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Yes, it sucks, and I am still dealing with credit issues and bill collectors after being hit (as a pedestrian) by an under-insured driver who ran a red light. It's damned infuriating, yet people still want to claim that we have the "best" HC system in the world. My arse. Only in America does the "freedom" include being stuck with bills due to someone else's negligence.
In Canada everyone pays into the system....the government can't pay for anything until it taxes it's citizens first (or borrows it).
It costs the Canadian government, "taxpayers" just over half as much $$$ per capita to provide universal healthcare than the USA already spends on it's mishmash of programmes.
Now, that DOES NOT include the trillions of dollars Americans spend out of pocket for direct pays, insurance primiums and other costs. A HUGE % of American healthcare dollars go to third parties that add absolutely nothing to care. The for profit system of healthcare is totally immoral and just so wrong on all kinds of levels.
There are other aspects of univeral healthcare that are not often discussed. Did you know that it costs on average about $1500 more per car to build a car in the USA rather in Canada in healthcare costs alone???? The true facts of the matter are that the USA can not afford NOT to have a universal plan of some sort. When Obama brings this factor up the right goes insane with rage because it's the truth. The entire rest of the western world are not all stupid you know. There has to be some big national advantage to UHC or it just would not have become a universal system in all of these countries.
Like so many things in the USA it's the very small minority who would lose out under such a system. I always thought that in a democracy it was the interests of overwhelming majority of the people that should call the shots but it sure is not the case in the USA in so many areas. Until such time as you can separate the money from the politics things will not get any better.
In Canada where corporations can not give any $$$ at all to politics in any form they have lost their political clout and can not effect policy against the interests of the people. It's balanced out though because unions and other special interests of the left can't either. It's the people who rule the roost and it's the people who will allow corporations unions and all other special interests to operate in the country for the benefit of the country and the people, period.
Yup. People avoid care and then the problems grow and what could have been prevented becomes an expensive surgery.
If you jump thru all the hoops of the insurance company, usually they will eventually give in and pay. But it is so time-consuming, plus the hospital/doctor will often send you to collections, so most people don't jump through the hoops and end up paying for what insurance should have covered.
I worked for a health insurance company for a year. Worst year of my life, seeing what they would put people through. But I'm an expert at dealing with health insurance companies now.
Please share some tips with us.
I just received a statement for a visit I did not make from an insurance policy I haven't owned in years. My PCP has my more recent insurance info.
Is there another person with the same name as mine- a mix-up? Did someone, somehow get a hold of that old insurance info and posing as "me" to get care? I cut the card up years ago. Is someone else's illness documented in my medical record?? Is the M.D. office or the ins co running a scam? I haven't been to my PCP in over 2 years. How can I pop up as having made a visit 2 months ago?
I will be calling the ins co and the M.D. office tomorrow- what should I say to get their attention and immediate action? Should I go to the M.D. office and request a copy of my chart? It is always a pain to have to take care of some complicated BS that should NOT be happening in the first place. We all have better things to do.
I'm a right-winger in favor of UHC. The right goes insane because the left doesn't want UHC, they want free care paid by the rich.
When the left offers a plan that everyone pays into and that is mathematically palatable, the right will jump on board.
I have stated many times on this forum it is in our best interest also.
Everyone does pay into taxes now. UHC would work now, and it's mathematically passable. Instead of shelling out $500 a month now for health-care for your family, you'd be paying significantly less in taxes for the same thing.
I don't see a problem with implementing a single-payer healthplan now. Your claims that the right-wing would jump onboard is devoid of any reason simply because the right-wing lacks reason. This isn't about what's good for the people, it's about what they percieve as the secular-left-wing-liberal communists attack on the good-old-heartland of Christian Republicans. It's outright lunacy. The only way to get the right-wing aboard a single-payer system is to say that Ronald Reagan was in favor of it, and Obama is vehemently against it.
Because really, the RWNJ in congress are just anti-Obama. Period.
I'm a right-winger in favor of UHC. The right goes insane because the left doesn't want UHC, they want free care paid by the rich.
When the left offers a plan that everyone pays into and that is mathematically palatable, the right will jump on board.
I have stated many times on this forum it is in our best interest also.
"Obamacare" is based on Republican ideas. Being a pragmatist, Obama offered up a more Republican style health care initiative, because it might stand a better chance. We see how that worked out. Silly Man (Obama).
I am against the mandate to buy health insurance, by the way. The rest of the program I am OK with.
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