For those opposed to universal health care in America, isn't this why people are trying to get it?

Question

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071221/ap_on_he_me/teen_liver_transplant;_ylt=AtCm5uSmosxVr7BF9j9ztCms0NUE

If this was your child or loved one, would you still be against universal health care?

Just asking. This story really pissed me off.

The thing that scares me is that for those of us who actually have insurance, we think we're safe. But this story shows a different story. Are we really that safe with insurance when something really bad happens that will cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars? Think they won't try to weasel their way out of paying?

Darth-My family is insured. This is the scary reality for people who actually have insurance. No one is saying anything about handouts.

Gregory-Then why do the Europeans live longer?

Answer 1

yes it's a must

Answer 2

Universal healthcare rates will cause insurance rates to go up and care to go down.

Not only would you now would have to pay for those Americans without health insurance, but everyone coming into the U.S. for medical care that don't have insurance.

The people that can't afford it need it more. There is already a union in California that caps the number of patients in a hospital. If the hospital is full, you will be shuttled (if it's an emergency) to the closest hospital which could be in another city. This is happening now. It will get worse later.

The only country making medical leaps is the U.S. Other countries use generic care based on U.S. care. There would be no more incentive for R&D research. In order to boost R&D, there would have to be contracts and you probably know how expensive government contracts are. The number of military and infrastructure contractors has been dropping even though the U.S. spends $120 billion on infrastructure repairs a year and $450 billion on military expenses. If that cancer drug doesn't work for you, there is nobody making a second drug for you to try. That's the way it works in other countries.

The death rate per thousand is higher in Europe than the U.S. which is higher than Iraq even though the U.S. and Iraq are supposedly more violent areas. Germany and Italy have twice the death rate per 1,000 (CIA online factbook) than Iraq's. If it's not violence, it's the standard of living and Europe's healthcare system can't keep up.

Answer 3

The story really pissed me off to but there are some things that you don't understand.
I'll try to make a short explanation of something that takes months to understand. So don't dismiss it until you get to the end of it.
People don't have the right to health care, I'd say that not even the right to life. I know it sounds crazy but keep reading.
Every time the socialist system sells you this idea, it's putting the burden in someone else. If you have the right to be fed, someone has to cook for you. If nobody wants to do that, somebody has to be forced to. You get your right and someone else loose his freedom, is turn into a slave. Same with health care, shelter or other socialist freedoms.
You may say that the doctors are paid for, it's true. But they're paid with money taken from others, it's called the "government's money" or the "people's money". Both things are wrong, the government produces nothing and the "people" produces nothing. It's money taken from people that work hard to produce wealth. They are not responsible for each and every one else's welfare. It's not fair.

And it's not only the basic health service we know now. Let's say that I lock myself into a lab for 10 years. I renounce to all frivolities and keep working non stop. At the end, I come up with a cure for cancer. You're about to die and my pill can save your life and that of many millions more. Would you say that you have the right to that pill?
A person with leukemia would have died 20 years ago. Today there's knowledge and technology to give them a longer life, maybe even to cure some. Who has to pay for that? Who has to do the hard work to get there?

It's tragic, maybe even cruel. But the socialist solution is not working and will never work. We have to go back to freedom and each has to work for what each needs or wants. Those with more money will get better health care, sure. They have better cars now, better houses, boats, planes. And better health care too. Those who can't pay for it will be taken care on a voluntary basis. As it was before socialism. And some will die and it's tragic, as some are dying now.

Answer 4

Nope. Universal health care would not have prevented that. It's all rationed. Let's stick to the US and see what happens in a similar case when it IS a government funded system making the decision:
"The story began last fall when doctors told Brandy, who lives with her single mother in a weather-beaten farmhouse about an hour south of Portland, Ore., that she was likely to die within a year unless she got a simultaneous lung-liver transplant, an operation that has been performed fewer than a dozen times in the United States.

