Did I ever say it was? Fact is, the uninsured subsidize all the paperwork required by the insurance companies.
My docs office just sent out a note saying that they’ll no longer play the phone tag game with insurance companies in an attempt to get the required pre-approval for prescription meds; a process which sometimes takes days. This’ll result in a reduction in staff needs. It seems to me that if the insured want all these fancy ‘services’ they, or their insurance company, ought to pay for the full actual cost of them, not spread it around to all comers.
I’m in the VA healthcare system. For various reasons, this is the only healthcare I have or receive.
My review of the VA I’m dealing is very positive. Alas, I can then turn around and point to margin’s experiences with the VA.
The VA, locally, does not provide ER services. And getting in to see a doctor can be a wait. OTOH, I’ve never gone to the VA with an acute condition that needed treatment ASAP.
Of course, if one wants VA horror stories, there’s the whole Swango case. For that matter, the old VA earned a lot of the bad reputation that it enjoyed. It’s better now, but there are flaws. I believe that geographic location matters a lot with the VA - some districts are better than others.
But nobody’s bodies are perfectly healthy. Even if right now your body isn’t damaged, it might be in the process of being damage, which is what testing and such is for. One positive side-effect of UHC will be that people are more likely to get check-ups, testing, and post-cure confirmations, which tend to catch many diseases in their early, easy & cheaper to treat stages.
Can someone clarify this point for me?
So, lots of people in the States use emergency rooms as their primary care. Many of those people cannot pay the bill, so the hospital never gets paid.
Does this sound like the whole ‘shoplifting makes us lose money, so we have to raise prices’ scenario? Aren’t people with insurance already subsidizing those without insurance? They have to make money somehow, so they raise prices for those who can afford to pay it, right?
If you have a cite for that I’d love to hear it. When HMOs were a relatively new thing, they were often cited as being a way to give people incentives to get problems treated while they were still in early stages, by making ER visits much more costly to the patient than a regular doctor’s visit.
The way it was working out, even with those people who had the HMOs was that they’d continue their same practices: If they had a problem, they’d wait til it passed some internal standard and then seek treatment in the ER. I think that for a lot of people seeking medical care is an emotional, not a rational, response. And so the patterns for many of them will be the same no matter how the payment for services might be arranged.
Now, I have no qualm accepted the probability that for the uninsured there will be some savings from getting things in early stages. But even there, I’m not sure that it will be all that great.
(I’m not trying to argue for or against UHC. I just remain to be convinced about this argument.)
I was looking around for more information and found, to my suprise, a highly contraversial study from a top university professer detailing all the flaws of UHC.
And, OtakuLoki, I don’t have a cite, my only evidence is anecdotal.
Anyone actuallý read my cite? It looks like you are all way more enamoured of some people’s anecdotes than actual studies.
Also, the glee some of you express at getting something you didn’t have to pay for is just gross. “Yeah, so I went to the doctor and got surgery and medicine through a system that’s about 60 percent funded by the top 5 percent of taxpayers, and I only paid ten bucks! Awesome!” Bleh.
No. We’re all paying (unless you juste visited). If you live in a country, and they have UHC, then everyone in the country is paying for the HealthCare. If anything, that’s more likely to happen here, what with Medical Bankruptcy/ER skip-outs/illegal immigrants/etc. Just because one person may not pay for everything involving them doesn’t mean they aren’t paying anything.
You are missing a golden opportunity here to handle this billing situation the good old American way: LAWSUIT. I’m not sure if you have a personal injury attorney, but I know one can be found in your area by calling 1-800-PI-Lawyer.
I hope you held on to the defective Q-tip as you’ll need it for evidence against the negligent manufacturer who so carelessly attached the cotton swab to the stick. Sure it didn’t cause any lasting physical damage, but you are clearly suffering from emotional distress. And you should reel in a lot more than $600.
Who needs socialized healthcare when we have frivolous lawsuits? As a fellow American, I’m hanging my head in shame that you didn’t think of this.
Anecdote ≠ data and all that, but I thought I’d share this.
