That would drive up costs because you’d be getting people who might be otherwise healthy and need little medical care volunteering for it. The point is to keep them from being a drain on the system where you can.
But you have to qualify for hospice. A doctor (in the US, at least) has to certify that you will probably die in six months.
I don’t know how accurate the numbers are, but I keep hearing health care workers saying that 90% of a person’s medical costs occur in the last year of their life. There are a lot of scans and tests and surgeries and scrambling to try and make it not be the last year.
Hospice also precludes any life extending therapy. Anything done has to be comfort related. You get antibiotics, for example, if the infection is causing pain or discomfort. And you have the right to refuse it, even if.
If more people opted out of the last scramble, it might save money. I’m not recommending that this be encouraged. It’s just the only thing I can think of that might keep end of life costs down. My Aunt, for instance, had at least eight different scans that I know of in the last four months. And two surgical procedures. She would not have been the least bit interested in anything that assumed she was going to die soon, but trading that for four months of increased pharmacy costs would have probably cost less.
I would have to agree with a poster up thread…the cheapest way to die in Canada is probably to round up the old folks and walk them out into the middle of no where sans clothing in the dead (no pun intended) of winter. Then simply round up the corpse-sickles and dispose as seems fitting.
Not sure what the Great Debate is here though…
-XT
If we’re really trying to have low-cost population reduction, we should probably consider disposal of the body, too. Incinerators are somewhat expensive to run, but they’re certainly cheaper than burial.
Ideally, you don’t even have a body to dispose of. I recommend that as many people as possible become lost at sea. Far enough out, and the fish will take care of the funeral. We could put some tracking devices on the boats so that they could be recovered.
:snort:
I really doubt that. I don’t expect to see Canadian-style health care in my (present) country in my lifetime. It would be shot down for some kind of moral reasons, as contrary to Individualism or Teh Market or something.
Never because it couldn’t work here, ehe? Well, we all have our prejudices…
-XT
I think this is it. Of all the method mentioned, this is the only one that saves anyone money as well as being cost-free to begin with.
From that, it sounds like a blanket Do Not Resuscitate order on everyone over the age of …70? is the way to go.
If the goal is to save money, lower that to 30. Necessarily fewer recissitations = more savings.
Also, rather than limiting yourself to recussitations, you could also stop handing out things that will prolong the time until that inevitable need to recussitate. Of course if you follow this line of thinking this soon starts sounding like the cancelation of that health care…which is of course the simple answer to the OP.
You are going to have to clarify what you think you are trying to accomplish and demonstrate a reason to post it on the SDMB pretty quickly. Otherwise this thread is about to die with no cost beyond a coupe of keystrokes.
[ /Modding ]
In realistic terms in regard to both the Canadian problem and the more broad and prehaps less acute North American problem, what are the likely outcomes of our scenario? History has proven that it takes an incredible stressor on the population before they will willingly let go of government goodies, particularly since we’ve pretty well adjusted to the level of taxation required. What is most likely - increase taxes, decreased service, or most amusing of the three secret passive culling of the herd?
Oh, or fourth a bolstering of privatized healthcare.
Being eaten by sharks saves the cost of burial/cremation.
Back off, Granny; I’m 69 now and I’ve got a long way to go yet.
You normally wouldn’t have a long way to go if you need resuscitation :).
Find a way to stop people from aging and you’ve solved the problem forever.
Dude, you are not a Canadian. I wasn’t seriously advocating denying healthcare to everyone past XX age.
And begbert2, killing off those who are still paying into the system is really not a good idea. I thought the op was trying to find a way to get rid of the most expensive health care users. Preventing (to the degree you can) prematurely born infants is probably the more sensible route to take.
Going over Niagra Falls in a barrel - with sponsorship you could even make a profit.
Well, you don’t have to kill them off - you just don’t save them if they start to die on their own. Or injure themselves or something. Worse comes to worst, if they really are producing more than they’re costing, they should be able to pay for themselves or pay for private insurance, right?
Though there is merit to the line of thought of only providing government health care for as long as they’re paying in - this would parallel private insurance quite closely, and presumably there’s some semi-rational reason that they use that model. Though of course this would leave the aged unemployed rather SOL if they need medical attention…but the OP doesn’t give the impression that “concern for the aged infirm” is foremost on the priority list in this thread.
What about the homeless, the handicap, those in prison, people on welfare, school kids, etc? How about if they paid into the system all their lives and didn’t use it?
Dude, the context here is that we’re trying to find ways to reduce health care costs and we’re entertaining ideas on how to shorten people’s lives to do it. Clearly warmth and human kindness aren’t the bottom line here; cold hard cash is, even if we have to ‘encourage’ people to an early demise to achieve our ends.
Given that, I think it’s downright charitable to merely take the health care away at some point and let people die on their own time.
One presumes that children and dependents could be covered under their guaridan’s ‘policy’.
And if people paid in and didn’t use it, well, that presumably is balanced out by people who turn out to need a lot of care while they’re still paying in. While still allowing a decent profit, of course. It works of insurance companies.