why do some Americans cling to the delusion that private healthcare is better than nationalized healthcare....

Question

http://www.amazon.com/gp/richpub/syltguides/fullview/RZ8NM8VYDK2OB

Evidence from other countries indicates that government-supported health care leads to a healthier population, yet the US continues to spend more than twice as much per capita on health care than comparable countries while having a population that’s less healthy than Europe or Canada.

Over 50% of US bankruptcies are related to unpaid medical bills.

One of the most elequent justifications I've read for government-financed health care for all is a chapter in the book Why the Christian Right Is Wrong: A Minister's Manifesto for Taking Back Your Faith, Your Flag, Your Future. Author Robin Meyers, a minister in the United Church of Christ, says it is simple justice. Jesus was a healer and Christians should care about healing the sick. Providing health care for all is the right thing to do and is more important than tax cuts for the wealthy.

Dolly

that is just anecdotal. it gives no insight into the big picture, whereas the statistics do...

http://photius.com/rankings/healthranks.html

commonsense

i want nothing more than healthcare for every citizen.

what is the point of being the wealthiest nation on earth if you cannot provide healthcare for every citizen?

Answer 1

I suppose you would pay for it by taxing smokers?
We are already facing bankruptcy from social "security".

Franklin Roosevelt introduced the Social
Security (FICA) Program. He promised:

1.) That participation in the Program would be
completely voluntary,

2.) That the participants would only have to pay
1% of the first $1,400 of their annual
incomes into the Program,

3.) That the money the participants elected to put
into the Program would be deductible from their income for tax purposes each year,

4.) That the money the participants put into t he
independent "Trust Fund" rather than into the
General operating fund, and therefore, would
only be used to fund the Social Security
Retirement Program, and no other
Government program, and,

5.) That the annuity payments to the retirees
would never be taxed as income.

Since many of us have paid into FICA for years and are
now receiving a Social Security check every month --
and then finding that we are getting taxed on 85% of
the money we paid to the Federal government to "put
away" -- you may be interested in the following:

Q: Which Politic al Party took Social Security from the
independent "Trust Fund" and put it into the
General fund so that Congress could spend it?

A: It was Lyndon Johnson and the democratically
controlled House and Senate.

Q: Which Political Party eliminated the income tax
deduction for Social Security (FICA) withholding?
A: The Democratic Party.


Q: Which Political Party started taxing Social
Security annuities?

A: The Democratic Party, with Al Gore casting the
"tie-breaking" deciding vote as Preside not of the
Senate, while he was Vice President of the US.


Q: Which Political Party decided to start giving
annuity payments to immigrants?

A: Jimmy Carter and the Democratic Party.
Immigrants moved into this country, and at age 65,
began to receive Social Security payments! The
Democratic Party gave these payments to them,
even though they never paid a dime into it!
Then, after doing all this lying and thieving and
violating of the original contract (FICA), the Democrats
turn around and tell you that the Republicans
want to take your Social Security away!

If you like what they've done there go for the government health care too. How long do you think it would be before it became legal to euthanize people that were "too expensive" to treat? Or before certain activity became too "high risk" for us "free" Americans to participate in? I suggest you move to a "better" country that already has socialized medecine.

Answer 2

I worked for numerous years in a county hospital district supported by taxpayers(a county wide government healthcare plan) and I have for years had my own health care provided by the Veterans Administration(a nationalized healthcare plan for qualifing veterans).
My experience is that in both systems the health care is rationed. If one needs surgery it will take 6 months to 18 months--not something you want if you have cancer or a brain tumor. I have personal first hand experience of friends dying before surgery or treatment. Also, the latest drugs and proceduresare not available--period. There is a list of criteria that each person must met in order to surgery or treatment.
If you are elderly with high blood pressure, diabetic, history of alcohol or tobacco abuse or drug abuse or obese--you may will often not get the treatment--not because you don't need it or the outcome will increase your life expectancy, but because someone else without these health problems will beneifit more.
So is this something you really want? I know I don't. I know veterans that pay for treatment and surgery they can not get from the VA-- laser surgery of prostrate, spinal surgery, and etc. They also, go to a private physican for the latest in medications.
The line has to be drawn and will be drawn on what medications, equipment, and procedures the budget will allow--the budget will not be set to cover everything for everyone.
The Veterans Administration is a good example--you can not pick your doctor(and there is no second opinon on your treatment), it is not usuall to wait months for a doctor's appointment, you have to travel miles sometimes over 300 miles for treatment. It was orginally set up that all veterans were covered, now only veterans that have injuries from the time they were in the service or veterans that are extremely poor are covered. The facilities are clean, but old and often lack comfortable temperature settings.

Answer 3

Like Suzy c I am also a Brit living in the US and like her also the only thing that scares me is the healthcare system over here, and the fact that most insurance doesn't really give you the full cover you should have.

Most hard working Americans I know don't seem to understand the concept of a national healthcare system and don't think it would work, some however who are self employed and work like hell and can't even afford health insurance try to put it to the back of their minds and just pray that they will never be seriously ill.

