All Episodes
Previous Next
July 29, 2025 23:03-23:49 - CSPAN
45:55
Washington Journal Betsy McCaughey
Participants
Main
p
pedro echevarria
cspan 05:16
Appearances
k
kim schrier
rep/d 01:12
Callers
donnie in oklahoma
callers 00:03
jimmy in texas
callers 00:15
|

Speaker Time Text
unidentified
Including Elliott Geiser to serve as Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Policy at the Justice Department.
And over on C-SPAN 3 at 9 a.m. Eastern, the National Transportation Safety Board will hear from investigators and other witnesses about the January mid-air collision between an American Airlines passenger jet and a military helicopter that killed 67 people over Washington, D.C. We'll have live coverage beginning at 9 a.m. Eastern on C-SPAN 3.
These events all stream live on the free C-SPAN Now video app or online at c-SPAN.org.
C-SPAN, Democracy Unfiltered.
We're funded by these television companies and more, including Mediacom.
This is binging, that's buffering.
This is a meetup, that's a freeze-up.
Power home, power struggle, security detection, no protection.
You can have this or you can have that.
This is Mediacom, and this is where it's at.
Mediacom supports C-SPAN as a public service, along with these other television providers, giving you a front-row seat to democracy.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Welcome Betsy McCoy to the program.
She served as the former New York Lieutenant Governor in the state and also now is the founder and chair of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths.
Betsy McCoy, welcome to Washington Journal.
unidentified
Thank you.
I always enjoy being on C-SPAN.
I really love your audience and I have so much information to share today.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Let's start with your organization, the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths.
What led to its creation?
unidentified
Well, I launched this when I left office way back, well, way back when I was Lieutenant Governor slightly before the Civil War.
I'm joking, but in the 1990s.
And when I left office, I launched RID, Reduce Infection Deaths.
And here's why.
While I was Lieutenant Governor, people came to me with their health problems often.
But increasingly, I noticed they were telling me one version or another of the same terrible story.
They had brought their mother, or maybe it was their father, or maybe it was their brother or their child to the hospital, and the patient had contracted a deadly infection.
So when I left office, I thought, I really have to do something about this.
And at the beginning, what astounded me was how much knowledge we have to prevent these infections.
What is lacking is the will to do it.
So a perfect job for a politician.
I launched RID, Reduce Infection Deaths.
And our first job was to make people aware of how many infections there are.
These infections kill more Americans each year than all the cases of breast cancer plus auto accidents combined.
This is a serious problem.
And secondly, to give patients more information, when I launched RID, not one state required hospitals to disclose their infection rate.
Now we're up to 38 states.
We're heading to all 50.
The reasoning is: if you have to go to the hospital, you should at least be able to find out which hospital has the lowest infection rate.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Ms. McCoy, that reporting, is it strictly a state oversight issue or is there a role federally when it comes to that reporting and making that information known?
unidentified
Well, now Medicare also collects that data.
So there are several ways you can get it.
But way back when, around the year 2000, you couldn't get it.
The hospitals were not reporting it to Medicare or to the state health departments.
Now, in most cases, they are.
And if you come to our website, hospitalinfection.org, hospital infection, that thing you don't want to get, org, we can actually teach you how to find that information.
Well, step by step, depending on what state you live in.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
What changed in that federal requirement for reporting to Medicare?
How did that happen?
unidentified
Well, we pushed very hard for that during the Bush administration, and not just for reporting, but also for Medicare to refuse to pay hospitals for the cost of treating infections the hospital had caused.
So now, if you go into the hospital and you're healthy and you develop an infection three or four or five days later, the presumption is the hospital caused it, and the hospital has to be responsible for the cost of correcting it.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Your organization, how is it funded?
unidentified
Private donations only, small donations.
I just get on the phone and call people and ask them for the money.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Our guests with us until 845.
If you want to ask her medically related questions, not only when it comes to infections and death caused by it, but other aspects of medicine when it comes to public policy, 202-748-8000 for Democrats, 202-748-8001 for Republicans.
unidentified
And let me just point out.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Let me get these lines out, please.
202-748-8002 for independents.
And if you want to text, if you're a medical professional, 202-748-8003 is the number that you can go.
