Originally Posted By FaMulan The American Health Care Industry to Health Care Plans from around the world. <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/21/AR2009082101778.html?referrer=facebook" target="_blank">http://www.washingtonpost.com/...facebook</a> Our system is broken, it needs to be fixed. Any one of the plans (other than the those in the third world that are mentioned) would be fine and dandy by me. Insurance Companies need to relinquish control over medical decisions and put them back in the hands of doctors.
Originally Posted By SpokkerJones What a coincidence. I just finished watching Sick Around the World, his hour-long special for Frontline. <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sickaroundtheworld/" target="_blank">http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/...heworld/</a> But listen, it would be unAmerican to get ideas from other countries.
Originally Posted By Princessjenn5795 That was a wonderful article FaMulan. Thank you for posting it. I am sending it to a couple of people I know that think our system is just fine.
Originally Posted By davewasbaloo >>>But listen, it would be unAmerican to get ideas from other countries.<<< I know you are tongue and cheek here, but I bet some people think this. It is amazing though, given the population of the US (other than the oppressed native nations) are from other countries originally.
Originally Posted By Mr X ***I know you are tongue and cheek here, but I bet some people think this.*** Oh, absolutely. If they can't find legitimate reasons to dismiss the other health care systems they have a long list of bullcrap reasons to fall back on, such as using tabloid articles to "prove" Canada, Japan, England etc totally sucks, finding some small flaw in the system and using that as an "example" of why it totally sucks, claiming that such a system is inherently Socialist and therefore must suck, and last but not least claiming that the system is not American, was not "made in America", comes from some OTHER place, and therefore sucks. It's hilarious. I recently read a smear article against the Japanese system (a system which has never failed me and works very well for everyone I know) which claimed that they have a shortage of doctors because, thanks to the horrible system, doctors can't manage to eek out a wage suitable for putting food on the table. They are reduced to providing unneeded vending machines in their clinics to make a few extra bucks, and charging for parking just to make ends meet. The article was quite convincing, and made me wonder since it sounded so plausible. They even claimed that a doc might at times be required to perform procedures that would amount to a pay equivalent of only $4 per hour, thanks to the lousy government payment standards! (as usual with smear pieces, the truth is that in some cases the docs might have to spend 5 minutes on a procedure that "only" kicks back $4 for them to pocket (after paying the rest of the employees), in rare cases, and even that if you calculate it out amounts to $80 per hour which ain't bad) I recently asked a person in the industry just exactly how much Docs earned, on average...he told me it was MUCH less than America but quite comfortable in any case. Somewhere between $150,000 - $200,000 per year. Yeah, I wish I could "eek out" such a salary!
Originally Posted By davewasbaloo Ya, $200,000 sounds reasonable to me, more than that sounds like madness unless they are the very best in the world. I would rather have a physician that is motivated by an ethical compulsion for their work than a monetary one.
Originally Posted By Mr X I read somewhere that the average salary for an anesthesiologist in the U.S. is over $400,000. Not sure if that's true or not, but in any case it sounded as though the U.S. pay for most doctors was well North of $200,000, but I certainly wouldn't begrudge them an impressive salary given what they do and the time it takes to train for it. But in any case, the argument against Japanese medicine appears to be pure bupkis.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 That's an excellent article, FuMulan - thanks for posting it. It's clear, concise, and debunks the myths in language anyone (maybe even DarkBeer) can understand. You didn't quote any of it, (and it's only 3 pages and well worth reading), so I'll just post some from the conclusion: "In many ways, foreign health-care models are not really "foreign" to America, because our crazy-quilt health-care system uses elements of all of them. For Native Americans or veterans, we're Britain: The government provides health care, funding it through general taxes, and patients get no bills. For people who get insurance through their jobs, we're Germany: Premiums are split between workers and employers, and private insurance plans pay private doctors and hospitals. For people over 65, we're Canada: Everyone pays premiums for an insurance plan run by the government, and the public plan pays private doctors and hospitals according to a set fee schedule. And for the tens of millions without insurance coverage, we're Burundi or Burma: In the world's poor nations, sick people pay out of pocket for medical care; those who can't pay stay sick or die. This fragmentation is another reason that we spend more than anybody else and still leave millions without coverage. All the other developed countries have settled on one model for health-care delivery and finance; we've blended them all into a costly, confusing bureaucratic mess. Which, in turn, punctures the most persistent myth of all: that America has "the finest health care" in the world. We don't. In terms of results, almost all advanced countries have better national health statistics than the United States does. In terms of finance, we force 700,000 Americans into bankruptcy each year because of medical bills. In France, the number of medical bankruptcies is zero. Britain: zero. Japan: zero. Germany: zero."
