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Originally Posted by Katiana
. All health care costs money.
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So does cable/satellite, your cell-phone, the internet and lots of other things that you
don't need. So, the reality is, you do have enough money to purchase your own "health insurance."
The fact that people are unable to make the proper decisions concerning their finances, lives or health care is not a valid reason to tax the snot out of me.
Quote:
Originally Posted by marcopolo
Here's my question: you say that the rest of the civilized world has 100% coverage. But how do you account for those who are denied treatment based on the cost/benefit analysis in the UK's system, or who are crowded out by rationing in Canada's system, etc.?
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That is exactly the problem. They see; they want; they're freaking clueless.
None of them has any understanding of how the health care system in foreign countries actually works, and if they did, they'd reject it.
As I've said repeatedly until I want to vomit, the MSA (Metropolitan Statistical Area -- in this case 11 counties) I live in has a population of 2 Million and 19 freaking hospitals of which 15 offer open-heart surgery.
You WILL NOT find a similar situation anywhere outside of the US.
Go to Berlin with a population of 3 Million and they have only 6 hospitals. Bucharesti with a population of 3 Million has 6 hospitals. Paris with a population of 2 Million has 8 hospitals, but one is military only, one is for pediatrics, and one is solely for invalids.
Now, who on this forum would like to know why European countries can have health care?
Because they have fewer hospitals and less redundant services.
Now how many Americans would be willing to drive 4 to 8 hours to get to a hospital that does open-heart surgery? Or to see an endocrinologist? Or to see an orthopedic specialist for a hip transplant?
Ah, yeah, that's what I thought.
Well, you can't have it both ways.
Quote:
Originally Posted by marcopolo
Some people do die on the waiting list for cancer treatment or heart surgery; many forms of treatment that are routine in America are denied or delayed in other places. Is this really 100% coverage as we understand it?
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Well, again, they don't understand it, and that's the problem.
Quote:
Originally Posted by marcopolo
Do you say to the 74 year old who needs bypass surgery, "Sorry, you cannot have it because we decided as a society that health care is a moral issue, not an economic one?"
Before anyone gets antsy, I am sympathetic to the argument that we spend too much money on procedures that are foolish by any measure. The President's own grandmother, in the end stage of dying of cancer, received an artificial hip. Two weeks later, they buried it. We do not have money for that, in my opinion.
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You're right we don't and on top of that, we have something European countries don't have and that is a 14th Amendment.
The 14th Amendment doesn't have any exclusions for morality or ethics, or age for that matter. If a 54 year old gets by-pass surgery, then so does the 74 year old.
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Originally Posted by Katiana
Why should insurance be only for catastrophic events?
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That's what it originally was for. General emergency room visits weren't included until the 1950s. Pregnancy coverage not until 1961. Doctor's office visits not until the late 1970s, and doctor's office visits wasn't universal until the mid-1980s.
Life is about choices. You'll have to choose between your cell-phone and doctor's office visits.
Choose wisely.
Quote:
Originally Posted by HistorianDude
The rest of the civilized world manages to achieve 100% health coverage at roughly half the cost per person of US Health care.
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And how do they do that? Because their system is not like the US system. Sorry, you can't just walk into any hospital you want and demand certain types of tests or procedures, because not every hospital offers those tests or procedures.
Show me a city in Europe with a population of 2 Million that has 19 hospitals with 15 offering open-heart surgery.
You can't do it, because it doesn't exist, because their system is not set up that way. Their system is set up for efficiency, not quasi-competition.
It is grotesquely inefficient and extremely costly to have 15 hospitals offering open-heart surgery.
If it wasn't for the fact that hospitals operate as cartels, and collude to fix prices, and have the backing of "health insurance" companies, then the Market System would work and it would force the hospitals to become more efficient and less costly.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by aspiesmom
Now unions are standing behind HR676 (Medicare for ALL) because corporate insurance companies are middlemen that are grossly profiteering off of OUR healthcare.
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How exactly will a single payer system work if you continue to allow hospitals to operate as cartels?
And taking the 14th Amendment into consideration, what is the maximum amount of money tax payers should spend on a single person? In other words, how much money should be spent on treatment to maintain a single person? $1 Million? $5 Million? $10 Million? $100 Million?
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I wouldn't want people to think you'd weasel your way out, so here's another opportunity to answer the question.
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