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My God, you're more than just a Socialist, you're also a Globalist. You want all Americans to go under one health plan controlled by Globalists such as yourself and pass it off as something wonderful. Create a crisis, then have all of the plebs begging for massive government takeover. What are your REAL intentions? You scare me!!!!!!!!!!!!
I want to try to stop the 27,000 Americans dieing from preventable deaths each year because of no health cover.
Hospitals dont get paid enough by the government and have to file bankruptcy and close?
Doctors have their salaries cut and no longer see it worth 8+ years of school for a smaller salary?
Seniors, cant find retirement homes to go to because the cuts wont pay for their stay?
Employers across the country cut out their insurance causing an increase in the uninsured, not a decrease?
When people from other country come here to receive medical treatement at the taxpayers dime?
When medical facilities get caught committing insurance fraud, and get fined, thereby limiting the amount of money available for your medical care?
When hospitals dont have enough money to buy newer, better machines for better care and have to go without?
When the government decides that a procedure is worth $X and the hospitals say no, they cant afford to do it for that amount..
When insurance companies start to pay off the politicians to get access to their new billion dollar insurance contracts with the government for care..
Any others? Any answer?
Based on the exprience of other countries with socialized medicine, these are non-issues. In fact, they seem more indicative of our present system than anything else.
Not even close, the war cost about $100 Billion a year, this will cost TWENTY times that.
I dont want the thread to turn into a discussion on costs, I want to discuss what WILL happen IF we get UHC and we cant afford it, which we cant.. What are you willing to then do? What will be the proposals to "save the hospitals", keep doctors working, keeping offices open? I already know one guy who is facing bankruptcy because government is cutting back on payments so much he cant afford to keep his practice open, and his practice sees thousands of ill individuals (I believe mental illness but not sure). Should the government then nationalize the doctors offices to keep them open?
Well if you get a UHC and it fails because you can't afford it at least you will be the FIRST industrialised nation to have "cocked up" creating a successful UHC. What a honour huh?
You (and others) dont' usually provide "links" when posting your side -
Actually, we do provide links and the provided links are from credible sources as well.
Since you do not provide links or data to back up your fear based scenarios, we can give them the attention they deserve.
Ooh and btw, Japan also nationalized some of their hospitals that cant afford to stay open, (brings you back to my OP, will we then nationalize the hospitals?)and can tell their sick that they wont treat them..
Yeah, lets all get universal health care like Japan
Yeah and read this!
Quote:
Says Linda Lawrence, president of the American College of Emergency Physicians: "We can no longer guarantee that a bed is going to be available when you have your heart attack. I hope this is a wake-up call to society."
In 2003, 501,000 ambulances were diverted from the hospital where they normally would have delivered a patient because the ER was full. In 2004, 70 percent of urban hospitals reported that their emergency departments had been "on diversion" at least once.
As increasing numbers of the unemployed and uninsured turn to the nation’s emergency rooms as a medical last resort, doctors warn that the centers — many already overburdened — could have even more trouble handling the heart attacks, broken bones and other traumas that define their core mission.
If you look at countries like Japan - who is having to CLOSE hospitals and clinics because they can no longer afford to keep them open...
Japan's clinics and hospitals are part of the private sector. They open and close of their own accord. The Japanese system is essentially a national insurance system that everyone is required to join. An interesting feature of the system is that the cost of virtually every procedure is negotiated between physicians and the Ministry of Health every two years. This keeps costs low. In fact, the major problem in Japan is that they don't spend enough on health care. The care that the Japanese people get is great, but they are currently underpaying for it at roughly 8% of GDP to the extent that nearly half of clinics and hospitals are operating in the red. Costs will have to be negotiated up at some point, but that's quite the problem to be worried over -- spending too little on health care. Few in this country ahve any experience at it at all.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Greatday
...to France and Germany who are going into severe financial crisis because of their system (and more and more French citizens choosing the private doctor route for better care)...
The health care system in neither country is going into severe crisis, and there is no such thing as private and public doctors in France. They are all private, with the exception of a very small percentage employed in a relative handful of state-owned hospitals. France is a multi-payer rather than a single-payer system. Virtually every doctor works with every payer. There are public payers and private payers, but no public and private doctors.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Greatday
I don't think you can say they are "all successful".
They are all more successful than we are. They pay much less than we do while receiving better overall care. Should I ask why you hate America for NOT wanting us to have more for less as well?
From 2006 data, the per capita cost of health care in the US was $6,100. In France, it was $3,500. We had 3.6 hospital beds per thousand people. France had 8.4. We had 2.3 physicians per thousand people. France had 3.4. Life expectancy in the US was 78.1. In France, it was 80.9. A US physican earns about five times the average US wage. A French physician earns about twice the average French wage. The French physician doesn't care. He has no medical school loans to repay. Medical and nursing school are free. He has very nearly no malpractice insurance to pay. Malpractice is dealt with in a system of medical courts. He does not have to hire any admin assistants to do insurance paperwork. The payment system is easy to work with. Anyone in France can go to any doctor. No one can tell a doctor what tests or procedures he may or may not perform. The course of medical care is determined by the doctor and patient alone. There are rarely waiting lists for elective procedures and no requirements for outside pre-approval. No one can be excluded from coverage for pre-existing conditions or for poor general health. The French health care system is consistently ranked at or near the top of those available in developed nations. The US health care system is consistently ranked at or near the bottom.
That is the state of things. We can continue the massive waste of our health care dollars by keeping to the path we are on now, or we can resolve to have better care at lower cost by finding to a different system. Others have done so before us, and are happier and healthier for it.
Last edited by saganista; 06-21-2009 at 09:22 PM..
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