Good morning. Some information and a question for you.?

Question

One of the biggest debates the we continually have here on this forum is National Health Care. I'm finding more and more information with regards to other countries who have this and how it's failing.

Here are some excerpts and a link:
Who's Really 'Sicko'

In Canada, dogs can get a hip replacement in under a week. Humans can wait two to three years

"I haven't seen 'Sicko,' " says Avril Allen about the new Michael Moore documentary, which advocates socialized medicine for the United States. The film, which has been widely viewed on the Internet, and which will officially open in the U.S. and Canada on Friday, has been getting rave reviews. But Ms. Allen, a lawyer, has no plans to watch it. She's just too busy preparing to file suit against Ontario's provincial government about its health-care system next month.

Her client, Lindsay McCreith, would have had to wait for four months just to get an MRI, and then months more to see a neurologist for his malignant brain tumor. Instead, frustrated and ill, the retired auto-body shop owner traveled to Buffalo, N.Y., for a lifesaving surgery. Now he's suing for the right to opt out of Canada's government-run health care, which he considers dangerous. Ms. Allen figures the lawsuit has a fighting chance: In 2005, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that "access to wait lists is not access to health care," striking down key Quebec laws that prohibited private medicine and private health insurance.

In the U.S., 83 House Democrats voted for a bill in 1993 calling for single-payer health care. That idea collapsed with HillaryCare and since then has existed on the fringes of the debate--winning praise from academics and pressure groups, but remaining largely out of the political discussion. Mr. Moore's documentary intends to change that, exposing millions to his argument that American health care is sick and socialized medicine is the cure.

It's not simply that Mr. Moore is wrong. His grand tour of public health care systems misses the big story: While he prescribes socialism, market-oriented reforms are percolating in cities from Stockholm to Saskatoon. Mr. Moore goes to London, Ontario, where he notes that not a single patient has waited in the hospital emergency room more than 45 minutes. "It's a fabulous system," a woman explains. In Britain, he tours a hospital where patients marvel at their free care. A patient's husband explains: "It's not America." Humorously, Mr. Moore finds a cashier dispensing money to patients (for transportation). In France, a doctor explains the success of the health-care system with the old Marxist axiom: "You pay according to your means, and you receive according to your needs." It's compelling material--I know because, born and raised in Canada, I used to believe in government-run health care. Then I was mugged by reality.

Consider, for instance, Mr. Moore's claim that ERs don't overcrowd in Canada. A Canadian government study recently found that only about half of patients are treated in a timely manner, as defined by local medical and hospital associations. "The research merely confirms anecdotal reports of interminable waits," reported a national newspaper. While people in rural areas seem to fare better, Toronto patients receive care in four hours on average; one in 10 patients waits more than a dozen hours.

This problem hit close to home last year: A relative, living in Winnipeg, nearly died of a strangulated bowel while lying on a stretcher for five hours, writhing in pain. To get the needed ultrasound, he was sent by ambulance to another hospital.

In Britain, the Department of Health recently acknowledged that one in eight patients wait more than a year for surgery. Around the time Mr. Moore was putting the finishing touches on his documentary, a hospital in Sutton Coldfield announced its new money-saving linen policy: Housekeeping will no longer change the bed sheets between patients, just turn them over. France's system failed so spectacularly in the summer heat of 2003 that 13,000 people died, largely of dehydration. Hospitals stopped answering the phones and ambulance attendants told people to fend for themselves.

http://socglory.blogspot.com/

Seriously, folks... Is THIS what we want for our country? A system that is failing elsewhere?
There have to be other alternatives, don't you think?

There is no doubt that our system has many flaws, but good grief, I can't begin to imagine it being improved under government control. I'm merely stating that there have to be other alternatives.

Answer 1

The problem is that the status quo is not working. Personally, I've seen my insurance premium and co-pays go up every year, while the service level has dropped. Like or dislike Moore's position regarding socialized healthcare, he does have a MAJOR point here that the system is broken and may be beyond repair. The question is what do we do to fix it. I was talking to a Dr. about the movie the other day and he told me that one of the major reasons insurance costs continue to rise is that there are 45 million uninsured who's medical costs must be absorbed by those of us with insurance. Every bill that a hospital or Dr.'s office cannot collect on forces them to raise prices to offset the loss. Another area that needs to be looked at is malpractice suits. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that there are an aweful lot of predatory law firms out there who make a living off of suing doctors and hostpitals, while their clients are used as pawns. This drives the cost of malpractice insurance up and puts good doctors out of business. I'm a liberal, but I have to say that I agree with the concept of Tort reform to some degree.
Another issues is the fact that HMO's and Managed Care companies force doctors to see MORE patients than they should and cut corners. Since they negotiate service costs with the providers... providers must see more traffic to pay bills. This is not a desireable scenario when it comes to working with public health.
I don't know if full socialized medicine is the answer... maybe there should be a system that allows people to opt out for private if they wish. I still feel that there are a few industries in this country that should not be 'for profit'. And healthcare is one of them.

