Yep. We suck. Hell, everybody HERE that I know hates the healthcare system here. I'm thousands of dollars in medical debt myself. If I didn't get the surgery, I would have either suffocated on my own uvula or, if that didn't kill me first, slowly died from a brain infection. Now I'm financially crippled for life, though. I don't know which I'd have preferred.
USA health system... umm... what the hell?!
- Thread starter Zhukov
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So, let me get this straight... health insurance in America works perfectly so long as you don't... get... sick?!?headshotcatcher said:
I'm just saying, only in America does the words 'pre-existing condition' mean you can't get it fixed. That's the biggest problem right there.
Are you American? That's not the American system.Laxman9292 said:
The American system will pay $20,000 for livesaving emergency care, even if the person receiving it can't afford it. We won't let people die if they come to an emergency room with a life-threatening condition.
But if that same person could get livesaving preventative care for $10,000*, we wouldn't pay for it. So if you take the wishy-washy American philosophy where you won't pay until the person is dying, but you won't let them die, you get the worst of both worlds.
The US doesn't have a coverage problem, really. We have a price problem. If prices went down, more people could afford coverage and would receive preventative care, and since preventative care costs less than emergency care overall costs would fall in tandem with overall prices, and the coverage problem would be solved in the process. Socialized medicine can be used to control costs, and there are ways to control costs and also keep our privatized system. But preventative care is the key to it all, specifically paying for preventative care. Someone needs to pay for it or we are headed off the cliff, so if only the government is prepared to pay then fuck it, have the government pay.
*Even if there is no up front cost savings from preventative care over emergency care, the improved health of the patient allows them to be more economically productive.
The United States is too right-wing. They are so far right that anything that brings them even remotely close to the middle of the politcal spectrum or to the left is referred to as socialism. The people are blowing the whole thing out of proportion when they call any leftist a socialist. But anyway, the war in the Middle East they're fighting costs 3 times more than a healthcare reform. Step it up, America.
The point being lifesaving. What in this situation is lifesaving? In the strictest sense, her life will not end simply because of a torn shoulder. Therefore, it doesn't qualify as a life threatening injury nor would operating on it be considered life saving preventative care. The US doesn't have a coverage problem, it has a problem of people not understanding how insurance works. Either that or people aren't reading their policies before agreeing to them and then bitching about them after the fact.menhir said:
Let me tell you a little story.Mezmer said:
My brother once saved up all of his money and bought a ball. He brought it to school and would play with it with his friends. However, the teacher saw this, and decided that everyone should get a chance to play with the ball. For the next few days, my brother got next to no time to be able to use what he had earned. And the people who used it were not at all kind with it either. The next week, he didn't bring the ball back. So rather then a few people getting to play with it, no one did. Now, would you call my brother greedy? Or would you say that he was in the right for not sharing what he had earned because it was done so by force? Me? I think what he did was right.
Let me ask you something, if you could work for 6 months of the year, and take the rest off and earn only 10% less then you did if you worked year round, which would you choose? I mean, I don't think that gives people much of a reason to want to work more. But hey, that's just me.
I want people to get health care, I just don't think that raising taxes on the rich is the best way to do it. Perhaps reform medical malpractace and put damage caps back in.
Not sure if the 20 grand is pulled from my post or not, but yeah, that's how much it my wife's fight with cancer cost AFTER insurance. Which was United Healthcare through my job, and believe it or not, relatively good insurance. The actual costs were in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.Laxman9292 said:
By the way, if she hadn't been married to me, she would have been uninsurable. She'd had cancer before, and had gotten rejected by pretty much every insurance company out there. That's pretty much all it takes. Insurance companies don't want a bad risk. Cuts into their profits.
BTW, I was paying about $850 a month for our COBRA. Another place the money went.
Even if we buy into the idea that anyone who gets a serious disease should go bankrupt, many ill people can't get or can't afford insurance. Institute of Medicine and the Urban Institute estimates that in 2006, roughly 22,000 people died due to lack of adequate insurance.
Funny thing is, it costs more money the way things are currently. Preventive care will discover many ailments when they can be treated easily, avoiding costly hospital bills. Oh, and fewer people die, if that matters.
I want to jump on the bandwagon and bash the US too! Come on guys, lets all make fun of how fat the people are there and how none of them have any class or the fact that 100% of the population is stupid bible thumping extremists. That'll be fun, right?
I read most of the first post. I read enough to know that most of it, while having a plausible and seemingly well thought out argument, fails immediately for one aspect.
"I'm not from the US."
"What the fuck US?!"
As the gentleman before me noted (Therumancer), its not as simple as most people think. It can't be fixed by simply getting off your butt and asking someone politely for this or that. The stereotype of the average american sitting in his trailer park eating hotpockets and watching wrestling, the idea that that's the average everyday american, is ridiculous. Sure we have those people in our country, but they are at least the vocal minority.
