by Diogenesister 100 Replies latest social current
LHG we are taking in a lot of immigrants and providing shelter and food . Many are put up in hotels over here . We aren't a huge country.
Thing is Americans who have good insurance cover can still be refused treatment, can still go bankrupt and can still die for example from lack of insulin.
Under an NHS type system everyone would pay less and not have to worry about going bankrupt or being refused treatment.
Jan from Tam
LoveUni - We pay the majority of big pharma costs worldwide. I agree with you and LHG and want no one going hungry/suffering -- the bleeding heart side -- and they should not considering what responsible, hard-working, Americans pay.
There's a reason medical students run to the US for education and desire to practice here -- they make decent money! They even flee from renown medical centers such as California (state taxes and make much less/salaried) than private practice in other states. Socialized medicine KILLS incentive -- fact! Liberal doctors worried about socialized med in US yrs. ago. Some still earn well but many were leaving the practice - 62-63% even in 'social' (oops, not social) America. They couldn't make a decent living w/all the ins. time waste, malpractice insurance, costs, taxes, etc., etc. I'm not referring to the top heart or oncologist specialists in the state/country.
Some states with no state taxes aren't quite what the minions think -- double fees for auto licensing - children's sports' costs/fees, ridiculous insurance rates (highest if not highest in country in LV) trucked in food regions so more expensive to eat, higher utilities (weather extremes) and housing costs (especially high end communities) equivalent to California w/growth explosion west/northwest regions. Always same price real estate in couple of affluent 'hoods LV same as Beverly Hills/couple of golf course communities as far back as late 80s. Everyone thinks it's cheaper -- wrong! Know people in NV and Idaho moving back to San Diego/so cali -- can't afford to live here. I can live cheaper at the beach😊 yeah -- but I won't full time. Three families left Bend, Oregon -- couldn't take it and balanced politically/one quite liberal. Starter homes WERE good incentive in this tax-free state but so many paying exorbitant rates for apts w/rate increases quarterly having to leave. Racing here.
LV101:
Thanks for your informative post.
Even though I was aware of why medical students overseas want to practice here in the USA, I wasn’t fully aware of what states with no state taxes have to deal with: which is that they end up paying exorbitant amounts of money for everything else!👎
@Jan:
Thing is Americans who have good insurance cover can still be refused treatment,
Not true. Unlike the EU/UK, hospitals cannot refuse to provide treatment due to lack of payment. I work in the upper echelons of a major healthcare system, unpaid treatment is a major headache.
can still go bankrupt
Anyone can go bankrupt, that’s a good thing as protections from creditors to garnish wages enter in when you are bankrupted. You do have to be pretty irresponsible to go bankrupt though over anything.
and can still die for example from lack of insulin.
Another partial myth. Most people die due to unreasonably rationing their insulin because of myths that are perpetuated about insulin. Almost all cases of insulin deaths are avoidable and parents have gone to jail for ultimately being stupid or abusive about it.
You, with few exceptions, can get very cheap insulin. Go to any vet and insulin is $25/bottle which would provide a human with 30 days of doses. This is the same insulin that was widely used until the early 2000s and still widely used in second and third world countries. If you need auto-injectors there are various open projects for 3D printing those, FDA regulation however prevents the general public from knowing about them. Importing animal derived insulin abroad is an option.
The primary problem right now is lack of human derived insulin, something that was marketed towards diabetics as somehow superior (in all but the rarest cases that is untrue) and Joe Biden recently made it so that insulin has a capped price (similar to EU style regulation), causing all but the largest manufacturers to exit the market both in the US and in the EU - the US market had been subsidizing EU consumption of the product, but the price caps are unreasonably low making even production infeasible which is causing a worldwide shortage and soon human insulin will likely become completely unavailable.
For about 90% of diabetics however (the people with adult onset type 2) proper diet and exercise would suffice.
Here in Australia, we have a 2 tier health system. It is usually ranked amongst the highest quality in the world. Everyone has access to free health care but you can also buy private health cover as well, if you want to. We also have reciprocal medical agreements with 11 other countries that cover most medical expenses, if needed , while in those countries. (U.K. is one of them.)