Answer 2

I'm beginning to think that some kind of universal health coverage is inevitable in the USA. The current system of medical insurance for profit is creating too many problems. I have experienced first hand an insurance company refusing to pay for covered health care. The unpaid bill ruined my credit. It took over a year and a law suit to make the company pay the bill.
Rather than arguing over having or not having universal coverage, we should be looking at designing the perfect system by examining the flaws in the others.

Answer 3

The other countries are failing? Really? The only evidence I've ever seen to support that hypotenuse are the cons whom like the proverbial bobble heads just mimic some right wing bombastic mouth piece....

I know people in Canada, France and else where who are perfectly happy with their health care as opposed to the US where we have millions of uninsured, the highest rate of infant mortality.

Hospitals over charge, Doctors are generally over paid...

Answer 4

There are flaws in every system.
Do you want to keep paying for those that have no insurance? ...because you do, you know.
If you have no insurance you get no hip replacement. You don't need a hip replacement to save your life. It's elective surgery.
I have relatives and friends in the UK. They say there are drawbacks....but they can't understand how the richest country in the world doesn't have coverage for everyone. They think it's amazing that a family could lose everything they own because of a health issue.
Do you know that 2 million more Americans became uninsured last year? In just one year!!
We used to have mainly Blue Cross and Blue Shield. It was sort of a one payer system. There were other insurance companies but mostly that company was used. Almost every working person got it, not only for themselves but for their whole family. The cost started going up and the Republicans decided to have HMO's. That was supposed to keep the cost down. Instead the costs have skyrocketed!! It's now privatized and for profit. We can see the huge mess it's made of our health care. Try to use it sometime when you have a chronic illness.
We need to do something. A nation that is not healthy is never going to get ahead. It will go backwards.

Answer 5

You articulate the point very well. I live near the US/Canada border, and work with many Canadians. I have heard the stories of ridiculous backlogs and lack of treatment quality. I have also seen many of the wealthy Canadians that come to the American hospitals for treatment. They have the means to pay for the care themselves and are unwilling to risk problems dealing with the Canadian system.

The movie of Moore's was built on the premise of socialized health care being superior. Anytime you set a premise like that you can take small incidental stories to make the case look good. However if it were to be looked at objectively, the premise would collapse. I wonder how much of the bad side of things Mr Moore had to ignore and cut out to paint his rosy picture.

Answer 6

What is odd is that I've known many people from Canada and Britain and I've never heard a single one talk about how great their health care system is. On the contrary. They talk about how if you have heart disease and are a smoker, you are put at the bottom of the list. Or how if you have liver failure, and drink heavily, your put at the bottom of the list.
Do we do that here in America? NOPE!
I do agree with one thing. While insurance premiums have gone up, so has the cost of health care, as with everything. It's called inflation. The people that talk about their premiums going up and their quality of care going down need to either blame their employers or themselves for not shopping around a little better. I for one am with Blue Cross Blue Shield. I have family coverage that costs me around $140.00 a month and the quality of coverage is pretty dang good.
For example, a little over a month ago I had a kidney stone drop, and man did it hurt.
I hate emergency rooms, and being a guy, I have to be in really bad pain or squirting blood before I go to the hospital. This time I went though.
I was immediately brought back, IV's started, the doctor came in within a half hour, started pain meds and ordered a CT scan. Found the stone, determined it was small enough to pass safely and sent me on my way. All of this took two and half hours. And I was okay by the end of the day, and much relieved that my guts weren't shredding, because that is what it felt like.
After my insurance paid their part. My part, including copays, was around $250.00. That's including everything. And for those that want to know, the CT scan alone was $600.00. The total bill, had I not been covered would have been almost $4000.00 yet I only paid $250.00.

Those that say they wait for hours in American ER's, I wonder, what did they go there for? If it was a broken bone, believe me, you WILL wait if they have heart attacks, car wreck injuries etc to deal with. It is call the triage system. If it isn't life threatening, you will wait unless they aren't busy.

