople begrudgingly admitted to a “mild adrenal insufficiency.”

JFK was secretly treated by Dr. Max Jacobson, known as “Dr. Feelgood” in celebrity circles. During 34 White House visits, Dr. Jacobson treated Kennedy for his World War II back pain with multiple injections of strong pain killers including amphetamine and methamphetamine.

Their documented side-effects included impaired judgment, nervousness and wild mood swings. Kennedy intimates observed improvements in the president’s mental acuity when the treatments ended in mid-1962.

Concealing a president’s serious illness undermines the trust we must have. It raises disturbing questions about who is really running things. It creates uncertainty and instability. It emboldens enemies.

It eviscerates the very core of public accountability and defies the Constitutional protections outlined in the 25th Amendment on having a viable President.

Hiding a president’s illness is wrong and dangerous, for America and the world.

SEEING THE LIGHT

Also published on Newsmax.  #PBMTherapyHeals

Imagine being successfully treated, painlessly and safely, for a wide range of diseases and conditions. Imagine having a cure for chronic pain.

This revolution in health and wellness is already available and will be celebrated on May 16 as the United Nations’ Annual International Day of Light.

On May 16, 1960, American physicist and engineer, Theodore Maiman, operated the first successful laser, achieving coherent and controllable light waves. This revolutionized manufacturing, communications, and health.

In 1967, Endre Mester in Semmelweis University Budapest, Hungary conducted studies to determine if lasers caused cancer. He shaved the hair from the bodies of mice, divided them into two groups and gave a laser treatment with a low powered ruby laser to one group. They did not get cancer. Instead the hair on the treated group grew back more quickly than the untreated group. The concept of "laser biostimulation" was discovered.

Today, “biostimulation” is known as Photobiomodulation (PBM). It is the process where a specific range of the light spectrum at the right intensity, when directed to the body for the right period of time, can restore the function of stressed cells to normal healthy operation. It is non-invasive, non-toxic, and has no reported side effects.

There are over 32 trillion cells in the human body. Each cell has hundreds of microscopic factories called mitochondria which combine oxygen with nutrients from the blood stream to make the cellular energy called ATP. This energy is used to help the cell live and to conduct its various roles in our body: keeping the heart beating, the brain thinking, the body moving, and the all the other functions that keep us alive and healthy.

Mester’s discovery was an epiphany. If specific light band waves can help cells to regrow hair, can they wake-up cells to do other things? Now over five-hundred human clinical trials and 4,000 laboratory studies have shown the answer to be an overwhelming YES!

PBM is now a common veterinary treatment for improving the lives of animals suffering from hip dysplasia and kidney failure. Throughout the world, forward thinking Doctors and Dentists are using PBM to successfully treat Oral Mucositis (side effect from chemotherapy), Dry Macular Degeneration, Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinson’s Disease, Lyme Disease, and diabetic wounds. It also reduces pain and inflammation in various orthopedic conditions such as tendonitis, neck pain, low back pain, and carpal tunnel syndrome.

Chronic pain costs Americans over $635 billion a year in additional healthcare costs and lost productivity. PBM is used for recovery and endurance by champion athletes. At the 2016 Rio Olympics, many Nike sponsored athletes used a whole body PBM product called NovoTHOR to help them train, recover, and win more medals. This led NFL, MLB, NHL and NBA teams to add “light beds” to their training regime.

A growing number of doctors and public health officials are exploring PBM therapy as an alternative pain treatment to Opioids. This may help solve the addiction crisis facing America.

If PBM is so effective, why is not everywhere?

Outside of the U.S. it is. Australia, Canada, England, the European Union, and NATO all recognize PBM, promote its use, and accept insurance coverage. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is slowly moving towards regulatory clearances for PBM light equipment to officially treat diseases and conditions. Currently, the FDA labels PBM devices in the basic category of infrared or heat lamps.

Until the FDA moves forward, U.S. insurance companies, except for a few BCBS affiliates, refuse to reimburse for PBM treatments. They remain a solid wall of resistance.

Medicare and Medicaid refuse to reimburse for PBM treatments. Federal Officials have labeled PBM “mumbo jumbo” and declared its successes “placebo effect”.

The International Day of Light is an opportunity to alert everyone who could benefit from PBM therapy of its existence and promise. It is a time to ask public officials about ways to bring PBM into the mainstream of American healthcare. It is a time to ask your Doctor, Dentist, Veterinarian, and local gym/wellness center if they offer PBM therapy and if not, why not.

May 16 is an annual reminder that bringing light therapy into healthcare is long overdue.

It is up to all of us, for ourselves, our families, and our communities, to make the promise of light a reality.

[Scot Faulkner advises global organizations and universities on healthcare reform and innovation. He served as the Chief Administrative Officer of the U.S. House of Representatives. He also served on the White House Staff, and as an Executive Branch Appointee.]

DEADLY OBAMACARE

[GUEST CONTRIBUTOR - PAUL BURKE]

Obamacare causes 8,000 deaths per year, because of penalties it puts on hospitals The penalties started in October 2012. Death rates from heart failure have risen ever since, because hospital treatment for heart failure has fallen.

