I want the honest truth on this.

[TallanKhan]

I live in the UK and no, our system isn?t perfect, waiting lists are somewhat long and there is an amount of money wasted as with all state run endeavours. However it certainly isn?t a bad system by any measure. You can claim its unfair that hard working people get taxed to hell to pay for the healthcare of those who cant be bothered to go out and get a job themselves and as someone who spent 3 years working 2 jobs for 70 hour weeks I have a level of sympathy with this. But that said, there are some people who just cant work, and many who want to but cant get jobs and I don?t think they should be penalised for that.

Yes some people milk the system but that happens everywhere, in America it just happens by stealth, for instance people make false insurance claims. And that all gets paid for by everyone else because the insurance companies don?t take that hit they just raise everyone else?s premiums...

And on the subject of standards of healthcare, no I don?t believe healthcare in the UK is inferior. Yes it could be better but there?s always more you can do for people. Healthcare costs are a potential black hole, forever sucking in money if you allow it to get that far. My boss is a living example of the quality of the UK healthcare system, before keyhole surgery he was one of the last people to undergo full open-skull brain surgery. I don?t know the exact details of the procedure, I never felt quite comfortable probing, but the particular procedure he underwent had an extremely low survival rate, only 3 people worldwide had ever survived it before. For all intense and purposes he was pronounced dead before he was on the operating table, they only performed the operation as a last resort. He celebrated his 61st birthday last Wednesday and he?s never experienced any complications.

Finally I would point out that if your just not happy with the standard the state run NHS provides here then there?s no one stopping you from taking out private medical insurance and being treated in a private hospital if you can afford to do so.

 

[Sayvara]

My Dad said that if I were born in the U.K. or Canada, etc. that I would have died from being denied treatment because of the "statistical survivability rate" being too low and the govt. not waisting money (even though mortality is less there).

Your dad, though very lovable (from your viewpoint), is so utterly wrong he'd have more credibility if he'd said the Earth was flat.

I live in Sweden, which also has state-provided healthcare. Noone would have dropped you in the dumpster just because you were born early. As long as you have a pulse and brain activity, you're getting all the help you can get. Anything else will have the National Board of Health and Welfare kicking behinds so hard licenses to practice medicine would be shooting out the top of their heads. That kind of hypotetical judgement call you are refering to would not only be highly unethical but completely illegal and would get a big bunch of people thrown in jail.

My partner works at the oncology ward, each day administering chemotherapy treatements which literally cost well over 100 000 USD equivalent... for every individual shot! The money is not spared, no matter your odds. You are given the best possible healthcare, no matter the cost, period.


As far as I understand, there is a big debate in the US about national healthcare right now.

My viewpoint is this: you don't put a friggin' pricetag on people's health! And you don't make business out of getting them well. To me that is an utterly disgusting concept.

When your life and limb is on the line, money shall never be an issue. No matter if you're a boozed out hobo or the King of Sweden.... once you step inside the doors of the hospital, money shall cease to be an issue.

I pay taxes for healthcare... and I don't want to have it any other way. Swedish healthcare is top-notch... and anyone that says differently can come over here and be proven what an ignorant douche they are, if nothing else by me punching out their spleen and making them experience the healthcare system first hand.

John Stewart did an excellent send-up of the whole idiot argument about nations with free healthcare being fails.

http://www.thelocal.se/blog/20090423/436/

/S

 

[Camoman]

Answers:

1. Absolutly not. I have no problems getting a doctor or getting the treatment I need. I don't think Canadiens go to America for medical purposes besides maybe buying certain medication they require for a cheaper price.
2. Dunno
3. It sucks
4. I'm not sure where you're Dad got his statistics, but he was probably lying and using false information to prove his point. Of course I could be wrong and that could be the truth. All I know is that ,according to my parents, I too had a very slim chance to survive over a week past birth but I did.

 

[TheSunshineHobo]

1. Canada's system is fine. My mother has been sick with an undiagnosed condition for years, shes been through thousands of tests and we've never had a problem. She went deaf about 5 years ago and had to get a cochlear implant (The waiting list was 8 months, she got it in two). My Uncle lives in Nunavut and will get medivaced to either Yellowknife or Edmonton for treatment. I've never known a single Canadian who has to travel to the States for care. Most get medivaced to the bigger cities for treatment.
2. Wouldn't know. I would prefer not to have to pay for prescriptions though.
3. American health care is inhumane, you deny people treatment for profit. You allow accountants and CEO's to decide your fate instead of a government that wants you around to vote. The American insurance company doesn't care if you live or die, as long as their bottom line is protected; whereas the government has more insentive to keep you around, you vote. Politicians like power, they need you to keep them in power, you can't do that if you're dead.
4. Doubtful. If your Dad was poor (Trailer trash poor) you'd certainly fair better in Canada than you would've in the States.

