US ranks worst, France best for focus on preventable deaths (regular, illegal immigration)
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I appreciate your views. To keep the thread on topic, however... Yeledaf is suggesting that the massive flow of immigration is a primary culprit for the U.S. to drop in the "preventable death" category.[
"Massive"? When did I say or post that? I use the term "significant", and I made the point several times -- though apparently not enough enough -- that we do not know the size of that population. It is unreported, undertreated, and tends to seek care only in emergencies -- thus skewing any healh care research negatively.
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This study (and there are others) suggests most illegals are in fact young and relatively healthy, and play a small role in the overall health care burden, herego they are not in fact responsible for dropping the U.S. in preventable deaths. Herego the U.S. system itself has problems, like the millions more each more of legal sick Americans that can't afford insurance or are denied coverage due to pre-existing conditions. And die more because they wait too long to see a doctor and/or they get the cheap medical care once they do go instead of the quality care for people with coverage.
These are people who work in extremely hazardous occupations, often involving exposure to dangerous chemicals, and who (I'll say this one last time) tend to delay medical care and attention until they are desperately ill or injured. No one is arguing that the US healthcare system is perfect, or that it does not have serious problems. What I have argued, consistently and (apparently) effectively (since you all have stopped challenging my central arguments and seek, instead, to broaden the conversation into other areas), is that the study mentioned in the OP, and any such studies, can be challenged for its lack of inclusion of important variables, its suspiciously political bent, and the inherent difficulties in comparing any group of highly diverse countries and cultures.
"Massive"? When did I say or post that? I use the term "significant", and I made the point several times -- though apparently not enough enough -- that we do not know the size of that population. It is unreported, undertreated, and tends to seek care only in emergencies -- thus skewing any healh care research negatively.
These are people who work in extremely hazardous occupations, often involving exposure to dangerous chemicals, and who (I'll say this one last time) tend to delay medical care and attention until they are desperately ill or injured. No one is arguing that the US healthcare system is perfect, or that it does not have serious problems. What I have argued, consistently and (apparently) effectively (since you all have stopped challenging my central arguments and seek, instead, to broaden the conversation into other areas), is that the study mentioned in the OP, and any such studies, can be challenged for its lack of inclusion of important variables, its suspiciously political bent, and the inherent difficulties in comparing any group of highly diverse countries and cultures.
No I get your point. I would just suggest that your repeated attempts to minimalize the health study may be misguided. Your objections appear to be based principally first on the immigration variable that you say cannot be quantified, yet according to the most detailed studies available in fact show their influence as being largely insignificant when looking at the big picture of health care. This report in question mentioned it focused on diabetes, cancers, stroke, heart disease, bacterial infections, surgical complications...which due to the young age and relative vigor of the illegal immigrant population takes them out of this equation in large part.
You secondly suggest there is a suspicious political agenda being advanced, however aside from your own personal suspicions you do nothing to prove or validate this, and add to this the facts the study was funded by an American charitable Fund and that many other homegrown American studies tend to reflect the same discouraging results, a reasonable person could be drawn to the conclusion that perhaps the medical professionals are not in fact trying to take a jab at Americans because of their irrational hatred and envy of our country, but instead are simply presenting the results as they find them to the best of their ability as professional researchers.
No I get your point. I would just suggest that your repeated attempts to minimalize the health study may be misguided. Your objections appear to be based principally first on the immigration variable that you say cannot be quantified, yet according to the most detailed studies available in fact show their influence as being largely insignificant when looking at the big picture of health care. This report in question mentioned it focused on diabetes, cancers, stroke, heart disease, bacterial infections, surgical complications...which due to the young age and relative vigor of the illegal immigrant population takes them out of this equation in large part.
Again, I must empathize that the size of the population in question is unknown, remains resistant to self-reporting (for obvious reasons), and is composed of many individuals who pursue hazardous occupations.
