I am against any government run medical care system.

[Rosemary2205]

Call it what you will, single payer, universal, socialized --- oh sure, in a perfect world I'd love it. But this is not a perfect world and as much as I'd like to think our Democrat reps won't screw it up, history tells me they'll horsetrade it just like they have everything else.

I don't know what the answer is. But I don't trust my future medical care to the next GWB. -- and there WILL be more GWB's in the future -- and the "other side" will not be able to stop the disaster.

[ulysses]

1. well, we need *some* kind of solution.

What we've got ain't it.

[dragonlady]

36. The Canadians really like their system

We recently heard a speech by a labor representative from Canada who explained how they do things there. The system covers every citizen for all doctor and hospital costs (no deductibles or copays). You can choose any general practitioner or specialist you want and change whenever you want. The doctor decides what care you will get, not an insurance company. Canada spends a much lower proportion of GDP on medical care than we do, their people are healthier, and their businesses are more competitive because they don't have to provide health insurance. The risk is spread out among everybody through personal and corporate taxes. Providers negotiate reimbursement rates with the provincial governments and don't have to fight with insurance companies for their payments. Labor unions sometimes negotiate with employers to pay for insurance to cover extras like prescriptions and upgrades from semiprivate to private rooms. There have been some problems with people having to wait for elective procedures, but that has been overstated and was caused by inadequte funding rather than by the system itself, and they are improving the situation. They even hope to add prescription drugs, home care, and preventive dental coverage in the future.

When asked how many Canadians are satisfied with their health care, he estimated it at 95%. It sure sounded good to us. You can hear this whole presentation by downloading audio files here:
http://grassrootsnorthshore.org/?page_id=19

[Spazito]

38. This Canadian certainly likes our system!

I can vouch for what the labor rep said, Canadians overwhelmingly support our healthcare system, we want to improve it NOT toss it, much to the chagrin of US HMOs and Pharmaceutical companies.

[buzzard]

95. As does this one.n/t

[Canuckistanian]

112. Same here

And the one thing to remember is - our health care is PAID FOR by the government, not RUN BY the government.

There's no bureaucrat deciding what my health care is going to be. I have a doctor and HE "runs" my health care.

[GreenPartyVoter]

2. I am on Medicaid (MaineCare) It's fine and certainly preferable to nothing, which is what I would

have otherwise.

[Gormy Cuss]

11. I agree. Medicaid is a lot better than nothing even as it exists now

and it would probably be better funded under national health.

[Truth2Tell]

115. Single Payer IS NOT government run medicine!

It's government run insurance. Big difference.

[Gormy Cuss]

127. Yes, exactly as Medicaid and Medicare are. n/t

[Red Zelda]

3. Good

Then take away the fucking benefits of congressmen.

[SammyWinstonJack]

29. Absolutely! If we aren't entitled to at least what we are forced too pay for with regard

to the health care benefits our Congress critters receive, then neither should they be. Threaten to take away their tax payer funded health care and see how fast they give us the same benefits! Seems only fair.

[blondeatlast]

86. Zing! Exactly, nt

[HCE SuiGeneris]

4. So we should keep tossing the sick out on the street?

Just one city's example -- L.A. http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/anderson.cooper.360/blog/2007/07/another-trip-to-dantes-inferno.html

[Warpy]

5. The best way to avoid having an underfunded system

like the VA here and National Health in the UK is to make sure it is a universal system, that the only way the rich and powerful can opt out of the system here is to get onto a plane and go to Thailand or some other place specializing in boutique care for elective surgery for spoiled rich men.

If they know they have to face emergency care here in the US, they are going to make that emergency care the best they can, along with the convalescent care they'll need until they can safely jet off to paradise.

Let the insurance companies turn to providing disability insurance, something they'll find much more profitable, a gap between nothing and SSD for when people are temporarily disabled by illness, accident or even pregnancy, childbirth, and child care until weaning at 6 months.

I would much rather have an agency whose purpose is to provide service rather than an outfit whose purpose is to generate profit run my healthcare.

Think about it.

[Rosemary2205]

16. I agree with you BUT

in my wildest imagination I cannot picture the elite who hold all the purse strings actually standing in line with the rest of us at any time for any reason.

And I cannot even say how sad it makes me to realize I just can't trust my own government.

