Universal Health Care

[Asguard]

I am in 2 minds as to wether you should be able to come here specifically to use our public health care system

My first thought is humanitarian. That is if you need help then we should give it

My second is political. that you should be putting pressure on your own goverment to fix your own rather than using ours and that if lots of you DO come here and use our system it makes it harder for the health departments to do the staigic planning nessary to plan for our own health needs.

As to the private system go for it, i wouldnt trust that system with a wart but if you want to use it go ahead

edit to add: just so you know im not just blowing smoke out my ass, for this subject we were required to study the SA health plan which shows what the predicted load on different services are expected to be so the state and federal goverment can fund those service that will be needed into the future

 

[joepistole]

I understand. I used to be a paramedic in another lifetime. And you are right, we need to solve this problem ourselves. It is not an easy struggle. But freedom and democracy does not come cheap. Rigiht now in the United States we are struggling with special interests and the neo-conservative movement.
We do need universal healthcare in the United States, and eventually it will come. WE cannont continue to financially bear our current system of healthcare. It is a house of cards that will fall under its own weight if nohing is done to correct it.
All organizations need to have some incentives to be efficient. I am sure you have such incentives. I know the Brits do. And that is what competition does, incents good behaviors to produce better results.

 

[iceaura]

By that measure, the US does quite well indeed. Rudy Guiliani recently noted in an ad that the prostate cancer he was recently treated for has a much higher survival rate in the US than in the UK.
“ the five year survival rate for prostate cancer to be 98 percent in the U.S. and 74 percent in Great Britain. ”

That's a lie by Rudy. The stats are messed up, due to different diagnostic criteria and treatment regimes.

The US diagnoses a lot of rich old men with low grade early stage prostate cancer (most sufficiently old men have some cancer in their prostate) and treats them at large expense and hardship, then records them as "surviving" when they die of heart disease later.

There used to be a web site that tracked the history of personal anecdotes from US politicians, defending the current US system - there are big campaign contributions in that. They are often pretty blatant lies.

All US Congressmen and big city mayors have socialized medical care - the equal of Norway's or France's.

- -
So the US is ranked number one in survival rates for all types of cancer.

You still have diagnosis bias, cause of death bias, income and age bias (old people in the US have socialized medicine, and are often rich as well) and more importantly lifespan bias: the US has shorter lifespans than almost any country with such fancy cancer treatment infrastructure.

 

[Asguard]

out of intrest how did the movie "sicko" rate in the US, it coincidently came out at the same time we were studying UK and US health systems. I couldnt find many conflicts between the infomation reported in that movie and the matierial we were studying. I felt sick when i watched that poor woman who's husband had been denied treatment for kidney falure i think it was. Especially how they had paid to find a match and then denied the transplant, how sick can you be. To a hospital employee's husband no less

 

[Myles]

all this is truly amazing, i had to go to hospital the other day and then my partner did few weeks later. I went to the closest public hosptial which is around the corner from my house. I wasnt very happy with the treatment so when my partner needed to go i took her to the hospital at uni (one of the 2 trauma centers in the state). My point is that my thoughts we only on which hospital gave the best clinical care and not on which i could aford or which i was alowed to atend.

I admire you sentiments but Sandy does not. If a hospital's costs were higher than you could afford, she would castigate you for living beyond your means.

Your thoughts were in the right place but, sadly, those who run the show take advantage of your vulnerability. That's how it looks from here where no one is discrimated against. Every human life is valued.

 

[sandy]

...in countries with better healthcare quality number than those of the United States. So that would include Canada.

There are no countries with better healthcare than the USA. None.

I've always considered healthcare as a service that should always be Government backed, and free.

No thanks. ANYTIME the government gets involved in any of our business, it turns out to be a nightmare.

Our healthcare system is fine. Be responsible. Don't have kids you can't afford. Get a good job, invest well, pay your own way. Live a healthy lifestyle. Don't be a loser and depend on the government for anything. It always disappoints. And fails.

 

[Challenger78]

Firstly i should say hi to anyone who is still here from the last time i was here
long time no see

Anyway as part of my paramedic's degree i am studying the health systems in different countries and i was astonished at the US health system.

In Australia we have 2 health systems, public and private
The public system is paid for both by tax and the medicare levy (ie another tax).
Medicare pay GP's and if they chose to bulk bill Medicare they are free to the public (some chose to charge above the Medicare rebate for different groups)

Public hospitals are banned by law from charging for services. This includes all procdures and all medication including medication they give you to take home

almost all A & E departments are in public hospitals as are all trauma units, they are also the teaching and resurch hospitals and they have the top staff.