Go ahead, please.
Sorry to interrupt.
unidentified
I was just going to point out that there's no such thing as a Republican infection or a Democratic infection or an independent infection.
They affect all of us.
It's a wonderful thing, though.
I've been in politics for many years.
There's nothing partisan about this effort.
We want, well, I'm going to show you why clean hospitals is such a major issue.
If I were to ask you, what is the single biggest factor determining which patients get an infection?
Maybe you'd guess their age, no.
Maybe you'd say, well, it's got to relate somehow to the illness or the injury that brought them into the hospital.
No.
The number one predictor of which patients get a hospital infection, what room they're assigned to, believe it or not, what room they're assigned to.
If they're assigned to a room and a preceding occupant had an infection, their risk goes way up.
In fact, it goes up 583%, according to a study at the Columbia School of Nursing, because that previous patient was discharged, but their germs weren't.
They were left behind on the bed rail, on the call button, on the TV controls, on the over-the-bed table, and other items within reach of the patient or within reach of the doctors and nurses.
So cleaning hospitals effectively is a major issue in preventing hospital infection.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
On the broader issue of health care, when it comes to topics, whether related to yours or the medical ones, the larger medical ones, how do you think the Trump administration is doing, especially with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at the head of health and human services?
unidentified
Well, I know that he's a controversial figure, but let me get below the headlines and say I've been very encouraged by most of the appointments.
For example, Marty Macery at the FDA, he's been a hero of mine for many years.
Marty Macquarie, even when he was a young surgeon at Johns Hopkins, was bold enough to say, there are too many mistakes in the operating room.
We need a system similar to what pilots have when they climb into the cockpit.
We need checklists.
We need timeouts.
We need to initial the part of the body on which we intend to operate.
All of these precautions were put into place by Marty Macri and another man at Hopkins, John Pronovos.
And so many people in the United States owe their health and their lives to the fact that they were bold enough to stand up against the medical establishment and say, we must do better.
So he's a great appointment at the FDA.
Another one that I think is really great is Jay Bhattacharara, a hard name to pronounce, but a brilliant man.
He's the new head of the NIH.
And I think he's terrific because like Macre, he is somewhat of a disruptor.
He said, let's not all engage in groupthink.
Let's be bold enough to challenge what the scientist on your right or the politician to your left says.
and just look at the data.
So during COVID, when the nation was locking down, Jay Batta Terreira said, well, here are all the data that suggests we ought to be focusing like a laser on the elderly.
Those are the ones who are dying, the elderly and the disabled, and let everyone else go to work or go to school.
In retrospect, he was probably right.
A lot of data support him.
But at the time, he was silenced, muzzled, vilified, and yet he stood his ground.
And when it was all over, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences awarded him a special prize for intellectual courage.
So we need people like that in government.
And let me say, I'm glad to see that the Trump administration is what some in the newspaper world would call cleaning house, replacing a lot of those who have been there for years with new people.
Because when I look at the data, American longevity, America's lifespans, how long we expect to live, has been steadily declining since 2014.
So why would you leave the same people in place who are running the public health agencies when they seem to be engaged in shortening rather than lengthening our lives?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Ms. McCoy, to that topic of cleaning house, one of the actions of the Health and Human Services Secretary was letting go of many people on an advisory committee when it comes to immunization practices, bringing on some new people, some of the people questioning the qualifications, including Senator Bill Cassidy, about that when it comes to some of those members.
What do you think about that topic overall, about the reconstitution of this committee?
And are you concerned about the experience level there?
unidentified
Well, I'm not an expert on vaccines.
I will say that right at the beginning.
All my children and grandchildren have been vaccinated, but it's always good to ask questions.
And I do, as I just said, I like to see turnover in these health agencies because people who have been there too long do succumb to groupthink.
We know during COVID, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, I stumbled there because I always call it the Centers for Disaster, the disaster.
The CDC performed so badly during COVID that it's good that they're really bringing on many new people.
You think this agency, which was founded in 1948 and all these decades, has readied itself for a disease attack of this nature, right?
Whether deliberate or not, whether man-made or natural.
All these years getting ready.
And yet when it actually happened, they didn't have the right tests.
They didn't respond quickly enough.