 

[megalomania]

My Dad said that if I were born in the U.K. or Canada, etc. that I would have died from being denied treatment because of the "statistical survivability rate" being too low and the govt. not waisting money (even though mortality is less there). He paid around 80k for me out of pocket to get the treatment.

I'm from the UK and I can tell you that doctors over here would be offended at the suggestion that they wouldn't treat somebody and wouldn't try their absolute hardest to save a life just because the chances of survival are slim.

The real beauty of our system is that Doctors are beholden only to the patient; I would rather have a doctor say 'you may have to wait a little for treatment' than 'I'm sure your insurance doesn't cover it'.

You can also hit back at your relatives with this: The reason the government has to put a lot of money into the emergency room treatment (as I understand they cannot turn somebody away) is because the 43million without insurance have to wait until their medical situation becomes serious before they can get treated. Emergency treatment costs much more than therapeutic treatment and has many more complications, if they had been able to see a doctor much earlier the actual cost to the American tax payer would be LESS!

 

[Ironic]

Summary at the bottom, reading is for background of the questions

My Dad said that if I were born in the U.K. or Canada, etc. that I would have died from being denied treatment because of the "statistical survivability rate" being too low and the govt. not waisting money (even though mortality is less there). He paid around 80k for me out of pocket to get the treatment.

Let me make 2 things clear:
1. I love my Dad with no end and his comment didn't phase me at all. I can understand his logic and feelings/emotions on this.
2. Although I do want univ. care, I would give it up as long as everyone is insured one way or another. I tend to read all sides of an argument before I formulate an opinion.

SUMMARY:
I would like these questions answered:
1. Does Canada's hwalthcare really suck that bad? Are there canadians coming here for medical purposes?
2. What problems are there with French/U.K. Healthcare? Because our media (except Faux) says mostly good things on it.
3. What is an outsider's perspective on American healthcare?
4. Would I have died?

I made this not to prod at anyone/thing, only to get a deeper understanding of the opinions and facts of the world around me.

Cheers, it's 3:30 a.m. here and the Palm Pre's keyboard is TINY!

I'm not going to type a lot, because I already have in another NHS thread, and it's draining me a little bit, so I will answer in short bullet points

1: Canada's healthcare, to my knowledge, is just as good as yours but not as expensive etc.

2: The problems with the NHS at the moment are a lack of nurses in some areas at the moment, and a couple cases of fraud when it comes to someone in a senior position swindling money from the hospital, but having said that, these cases happen all the time in other private hospitals and insurance frauds (in insurance dependant systems), but are highly publicised due to the NHS being a government run organisation.

3: I would have to say that the majority view of people I know in England, and my own personal view (being English) is that the American system seems to be decidedly Un-American, or extremely American, I'm not sure. It benefits the rich whilst neglecting the poor, and relies entirely on "You paying for it yourself", but not "The country takes care of it's citizens". The rich in England used to be the monarchy, and that's what pilgrims tried to escape from, yet now, you seem to suffer from a modern-day monarchy in the form of wall-street. Same power, different system. I'm not trying to down trod being rich or anything, but a system whereupon the rich can live and the poor can rot, seems pretty unjust.

4: No you would have not. The republicans are bullshitters on this one, they don't decide whether you die or not, the only sort of "deciding" committee on this is cost effectiveness of new and old drugs, e.g should we spend $2million on this new, experimental drug, or $1.5million on the drug we KNOW has a 80% success rate. If the hospital didn't know how to do the experimental treatment that would have saved you, they may have referred you to a hospital that was doing it at the time, but the same could be said for you dying if you were at a different hospital in the US, that WASN'T trying the treatment. I myself was 9 weeks early, and very nearly died a number of times after being born, but i'm 6foot 3inches with an IQ very similar to yours, (bout 138-140, its been awhile since i tested) without any health complications ever, since.

 

[scnj]

They keep closing hospitals down

There are currently two hospitals near me. One has A & E, the other does not. After that, the nearest hospital with A & E is a 12 mile drive. The two near me are being closed, and a new one is being built half way between the two, but it won't have A & E. Where's the sense?

 

[ben---neb]

Snip.

Snip

Snip

I am literally apoplectic with rage at this bull shit.

20% of Governmental expenditure in the UK is on healthcare. At that point in time my parents were on the 20% income tax bracket. So 1% of their income went on it. You are claiming that a 1% dip in taxes is worth that?

In the US my family would have been paying a similar amount on income tax (when you put state & federal together) and most likely would have been paying health insurance separately.

The average employer-sponsored premium for a family of four costs close to $13,000 a year, and the employee foots about 30 percent of this cost.