Most people don't understand how hard it is to get anything changed here if you make less than $2 mil/year. I've written my state senator, my representatives, I've picketed state capitals, I've spent considerable sums of my own money to try and get things changed. For what? So the people in the building to have the inconvenience of having to close their windows for a week or so, or close the curtains or risk having to see one of the unwashed masses outside.
The simple fact is, there is nothing that we can do unless we do so in a sufficiently large enough group, and I can tell you from first hand experience organizing things like this, its next to impossible to get that many people to agree on something.
Most of this debate/discussion is nothing more than mental masturbation. It would be great to see something done about this. A good number of people get screwed over because of this commonly. But speculating on the nature of an issue like this isn't going to do anything.
/angry rant.
I don't mean to be a dick about this, its just a little frustrating from my point of view.
I read most of the first post. I read enough to know that most of it, while having a plausible and seemingly well thought out argument, fails immediately for one aspect.
"I'm not from the US."
"What the fuck US?!"
As the gentleman before me noted (Therumancer), its not as simple as most people think. It can't be fixed by simply getting off your butt and asking someone politely for this or that. The stereotype of the average american sitting in his trailer park eating hotpockets and watching wrestling, the idea that that's the average everyday american, is ridiculous. Sure we have those people in our country, but they are at least the vocal minority.
Most people don't understand how hard it is to get anything changed here if you make less than $2 mil/year. I've written my state senator, my representatives, I've picketed state capitals, I've spent considerable sums of my own money to try and get things changed. For what? So the people in the building to have the inconvenience of having to close their windows for a week or so, or close the curtains or risk having to see one of the unwashed masses outside.
The simple fact is, there is nothing that we can do unless we do so in a sufficiently large enough group, and I can tell you from first hand experience organizing things like this, its next to impossible to get that many people to agree on something.
Most of this debate/discussion is nothing more than mental masturbation. It would be great to see something done about this. A good number of people get screwed over because of this commonly. But speculating on the nature of an issue like this isn't going to do anything.
/angry rant.
I don't mean to be a dick about this, its just a little frustrating from my point of view.
Health Care is complicated as what is and is not covered allways causes debate, for example I live in Ontario, oral and eye care are not covered but abortions and sex changes are. Now their are legitmate reasons why they should/should not be covered. In Ontario I Think about %50 of all tax money goes into health care and thus it can be expensive but people live a good life style so its not hurting me to bad even with the 13% hst
Fair enough, the US system would never under any circumstances pay for the shoulder surgery without insurance. But, preventative care does save a great deal of money in this case. If the condition were allowed to deteriorate until she lost the use of both arms, how productive would she be for the rest of her life? It's fair to recoup the costs of the medical care out of the future productivity saved by the care, and since she did get the care she needed it is not an example of failure in the system, but it does show how counter-productive it can be to treat medical care like other goods (pay now or no care.)Laxman9292 said:
Hero in a half shell said:
Lucky!This year I had my 4 wisdom teeth removed and the bill was over $600! Oh, and that's after the insurance!
At age 18 I got a pair of glasses for just reading. Over $170! You are lucky
It's called your fricken taxes, dude. If your taxes aren't getting you quality health care, OR getting you a proper government watchdog so that when you get sick health insurance actually does what it's there to do rather than abandon you because you didn't take the superplus plan...Laxman9292 said:
then what the hell is your tax money going to anyways?
Here's how it works in the Great White North...
The government insurance plan takes a percentage from your pay,and puts it into an accout that can only be spent from to pay for plan-covered medical expenses. Simple,and easy. That's what I understand,anyway.
Public health FTW.
The government insurance plan takes a percentage from your pay,and puts it into an accout that can only be spent from to pay for plan-covered medical expenses. Simple,and easy. That's what I understand,anyway.
Public health FTW.
I can understand this one, holy crap. I didn't pay it myself, but when I was an infant I had really really bad ear infections. Had both ears with tubes and lots of antibiotics.Imp Emissary said:
This year I had my 4 wisdom teeth removed and the bill was over $600! Oh, and that's after the insurance!
At age 18 I got a pair of glasses for just reading. Over $170! You are lucky
The only way I've gotten around this sort of thing is, sadly enough, by joining the military. Its the only source of free healthcare for the average american citizen. It just requires a bit more than a monthly premium.
could have swore i heard something about a law of companies dropping people of prexiting condetions.conflictofinterests said:
If the insurance companies make you pay them a good deal of money for years, and when you get injured they wave a bullcrap loophole in you face and say "F@#k you. Your on your own."......Well, wouldn't it be better if we just take that money we were going to pay them and put it in a bank......*remembers what banks do in America with our money*lax4life said:
.......Or just freaking hid it somewhere! >( I hate people. Why do we intrust our money needed to keep us alive and well, or just damn healthy to the most greedy?! Well, at least the good people of the Escapist got the money Allison needed. Hell the planed to wait 60 days but got what they needed and more in about 6 hours! HELL YEAH! F@#k anyone who says video games or other parts of geek culture make you into a bad person. A bad person is a bad person. The Escapist is good.