Under Oregon's unique Medicaid system, which openly rations healthcare in order to provide basic care to as broad a population as possible, Brandy was eligible for a liver transplant or a lung transplant, but not both. In January, and again after a review in May, the state-run health plan said no. There wasn't enough data to show the $250,000 procedure was worthwhile, the health plan's administrators said, and the plan didn't cover experiments.

But Brandy wouldn't take no for an answer. A tough, determined young woman who had managed to work part-time at a photo studio, baby-sit her boss's children, coach the high school football team and maintain a 3.2 grade point average between numerous and prolonged bouts in the hospital, Brandy wasn't about to give up her life without a fight. She sued the state of Oregon, charging that it was making a flawed moral choice in refusing to save her life. Since then her caustic, articulate criticisms of the Oregon system have given a vivid sense of the obstacles any universal healthcare plan for the nation would face.

"They'll pay for an alcoholic to get a liver transplant because they've been drinking all their life," she says, sitting with her mother at a rickety picnic table under a cherry tree by her front door. "They'll pay for a heroin addict to get cured, to help someone kick the cigarette habit. Those are things people do to themselves. If you put it to a vote the people would say pay for some girl's operation instead of some alcoholic's liver transplant or some crack head's needles. I just think it isn't very fair.'"
http://archive.salon.com/health/feature/2000/07/07/brandy/

Oregon tinkers with its lists, etc. but the fact is, in ALL systems the care IS rationed.
Do you realize that EVERYONE eligible for VA because of service does NOT qualify to get all the care he might need? The budget is set. EVERY person needs to pass a "means test." He will see where he is in the queue that year: can he be seen? what will his co-pay be? Can change EVERY year.
So no, universal health care is NOT the answer.
The current system stinks.

This book addresses these issues and others and you can see the plan that makes more sense than others I've seen (you have to click on the PDF, it's not the blurb that is the plan):
http://www.booklocker.com/books/3068.html

Answer 5

Something like that is enough to push a family member over the edge. Things like that will force people to become violent due to the inhumanity.

Edit:

"1. This was not a lack of health care that caused this. They had insurance...just not good insurance."

Thats a load of bs. I want to hear you say the same thing when you need a transplant and you are denied. You are probably someone who thinks the home owners are to blame for the mortgage crisis in America.

"As for Michael Moore-On. Everything that he has ever done is blatant distortions and pure lies...and HAS BEEN DEBUNKED!"

Oh yeah? Debunk the fact that people are dying because they don't have enough money. Debunk the fact that our children are around super high levels of lead 24/7. Why is lead used in the manufacturing of toy products? Because its cheaper. Anything unethical or results in the injury of people is allowable as long as the end justifies the means, which the ends is who can become rich the fastest. Debunk the fact that we aren't allowed to buy medications from other countries because its for our own safety. Since when do they give a damn about our safety?

I guess the death was a result of good business.

Edit 2:

"Are we really that safe with insurance when something really bad happens that will cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars?"

The answer is no, unless you are super rich and can buy the system. This is what people do not understand. Transplant, medical service etc. will always go to the highest bidder.

Answer 6

you're top, going into an emergency room does not empty your wallet. that they had already be empty from having to pay for all human beings elses scientific desires. right here contained in the U. S. I even have the main inexpensive coverage money could purchase. I pay decrease than $4 hundred a 365 days for $2 million in insurance with a $2000 deductible, which includes prescription drug insurance. Assuming that the cost may be the burden of the wealthy like the the remainder of each and every little thing else the government does, that could imply that i could maximum in all probability be paying contained in the ballpark of $35,000 a 365 days to conceal different human beings. that's what could be unfair.

Answer 7

First, the US spends more on healthcare than any other country in the world per head of population. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care#Economics Second, despite this, the US has some of the worst figures for life expectancy and infant mortality in the western world.

I live in the UK and work in the NHS, our universal health care system. Yes it has problems. Routine problems that can wait do. Emergency problems that can not, do not. But we can also take out private health insurance. And we have better figures for life expectancy and infant mortality.

I can understand that Americans are proud to live in the richest and most powerful country in the world. I can not understand why you are happy to have a system that costs more than anywhere else in the world, and yet allows babies to die, that would have a better chance of living if they had been born in another developed country.