Private hospitals are a bit of a joke (we took one patient back to a private hospital after she had just been discharged because she had a BP of over 200 and they told us she just had "high blood pressure")

We also have the PBS which subsides perscriptions to $30 for everyone and about $5 for people on a health care card

In comparision the US has NO universal health care system and when the Clintons tried to introduce one it was voted down. Now yes i know the politisions got pay backs by the stake holders for this but thats not my question. I want to know why the average american cizitizan doesnt FORCE your pollies to introduce universal health care. I am amazed about this when you can see what happens across the border in Canda, in the UK, Australia, New Zeland, even in cuba.

After all like education, universal health care helps the whole country especially business as all the people are treated early rather than living with treatable and preventable cronic health problems which also puts pressure on the unemployment services because people then cant work when in another contry it would be delt with straight away.

G'day mate, yeah, this has been debated since the advent of sicko, My entire high school grade viewed that movie, and was astounded at the stupidity of the US heathcare system. The reason that they thought private healthcare would be better (IMO) was that they thought that privatisation, all the latest and high tech equipment would be brought in due to the interest of the consumer. they didn't count on the lack of preventitive medicine, the GP consultation charge, etc.

Don't worry about sandy, she thinks the sun shines out of America's Ass.

 

[superluminal]

There are no countries with better healthcare than the USA. None.

Prove it.

Our healthcare system is fine. Be responsible. Don't have kids you can't afford. Get a good job, invest well, pay your own way. Live a healthy lifestyle. Don't be a loser and depend on the government for anything. It always disappoints. And fails.

Ha! Get a GOOD job(?). Don't have kids. be verrryyyy careful.

Because if you don't follow sandy's advice, and trim your lifestyle to the bare minimum, you won't be able to afford the health costs in the good ol' USA.

Sandy, why don't you just move back to your island where no one helps or gives a shit about anyone else.

 

[madanthonywayne]

The United States can no longer afford it's current healthcare system. That is the point that conservatives don't seem to get! Our government has created a government run healthcare system that does not work well, and is unquestionalby the most expensive and inefficient healthcare system in the world. Through its regulation of our healthcare industry it has created a bloody mess, because of special interest legislation designed to prevent free market competition.

I'll agree there are problems. But the government is, as you noted, the cause of many of the problems. Medicare and medicaid are already way overtaxed and scheduled to go broke anytime now. If things continue as they are, medicare and social security will soon consume the entire federal budget!

Our government can not afford to provide healthcare. It can not afford to even continue to provide what healthcare it already provides! So whatever solution you propose, you need to keep that in mind.

We need to do three things. First, we need to break up the healthcare monopolies...that means free markets...that means if I can get drugs from Canada cheaper; I should be allowed to get my drugs from Canada...that means that we allow more doctors to be trained. We take down the unnecessary barriers to entry into the profession.And we need improve the way we train doctors...too much time is spent on non-medical training. Second, since everyone has a healthcare risk, everyone should be paying a healthcare premium. In other countries, they do it through a tax. Everyone needs to pay a fair share of the healthcare expense we all pay now regardless if we have insurance or not. Third, we need a common and efficient administrative/information managment system that allows us to significantly cut back on unnecessary and inefficient administrative activities.

Surprisingly, I agree with a lot of that. Just keep the government out of it as much as possible. Pass a few, simple rules. Don't micromanage or require that the insurance include X, Y, and Z.

Require that insurance companies treat the whole country as the group they insure and charge the same fee for the same coverage to everyone. This would probably have to be combined with a requirement that everyone buy medical insurance (as we do with liability insurance for our cars) to avoid only sick people buying the insurance.

And if people want to buy drugs from Canada, fine. The net result of that would probably be prices rising in Canada. But it would probably help a little with drug prices in the US.

That's a lie by Rudy. The stats are messed up, due to different diagnostic criteria and treatment regimes.

It's not a lie. He gave his source. It's just a bit out of date, but newer data still shows an advantage in the US.

All US Congressmen and big city mayors have socialized medical care - the equal of Norway's or France's

. That's not socialized medicine. That's just a great medical plan thru their employer.

You still have diagnosis bias, cause of death bias, income and age bias (old people in the US have socialized medicine, and are often rich as well) and more importantly lifespan bias: the US has shorter lifespans than almost any country with such fancy cancer treatment infrastructure.

With respect to prostate cancer, a very slow, usually not agressive cancer, early diagnosis may, indeed, create some bias. But with most cancers, early diagnosis is the key to survival. So I wouldn't call that a "bias".