I have flip flopped on this quite a lot. I do, actually WANT universal single payer healthcare. But I'm watching my newly elected D's behavior when it comes to Iraq, and Education and host of other things, and just think it will be a complete disaster for everyone who ISN'T quite wealthy.

[Warpy]

47. I want it so badly that my long term plans include a move

to Mexico, which has a national health insurance program in place, although they are too poor to make it universal. There is no opt out unless the rich leave the country, as I understand it, although they do get to pick their own docs like they do in all national health insurance plans.

[happyslug]

56. Yes, and the poor can not afford it:

A post which points out the good points of the Mexican System (and ignores the bad points):
http://www.mexconnect.com/mex_/mexhealthcare.html

A more critical report of Heath Care in Mexico:
http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi/reprint/21/3/47.pdf

Basically, if you can pay the Annual fee for the IMSS program, it is as good as any in the US or Europe. If you can not you are out of luck. This is NOT Medical Coverage, it is coverage for groups that the Government were afraid of (The rich and the raising urban Working Class of the 1930s and 1940s). The only care provided to the Rural and Urban Poor has been vaccinations (95% of the population).

[Warpy]

64. I will be expected to pay for any employees

and every Gringa who lives in Mexico accumulates at least a maid and gardener, part time. That suits me just fine, a very reasonable way to get what I can't get in my own country at any price--health insurance.

I have absolutely no illusion that either party is ready to deal with the mess fairly or compassionately. All they want to do is protect the bloodsuckers who have been killing us for years.

[happyslug]

48. You are missing the 80/20 rule

Only 20 % of the population need extensive medical treatment, 80% of the population do not. Thus the 80% subsidizes the 20%, but this is like fire insurance on your home. It has been estimated that if you built your home when Mohammad was alive, it would have burned down ONCe since that date (i.e. 1 in 1300 years). Why do people buy Fire Insurance? For the simple fact IF their howe catches fire they do NOT have to come up with the cash to build a new one, the insurance company will pay them. The costs of NOT have fire Insurance (i.e. coming up with the money) exceeds the gains of NOT paying the insurance fees. The same with the 80% of the population who do NOT fully use their health insurance, they want health insurance just in case they are in the 20% instead of the 80%.

As to the rich, this is made more complicated by the fact that severe medical treatment need a pool of people to justify the training of the Doctors and Nurses in that particular type of care. If no one can afford the care, the system is NOT set up and no matter how rich you are you can NOT get the care needed (Thus you have Arabs and other Third world leaders coming to the US and Europe to get medical care, care that is NOT available in their home countries do to the fact the majority of people can NOT afford to get it).

The best Example of this is liver transplant. There are common in the Western World for we have most people with health insurance, so the medical community sets up operating Rooms, Doctors and support staff for such operations. In many third world countries. most people with liver problems that need a transplant just die do to NOT have the Cash to pay for the transplant. As to the rich they have to go to countries that do such operations. The reasons these countries do such operations is the poor and working class people are in their pool of applicants (do to health insurance) thus the medical community has an insensitive to set up a system to perform such operations.

Thus universal Health Insurance INCREASES what services that are available do to the larger size of the group that can PAY for the treatment (via health insurance). In the US over 60% of the population has Health Insurance (And another 10% has Medicaid). This is a huge pool of people to pull from (Many US Employers first started to give their employees Health Insurance during WWII, for their were FORBIDDEN by law to offer higher wages during the duration of WWII, but offering Health Insurance was permitted, this was further enhanced in the late 1960s when Congress made it clear such Health Insurance was deductible for Income Tax purposes if extended to most employees of a Corporation).

My point here is Health care is a product of people who USE Health care as much as people who want Health Care. The more people use Health Care, the better it will be. In most First World Countries this increase in number of people using Health Care was a product of Universal Medical Coverage. The sole Exception is the US and its more a product of the Labor Shortage that hit US industry do to WWII (and the Strength of Labor till 1980). The problem is since 1980, Labor has NOT been able to expand health care (and in fact people covered by health care has dropped in the last few years) while immigration has provided a pool of poor people who will work for any wages without health care. Combined these two economic changes has lead to the slow drop in the number of people insured. This will slowly increased until it is Mandated that EVERY ONE HAS INSURANCE or you see a sever labor shortage in the US (Which will lead to people opting for Health Coverage instead of wages in certain situation, thus most employers will increase medical coverage paid by the employer).

[Horse with no Name]

108. Let me fill you in on one thing

LOTS of folks die in this country too--because they can't AFFORD a transplant.