They didn't have data about where in the United States the virus was hitting us.
It was so disappointing.
So of course, they should be new people in an agency like that who will make it perform better next time.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
This is our guest.
Jay is our first call.
He's in Maryland, Independent Line.
You're on with our guest, Jay.
Good morning.
Go ahead.
unidentified
Hi, how you doing?
So basically, I'm a pre-med student.
I'm about to graduate, actually, and I'm going to study for my dad, the dental admissions test.
And due to a rising health cost in our country and the rising cost of school in our country, the barrier for entry to become a doctor or a dentist is so high that I think that's really what's leading to the cost.
And a way to go ahead and provide affordable health care to everyone would be to lower the barrier for entry in our country to become a medical professional.
I mean, obviously, we don't want just anyone to be able to operate on someone, but just the rising costs of school and also the barrier of how many classes with your medical career is just outrageous.
And I think it would really lower costs in our country to make it more easy to become a medical professional.
Obviously, we're not going to go ahead and scrimp on health care and the service that we can provide, but just all these useless classes and all these costs that are associated with just the ability to become a medical professional in our country is, I think, leading to the real problem in our country that affordable health care and also just service of health care is becoming scarcer and harder to come by.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Jay, if I heard you correctly, I think you're getting ready for a medical career.
What's the expected cost?
What's the expected cost?
unidentified
Sorry, what?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
What's the expected cost for you?
unidentified
If I go to a private school, a private dental school, it'll cost about $100,000 a year.
And that's not including the living costs that I have to live by as well.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Okay, Jay, there in Maryland.
unidentified
Thanks.
Thank you.
I want to jump into this question.
It's a very complex question, but let me say, first of all, higher education in general, not just medical preparation, has gone way off the charts in terms of cost.
And there are many ways that we can bring that down.
Part of it is the fault of the federal government.
The federal government has offered so many loans to students.
And the more loans they offer, the more these institutions raise the tuition.
In other words, it's like a vicious cycle.
Somehow the federal government has to say we're going to offer loans, but we have to have some control over the prices that these institutions are charging so that they don't ratchet up the cost every time we increase the loan availability.
That's number one.
Number two, the cost of health care in this country, a lot of it goes to insurance companies and their red tape.
I've been pushing very hard for insurance companies to have less control over the care patients receive.
All of these pre-approval requirements and afterwards, all of these denials, they have gone up incredibly since 2012.
It used to be that insurance companies denied about 1.5% of claims.
Now it's up to 15%.
In some companies, 20 or 25%.
That is unforgivable.
And we have to pull back a lot of that power from insurance companies.
If they sell you a plan and say you're covered when you get sick, you ought to be covered.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Let's hear from Betsy.
Betsy is in Michigan, Republican.
unidentified
Betsy to Betsy.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Betsy, go ahead.
unidentified
Good morning.
I hope you're all doing well.
I have more of a statement.
My father went into the emergency room with a urinary tract infection and ended up getting pseudomonas, E. coli, and MRSA.
Oh.
While he was in the hospital, and I noticed a lot of things going on with the, I spent up to 12 to 15 hours in the hospital with him.
And when he was being treated, it was a lot of staff that was coming in and out.
And with the MRSA, your respiratory therapist came in to change and clean out the trach.
Meanwhile, her phone rang.
She reached in her pocket, grabbed her cell phone, started talking about something private and personal with a friend, put her phone back in her pocket, and she went to touch his trach.
I spent most of my life in the medical field, but I was disabled due to a car accident.
And so I knew what was going on.
So I told her not to touch him again, especially because I don't know what was on that phone prior to her touching it.
So that's how a lot of patients are getting sick with things is the staff isn't paying attention.
So she had actually had to wait several minutes for someone else to come into the room and change her gloved hand because I wouldn't let her touch it.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
All right.
unidentified
Well, good for you for standing up for your father.
I'd like to address this question because this is right up my alley.
The fact is that almost all hospital infections are preventable.
And lapses in protocol like the one you just described are a major cause.
You see doctors and nurses clean their hands with the URL type dispensers on the outside of the room.
Then they walk in, they reach up, they pull open the privacy curtain to see the next patient.