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You secondly suggest there is a suspicious political agenda being advanced, however aside from your own personal suspicions you do nothing to prove or validate this, and add to this the facts the study was funded by an American charitable Fund and that many other homegrown American studies tend to reflect the same discouraging results, a reasonable person could be drawn to the conclusion that perhaps the medical professionals are not in fact trying to take a jab at Americans because of their irrational hatred and envy of our country, but instead are simply presenting the results as they find them to the best of their ability as professional researchers.
The agenda of you and your allies, who have spent the past few days criticizing me personally and mischaracterizing my criticisms of the study, is evidence that there exists a reservoir of ill-feeling toward anyone who either tries to make the case that healthcare in the US is not actively homocidal, or that socialism may not be the perfect fit for a country as independent-minded and diverse as ours. I refer again to the snide remarks of one of the researchers who was interviewed by WaPo reporters, and to the prevailing attitude among many Europeans that now that they are safe from their own home-grown monsters through the efforts of the US, they may with confidence impugn our country and its institutions, and ignore the many factors which make comparisons between their tiny and docile populations and our dynamic and brawling citizenry at best questionable and at worst fatuous.
Maybe you should just accept that fact that you've been unable to attach credibility to your opinions and criticisms simply because they aren't credible. As a variety of other posters has been generous enough to point out, time after time after time...
Ok, well let me refocus my point then...if we weren't having to spend billions on care for illegals, even if they are, as a group, generally more healthy, it would take a big burden off our already strapped health care industry. So my point still stands...even $1 spent on illegals for health care is too much, because it takes resources away from real Americans. Those billions could be spent on improving the health care for people that actually belong here.
Are illegal immigrants from the south really not "real Americans?" Mexico is in America. They may not be real United Statesians. If a new country were created from France, Germany, and Spain and called "The United States of Europe" would that make all of the Swedes and Hungarians not "real Europeans?"
Hello! They took the damn vacations becuase the system was set up that way! Americans don't take mass vacations like that because our system is not controlled to the degree that the French system is! If if if. If ifs and buts were candied nuts we'd all have a helluva christmas...
The whole "they wouldn't have been on vacation" issue is more the result of differing attitudes between the US and France about the conflict between labor rights (even getting up into the areas of higher pay, like doctors) and the social necessity of what that labor provides, as was evidenced in the presidential campaign debate over whether striking public employees should be required to continue to provide their essential services in some minimal form. It has little to do with who pays for your health insurance, which is what most of the people here complaining about the various inadequacies of our delivery system are advocating we change, not making all doctors public employees with two-months vacation in the spring. I chalk it up more to cultural differences than to the "universalness" of their healthcare system...
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No, because the study in question covered the years 2003-2004. Don't you ever read anything but the inside of your eyelids?
You didn't understand what I typed. It's understandable if you read it harder.
[quote] Again you confuse medical insurance with medical care. You on the left do that a lot. The point is not who would have paid for the care: it's whether or not it would have been available.
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In France, in 2003, the doctors -- good government employees all -- had negotiated a contract with the government which permitted them to be absent en masse at the beach. Care was thus not available.
Could one assume, then, that your condemnation does not extend to countries with UHC where most doctors are not considered government employees, such as Canada?
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In the messy old USA, with its greedy medical practitioners who are in business for themselves or their corporations, it paid for them to be available to provide care whenever needed.
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Think about who the President of France is. Ask yourself how he was elected -- and pause for a moment while contemplating the events of 2003 and the problems inherent in state-run enterprises...
like the millitary?
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Why, they are eventually included - but in seriously deleterious circumstances, owing to their reluctance to be identified when preventive care might have alleviated their conditions. (They certainly didn't receive it in Mexico prior to their arrival)...Thus, their inclusion as serious ill or morbid patients tends to impact the statistics negatively.
Billy4 did a good job with this, read over that again and see if it sinks in. I.I.'s are less likely to have the studied diseases in the first place, making their significant skewing of the study (by under 7% of the population) unlikely.
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"Lowest satisfaction rates?" Don't make me laugh. What is this, a comparison of the Ford Expedition and the Cadillac Escalade? You are expanding the topic to cover up your inability to deal with the questions that I have raised with the OP.