[happyslug]

110. True, but we have the facilities, which is the point I am trying to make

And the reason we have the Facilities is we have a large pool of people who can pay for such treatment via insurance. Without that large pool, you can NOT justify the treatment centers based on the costs of such treatment centers. Thus if the percentage insured ever drop substantially, such treatment centers will go out of business for less people will be able to pay for them. Less insured people, less income for the centers leads to less facilities. The rich Can only afford so much on their own, sooner or later the costs is even to high for them. How these things are handled is by spreading out the costs to more people. With Health Insurance that cost spreading works, if health insurance drops to much, so will the care level in this country even for the rich.

[sentelle]

121. the rich dont care

The rich don't care, because whatever they need done will get done. When b*sh had his girlfriend have an abortion, it was done where the rich did it... Overseas.

They call it going to the spa or whatever rubbish.

I'm sorry, but for me, its singal payer or nothing. I don't believe in corporate welfare, and I don't believe in being forced (mandate being a synonym for being forced) to give money to blood sucking insurance companies that care of nothing but profits.

[ieoeja]

116. The county where I grew up changed their policy when a rich man died.

I grew up in a bible belt county dominated by Democrats who made the switch to uber-Conservativism over the past couple of decades. One year they decided they did not want their taxes to pay for ambulances. If you ain't got the money or insurance, they probably figured you were better off dead anyway.

First time that year a rich man needed an ambulance, with no county guarantee their bill would be paid, they refused to come. The man died, and the county went back to the old policy rather quickly.

[magellan]

6. I understand what you're saying, but it's not like it works now.

If you can afford it in the first place -- and plenty can't -- you pay out the nose and always run the risk of having to fight your insurance company for reimbursement. And just look what's happening to Medicare now they're privatizing that.

[msmcghee]

7. You need to watch Michael Moore's Sicko. n/t

[bluethruandthru]

8. Single payer is government paid not government run.

The government just pays the bills. Do you trust your medical future to your insurance company?

[annabanana]

46. Ding Ding - We have a winner! This is correct.

Why is this so hard for some people to "get"?

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

92. Which is also problematic...

...when you get them saying "We'll pay for serivce X, but not service Y." Which is not to say that I'm against universal health care. I just think its implementation would have to be very carefully crafted to avoid any political tampering with what should be purely medical or financial decisions.

[Canuckistanian]

113. There's not much denying of services going on

If it's some kind of cosmetic surgery or if a doctor doesn't recommend it for a valid medical reason, the government doesn't pay for it.

And that doesn't happen too often.

And anyways, doctors are the ones who decide what services or procedures go on the schedule. The government has NO say.

I think it's the FRCPS (Fellowship of Royal Canadian Physicians and Surgeons) that decides.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

9. So you prefer rich-only medical care? Hmmmm... nt

[acmavm]

10. Have you got insurance? What advice to you have for those who don't?

For those who can't afford it? For kids who can't get dental care or glasses? For old people who can't get medicine?

Certainly if you can tell us what you DON'T want, you must have some kind of idea what you do want.

[YOY]

12. Are you aware that every other civilized country has it?

and it works better than what we have? I've been a few places. It does.

[Rosemary2205]

21. I'm not so sure we are a civilized country anymore.

I'd like to believe our citizens will come to their senses and stop the race to the bottom for 98% while the 2% suck the life out of the rest of us, but look at how they keep voting. How many true progressives do we really have that refuse to bow to the ultra elite with enough strength to stop the next GWB?

I am discouraged that a potentially wonderful system would not work here because we've spent too many decades teaching Americans that profit and greed and all good regardless of who gets hurt.

[Pamela Troy]

68. What????

"I'm not so sure we are a civilized country anymore."

And this qualifies as an argument against socialized medicine -- how?

[YOY]

83. That's not really a good excuse no insult intended.

Even the opponents would wake up and realize how much better such a system would work after using it. All save the folks who are no longer making money hand-over-fist with the current system. They'd be bitching into their graves.

[bob4460]

13. YOU MUST HAVE INSURANCE

I don't and I cannot get into a doctor without it we need something better

[Rosemary2205]

26. high deductable no prescriptions.

I am disabled and so is my husband. A regular insurance company won't touch either of us with a 10 foot pole.