Obamacare fines hospitals when they treat Medicare patients for heart failure, if the patients need another hospital stay within a month. Hospitals need to avoid the fines, so now they treat 20,000 fewer patients for heart failure, compared to four years ago, before the penalties.

Do patients survive the loss of treatment?

No. CDC says death rates from heart failure rose after 2012, though these deaths had fallen every year from 2000 to 2012. Higher death rates in 2013 and 2014 mean 7,200 and 9,600 more people died from heart failure in these years than would have died if the 2012 death rate had continued.

http://cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db231.pdf

The term "heart failure" is also called "congestive heart failure" or cardiomyopathy. It refers to weak pumping because of muscle deterioration, stiffness, leaking valves, etc. It is not the same as a heart attack or heart stopping. It is a major cause of death in the US.

These are the latest national figures, but five earlier studies from 2010-2014 also showed that hospitals which had fewer re-hospitalizations had more deaths, especially among heart failure patients.

http://globe1234.info/medicare/category/research

Medicare said in August 2012, "We are committed to monitoring the measures and assessing unintended consequences over time, such as the inappropriate shifting of care, increased patient morbidity and mortality, and other negative unintended consequences for patients." They have not reported any of these monitoring results in 4 years.

http://federalregister.gov/d/2012-19079/p-1799

Re-hospitalization penalties give hospitals an incentive to treat fewer seniors. Medicare even gives hospitals an online tool to predict re-hospitalization risk for each potential patient.

Hospitals can avoid penalties by any mix of the following:

·         Avoid admitting the sickest Medicare patients with heart failure ("There's not much we can do for you. Treatments are risky. You're better off at home.")

·         Treat as many as possible of the least sick outside of hospitals

·         Improve subsequent care for those admitted, to reduce re-hospitalizations

It is easier to give less care than to improve it, though hospitals certainly are doing both. And the result we see is that death rates have started to rise.

The figures here count hospital admissions in July 2008-June 2011, compared to July 2012-June 2015. These are the oldest and newest comparable data available. Medicare released the older data in a comparable form in May 2013.

http://globe1234.com

Re-hospitalization penalties are large. Hospitals get $6,000 for treating a Medicare heart failure patient, but pay a $27,000 penalty for each re-hospitalization within 30 days, above the national average rate. So every hospital tries to be below the average, driving the average down and the risk of penalties up every year. There are also minimal adjustments for the mix of patients each hospital serves.

Penalties total $71 million this year, down from $76 million last year, because hospitals treat fewer Medicare patients for heart failure. The only way hospitals as a group can reduce their penalties is by treating fewer patients. And they do.

The penalties apply to patients treated under Medicare Part B. Hospitals which face the re-hospitalization penalties now admit 5% fewer Part B patients for heart failure than four years ago, even though the total number of seniors covered by Part B increased 12% in the same period.

There are also penalties for re-hospitalizing patients after coronary bypasses. The penalty is $188,000 for each one above the national average rate; penalties began October 2017. Penalties after elective hip and knee replacements are $239,000 and began October 2014. The penalty calculations are written into Obamacare. It is too early to see if the number of people treated has fallen, but the American College of Surgeons warned Medicare that treatment would be cut: "the potential that these hospitals will decrease their care for such patients, thereby creating an access issue."

One state is exempt from the penalties: Maryland, where Medicare has its headquarters, and where many of its retirees live.

Medicare penalizes all unplanned re-hospitalizations, even if they are unrelated to the original care. The law only lets Medicare penalize readmissions related to the initial care, but Medicare found that law, "difficult to implement." So they decided not to follow the law. Obeying the law would help, but penalties would still discourage treatment of frail seniors, who have above-average risks. The law and the penalties themselves are wrong.

http://federalregister.gov/d/2013-18956/p-2129

In 67 metro areas, Medicare has a second way to discourage hip and knee replacements, especially for the frailest patients who may need them most: hospitals must pay nearly all medical expenses for 90 days after treatment, though they have almost no control over these costs. After coronary bypasses next year, hospitals will similarly have to pay for 90 days of costs. Fewer hip and knee replacements and coronary bypasses, when Medicare patients need them, condemn seniors to reduced activity and faster decline.

Medicare and Social Security do save money when patients die sooner, but that is not how the country wants to save money. 

MEDICARE KILLS

[Guest Contributor - Paul Burke]
Photo of Paul Burke's Father - age 98

Ironically after all the effort to expand coverage, Obamacare pays doctors to deny care.

In the first place doctors who advise Medicare patients against treatment can sign up to keep half the savings as a kickback.

Second, hospitals which talk Medicare patients into hospice, or out of coming back to a hospital, keep as much as $265,000 for each readmission they avoid.

With less treatment, seniors die, saving money for both Medicare and Social Security. Hospitals in Maryland, where Medicare and Social Security have their head offices, are exempt. So are military hospitals, where members of Congress go.