 

[Myles]

There are no countries with better healthcare than the USA. None.

No thanks. ANYTIME the government gets involved in any of our business, it turns out to be a nightmare.

Our healthcare system is fine. Be responsible. Don't have kids you can't afford. Get a good job, invest well, pay your own way. Live a healthy lifestyle. Don't be a loser and depend on the government for anything. It always disappoints. And fails.

Sandy, are you a broad who's never been abroad ? You seem to live in a bubble.

 

[madanthonywayne]

Sandy, why don't you just move back to your island where no one helps or gives a shit about anyone else.

You advocate having the government take money from one person at the point of a gun and giving it to another. You call that "help". That's not help, that's extortion.

Help is when your neighboor has a problem and you, of your own free will, help them. Or when someone at your church has their house destroyed by a tornado and the whole congregation pitches in to help them out. That's help.

It's easy to spend someone else's money or to say the government should take care of it; so I can forget about it. Not being in favor of socialixm doesn't mean you don't care about people, quite the contrary. It means you don't think it's in anyone's best interest to put the goverment in charge of everything.

 

[Myles]

You advocate having the government take money from one person at the point of a gun and giving it to another. You call that "help". That's not help, that's extortion.

Help is when your neighboor has a problem and you, of your own free will, help them. Or when someone at your church has their house destroyed by a tornado and the whole congregation pitches in to help them out. That's help.

It's easy to spend someone else's money or to say the government should take care of it; so I can forget about it. Not being in favor of socialixm doesn't mean you don't care about people, quite the contrary. It means you don't think it's in anyone's best interest to put the goverment in charge of everything.

Is your government so desperate that it has to take money from you at the point of a gun ? I've heard of the Texas Rangers but not the Taxes Rangers.

Your definition of care is very narrow.As you appear to be a churchgoer, ask for an explanation of " Am I my brothers keeper ?", " Love thy neighbour as thyself "and " The Parable of the Good Samaritan"

By having the type of healthcare available in any civilized country, how would you be putting that government in charge in any way that would affect people's live other than for the better ?

I think your message means no more than you are unwilling to pay a few more dollars in tax every year.

 

[Asguard]

medicare and medicaid are about to go broke?

how much tax is spent on them?
i am wondering because the medicare levy here is something like 2% of income maybe (could be lower than that) and that pays for most of our health system

oh and on regulating private health insurance, health insurance is regulated here in that they have to submit all there books to the regulater and when they want to increase there fees the regulater decides if they can or not. This is so they can never go bankrupt and yet keep it afordable. On top of that the biggest private insurce company is goverment owned (for want of a better word) so this keeps downward pressure on prices and upward pressure on services

 

[superluminal]

You advocate having the government take money from one person at the point of a gun and giving it to another. You call that "help". That's not help, that's extortion.

Help is when your neighboor has a problem and you, of your own free will, help them. Or when someone at your church has their house destroyed by a tornado and the whole congregation pitches in to help them out. That's help.

It's easy to spend someone else's money or to say the government should take care of it; so I can forget about it. Not being in favor of socialixm doesn't mean you don't care about people, quite the contrary. It means you don't think it's in anyone's best interest to put the goverment in charge of everything.

Unfortunately mad, it's not that simple. I could just as easily respond that your approach advocates allowing the government, in partnership with massive corporations, to control and distribute wealth, opportunity, and essential services at their whim, and you with no say in the matter.

You may recognize this:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

The government is already in everything. I'm not advocating putting the government in control of everything, I'm advocating forcing the government to do the job we gave it and provide for the general welfare of it's people.

Do you think that allowing the private sector to push healthcare costs to the point where no independent american could afford it is in the spirit of that run-on sentence up there? You really think that the the overall health and welfare of the nations people should be subject to the same market fluctuations as the price of gas or a gallon of milk?

Do you think it would be possible, without using the word socialism, to get the government out of all the fucking shit is involved in where it shouldn't be, and getting it involved in the few critical areas that it should? Like doing everything it can to make sure it's population isn't sick, starving or on the street?

I'm not a socialist. I'm a realist.

You really think, like sandy, that those who can take maximum advantage of the corporate system are more deserving of basic health care and services, while those that can't or don't (like millions of struggling single-income families who work as hard as you do except they haul your trash or paint your house) are losers?

I'll bet you don't.

 

[iceaura]

If things continue as they are, medicare and social security will soon consume the entire federal budget!

The US privatized system sucks, and is going broke, true.