My policy is expensive and covers very little. I was determined to get off social security disability and get back to work. I no longer qualify for medicare or medicaid. My husband is still covered as he will never be able to work again. Getting him medical care is a full time job though I am grateful he has something, even if it means a constant battle finding a provider. Medicare is in deep shit because it is so underfunded.

[drmeow]

14. I can understand your concerns

The last thing we want is a GWB type being able to access our medical information. Of course, the way things are going right now, not having a single payer health care system isn't protecting us from that.

I agree, it has to be a system where EVERYONE has to use the same system. If Congress and the President are on the same health care system that everyone else is on, it will certainly be a better program.

Incidentally, under Saddam, Iraqis had a very good socialized medicine system.

[Evoman]

90. Why would a GWB type be able to access your med info?

All the government gets is a bill. It's not like they can just waltz into your doctor's office...their is still confidentiality.

[warren pease]

105. Well, yes and no...

HIPAA is allegedly supposed to protect against such intrusion, but in the age of Bush, absolutely nothing is safe from the prying eyes of snoops and snitches, both governmental and corporate. Note this article, and this particularly vile paragraph from it:

Thanks to the Bush administration, a new federal rule took effect on April 14 (2001) that authorizes HMOs to take medical records from clinics, hospitals, and pharmacies without patient consent. The new rule drew enormous media attention when it took effect, but the media’s description of the rule was grossly misleading. Most news outlets not only failed to report the new privileges extended to HMOs, they also described the rule as if it enhanced medical privacy.

And privacy isn't the only thing being violated; your medical records are now sales tools that your insurance company can sell to any of the hundreds of thousands of companies that the HIPAA "privacy rule" calls "business associates." Here's another snip on how medical insurers can use your illnesses, diseases or injuries to create your own personal marketing hell as you become the target of zillions of emails, telemarketing calls and reams of junk mail just because, say, you broke an ankle recently and Crutches&BracesRUs.com, along with hundreds of their competitors, spend every single evening trying to entice you to empty your wallet for their fine products:

But these protections afforded by the new rule, known as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) Privacy Rule, are minor compared to the loss of protection HMO patients will suffer. One can appreciate, for example, the rule’s effort to minimize the possibility that strangers might see patient names on a file, a scheduling board, or a computer screen. But the possibility that providers might inadvertently reveal patients’ names or even data about their health to a few strangers passing by poses a tiny threat to patient privacy compared to the certainty that HMOs have been routinely examining, and now, with the blessing of the federal government, will continue to examine routinely, patient medical records without patient consent. Moreover, the Privacy Rule permits HMOs to share those medical records with hundreds of thousands of firms the HIPAA rule calls "business associates."

So while GWB is no doubt too dense to know which end of a medical chart is up, his pals in official snoop-dom and BushCo crony industries can certainly figure it out.

So I can see why people would be leery of single-payer on those grounds. However, it looks like the present system gives private, for-profit, unaccountable insurers full access to those records already, and lets them sell your most personal information to all comers.

It's hard to pick an entity least trustworthy when choosing between the feds and the insurance industry. Part of the solution is eliminating these for-profit parasites from the entire health care process -- permanently. The other is eliminating anyone remotely associated with BushCo, the PNAC and the neo-conservative movement in the fastest and most efficient (legal) way possible. Whether that's impeachment, federal indictments leading to life sentences, "extraordinary rendition," locking them in detention camps or just keeping them under house arrest with an ankle beeper bolted on -- or maybe some combination of the above.

Just so they're out of earshot, out of sight and out of power.


wp

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

15. Why not look at the countries

with the best health care systems? Wouldn't it make sense to copy what they do?

[sendero]

17. Medicare..

... works about as well as any insurance program, except providers don't care for it so much because they don't get paid as well.

In any single payer system, the well off will still get whatever care they can pay for.

[Warren Stupidity]

18. You are very confused. Its medicare for everyone.

First of all, the single payer proposal is just that: the government pays for healthcare, it does not hire doctors, run pharmacies, operate hospitals. The government replaces the for-profit health insurance industry by simply extending medicare to everyone. The costs are paid for through taxes, for example through the current payroll tax with employees and employers splitting the cost.

Now of course there is a political question of the funding level for such a system. Yes indeed we can make the choice to underfund our healthcare system and we will then get shitty service. We could do to ourselves what the British did with Thatcher, and vote ourselves into a degraded service. At least we would have a say in that decision. As it is now in our current system of medicaid for the very poor, medicare for the elderly, and whatever you can manage to get for yourself for the rest of us, most of us get whatever insurance our employers provide, pay whatever our employers demand we pay, and have no say at all about the service we get from the private health insurance company we are contracted out to. That company's profits are determined by how little service it provides. The health insurance industry maximizes its profits by denying you care, by grudgingly granting you the cheapest possible care, by denying you coverage at all if it can.