So we'd have been an extra 4k out of pocket for the same cost.

Sorry, you misunderstand me. The opportunity cost of the NHS is the complete cancellation of income tax. That is if we did not have the NHS the government could scrap income tax and still balance the budget. Therefore the cost of the NHS is 20% of your parents income.

I know the taxes are pooled together then re-allocated out but my point still stands. Perhaps it would be better to say that scrapping the NHS would result in over a £100 billion decrease in tax revenue needed. This could come from a cancellation of a lot of small taxes or one big one i.e. income tax.

I stress again that your parents did pay for your treatment just not upfront. The NHS is NOT free, it costs over £100 billion a year of taxpayers money, of my money and your money. Personally, I'd rather that as a healthy indivdual i don't have to pay for people who aren't healthy.

 

[smell-of-man]

I'm from Belgium and from what I've heard (you can correct me on this one) we have one of the finest health care systems in the world.
So, I'll try to answer your questions from my point of view. I've even made an account here just to post this, because I'm quite the socialist (even in European standards, for you americans)

1) I've always heard otherwise... from what I know, it's the citizens of USA who go to Canada for free (or not as costly) healthcare.
2) There aren't really any problems with our healthcare here in Belgium. Yes, like your father said, we have some moochers of the system here, but the healthcare benefits everyone... it's a humanitarian right to get basic health care here.
How it works here is like so: For example, you need a visit with your house doctor... you have to pay him ?20 (standard rate for almost everything) and later you get around ?18 paid back by the medical authorities. It works the same with almost any drug... only the more experimental drugs aren't covered by our health care system. Also if you wind up at the hospital, most of the costs are paid back by the system... only experimental procedures aren't covered.
3) I couldn't live in the US (I refuse to call it America). I don't make enough money to be able to afford decent health care there. I'm a student trying to live on my own, so I don't have a lot of money to spare.
And the stories I've heard about US-residents who have been refused of health care because they didn't have insurance just scare me.
4) You can never know, but I don't think your dad would've had to pay 80k to get you treated.
Ok, such an experimental procedure wouldn't have been covered by Belgium's health care, but at least the more essential drugs and procedures would have been covered.

Greetings

 

[rossatdi]

Sorry, you misunderstand me. The opportunity cost of the NHS is the complete cancellation of income tax. That is if we did not have the NHS the government could scrap income tax and still balance the budget. Therefore the cost of the NHS is 20% of your parents income.

I know the taxes are pooled together then re-allocated out but my point still stands. Perhaps it would be better to say that scrapping the NHS would result in over a £100 billion decrease in tax revenue needed. This could come from a cancellation of a lot of small taxes or one big one i.e. income tax.

I stress again that your parents did pay for your treatment just not upfront. The NHS is NOT free, it costs over £100 billion a year of taxpayers money, of my money and your money. Personally, I'd rather that as a healthy indivdual i don't have to pay for people who aren't healthy.

Lol wut?

What on god's green earth are you basing this on?

Percentage of Government revenue from income tax: 29%
Percentage of Government expenditure on health care: 18%

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK_tax

So those are the crude numbers. How does your logic work from this?

Also, tax is not organised on a sector in vs. sector out basis. The pool of expenditure is based on what government believes it has to do. The pool of revenue is based on what people are prepared to give (without voting them all out). Its a bit childish to line them up.

As for you general logic of being a healthy person. You are currently a healthy person, you may not stay so very long. Also you know doubt know people who are not healthy. Are you so small minded that you want only to pay for the here and now for yourself? One of the major problems with the US system is people catch/develop serious illnesses and then won't be insured ever again. They then have to pay out of pocket expenses that have been driven up by a system of greedy insurers.

 

[AceDiamond]

As for you general logic of being a healthy person. You are currently a healthy person, you may not stay so very long. Also you know doubt know people who are not healthy. Are you so small minded that you want only to pay for the here and now for yourself? One of the major problems with the US system is people catch/develop serious illnesses and then won't be insured ever again. They then have to pay out of pocket expenses that have been driven up by a system of greedy insurers.

The other part of that argument that also makes it sound really dumb is when you compare it to other services that currently are under a "socialist" model, specifically the police. Nobody really needs 24/7 police assistance, and it'd be great to think everyone could go through life without ever needing their help, but eventually you will. So if that model works for police and nobody complains about paying taxes to pay for their services, what's the hangup about healthcare? I know I know, "the government can't tell us what to do, etc." well frankly that feels like the argument a petulant preteen makes to their parents. I'm not saying that's a perfect analogy but given all the whining about it it's starting to feel very close.

As a person who's been repeatedly screwed over by the mismanagement of the healthcare system in the US, I welcome a change to a more nationalized/public version. No more corporate bullcrap.