Answer 8

harry k where the hell do you get off using that talking point? The wait for surgeries and the like are JUST AS LONG HERE! I had to wait 2 weeks to get into a doctor as a new patient! That's bad enough, and the weekend after my appointment I was in the ER because I couldn't get my needed diagnostic tests run in time to catch an inflammation that was brewing. It could have been prevented if I could have gotten in sooner, and my insurance had not been such a stickler about who, when and where.

I'm not opposed to UHC, but I don't think this country will be able to handle it. It will get just as corrupted as private insurance is now, depending on the administration that starts it and administers it. But we need something. We need to start thinking about each other and not what PROFITS can be made off people living or dieing! A healthy country is a more productive country, IMO...we can't be productive if there are cost barriers to better health, and this INCLUDES alternative solutions (like they have in Germany).

And also, we need to encourage more kids to go into the medical field, there is a shortage right now of nurses and the like. This is primarily because of the aging baby boomers (My mom happens to be one). To offset the amount of people going on rolls for UHC and aging baby boomers, we need more people in the field. That's why you see such long wait times, the staff is NOT there.

Edit:
Darth I would gladly pay more taxes to make sure your kid was healthy if that's what it takes to make sure MINE doesn't get sick as well, from being around yours. Take a look at any classroom and you'd be ready to jump on that bandwagon. I would really, honestly, glad pay a little extra (or rather see the government divert (reform) their budget to make t his doable) that way people are taken care of and have PREVENTATIVE care.

Bonny, ditto on that one. I'm covered, but between the premiums and my deductible that I've now reached, that's about a forth of my monthly salary. As much as my rent payment Even if you have it, the little extra costs can kill a budget. I'm not advocating for a handout either, we just need something more afforable. Even if you use private insurers as a part of UHC (like they do for SCHIP), your insurance companies can still make a profit, while making it more affordable for everybody involved. I'm sorry, but $100 a month to pay $2500 and 80/20 after that is just too much...how can you be expected to pay rent (or a mortgage) and put food on the table after that?

Answer 9

This is not to belittle peoples' feelings about a tragedy like this, but we have recently dealt with a European health care system with universal care, and it can be at least as uncaring as our system.

When an elderly relative had become unconscious, when the ambulance attendants saw how old he was they at first refused to take him to the hospital because of his age, they were only authorized to take him to a hospice where he could be made more comfortable while awaiting death. It was only after a tip was offered that they agreed to take him to the hospital, where the whole process began again.

Bureaucrats, whether they work for the government or for the private sector, can be heartless.

Answer 10

That is tragic. But please note that the insurance company said it was doubtful that the transplant would help. Their take was that if it wouldn't work, it didn't make sense to spend the resources (money and a precious liver). Was there even a liver available for her?

Under socialized medicine, she probably would have been passed over as well, in favor of someone with better chances.

And as with all insurance - they didn't say she couldn't have it, just that they weren't agreeing to pay for it. In my experience with insurance companies, the first answer is always "no". You have to go back to them to get a "yes".

thumbs down ? This is a tragic event and it's terrible that this girl died - but to answer the question, UHC would not have helped. This is not the test case for UHC.

UHC will not make more doctors, hospitals or livers available - it will spread our existing resources across more people, and as anyone knows from freshman econ - more demand will equal higher prices or create scarcity. It will create more of these awful "where to spend our scarce resources" questions. And yes, there's a lawsuit in this, and I'd bet the parents will win, or at least Cigna will settle out of court.

Answer 11

I understand where you are coming from, Bonny, but there are severe disadvantages to such a health care.

You know in areas of Canada and Europe, who have such a healthcare system, one can wait as long as six months to see a family doctor. There was even a story in a remote town in Canada where they determined family doctor visits by lottery. Not all glitter is gold.

Michael Moore may have glamourized it, but really universal health care isn't such a hot idea. There's too many illegal immigrants and people who abuse the welfare system as it is, why let them have another advantage in life? It's about time people who worked for their things in the US got it from the hard work they get. So sick of people taking advantage already.