And immediately their hands are contaminated before they ever touch that patient.
We need to train our healthcare personnel better to envision where the bacteria are in the room and how they get on their hands and then eventually to the patient.
You are so right about the cell phones.
That's a major cause.
And let me just point out to everyone who's listening or watching that we at RID have a special brochure.
It's free.
You can download it or we'll mail it to you.
It's called 15 Steps You Can Take to Reduce Your Risk of Infection.
And the number one step, whenever any healthcare personnel come in the room, you ask them to clean their hands in front of you.
Don't let them say, I did it before I came in.
You want to see them clean their hands in front of you just before they touch you.
And if you're worried about being so pushy, just remember your life is at stake.
We have 15 steps here.
Another one that's critically important is when you go to the hospital, bring a little canister of bleach wipes with you and have someone who's with you, your loved one, your friend, wipe the surfaces right around the bed once a day with a Clorox bleach wipe.
Any brand, it doesn't have to be Clorox, any brand at all.
It will reduce your risk of getting C. diff, the most numerous infection, by 86%.
That's per a study by Robert Ornstein at the Mayo Clinic.
So there is a lot you can do, especially if you have someone with you in the hospital, to protect yourself from these risks.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Cleveland Clinic tells us that amongst the common hospital acquired infections are central line associated bloodstream infections, catheter-associated urinary tract infections, surgical site infections, ventilator-associated pneumonia, what you just mentioned, C. diff, and then MERS.
unidentified
Well, I'm talking about the pathogen, not the location.
There are two ways to describe infections.
You're talking about where it is, central line, surgical incision.
I'm talking about what kind of germ it is.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Sure, but you would argue that all those are preventable just by practice.
unidentified
That's right.
They're preventable, almost all of them.
The one that's less preventable is pneumonia in the elderly.
But even there, let me show you.
We have a kit.
You can get it online.
And it's a kit we prepare for hot patients who are going into the hospital.
And one of the things in this kit, and this is an important tip for you, if you're going into the hospital, you'll notice patients are never asked to clean their teeth.
They lie there day after day, and a bacteria forms inside their mouth on their tongue.
It's a hard shell of bacteria because nobody's helped the patient brush his teeth or clean his mouth.
And when that bacteria starts to flake off, the patient aspirates it, breathes it into their lungs, and they get aspirational pneumonia.
So it's really important to clean your teeth and your mouth when you're in the hospital.
And in the kit, we have these special wands with a pre-soaked with a mouth cleaner.
But otherwise, your spouse or your sister or brother, whoever is there with you, can just help you with a regular toothbrush and toothpaste, clean your mouth, and it will go a long way toward protecting you from getting pneumonia.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Let's go to Kevin.
Kevin is in Washington, D.C. Democrats line.
unidentified
Hi.
Hi.
I heard Dr. McCarry speak on C-SPAN.
He talked about his book, Blind Spots.
He said that COVID was the biggest industrial accident in history.
But I think it might be also part of an intelligence thing.
Peter Dasak may have been working for the government like Sidney Gottlieb, the CIA scientist that was in charge of MKUltra and experimented on everybody with the LSD and stuff like that.
So the reason that they can't say that it was Sidney Gottlieb was because it's a national security thing.
Same with the Epstein thing.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Well, guess what, Caller, what would you like our guests to address specifically?
unidentified
Specifically, why doesn't the Intelligence Council come up with a new determination that since all the facts have been made public, according to the CDC director Robert Redfield?
He said he has a book that's waiting to come out, but he wants the Intelligence Council to come up with a new determination that acknowledges the facts that are available online at usright2know.org.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Okay, Collar, thanks.
unidentified
Could you please summarize that question for me?
I didn't quite hear it.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
I think it goes largely to the origins of COVID.
I'm paraphrasing greatly.
unidentified
Great.
Well, in fact, we all want to know what the origins of COVID are.
We got a lot of bad information.
More and more, the reports coming out of our own government now indicate that COVID did originate in a lab, not in a wet market or in nature, that somehow it was a lab-constructed virus.
Whether it was intentional or not, I can't comment.
We haven't seen enough evidence on that.
