Originally Posted By DAR <<OK. Would your insurance company be willing to give medical insurance to old people with pre-existing medical conditions? >> We don't provide medical insurance, we provide life insurance. And with the amount of policyholders from ages 0-100 I think I can safely say that my industry has no problem insuring people. Now we're not going to issue life insurance to someone who's a cokehead(oh we've had one of those applied)or we went give new insurance to someone who's getting up there in years.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <I solidly resent people who say we would be better off with socialized medicine in the USA. > I'm sorry you resent us, but comparing our current system with Britain's or Canada's, I'll take theirs. <If I want a tumorous kidney out, I can get the operation within hours. If I am in a car accident and need cardiovascular repairs, I can get a helicopter ride to the O.R. If my wife wants fake breasts, I can choose from any of 10,000 physicians. > <We have coverage for kids who's parents don't want to get it, Medicade. Old people? Medicare. Both are a joke, and it would be no better if the government took over the entire healthcare system. It would be exponentially worse.> Actually, Medicare is one of the best programs we've ever put in place. Before it, elderly Americans were on average the poorest Americans. Senior citizens ate dog food because they couldn't afford food and health care. After Medicare, elderly Americans' standard of living has vastly improved. Check out the numbers pre- and post-Medicare. The thing is, we already insure the two most expensive groups of people TO insure - the elderly and the very poor. If we expanded that pool to include everyone else, relative costs go down. It's insurance 101 - the larger the pool, the more risk is spread around. The largest possible pool is - everyone. That's why single-payer works. If (and it's a big if), you have the money.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <I solidly resent people who say we would be better off with socialized medicine in the USA. > I'm sorry you resent us, but comparing our current system with Britain's or Canada's, I'll take theirs. <If I want a tumorous kidney out, I can get the operation within hours. If I am in a car accident and need cardiovascular repairs, I can get a helicopter ride to the O.R. If my wife wants fake breasts, I can choose from any of 10,000 physicians. > If (and it's a big if), you have the money. <We have coverage for kids who's parents don't want to get it, Medicade. Old people? Medicare. Both are a joke, and it would be no better if the government took over the entire healthcare system. It would be exponentially worse.> Actually, Medicare is one of the best programs we've ever put in place. Before it, elderly Americans were on average the poorest Americans. Senior citizens ate dog food because they couldn't afford food and health care. After Medicare, elderly Americans' standard of living has vastly improved. Check out the numbers pre- and post-Medicare. The thing is, we already insure the two most expensive groups of people TO insure - the elderly and the very poor. If we expanded that pool to include everyone else, relative costs go down. It's insurance 101 - the larger the pool, the more risk is spread around. The largest possible pool is - everyone. That's why single-payer works.
Originally Posted By jonvn "I solidly resent people who say we would be better off with socialized medicine in the USA." The statistics say otherwise. I'm sorry, but the way things are now, we have some of the worst health care in the world. This is what I don't understand. People say our system does this and that. When compared to any other industrialized nation, we STINK. It's NOT GOOD. They all do better, they all have government backed care in one form or another. Look at the reality of the situation, not the philosophical aspect of it that just happens to feed into the insurance company's pockets.
Originally Posted By jonvn "Senior citizens ate dog food because they couldn't afford food and health care." I have always found this hard to believe. Dog food is actually more expensive than people food.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 Not gravy train. (Seriously - we just got a dog. The previous owner said he liked gravy train. We discovered he doesn't really like it at all and now we know why he's so skinny - the previous owner was cheap!)
Originally Posted By DVC_dad let me rephrase, I don't resent you as a person. I disagree with you. Big difference.
Originally Posted By DVC_dad I think you people are confusing insurance affordability with the heathcare system as a whole. Physicians come here from across the globe to learn. Let's not confuse good insurance with good healthcare.
Originally Posted By DVC_dad and no, for MY purposes, Canada and the UK do NOT do it better, quite the opposite.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 Do you know anyone who has lived with both? I do. I know 2 folks who have moved to Canada, one to Britain, and one to Spain. They all say those countries have a better system than we do. Not perfect. Just better. <Let's not confuse good insurance with good healthcare.> But all we're talking about is changing the insurance system. We'd still have the fine health care - it's just that access to it would not depend on some cubicle worker in Baltimore (or Bangalore) making the decision on whether you get treated or not.