I've personally never known of anybody with a possible life threatening problem having to wait. My first wife had diabetes really bad, we went to the ER many times, and because of the nature of her disease, they ALWAYS attended to her very quickly.
Even uninsured people if they go to the ER with a serious problem, they WILL be taken care of, PERIOD.

Answer 7

The advantage that we have here in the US in instituting universal health care is that we have the examples of other health care systems and we can evaluate what doesn’t work well and what does.

The European, Canadian, Japanese, etc. universal health care systems have been in effect for decades and we can analyze and Americanize the system to meet our needs and address the problems. It would involve some thinking but we can do it.

The fact is that we have many problems here in our own health care system and we can’t leave them unaddressed.

Answer 8

I do understand your point. Paying for your own health care, as you should know, is also out of wack.
Part of the problem is a lawyer like John Edwards raping the system so he can buy a 28,000 sq. ft. house.
Another problem is a person coming off the street and going to the ER because they have poison ivy. I know they have been treated as such. And I know they didn't pay for it. They said so. They were wondering why I was only using calomine lotion. My poison ivy was much worse.
Thats because MY health care isn't free.

Answer 9

I really believe the problem needs to be clearly defined before we spend a fortune to fix it, I mean if you cannot clearly articulate what the problem is, how can you fix anything.

To all of the idiots, we have universal healthcare in AMerica, it is available to all people regardless of citizenship, it is available to all people regardless of insurance coverage and ability to pay. To say we do not have universal healthcare in America is just a lie. To say that if you cannot pay that you cannot get care is a LIE.

Hospitals and medical care givers budget on average 12% of their operating costs to indigent care. 12% is more than the number of people who do not have healthcare insurance so I am having a problem seeing insurance coverage as the problem.

So if I may I would like to propose what the problem really is, and it is multi-faceted so excuse the rambling.

Health care in AMerica is expensive, we have the best facilities and the best care givers in the world. For those that want to throw up single issues statistics to argue this point you are either stupid or naive.

Most AMericans pay their way and to avoid having to pay doctors and others we instead opt for insurance believing that this is the lesser of the costs. In most instances that is a false belief. The only time you need insurance is for catastrophic care, surgeries, life threatening accidents and illnesses and the like, really big dollar items. Try this, call your health insurance people and tell them you want to reduce your coverage to catastrophic care only and the will say NO.

Currently the health insurers give more dollars to politicians than just about any other industry. Why is that? Insurers want to be able to control regulation and write the laws that effect their profits, and they do that by buying Congress. Eliminate this connection and the cost of insurance will go down.

Lawyers and in particular ambulance chasers increase the costs of insurance. Eliminate punitive damages in health care lawsuits, make the losers pay their own legal fees and this will lower the cost of insurance and care. But of course you do know who is in the top contributors to Congress, lawyers of course, because they want to control the regulation and write the laws that impact their ability to make more money.

So far we are in the early part of my points, but so far we have insurers buying Congress and we have lawyers buying Congress, for the blind, there is a common thread here in the health insurance and care costs............ Congress.

So I am going to stop now, as I believe it is abundantly clear that Congress is a major contributor to the cost of health care and insurance and any fool who wants Congress involved in fixing the problem is blind, ignorant and stupid.

Yes, we need to do something about the cost of insurance. Insurance companies make huge profits, I have invested in those companies for years, better than oil and high tech ever were. This is not bad, but competition is reduced due to congress and therefore the insurers write the rules and can do basically whatever they please, as long as they control congress.

My only thoughts on how to fix this is to remove Congress from the health care picture, let the free market move the costs, let the consumer move the costs of insurance.

I will finish with a socialist healthcare story. My friend, neurologist, says that in the UK if you have an aneurysm and are under 60 years old they will stabilize you and admit you to the hospital and care for you for a week, if after that week you have survived they will send a specialist in to try and repair the damage in your brain, if you are still alive. If you are over 60, they will not treat your aneurysm.

Is this what you want in AMerica?

I don't.

Answer 10

Are you suggesting that the health care system in this country is better than the countries who have a socialized plan?
How long do you have to wait in the waiting room here? And don't forget that an ER visit isn't even an option for many Americans who have no Insurance. Where are the facts of other nations that the health care systems are working?
No system is perfect, but this country could do much better.
And I must say it is a shame how the elderly are affected in this country because of this crisis. Shame on those who put profit before human lives and suffering. And shame on those who think that it is just fine.