Have a flexible spending account?

Are you one of the millions of Americans who use a flexible spending account to pay some of your health care costs?  If so, you're among the first to understand that Obamcare is really a huge tax increase disguised as the destruction of the world's best health care system.

Drs. Pelosi, Reid, and Obama's prescription is already unleashing a clown carload of unintended consequences.  Frustrated flex plan members, no longer able to use their pre-tax savings accounts to purchase common over-the counter medications, are asking their physicians to write prescriptions for common remedies like aspirin, decongestants and antacids.  Although it's only March, enough havoc has already ensued that the Wall Street Journal has published a lengthy article on the phenomenon:

Sandy Chung is grappling with a new kind of request at her pediatrics office in Fairfax, Va.: prescriptions for aspirin and diaper-rash cream.

Patients are demanding doctors' orders for over-the-counter products because of a provision in the health-care overhaul that slipped past nearly everyone's radar. It says people who want a tax break to buy such items with what's known as flexible-spending accounts need to get a prescription first.

The result is that Americans are visiting their doctors before making a trip to the drugstore, hoping their physician will help them out by writing the prescription. The new requirements create not only an added burden for doctors, but also new complications for retailers and pharmacies. 

"It drives up the cost of health care as opposed to reducing it," says Dr. Chung, who rejected much of a 10-item request from a mother of four that included pain relievers and children's cold medicine.

Though the new rules on over-the-counter drugs amount to a small part of the massive overhaul of the health-care system, the unintended side effects show how difficult it can be to predict how such game-changing legislation will play out in the real world.

We all need to know about this.  We're talking about aspirin today, but soon your pregnancies, heart stents and cancer treatments will  be included in the mayhem.  Read the whole thing, call you congressman, and tell your friends.