But most evidence suggests that it came from a Chinese lab in Wuhan.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Ms. McCoy, may I ask you about the recently passed One Big Beautiful Bill Act, and how do you think ultimately it impacts Medicare cuts or Medicaid cuts, I should say?
unidentified
I think you're referring to Medicaid.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Yes.
unidentified
The state-federal partnership for health care for those who are disabled or indigent or need help for some other reason.
And I think there's been a lot of misrepresentation there.
No pregnant women, no children, no elderly or disabled are going to lose their Medicaid benefits.
The one thing the Big Beautiful bill does is to say if you are an adult and you have no dependents at home, but you refuse to get off the couch and go to work, you will not be eligible for Medicaid.
You have to work 20 hours or volunteer or go to school, or if you have an addiction problem, be in an addiction program of some sort.
That is the requirement in order to be eligible for Medicaid if you're a single adult without dependents.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
One of the people we had recently on the show is Democratic Representative Kim Schreier.
She is a pediatrician by trade.
She co-chairs the Congressional Doctors caucus.
She had this to say about the act when it comes to overall health care.
I want to play you what she had to say and get your response to it.
kim schrier ▲ ● ▼
Again, fundamentally, when it comes to this, I'll call it the big ugly bill.
Fundamentally, it is a shift from funding that takes care of the people in this country who are most in need, and it transfers it to a gigantic tax cut for the wealthiest people, the Elon Musks in this country.
And the vast majority of those dollars are actually being sucked out of health care.
It is taking Medicaid health insurance away, and in total, will take health care away from about 17 million Americans and transfer that to the Elon Musks of this world.
I think that is morally bankrupt.
And when I think about what that will do to our health care system, writ large, when you have that many people who now have no health insurance, go to the emergency room for their health care, cause long waits in the emergency room, drive up prices for everybody, and send our insurance rates higher, in addition to closing rural hospitals.
This is going to be catastrophic.
And again, the point of this is not fiscal responsibility.
This explodes the debt and it transfers that money to the wealthiest who don't need it.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Ms. McCoy, that's her assessment.
How do you respond to that?
unidentified
If that were true, I would totally agree with her.
But of course, it isn't true.
The 17 million to which she referred are people, single adults, who, according to the estimates, may decline Medicaid rather than go to work, volunteer, enter a school program, or an addiction program.
$17 million.
It does not include any women, women with children, pregnant women, disabled or elderly.
On the larger issue of the tax cuts, it's really interesting and obvious.
All you have to do is look at the data.
These tax cuts, like the first tranche of Trump's tax cuts, it's just renewing them, go to the middle class.
Actually, many of the wealthiest people pay a little more.
The big new tax cuts are for people who get tips.
I don't know of any Elon Musk types who work for tips, but I know a lot of waitresses and car washers and people like that who get tips, and they are very glad they no longer have to pay income tax on the first $25,000 worth of tips.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Let's go to Chuck.
Chuck is in Alabama, Independent Line.
unidentified
Hi.
Good morning.
How are y'all doing?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Fine.
Thank you.
You're on.
unidentified
I've got a question.
jimmy in texas ▲ ● ▼
I remember, I don't know, I can't remember the exact number of years, but I remember President Obama standing up and saying, you know, this Affordable Care Act, you're going to be able to reduce all your costs.
donnie in oklahoma ▲ ● ▼
You're going to save, I think it was $1,200 a year.
jimmy in texas ▲ ● ▼
Health care was going to be almost, you know, everybody can afford it.
unidentified
Well, I sure can't afford it now.
What is going on?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
And they talk about Trump lives.
unidentified
I think that's one of the biggest lies in history.
Can you talk about that?
Well, I will talk about that.
The Affordable Care Act was misnamed.
It didn't make health care more affordable.
It did offer health insurance to some people who didn't have it previously.
But here's the problem: it was a one-size-fits-all design.
And when you require that every health insurance plan be packed with all these costly extras, of course, the price is going to go up.
One of the problems is that government should let people make more of their own decisions of what kind of health insurance they'd like to buy.
For example, if you're a single adult and you don't have children, well, then you don't want to pay for pediatric dental care, right?
It's just obvious.
But the plans are one-size-fits-all.
