Who here knows what is covered and not covered

[ChrisC]

Originally Posted by Mistermobile

So you say the doctor-patient market will be self regulating. But it isn't. Doctors are expensive. Period. Good luck finding one "that charged what they thought was acceptable." I don't know of one doctor that went out of business for lack of patients.

Not in your lifetime. And the reason for that is because the speculators (insurance companies) took over the industry just like a mafia protection plan racket. Then the big, dumb, bumbling government came staggering in, drunk on its power, and tried to make it all better. The result is what you now see. If you want to see a functional healthcare system, you need to go back to the nineteenth century and before. Yes, you hear a lot of people squalling that it was a horrible system. No, it was not a horrible system. The system was fine--people helping people. What was horrible at the time was the medical technology--but that is no fault of the practitioners. The practitioners were trained as best they could be trained, given the state of medical practice, and more importantly, the business model was JUST FINE. As with most all trades of the time, it was extremely simple: you need my service, I provide it, you compensate me for doing so. Simple. Very simple and very effective. It's all these regulations and opportunistic middle men/regulators/governments that have ruined pretty much every aspect of labor and service. They've essentially turned the world into a living hell because hell is what they've modeled their ideals upon.

[Mistermobile]

I am from the Government, etc. ChrisC is just too nice to Congress, Agencies, and the regulators who all benefit from Big Pharma, the American Medical Association (Doctor's Union), Healthcare insurer's (Aetna, Blue Cross, etc.) and the health care industry either directly or indirectly, but mostly directly.

One example that I find galling is that physicians are incentivized to write prescriptions for Big Pharma medicines by trips to "educational" conferences in resort locales.

Physicians' assistants would eliminate the doctor deficit, elimination of the state by state licensure of doctors, competitive purchasing of commonly prescribed drugs, etc. would lower costs are good ideas that so far have not been effected.