Medicare has become adversarial, because doctors and hospitals get these kickbacks from cutting care. As long as Democrats refuse all amendments of Obamacare and Republicans insist on complete repeal, the kickbacks will continue, and patients need to protect themselves by avoiding doctors who sign up for kickbacks, and by hiring a nurse-advocate in the hospital, just as we hire a lawyer in court.

My father was 98, active, and articulate about choosing life, in five languages. He used a wheelchair, worked out twice a week with a personal trainer, read the daily paper and the Atlantic, enjoyed restaurants and the opera. Before retiring he managed the Latin American business operations of Time-Life magazines and books.

He was fragile, and by some standards not so old. Many people live and contribute past 100. Yet hospitals urged him to give up the life he enjoyed. They tried to talk him into stopping dialysis, which would have meant death in a week. They urged palliative care and a "do not resuscitate" (DNR) order, contrary to his advance directive. They kept him without food for three days because of suspected swallowing problems. They started blood thinners, which gave them a reason not to operate to drain his chest. They convinced his assisted living to evict him unless he went on hospice and gave up dialysis. He refused.

His doctors had not signed up for kickbacks, but they did face Medicare penalties if above-average numbers of patients returned to a hospital within 30 days. A readmission penalty after congestive heart failure, which he had, cost the hospital $35,000. After knee or hip replacement it would cost $265,000. They paid no penalty when he died. We heard, and anyone who might come back in 30 days starts to hear, "Not a good candidate for treatment... Side effects can be bad... Palliative care... Hospice... DNR." We knew nothing of readmission penalties and did not hire an advocate. The readmission penalties propelled both the refusal to treat him and the pressure on his home to evict him, which left him in despair, and in two days he died.

Hospitals cannot bill patients or other insurance for readmission penalties, so they face draconian costs for treating anyone who might come back in 30 days. We all know readmissions save lives. Dr. Hawking, Senator Byrd and President Mandela were readmitted when needed. But Senator Byrd used an Army hospital, exempt. Medicare staff and retirees use Maryland hospitals, also exempt.

A penalty for readmission can be a death penalty when it drives hospitals to avoid treating you. The American College of Surgeons has warned about "the potential that these hospitals will decrease their care for such patients, thereby creating an access issue" (letter to Medicare 6/14/13).

Medicare recommends death penalties in nursing homes too, for excess rehospitalizations. If that penalty is adopted, fragile patients would not be accepted into nursing homes, and if already there, would be urged to forego needed hospital stays.

Four published studies, from Veterans Affairs, New England Journal of Medicine, New York Hospital Association, and Medicare's own contractors at Yale, show as you would expect, that when fewer patients return to hospitals, more patients die. Three other studies, from an Oklahoma hospital, Kaiser, and Healthgrades, show that patients with palliative care or DNR die sooner than they would otherwise, so signing up patients leads to more deaths and fewer readmission penalties.

Medicare knows its penalties can lead to more sickness and death, "We are committed to monitoring … increased patient morbidity and mortality" (Federal Register 8/31/12 p. 53376). Its contractor has already found higher deaths. Any NIH study would monitor deaths and stop the experiment when death rates rose. Medicare does not.

Medicare is explicit that "end-of-life/palliative care" is an "efficiency" which should increase kickbacks to doctors (2009 p.6). MedPAC, a Congressional agency, recommends "hospice use and the presence of advance directives" as methods to decrease rehospitalizations (2012 p.195). MedPAC did the original unpublished 2005 study justifying readmission penalties. They said 76 percent of readmissions within 30 days were "potentially preventable," but the study was based on experimental software without clinical reviews (2007 p.108).

If you think 20%-55% of your care is unnecessary, you will do fine, since kickbacks are designed to cut your care that much. Be aware that quality controls are minimal. Or if you have no interest in life, the system will oblige. My mother had cancer and died on hospice at age 88. But people deserve to choose. Seniors have paid for insurance and count on treatment without the government micro-managing hidden penalties and kickbacks to sway professionals against their wishes.

With research you can avoid doctors who sign up for kickbacks. Readmission penalties are harder to avoid. Your own doctors do not manage your hospital stay. Staff doctors do, and they need the hospital to be financially strong. Patients need to hire independent expertise during hospital stays, to get full information. We cannot trust hospitals which face $35,000-$265,000 penalties.

A bipartisan majority should repeal the penalties. In the meantime Medicare needs to exempt more patients, as it now exempts people under 65, or without Part B, or in Maryland. It should exempt patients over 95 or 100, since they are most at risk of improper pressure to die, and they are too few to affect the statistics. Medicare should also offer demonstration programs to exempt patients who pay an extra premium, or patients willing to have a copay for every hospital stay. Currently only the first stay in each 60 days has a copay, of $1,200. These alternatives reduce Medicare costs, while leaving hospitals willing to readmit when needed.

Paul Burke is a researcher who has analyzed data for HUD, Congress' Office of Technology Assessment, and the UN Development Programme. He manages a watchdog site, Globe1234.com, and is not connected to the health care industry. He has declined Medicare for himself to avoid its interference in his healthcare.