There can still be long wait times for elective surgery and the system is definitely not perfect.
Health care is something all of us will need at some stage, even if its just a visit to the doctor. Why would anyone not want it available for free- or low cost, to everyone?
@jojo: when you’re talking about wait times, the system is broken. Waiting for people to die is not healthcare, especially if you’re asking money (taxes) for the privilege. If government healthcare was better, there would be no wait times, costs would be lower, no such system exists however, medical tourism only happens in a few places in the world and those are universally private systems.
Why would anyone not want it available for free- or low cost, to everyone
Because that’s a myth. Hospitals are expensive places to run, someone has to pay for it. If the government pays for it, that really means that you are paying for it through several middle men so it becomes much more expensive, the only way to cut cost is then to ration health care which is what UK, Canada, Australia and EU does, if you’re 80 you’re cut off, if you’re too unhealthy you’re cut off and if the treatment is too expensive, then we propose alternatives (eg forced euthanasia, amputation, marijuana and other non-medicinal drugs, concentration camps for COVID etc).
The question is why would you entrust your healthcare to a corrupt government system. If you’re talking about private/public systems, you’re paying twice, once for the public system and then again for the private system and because not everyone is in the private system, it ends up being much more expensive which is why people unilaterally go to the US for care.
Anon, you make a fair point about wait times in some cases. I was referring to elective surgeries like hip replacements etc.
For another example, an older relative recently had a heart attack. Within a few days they received a full heart bypass, followed by post care and several weeks rehab, all free in the public system.
If someone is injured in a road accident-even a pedestrian, they are fully covered for all health care, sometimes for life and may also receive a pay out in compensation, depending on their injuries. The injured patient doesn't have to try to find the person to sue, it is all taken care of.
Yes, we certainly pay for it in taxes and fees, but personally I think it reduces the anxiety of any health emergency.
Elective surgeries aren’t unnecessary and delaying them is unnecessary pains and suffering and accelerate death. People don’t just decide to get new hips or cancer treatments for the fun of it. What does happen in systems like that is that people that are older get put on long wait lists, if you’re too sick a panel of bureaucrats decides to end your care effectively the government choosing to kill you to save money and given there is no other option, you can’t do anything about it. Not sure why people would consider that better or more humane.
As far as the other argument, private systems have a thing called insurance, I don’t have to worry about paying my doctors if I need a surgery, out of pocket limits are reasonable (so I can’t go bankrupt) and if in an accident I likely don’t have to worry about that, my insurance provider will happily sue on my behalf and get their share of the money out of the other party, in most cases insurance companies will settle these matters out of court though.
Given car insurance is unregulated, it is very cheap. Likewise dental and eye care is unregulated and very cheap, even less than the co-pay you pay for your government dentist and we go to the dentist twice a year, where I came from in the EU, we went every other year unless you paid privately.
Health insurance on the other hand is highly regulated, monopolized by the government by region and with ObamaCare became in some cases 3x more expensive. Still, even in the most expensive states like New York and California, people in the US pay less in taxes and private insurance than they would for government funded schemes although there are, as pointed out, ObamaCare, Medicare and Medicaid which are the government funded schemes, they do give the same coverage as privately funded insurance, no wait times, no death panels, but with higher deductibles, higher co-pays and they pay providers only 70% of actual incurred cost.
Hospitals in America are more expensive to run than anywhere else because they are ripped off by pharmaceutical companies and have to pay top dollar for everything.
The NHS is the largest pharmaceutical customer in the UK because it buys in bulk for all hospitals. So it can haggle and cut drug prices.
Also the NHS doesn't spend a fortune on pen pushers in offices calculating bills.
Cancer treatment isn't considered elective surgery, where did that come from ? I had breast cancer and my husband had a cancerous tumour on a kidney. We were both treated very quickly.
Much of what you have said is GOP propaganda. And people shouldn't go bankrupt and sell their homes to stay alive .
Jan from Tam