Yes of course universal single payer public health care will not be perfect, and politicians may try to get votes by cutting costs, there are indeed risks and pitfalls. Unlike private health insurance, there is also the potential, realized in most of the other modern industrial democracies, to provide superior healthcare to everyone at a reasonable cost.

Go see Sicko. Our system is very broken. It is the most expensive system on the planet and it delivers shitty healthcare. Healthcare should never be for profit.

[Rosemary2205]

22. I've seen sicko.

I am in no way saying for profit is superior. I'm saying I don't think non-profit will ever work in the US ever again because the elite have bought and paid for both sides of the aisle.

[Pamela Troy]

69. And your against a system where the elite DOESN'T do this?

Please explain.

[baldguy]

19. In a perfect would, health insurance companies would be in business to provide health insurance.

Instead they exist only to turn a profit - meaning they take your money and provide nothing in return. Wanting more of the same is pure insanity.

[Rosemary2205]

23. I never said I want to keep the status quo

there are always more than just 2 choices.

[Pamela Troy]

70. So....

What do you propose?

[sandyd921]

20. Why would a government run system be any worse than

medical care controlled by insurance companies whose only motive is making a profit? BTW a single payer system would likely be administered by the government instead of a profit-driven insurance company, but medical care would be provided by providers in private practice and hospitals and clinics much as it is now (although some recommend that hospitals go back to being non-profit, like they were for much of our history).

[Thothmes]

82. Think FEMA and the DOD as examples of govt run organizations

[FredScuttle]

114. Caveat - government agencies run by people who hate the Fed Gov't are doomed to fail

In comparison, FEMA was a model of efficiency under the Clinton administration.

[Thothmes]

117. Can you guarantee that the Govt will always be run by altruists.

[sandyd921]

120. We have to work to restore our democracy and trust that future

corrupt administrations will receive a drubbing from the citizens (as hopefully the republiCONS will in 2008). We cannot base policy decisions for this nation on what might happen in the future. If the founding fathers had done so, they would not have written the constitution and founded the US!

[sandyd921]

119. Under a corrupt republican administration

n/t

[NNN0LHI]

24. Do you currently have health care coverage?

Before we go any further.

Don

[Rosemary2205]

27. see upthread

[NNN0LHI]

33. Your husband is currently on medicare and you have been on it in the past when you needed it

Is that correct?

But yet you say you are against any government run medical care system.

Does that make any sense?

Don

[Rosemary2205]

51. Medicare barely works now.

The system is a hair from bankruptcy and there does not seem to be any hope of Congress fully funding it any time soon. I am concerned about what will happen when Americans have no other choice BUT Medicare. I'm not against Medicare - I am against all of America having no other choice BUT to entrust their medical care to a federal government clearly bought and paid for by the elite. In the long run I don't think we will be any better off than we are now, because I do not trust my fellow Americans to vote in their own economic interests.

Please understand, I am not in favor of the status quo.

[Cleita]

25. Single payer is not government run medical care to begin with.

However, since 60% of medical costs in the USA are paid for by government through Medicare, Medicaid, CHAMPUS, SCHIPS and the VA, if you did any research, you would know that all these systems have been running quite well for the last fifty years and some even longer. Single payer is about insuring all Americans with an improved and comprehensive Medicare, the most efficient system in the USA including the private insurance companies and HMOs who have shown an inability to provide blanket coverage for all conditions for a minimum cost of 2% to 3% in administrative costs. Private insurers and HMO's can't do it without 15% to 30% in administrative costs, yet they have to insert huge deductibles and also have to cherry pick whom they insure for medical conditions on top of it. The government has done it without excluding anyone for previous medical conditions and a deductible of $100 a year. It's time for all Americans to get the medical benefits our seniors do. Please go here and educate yourself.

http://www.pnhp.org

[Breeze54]

28. Are you against the US Postal Service, the police and firefighters too?

:shrug:

Medicare and medicaid? There are already plenty of things "run by the government" and they work fine! Sure, there can be problems but NON-PROFIT single payer universal health care IS the way to go! FOR-PROFIT health care is a sham, a scam and bankrupting people!! Not to mention all the people who don't have any coverage at all because they're poor. There's no profit in the poor.
That has to change if we are going to refer to ourselves as a civilized society. The USA CAN afford it... we can't afford not to anymore.