Our government can not afford to provide healthcare. It can not afford to even continue to provide what healthcare it already provides! So whatever solution you propose, you need to keep that in mind.

Then we should change our government to one of the many that can.

Surprisingly, I agree with a lot of that. Just keep the government out of it as much as possible. Pass a few, simple rules. Don't micromanage or require that the insurance include X, Y, and Z.

And keep insurance companies out of it, too. All bureaucratic micromanaging is bad, right ?

Require that insurance companies treat the whole country as the group they insure and charge the same fee for the same coverage to everyone. This would probably have to be combined with a requirement that everyone buy medical insurance (as we do with liability insurance for our cars) to avoid only sick people buying the insurance.

And, step two, combine them into one insurance company. The savings in bureaucracy alone would be a third of our current medical bill. That would avoid the miserable situation we have with car insurance, which is only prevented from bankrupting the poor by the fact that we can hire anyone to fix our cars, do without a car if necessary, and throw the cars away if they are too expensive to fix.

And if people want to buy drugs from Canada, fine. The net result of that would probably be prices rising in Canada. But it would probably help a little with drug prices in the US.

Drug prices would not rise in Canada. They have socialized medicine in Canada.

"That's a lie by Rudy. The stats are messed up, due to different diagnostic criteria and treatment regimes."
It's not a lie. He gave his source. It's just a bit out of date, but newer data still shows an advantage in the US.

His "out of date" BS was (and is, so far) still being quoted by him after he had been informed. He lied.

That's not socialized medicine. That's just a great medical plan thru their employer.

It's government furnished medical care. It's not through their employer, it is by their employer - the government "self-insures".

“ You still have diagnosis bias, cause of death bias, income and age bias (old people in the US have socialized medicine, and are often rich as well) and more importantly lifespan bias: the US has shorter lifespans than almost any country with such fancy cancer treatment infrastructure. ”
With respect to prostate cancer, a very slow, usually not agressive cancer, early diagnosis may, indeed, create some bias. But with most cancers, early diagnosis is the key to survival. So I wouldn't call that a "bias".

I listed several biases there. The ones that created the bias Rudy lied about apply to prostate cancer. Others apply to other cancers.

The most obvious general one is that cancer is a disease of old people - who have socialized medicine, in the US. So using cancer stats to criticise socialization is automatically dodgy. Then you have smoking, life span, etc etc etc.

The point is: The US provides second or even thrid world health care for 2/3 of its citizens - the uninsured and underinsured. The US spends twice as much as some other countries who provide first world health care for all of their citizens. That is failure. The US system is a failure.

 

[Norsefire]

But people must also realise that healthcare isn't a business, it's a human service that should be backed by the Government. It's like education, although education in this nation (America) is certainly terrible, in the sense that there is no competition among teachers.

However, if you make healthcare like a private business, then the middle and lower class people will probably get very few, if any visits to a doctor.

 

[pjdude1219]

There are no countries with better healthcare than the USA. None.



No thanks. ANYTIME the government gets involved in any of our business, it turns out to be a nightmare.

Our healthcare system is fine. Be responsible. Don't have kids you can't afford. Get a good job, invest well, pay your own way. Live a healthy lifestyle. Don't be a loser and depend on the government for anything. It always disappoints. And fails.

but you want to get the government involved in peoples choice to get an abortion

 

[pjdude1219]

But people must also realise that healthcare isn't a business, it's a human service that should be backed by the Government. It's like education, although education in this nation (America) is certainly terrible, in the sense that there is no competition among teachers.

However, if you make healthcare like a private business, then the middle and lower class people will probably get very few, if any visits to a doctor.

health care is a public good is what your trying to say

 

[Norsefire]

sandy, America doesn't have the best healthcare, but also not the best doctors either. I believe that's the French.

 

[superstring01]

sandy, America doesn't have the best health care, but also not the best doctors either. I believe that's the French.

American hectare, in general, sucks (that's the mean average). However, my friend, the USA does have the best doctors. In our current day in age money buys the best, and the USA pays doctors more than any other nation on Earth. Moreover, doctors are also attracted to other perks like scientific equipment, which is in ridiculous abundance in the USA. College connections and peer contacts round out the overall fact that the worlds top universities and hospitals are all in the USA.

Tell me why the royal family of Saudi Arabia and Jordan (remember: King Hussein went to the Mayo Clinic for his cancer treatment, do you think a man with access to billions of dollars would have gone to "second best"?), the crown princess of Sweden (she came for Anorexia treatment) and the Sultan of Brunei all have come to the USA for treatment?

~String