Every time anyone that I’ve known has had anything remotely medically serious, they’ve been treated promptly and well under the NHS. One of my friends in college was suffering from recurrent headaches and went to the opticians to see if it was his eyes. The optician (free)* noticed unusual swelling behind his eyes, sent him to his doctor (free), who sent him to hospital for an MRI (free). He had a large brain tumour removed the next morning (free), if it had gone any longer he probably wouldn’t have made it.
Cost was nothing, wait was nothing, and the after care he’s had has been great. He’s told me about how he’s had his sperm frozen for if the radiotherapy has its nasty side-effects. All on the NHS. And for more trivial cases, it seems to work pretty well in my experience. I’ve never had a wait to see my GP, only ever to see specialists, and never really that long in that case.
*I’m aware that the (free)s in the above are not really ‘free’, but paid for via taxes. But they’re free in the same sense that the fire service and the police are.
No, we all understand that we pay for it in taxes every year. That much is understood.
I tried to think of an argument you would understand, but couldn’t find one. I disagree that many people find you likeable (as you said in another thread).
Sure did read it. Did you read George Kaplin’s statistics on longevity and infant mortality that indicate the US trails countries with socialised medicine?
And you find it “gross” to hear that people got medical care they needed without losing their savings and winding up destitute? Interesting. Over here, we tend to read stories of people dying or being bankrupted by health problems with a sense of horror and disbelief that it could happen in a country as rich and world-leading as the US. We pay 1.5% of our taxable income to the Medicare levy, so someone earning $80,000 pays for two cottonbud removals a year… Kinthalis’s $72,000 doctor would almost cover one an hour!
Uh…we do pay. I pay taxes and it doesn’t hurt at all. And I got to go to the doctor the day my eyes swelled up without putting it off because it would be too expensive. And I got to buy my medication without worrying that I couldn’t afford it.
I’ll tell you what’s gross. Trying to defend your need for medical services to your insurance agency, month after month. Never going to the doctor because your insurance might not cover it. It’s pathetic and disgusting, and a civilized society shouldn’t have to put up with it.
EDIT: must type faster! 
I’m a moderate. Put me down for “qualified success” please. 
Because a blog is far more reliable?
Take this item from your cite:
Inflammatory and vague. “Up to one million?” Currently about 545,000, of which over a tenth wait a week or less, half are seen within four weeks, over three-quarters within eight weeks and over 90% within 12 weeks. It’s not ideal but it’s not dire either. I’ve been in that last 10% and to be honest it wasn’t remotely life-threatening (surgery on a deviated septum). There’s nothing wrong with sensible prioritization.
As for “an issue in every election”, political rhetoric is not entirely germane in that the opposition will always seek to point out the failings in the system and the current government to point out the improvements. The truth is that waiting lists peaked around 2000 at three-quarters of a million and have been declining ever since. Out of hours care has improved (at least in London) and patients now have much more control over which hospitals they attend and GPs they see.
As for rebutting Michael Moore, I don’t care. He’s a twat who deliberately misuses facts to increase his smugness factor and adds nothing to either side of the debate. George K has more relevant stats above.
Awesome not because we got something for nothing but because we got something that is fundamentally necessary that we may well not have otherwise been able to afford. Awesome because I didn’t have to decide between my daughter’s well-being and the furniture. That is awesome indeed. And I’ve been paying UK taxes for many years now; it’s only recently that I’ve required more than the odd GP visit from the NHS. It probably evens out in the long term.
That said, it’s ironic that this all got started because someone failed to use a Q-Tip properly. I mean - dude! It’s not exactly a gunshot wound. Buy some tweezers.
I’m happy for you, Ivy. I’m glad things are going well and you are being cared for.
Guess what - if I was diagnosed with breast cancer today I, me, myself would have to pay for Neulasta shot entirely on my own. Look at the cost pre-insurance for your treatment. If I had breast cancer I would have to pay ALL of that entirely on my own. Except I can’t. Really, I can’t. If I liquidated everything I own I could not pay for more than two of those shots you mention. Just two. Nevermind tests, surgery, chemo/radiation, reconstruction… I am unable to pay for it because I HAVE NO MONEY and I HAVE NO INSURANCE.
Tell me - what do you think would happen to me in that situation? My family can’t help out - my parents are already paying crushing medical bills, one sister is on welfare supporting two kids on her own, the other has six-figure debt and two kids to raise… there is no money to be had from my family.