And I'm hoping that at some point, President Trump or any president in the White House will attempt to do what he tried to do in the first term, which is to allow people to make more of their own decisions about the kind of health insurance they want.
And as I said previously, the most important thing is to tell insurance companies that once they sell you a plan, they can't then require pre-approvals for every treatment and deny as many as 20% of your claims.
Cannot do it.
Should be against the law.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
There's a debate on Capitol Hill about the extension of subsidies for the Affordable Care Act.
Where are you on that?
unidentified
Well, I think that one of the reasons the plans are so expensive is the government is picking up the tab for almost everyone.
So the few people who aren't eligible for subsidies are paying through the nose.
I think before the government, these subsidies were justified as part of COVID.
And of course, during COVID, we did want to make sure that everybody had health insurance.
It was a terrible time in the history of our country.
But to simply renew without questioning whether the patients, whether the families, and whether the government is getting their money's worth is foolish.
I would say that there should be no renewal of subsidies until there is a total demand for better practices by the insurance companies.
No more pre-approvals except for major surgeries, certainly not for medications.
No more denials of claims except in the most unusual cases.
We cannot continue to pay insurance companies to take our money, take Uncle Sam's money, which is taxpayer money, and then deny the claims.
Sorry, that's just not acceptable.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
We're joined by Betsy McCoy.
She's with the Committee to Reduce Infection Death.
She is their founder and chair.
She also served as the new former New York lieutenant governor, taking your questions.
Again, if you want to ask her questions when it comes to health-related matters, 202-748-8000 for Democrats, 202-748-8001 for Republicans, and Independents, 202-748-8002.
If you are a medical professional and you want to give your comment, 202-748-8003.
Mark is in Tampa, Florida.
Mark joins us on our line for Democrats.
Mark, hello, you're next up.
unidentified
Hi there.
Yeah, I am 62 years old and I am enrolled in the Affordable Care Act.
Can you tell me why they did not extend the premium tax credits for myself and 22 other million Americans?
Because they're not extending that.
And so that's going to cause my monthly premium to go up $650 per month.
That's the question we were just discussing.
We were just discussing that, so I'll just summarize.
My view is that before the Congress agrees to renew those subsidies which were put into place during COVID, they ought to be asking more from the insurance companies and expressly that they ought to be requiring that insurance companies actually pay the claims once they take the premiums.
That's a pretty good summary, don't you think?
caller do you have a follow-up um i it's gonna you know the fact that that he's they did not extend those it is gonna just make it so expensive that um i'm not even sure that i'm going to be able to keep my uh health care coverage And I know there's a lot of millions that are not going to be able to afford it at all.
So it just seems like, you know, maybe we could have not done as much of the tax cuts for the 1% and allowed people to still keep their health care like myself.
Let me point out the tax cuts weren't for the 1%.
They were renewing the tax cuts that President Trump put in previously.
But I'm not here to defend the tax cuts.
What I want to explain is that before COVID, the subsidies will go back to exactly what they were before COVID.
Did you have your plan before COVID, sir?
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Sorry, he's gone.
unidentified
Oh, okay.
So they're not eliminating the subsidies.
They're just saying the special bump that was put into place during COVID will be withdrawn if that's the decision Congress makes.
They haven't actually made that decision yet.
But what I'm pointing out is that Uncle Sam ought to be demanding more from the insurance companies in return for that money, specifically reliability.
Once you have a plan, you shouldn't have to go through all these pre-approvals, which delay your care, and you shouldn't be smacked in the face with all these denials after you submit a claim.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
When it comes to the cost of health care overall, Ms. McCoy, what's the onus on the health community, the medical community, about controlling costs?
unidentified
Well, I'm smiling because people are always complaining about the cost of health care compared with other things.
But it's quite amazing what health care provides for us.
The miraculous treatments for heart disease, for example, the rising cure rates for many types of cancer.
People complain about the cost of going to their doctor, but they don't seem to complain when they buy fancy new gadgets or fast cars or other things.
What I'm saying is that I don't think health care is overpriced compared with other things we pay for in our society, considering the enormous benefits that healthcare provides for all of us, and especially the number of years that people study to be a doctor.
It's easy to attack it because government pays a big part of the tab.