[JustAnotherGen]

30. I'm not

I was in St. Tropez, France in May of this year and had a bad, bad chest bug. Not only did my hotel get a doctor to come to me but the doctor gave me 'free of charge' a horsepill antibiotic. I then went to the pharmacy to get my 'prescription' cold medicine and paid $5 for the bottle. I paid $50 US for the Doctors visit.

I came back from Lyon France this past Sunday, got off the plane in Newark, grabbed my suitcase off the carousel and threw my lower left back. As my boyfriend said in his Franglish (it's our own language we've created), "Too bad this didn't happen here. You would have been taken care of." There's not a lot he can do at a moments notice when he lives 3000 miles away.

But he's right. I think instead of saying, "Well here are the problems we see in other countries that have socialized medicine so we can't have it here," we should say:

We can do it better.
We can learn from their mistakes.
We can make sure it's properly funded.
We can make it less expensive.


I look at ALL of the candidates programs - not one is speaking about making it illegal to sue a physician. I.E. What if we went to a two strikes and your out system? First strike is a years suspension. Second strike is an out -you no longer get to practice medicine in the US. Part of the cost of health care is the high insurance premium the Physicians have to provide.

How do we bring health care costs down? Take away Malpractice Insurance. See - they're getting hosed right along with the rest of us.

I guess I just have a nasty attitude towards ALL types of insurance scams - and yes. To me - be it Auto, Home/Property (look at Hurricaine Katrina denials), etc. etc. Health Insurance is just another.


Just because none of the candidates that I'm Aware Of is speaking about this in their 'plan' - doesn't mean I'm willing to throw the whole idea under the bus.

[warren pease]

31. As my fellow Warren said upthread, the payer is the only difference...

...docs and hospitals continue to operate as they have. My doc, for example, has his own practice. He accepts payment from a couple dozen different carriers. Does that mean he works for, say, Blue Cross? Of course not, although at times it seems like it because the intrusive bastards won't let him practice medicine without spending a lot of time looking over his shoulder lest he order a test or prescribe a medication that might cost the for-profit swine an extra dime.

The following is the nature of single payer, which is the only workable alternative to this deadly joke that's currently killing around 18,000 people a year because making gobs of money is incompatible with performing the industry's stated purpose -- covering subscribers' medical costs.


One nation, one payer.

Everybody in, nobody out.

No pre-existing conditions.

No doctor bills.

No hospital bills.

No deductibles.

No co-pays.

No in network.

No out of network.

No corporate profits.

No more medical bankruptcies.


In my opinion, to get to single-payer, we need to separate the idea of health care from the idea of health insurance.

Health care is what happens when patients and health care professionals interact to, in the best case, successfully diagnose and treat a medical condition or injury.

Health insurance is the protection money you have to pay the middle man to enable this transaction and keep you out of bankruptcy court. Why would you want to give some parasite intermediary who does absolutely nothing to provide health care a single damn penny?

And keep in mind that Medicare runs at an annual overhead of about 3 percent, while for-profit insurers typically squander between 25 and 40 percent of an estimated $2.2 TRILLION gross annual combined income for entire medical industry. And that 25 to 40 percent -- which translates into between $550 billion and $880 billion -- does absolutely nothing to enable them to do their alleged jobs, which is covering medical expenses for their rate payers.

And you're actually afraid of getting screwed by a universal-access, single-payer system? You're currently getting screwed 12 way from Sunday and you're worried that the feds might do an even worse job?

Nonsense. If that were the case, all other western democracies would exhibit shorter life spans, higher rates of cancer and heart disease, higher infant mortality rates, lower birth weights, fewer average healthy years, failing mental health programs, and far more serious epidemiological incidents. Since the opposite is true in all cases, I think it's fair to infer that single-payer works and this cobbled together disaster we call a health care system is not getting the job done.

Finally, and perhaps the most galling stat of all: A Harvard Medical School study showed that, back in 1999, the US taxpayer shouldered the burden for just under 60 percent of all health care costs nationwide by being forced to fund health care for federal, state and local government employees. That included programs such as the federal employees health plan and those for state and local employees as well (through property taxes); the Cadillac coverage our fine representatives and Senators enjoy (which they say we can't have); the costs of covering ER expenses for those without insurance; the costs of running the Medicare program; and the state and local costs of various Medicaid programs.