What would happen to me? I would die, that’s what would happen. I would die of my cancer, and if I was lucky I’d be able to get some painkillers.
That’s why I stay out of threads about people going through major medical stuff like that, because it only makes me angry to know that my fellow citizens don’t think I deserve equal treatment and that if it were me with the serious diagnosis I’d be discussing how to scrape together enough pennies for some painkiller and what music I want played at my funeral rather than how I’m going to get the latest treatments, get better, and get back to living my life.
I realize that I’m a second-class citizen when it comes to medicine in this country. I hate it. I really, really do, but until I have insurance I realize that a major disease like, say, breast cancer, is a death sentence in the US.
Given a choice between being allowed to die simply because I’m not wealthy enough to live, versus some waiting in line, I’ll chose the “socialized medicine”.
You know what? Senior citizens already have single payer medical care, called “Medicare”, and they’ll fight tooth and nail to keep it.
See the VA only serves one small segment of the population, and it’s easy to ignore a minority. If EVERYONE was in the same system then everyone would have a stake in making sure the system was adequately funded and run with some competence.
This is really fucking rich. Let be add my voice to the choir calling Rand Rover on his bullshit. I lived in a country with socialized medicine for two years and I went to the doctor only once. I fell off my bike and thought I had broken a rib. Went to the doctor and saw him within 30 minutes. Showed him my social security card (I even got one as a foreigner!) and never saw a bill. If I would have been billed it would have been 100 dollars for a 10 minute consultation.
What is really fucked up is these assholes can’t see that having good healthcare makes a nation more competitive. It’s a hidden tax on companies setting up shop in the US. You have to pay healthcare. If we take that away then not only do we get healthier workers, we also make it cheaper for businesses to set up shop here.
Now who the fuck do you think pays for people who go to the hospital and can’t pay now? We all do, of course, through every single thing we pay for in the healthcare industry. There’s no such thing as a free lunch and the hospital is going to pass the cost down to us.
Except with socialized medicine, maybe we can catch some of these problems before the become an emergency and save some money?
Oh but no, nevermind. I forget that the free-market fairy will take care of all and make us all fat and merry. It’s an ideology as out-dated as communism. The ones who are truly duped are the assholes like Rand Rover who think that people become wealthy and successful. Guess what, the guys who are super fucking rich, don’t believe this bullshit.
Just tell me how come all of these nasty commies in Scandinavia manage to top us in GDP per capita? Maybe we ought to start paying attention to what actually fucking works in this world instead of idealized fantasies by right-wing douchebags who never actually ever earned any fucking money?
I see this argument trotted out from time to time as “proof” that socialized medicine doesn’t work.
All it proves, though, is that those who have the money can and do choose to bypass the system and purchase quicker/better/fancier care when they desire it. I made a large enough salary and had $40K at my disposal, I’d probably choose to spend the money on immediate treatment from a highly regarded surgeon with top-notch qualifications, rather than wait a couple of months to see a run-of-the mill surgeon at no extra cost.
Socialized health care does not and never will work for the small segment of the population who can afford top-shelf medical treatment. However, it works wonderfully for the rest of us who need access to good-quality health care without worrying about being paupered in the process.
Hell, even some visitors pay for it in the UK. I was there for six months on a visa that let me hold a job, and there was a slice of every paycheck that went towards the NHS, even though I wasn’t covered by it.
[qoute=DeadlyAccurate]I’m curious how UHC stacks up in countries with populations as large or larger than ours.
[/quote]
Um, in case you’re not joking…that’s a big part of the problem. There are no first-world countries with populations remotely near that of the US. Japan is closest and has roughly half our population. The only countries that are larger, population-wise, are China and India. Most of the countries that are close to our size are the types of places where groups like Doctors Without Borders work - they may be great for a developing nation, but there’s nowhere that can really guide America through this.
I bow to your superior wit! 
Maybe the rules have changed since you were here, but currently if you are employed in the UK by a business with a principle place of business in the UK, then you are entitled to treatment on the NHS, as are your spouse and children under 16. There are even allowances made for certain voluntary workers too.