But in fact, when you compare health care here with other countries, it's not that much more expensive and the access is much better.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
To your topic, which you founded your organization on, we have a viewer who asked the question, ultimately, when it comes to hospital infections while being treated there, does UV-C light help with the respect to the issue?
unidentified
I'm so glad you raised that question.
Yes.
There are several technologies that could literally guarantee patients an automatically continuously non-toxically disinfected room.
UV light was used for a long time in robots going from room to room.
It is toxic, so many hospitals don't use it because that room has to be shut down.
The personnel using the machine have to be specially trained.
But now there are even better technologies, dry hydrogen peroxide, for example, far UV light, that can be used continuously even when the healthcare professionals and patients are in the room.
And that really should be something that hospitals are aggressively pursuing because these hospital infections are preventable and they're a serious large cause of death in the United States.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Mary joins us from Washington State Independent Line.
You're on with our guest.
Go ahead, please.
unidentified
Morning, Pedro.
Good morning, Ms. Macaulay.
Good morning.
I have a couple questions between you and Pedro.
I think you can answer.
One of the things, and this is probably off-key, I just wanted to know, and I've been trying to find out.
I'm at home because I do have cancer.
And when I was in the hospital, it's been, I guess, six, eight weeks ago.
They had put me, well, what I think is with the nurses, where they go from patient to patient, and with their uniforms, they have those plastic units like paper plastic, those extra things that they put over their uniforms or their scrubs or whatever they wear.
And they use a mask and stuff like when you first come in because they don't know what you have or whatever, and they don't want to be infected by it.
And I think that's a good thing.
The other thing I was wondering.
I'm sorry.
Oh, my question is, I wanted to know if maybe it has something to do with our water system, because it's been so many years since they've done anything from what I understand.
My biggest question I get for you is, why did, I can't even imagine $1 trillion, what it looks like.
What was the $5 trillion in that beautiful bill or whatever they call it?
What are they going to do with $5 trillion?
I mean, everything could be fixed and everything could be done.
I don't know what that was given in the bill for.
Let's talk about the infection issue first because I can offer some real expertise there.
The nurses and other personnel who are putting those gowns on over their uniforms were doing it to prevent the spread of infection from one patient to another, not necessarily to protect themselves, but otherwise when a doctor or nurse leans over a patient's bed, perhaps to change a dressing or to examine the patient, and then steps back, the bacteria that's on the patient, that's on the bed rails, that's on the bed lens,
then on the doctor's or nurses' uniforms, and that gets transmitted from one bedside to the next.
So those gowns are a good idea, especially if you know a patient is carrying some sort of infection on their skin.
I was going to encourage you and everyone else to take a look at this brochure.
Let me tell you some of the things that are in here that are just really practical steps.
For example, if you're going to the hospital for any reason, don't shave.
Don't shave your face.
Don't shave your legs.
Don't shave anywhere because shaving creates nicks in the skin.
It's like a welcome mat for bacteria.
So that's a really good step.
If you're having surgery, almost any kind of surgery, bathe for three days with a special soap.
This isn't a brand.
It's just a type of soap called Hibocleanse or fluorohexidine soap.
Fluorhexidine is the type of soap.
It's a liquid soap that destroys the bacteria on your own skin so it won't migrate into your surgical incision and cause a bad infection.
And all the studies show that whether you're getting a hip replacement or a new knee or you're having a heart surgery, if you bathed with that type of soap for three days before your surgery, you're definitely reducing your risk of a surgical site infection.
So I would encourage you to come to our website and read all 15 steps because it will prepare you well before you go into the hospital.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
This is from Susan.
Susan is in New York State, Republican line.
unidentified
Hi.
Good morning.
Good morning, Ms. McCrawley.
Morning, thank you.
All right, my question.
My question is: I just got out of the hospital yesterday, emergency surgery, and I was pretty much shocked and horrified at the condition of our major hospital in Albany, New York.
I couldn't believe how filthy it was.
I just, there were soiled linens that were left in my room from the last patient.
I'm listening to what you're talking about, and my mind is glowing.
There were nurses, the nurses in my area didn't wear masks.
Aren't they supposed to wear masks?
I mean, what am I supposed to do about the things that went on?
We had a shared bath for everybody.
It wasn't cleaned.