Americans as you say are somewhat deluded or should I say wish to remain blissfully ignorant of the facts, as I said they can't seem to grasp the concept of mostly free healthcare, anything that has a socialist ring to it seems to send shivers through them like the Russian missiles trundeling through Red Square we used to see on TV years ago, The national healthcare system in the UK was created after WW2 so that no one would ever go without healthcare and would never be burdened the with extortionate cost directly, becoming what is regarded as one of the greatest achievements of the 20th century.

I don't like to critisize this country that I now live and work in and the really great people that I have become friends with, but I wish they would realise that they are being ripped off by an old fashioned greedy system, Americans who work for themselves and who are trying to achieve the American dream deserve better than to lose everything just because they become ill, or is it that the greedy diabolical insurance companies have more power than the government itself!!!

Healthcare should be non profit making, we should tell the insurance companies to go to hell!!!

Answer 4

Our current health cae system is admittedly a mess. BUT--until the last 20-30 years the US had the est health care in the world. It was a dual system--private in most areas, public where it was needed.

Since then, a succession of deplorably successful efforts by the neoconservatives have turned most of our health care over to so-called "provider organizations" more interested in quick profits than in quality health care. They have encouraged and subsidized the abandonment of corporate responsibility to provide health insurance options to workers. Ad tey have turned most of our public health care over to quick-buck operators ina process of so-called "privatization"--which is nothing more than creating a middleman who takes public money and then payses what they have to as medicare/medicaid--after raking a fat percentage of the top. With no choice of providers or services on the part of the people who have to depend on the system.

etc., etc.

My pint--we don't need nationalized health care. We do need real reforms. But--I'm afraid natiolized (socialized) health care is what we're going to end up with. Why? Because those are the only reform poropasals that are being offered. So far, from the conservative side, all we've heard is rhetoric, knee-jerk idological rants, and political slogans. But that's not going to cut it when people need health care. If the conservative side doesn't start coming up with some real policy proposals--people are going to opt for socialized medicine if that's the only alternative they are offered to the current broken down and corrupt system.

Answer 5

Healthcare is not a right, we do not have to provide healthcare just as we are not required to feed, clothe and provide shelter for all our citizens...Though lately it seems we are heading in that direction. Way to go Democrats! We'll soon all be shelling out even more to the federal government with every paycheck! Apparently the government knows how to spend our money better than we do!?...Yes?

No.

Answer 6

Socialized Medicine does not work as well as you think. I live less than 2 miles from the Canadian Border, almost due south of Montreal. The number of Canadian's who flock into the USA for health care that their own country WILL NOT PROVIDE is staggering.
I would much rather be bankrupt and alive, than wealthy (which you can kiss bye bye in taxes should socialized medicine ever occur) and DEAD.

Answer 7

The question is not as clear as you have put it. The cost of making the population as a whole healthier is to make compromises on the tail end of life. Open heart surgery, advanced chemotherapy and highly technical diagnostic tests designed to catch illness prior to their advancement to terminal status are simply nowhere near as available in those countries as in the United States.

Add to that the need to permit the government to tell you how to run your lives in order to acheive the benefits of "wellness" and you have a recipe for disaster given the general expectations of the American public as to health care and civil liberties.

Answer 8

Personally (and I have spent a lot of time thinking about this) I think it comes from the myth of the American "rugged individualist" from our cowboy movies; you know, the guy who pulls arrows out of his own back after being attacked by Indians, or the guy who drinks a little whiskey, pours some in the hole in his leg, and digs the robber's bullet out by himself.

The real absurdity is that these folks really believe that by paying for insurance, they are actually taking care of their own needs and being responsible. Insurance was actually developed to spread risk and expense around to provide treatment to those who actually needed it at the time by accepting payments from those who were healthy for the moment. I fail to understand why these folks choose to ignore the fact that this is actually exactly what a tax-based national plan would do, but at a lower cost due primarily to lower administrative costs, coupled with the massive buying power a single-payer system offers.

If we can get the bloodsucking personal injury attorneys out of the picture, the whole thing would even stand a chance of working. They, patent-seeking drug companies, and insurance companies are the primary reasons the cost of healthcare has grown at several times the rate of inflation these past thirty years.

Answer 9

I am a Brit who has lived in the States for 15 years. The one thing that scares me about this country is the health care system and the insurance companies, they have everyone screwed.
When my husband and I bought our house we decided we had to get coverage as in the event of a major medical, we could loose our house.
Our insurance is 5% of our take home. The stupid thing is, that covers nothing. We still have big bills if we go to a doctor or dentist, g0d forbid if is an emergency, it would be worse.
I dread and fear having to go to a doctor and that is not right.
I do wish they would bring on a nationalised sytem. If you wanted to go private as in the UK you could still do so.

EDIT ~ To crabby ~ If you happen to be a low income but own your home, or are trying to, you get no help with health care.

Answer 10

Because some Americans are just dastardly, evil people whose only crime is believing in freedom, and freedom of choice, and that what they earn for a living belongs to them and their families and not to Kennedy, Waxman, Obama, Edwards, Hillary, or any other of the Communists trying to convert this free land into a neo-Soviet Union.