Originally Posted By DVC_dad Yeah riiiight. Here's one simple article I got in less than 5 seconds. yeah, government run healthcare is the answer, riiiiight. click if you dare. <a href="http://tinyurl.com/2marr5" target="_blank">http://tinyurl.com/2marr5</a>
Originally Posted By DVC_dad The problem is you can't have one without the other. Medicade and Medicare...why are there more docs that do NOT accept it than do? Because it doesn't pay well. Would you go to work if on Tuesdays you earned 25% of YOUR normal pay? Of course not. If we socialize medicine...think about it....you are saying let the United States GOVERNMENT run our healthcare system and it would IMPROVE? Surely you can't be seroius. Government takes over, docs get paid less and less and less as coverage is squeezed to meet budgets. Our best and brightest would quit going into medicine, and it would happen in a very very few short years. The overall quality would go down and everyone would eventually loose. I have no problem with the access that I have to healthcare, no problem whatsoever. I don't even need written referrals for specialists...I just go. Why would I want anything in the system to change?
Originally Posted By DVC_dad We can't even pay for a small war. There is NO WAY our government could afford coverage for the masses.
Originally Posted By DVC_dad I think the real root of the argument can be traced back to the very heart of Democratic thought vs. Republican thought. Somewhere along the way, no matter how liberal minded you may be, eventually you have to expect people to work for what they get. Eventually compensation must match effort. Of course there are exceptions. I think the most horrible of these examples would be the poor care our returning vets of war receive. Is that the kind of healthcare you really really want, because that is good compared to what it would be.
Originally Posted By DVC_dad Access? Canada? Interesting... <a href="http://tinyurl.com/2e6dlb" target="_blank">http://tinyurl.com/2e6dlb</a>
Originally Posted By DVC_dad What about Ohio? <a href="http://tinyurl.com/23qzqo" target="_blank">http://tinyurl.com/23qzqo</a>
Originally Posted By DVC_dad I apologize for my absolute obsession on this subject. My wife is in private practice, and I see it from a somewhat biased, though not necessarily inaccurate, view.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 None of this proves anything other than there is no perfect system. There isn't. How many links do you think I could post to horror stories in the US system? People who HAD insurance and still got denied and ended up losing their lives, or their kids lost their lives... You know I could. <If we socialize medicine...think about it....you are saying let the United States GOVERNMENT run our healthcare system and it would IMPROVE? Surely you can't be seroius. > Again, the government doesn't run healthcare. That's a shibboleth that doesn't hold water. The government runs the billing. <I have no problem with the access that I have to healthcare, no problem whatsoever. I don't even need written referrals for specialists...I just go.> You're part of a shrinking group. But nice "I've got mine, Jack" attitude. Most people do need written referrals and other hoop-jumping. 40-50 million of us don't have insurance at all. When those people get desperate, they go to emergency rooms, and we all end up paying for them ANYWAY, only we pay more because they've gone when they had absolutely no other choice and are seriously ill, rather than go for preventative care. We already insure the two most expensive groups to insure; the elderly and the very poor. Expanding the pool and spreading the risk just makes sense. And doctors in the UK, for instance, do very well. Not as ridiculously well as some US doctors, but they're not starving. But thanks for revealing your wife's deal and your bias. I appreciate that, even if I think you're just flat wrong on the relative merits of our system vs. others.
Originally Posted By DVC_dad First of all I don't have an attitude of "I've got mine Jack!" If you knew the things we have done...with no expectation of even a "thank you" for uninsured or poorly insured. There are atleast 100 families that we never bill a dime to, because there are real cases of need out there. She has volunteered time and supplies at "free clinics" many many hours. she's one of the "good guys." I apologize if I came across as having an attitude like that. I don't. I'll admit we have problems in our country, but socializing healthcare, or regulating the billing, or the access is not the answer. There are problems much larger than the situation, the whole soray water on the cause of the fire, not just the biggest flames. It is a very complicated set of issues and problems. There is no easy fix. Again, I apologize for the attitude, its not a real representation of me. Going back to providing coverage to everyone....where would we get the money for it?
Originally Posted By Dabob2 I accept that this isn't really your attitude. Where "I've got mine Jack" came from was your statement that your healthcare is fine, followed by the statement "Why would I want anything in the system to change?" Well, maybe you wouldn't - but a lot of people are not as fortunate. Sure, healthcare is complicated. But part of the problem is that it is made MORE complicated by the mishmosh we have now. One of the the beauties of single-payer is the very fact that it simplifies. Not that it makes anything simple. Just MORE so. Where do we get the money? From taxes, like in other countries. This is what always makes people say "more taxes??? Hell no," without realizing that we currently pay more for our healthcare here than other countries, and that includes when taking taxation into account. It would be tricky at first to wean people off the current system, especially those who are lucky enough at present to have employer-provided insurance, but it could be done. It has been done elsewhere.