It was filthy every time I went in there.
Absolutely filthy.
It's terrible.
It's horrifying, and it's very common.
Let me tell you: if I were governor, I used to be lieutenant governor.
If I were governor, the state would be inspecting hospitals for cleanliness.
You know how in many cities across the U.S., restaurants, they get a grade for cleanliness.
It's right in the window, A, B, C. You don't want to go to a C or D rated restaurant.
But the fact is, you can stay home and make your own dinner.
You don't have a choice when you go to the hospital.
You have to be there.
You're sick.
And hospitals should be clean.
And the fact is, they should be inspected for cleanliness, and the grade should be right on the front door of the hospital.
And there are technologies available to make hospitals disinfected, and hospitals ought to be using them.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Caller, did you have a chance to talk to your providers about this?
And what was the response if you did?
unidentified
No, I just got in last night.
But my question also is: the final topping on the cake was: I was in something called the observation section before my surgery or whatever, and then they put me back in there, which was part of the ER.
And somebody comes rolling in when I'm ready to be discharged.
I thought she had my discharge papers.
She says, No, I'm here to let you know that you may or may not be covered for your stay here.
And I said, Wait a minute.
I said, You go to a hotel and they give you a bill, you're expecting a certain amount.
You couldn't have told me this before you put me in the observation room.
You wait until I'm leaving to tell me that I may not be covered for all these.
You should be outraged about that.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Okay, well, let us respond.
Go ahead, Ms. McCoy.
unidentified
You should be totally outraged about this.
This is a real scam.
This observation, and hospitals are doing this everywhere now.
They're putting you in a category called the observation that Medicare, Medicaid, insurance companies don't cover.
And when somebody says to you you're going into observation, you should say, absolutely not, right?
Everybody should know this is a total scam.
It should be outlawed.
There should be no such thing as observation.
You're either in the hospital or you're not.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Can you elaborate on that?
What it means to be an observation and why it's a concern specifically?
unidentified
This category called observation should be illegal.
There's no coding for observation.
They can't get paid for it.
If they're going to admit you, then they should admit you and say you are now a patient and you are covered.
That's a decision that's made in the EER by the triage people.
But to put you in this gray area called observation, where you may sit for two days and then get a whopping bill from the hospital, hospitals should not be permitted to bill you for observation.
That's an underscore.
I'm saying that absolutely, totally, 100%.
Nobody should be billed for observation.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Ms. McCoy, as we wrap up, as far as where you see health care is going under this administration, what are you hopeful about and what are your concerns going forward?
unidentified
Well, I'm hopeful that these disruptors like Marty Macery and Jay Botta Terrio will demand more from the public health agencies.
It's unacceptable that American lifespan is steadily declining despite all these claims all these public health agencies are making.
That's number one.
And number two, I hope that we impose reforms on the insurance company so if you have insurance and you go into the hospital, you're not hit later with a claims denial.
There you have it.
pedro echevarria ▲ ● ▼
Our guest website is hospitalinfection.org, Betsy McCoy, the Committee to Reduce Infection Death.
She is their founder and chair.
Thanks for your time today.
unidentified
You're quite welcome.
C-SPAN's Washington Journal, our live forum inviting you to discuss the latest issues in government, politics, and public policy from Washington to across the country.
Coming up Wednesday morning, we'll talk about the 60th anniversary of Medicare and Medicaid with Andrea Dukas, Vice President of Health Policy at Center for American Progress.
Then Article 3 project founder and President Mike Davis on the legal challenges facing President Trump's agenda and the administration's claims about the 2016 Russia probe.
And President Truman's eldest grandson, Clifton Fruman Daniel, discusses the 60th anniversary of the signing of Medicare and Medicaid and President Truman's health care legacy.
C-SPAN's Washington Journal.
Join in the conversation live at 7 Eastern Wednesday morning on C-SPAN, C-SPAN Now, our free mobile video app, or online at c-span.org.
C-SPAN, Democracy Unfiltered.
We're funded by these television companies and more, including Comcast.
Agriculture is the main life in Sussex County, and I'm very proud of that.
I felt like we were being left behind.
Everybody around us seemed to have internet, but we did not.
▲
Export Selection