 

[Aesir23]

No, you wouldn't have died in Canada. With what I have experienced with Canadian healthcare, they tend to prioritize patients. Patients that are in an emergency or urgent state go before anyone else. When I had to go in for an operation I was admitted to the hospital in only a few hours after going into the ER and then I went in for an operation the next day.

The thing is, the republicans are severely skewing the facts in order to scare people into believing that social health care is the worst thing in existence. They've always done things like this.

 

[Cerebreus]

I do not know about american or canadian health care being from New Zealand myself but basically I like the heath system we have here. Sure minor surgeries can take a while but at least you can get them done. If you want you have the option of going for private healthcare. Just because the government is providing free healthcare for those unfortunate enough to not have insurance does not mean private hospitals do not exist.
I just really can not grasp the mentality of people who want to deny these 46 million at least some healthcare all because they do not want to pay a little more in tax. I have finished school, have not needed the police in my life, have good health, do not drive so do not use the roads. Does this mean I get to avoid paying tax as I really do not need much government assistance?
Oh and a friend of mine is in california. She gets all her medicine from her sister down in mexico as she just can not afford the freaking rip off prices they charge in the US.

There is a desire by many to fix the problems with healthcare in america. The disagreement is about how to fix them.

The main point of contention seems to be about government control. Some people fear the government will be able to control people's lives through their plan, but an even greater number of people fear the government will screw this service up like it has many others. People are concerned that their healthcare will be of lower quality or be rationed because of cost-cutting by the government. Given how much debt has been accumulated by both this and the last administration, that's a very likely possibility.

Something should be done, but it should be done right.

 

[Julianking93]

SUMMARY:
I would like these questions answered:
1. Does Canada's hwalthcare really suck that bad? Are there canadians coming here for medical purposes?
2. What problems are there with French/U.K. Healthcare? Because our media (except Faux) says mostly good things on it.
3. What is an outsider's perspective on American healthcare?
4. Would I have died?

I made this not to prod at anyone/thing, only to get a deeper understanding of the opinions and facts of the world around me.

Cheers, it's 3:30 a.m. here and the Palm Pre's keyboard is TINY!

1. No. Canada's healthcare is [b/]far[/b] better than America's. Many people will fly to Canada from the US to get medical treatment for say, fatal illnesses, broken bones, etc. (In fact, I know a guy who tore his bicep right from his arm and flew from Florida to Canada to get it fixed for free. It would have cost him 65,000 dollars in the US)

2. The French/U.K. health care is fantastic. Its a lot like Canada's. All medicine is around 10 dollars (US currency) no matter the quantity or the quality, you stay in a hospital with no charge at all, and doctors even make [b/]free[/b] house calls.

3. I'm American and I hate our healthcare.

4. No. Simply put. No you would have not. I have never heard of a low "Survivability rate" for the Canada or the UK

 

[Smudge91]

The NHS don't leave people to die if they have a low chance of survival infact they do the opposite and treat everyone the same. At least in Britian you can be sure that you will be given care even if you have to wait a few months however the waiting lists are going down. I would also like to add that the cleaning services are contracted out by the NHS so the cleanliness of the hospitals are at the fault of companies who treat their empolyees appaulingly and don't do the job properly this isn't the fault of the NHS even though i do think that some companies should have their contract terminated.

 

[MusicalFreedom]

SUMMARY:
I would like these questions answered:
1. Does Canada's hwalthcare really suck that bad? Are there canadians coming here for medical purposes?
2. What problems are there with French/U.K. Healthcare? Because our media (except Faux) says mostly good things on it.
3. What is an outsider's perspective on American healthcare?
4. Would I have died?

1: from what I've heard from loads of people, no. but I'm English (our healthcare system doesn't suck either)

2: first, "faux" is pronounced "foe" with an O sound. no-one seems to know that. secondly, some people are denied some treatments, but it's normally the case that the treatment is incredibly expensive and would only extend life by about a week. but it's nearly universally accepted over here that the NHS is good. waiting times for non-important procedures can be extended if more seriously ill people turn up, but it's not that bad at all. I once had tonsillitis and managed to see the doctor the next day.

3: I don't understand why so many americans are defending it, the insurance companies will do what they can to weasel themselves out of paying for you, whether it's "pre-existing conditions" or just not cost-effective. people whine that the government would decide who gets treatment and who doesn't, but the health insurance companies do that already! saying that the economy is too bad to implement UHC is crap, since the UK did it in 1946, in the aftermath of WW2. in the UK, nearly everyone gets the treatment they need, and collectively WE pay less than you lot for healthcare. we even have Bupa, a private insurance company, and it's doing okay.

if the UK lost the NHS, there would be fucking riots.

4: probably not.