You don't think whether people think their healthcare is good is a significant factor in finding out whether it is or not?
Maybe you should just accept that fact that you've been unable to attach credibility to your opinions and criticisms simply because they aren't credible. As a variety of other posters has been generous enough to point out, time after time after time...
I would accept that fact if it were indeed factual. On the contrary: the attention I have received from other posters demostrates not that I lack credibility, but that they -- and you -- are unable to refute the perfectly legitimate criticisms which I have directed toward the study cited in the OP.
The whole "they wouldn't have been on vacation" issue is more the result of differing attitudes between the US and France about the conflict between labor rights (even getting up into the areas of higher pay, like doctors) and the social necessity of what that labor provides, as was evidenced in the presidential campaign debate over whether striking public employees should be required to continue to provide their essential services in some minimal form. It has little to do with who pays for your health insurance, which is what most of the people here complaining about the various inadequacies of our delivery system are advocating we change, not making all doctors public employees with two-months vacation in the spring. I chalk it up more to cultural differences than to the "universalness" of their healthcare system...
Chalk up what you wish. The fact remains that government employees both rig the system to their benefit (French doctors / August vacations) and resist substantive change to their sweet deal and carpet-bomb any criticism (our pal saganista / the bloated federal bureacracy).
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You didn't understand what I typed. It's understandable if you read it harder.
<shrug> You referred to events of 1994-95. I referred to events of 2003, which was one of the years incuded in the study. Make up your own mind which is applicable...
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Could one assume, then, that your condemnation does not extend to countries with UHC where most doctors are not considered government employees, such as Canada?
What they are "considered" is irrelevant. How their functions are structured is what is at issue. Please stay on topic.
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like the millitary?
Irrelevant to the discussion.
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Billy4 did a good job with this, read over that again and see if it sinks in. I.I.'s are less likely to have the studied diseases in the first place, making their significant skewing of the study (by under 7% of the population) unlikely.
Yes, I congratulate your team on covering each others' mistakes quite well. Unfortunately, you collecitvely continue to ignore the points I made concerning hazardous occupations, under-identification and under-reporting, and the propensity for this group to delay care until medical events reach a critical stage.
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You don't think whether people think their healthcare is good is a significant factor in finding out whether it is or not?
I think what people think is less relevant than whether or not they are alive and enjoying a good level of health -- especially among Americans, many of whom make it their life's work to complain anytime they are asked about anything, and who are constantly bombarded by media incitements to consider their health care system both less than optimal and the work of evil forces motivated solely by greed.
I think Europeans just feel health should not be a luxury but is a basic human right and IMO they are absolutely right.
I love this statement because I 100% agree with it.
The U.S healthcare system is not very good. The CEO's of those medical insurance companies I would not doubt they make millions of dollars in order to pertain their luxury lifestyles. (From our money that goes into insurance agencies)
Bush does not want America to become a socialist economy. Even if there was something like healthcare offered as a basic need.
Healthcare in America is mostly private. That is why doctors make such good money, the only off-set if healthcare was government owned -- doctors would make less.
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Originally Posted by fishmonger
It demonstrated an essential weakness of everyone having vacation around the same time and of too many people not having air conditioners, as well as the inability of man to plan for every freak environmental catastrophe that occurs. It proves very little about the efficacy of universal health insurance as a whole. It showed a weakness of the French government in being equipped and ready to adequately handle such natural accidents, much as Katrina did for the US government. You keep saying that I'm saying things that I'm not saying, while doing the same to yourself.
That is one thing that I agree with, the same goes on in Ukraine and Russia. (except the vacation is given sometimes in July, but mostly August too)
There needs to be more of a spreading out as to when vacations are given. What if there was some type of federal disaster.. I shutter to think.
I love this statement because I 100% agree with it.
I would agree with it as well if its initial premise were accurate: i.e., that anyone in his right mind considers "health..a luxury."
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