That 60 percent represented $2,604 per capita at the time, which means government spending per-person on health care in the US was higher than total per capita health care expenditures in any other country in the world -- including those with single-payer, universal-access national health care systems. So we're paying for national health care; we're just not getting it.


wp

[dysfunctional press]

32. so- you don't want to keep the status quo, you don't want single-payer

and you don't have any ideas what you want...just something "different"...AND you've seen "sicko"

you must have SOME idea(s) about how people should be able to see their doctors, get their meds, and get the care they need when they need it, and how it should be paid for- what type of system do you envision as being satisfactory to you? or- what do you want/expect from said system?

:shrug:

[Dawggie]

34. Unfortunately, it will take a complete revolution by the people

to take the insurance companies and big pharma out of the system. They have bought 90% of our politicians and will not give up without a fight. Just look what we have done for oil in a sovereign nation. Now imagine what the corporatocracy would do to keep our money in reference to health care.

[Lint Head]

35. If we can fund a military to kill people we can fund medical care

that keeps people alive. I think health care should be declared a human right. No one should suffer or die because they cannot afford health care. No one!
:dem:

[Rosemary2205]

53. We CAN - I'm just not sure we WILL.

We already are voting in Congresscritters who fund medicare less and less and corporate tax breaks more and more.

[JustAnotherGen]

37. warren pease

Thanks for taking the time to lay out those facts. :-) Every American needs to be aware of those facts.

[ileus]

39. I'll cost Trillions and the government will still have to prop up hospitals.

If the plan is anything like the medicare plan there won't be a hospital that remains open without direct government funds. I'd say the cost to insure everyone in America would be 1 trillon a year at least.

[Spazito]

43. The US system is already the MOST expensive, per capita,

as related here in this analysis by the University of Maine entitled " The US Health Care System: The Best in the World, or Just the Most Expensive?


http://dll.umaine.edu/ble/U.S.%20HCweb.pdf

It is a PDF file.

[Greyhound]

40. You're confusion seems to rise from a lack of definitions. Single payer is not run by the government

but fees are set and the bills are paid through a common fund pool that is administered by the government. That is probably the best system and the easiest to implement.

Your Doctor sets a course of treatment for your condition, the treatment is administered, and the bills are paid at the set rate through the common fund. The problem for the reich-wing is that no one is going to make millions of dollars in that system.

Now, what is your objection to that?

[Rosemary2205]

55. I am not confused.

[Greyhound]

73. Then what is your objection? n/t

[China_cat]

41. Nobody's looking for government RUN health care.

Just pay the bills like Medicare does. Or at least like it used to.

[knitter4democracy]

42. So, you'll never be on Medicare?

I'm just wondering.

[Rosemary2205]

54. I already have

My husband still is. Finding a doctor who takes medicare ONLY is a real challenge and I live city with a pretty good medical care options. Medicare is grossly underfunded, and I am very concerned about what will happen when Americans have no other options and then the next GWB takes over and his Bill Frist take over.

[knitter4democracy]

85. Really? Hubby's office takes Medicare only.

His last one did, too. I can't think of any in our area that require a supplemental, but that's probably because so many patients here can't afford the supplemental insurance.

Whereabouts are you? I might know someone there.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

44. I understand the reason for your discouragement, but this is a poor argument. All through

history there will be poor and corrupt leaders.

By this reasoning, why try to do anything about anything, ever?

[bullwinkle428]

45. Dubya hasn't effed up Social Security, no matter how hard he attempts to try!

It's still doing its job quite well, for those who rely on it.

[MannyGoldstein]

49. I Guess You Just Don't Like Better Results At Half The Cost

Which is what every other developed country has.

[pansypoo53219]

50. i don't have dental insurance,

so i gotta pay out of pocket. if i pay it same day or close, dentist gives me a discount. so, obviously insurance is a pain.

[Gloria]

52. Medicare seems to be working just fine for me...no complaints at all...

I can see any doctor I want....Trouble is that Bushco keeps trying to get doctors OUT of serving Medicare by lowering their reimbursements.

The private companies have their hands in it....they issue the billing statements but otherwise keep their distance, except for the
"complete plans" which are crap......so why not expand traditional Medicare??? TOO SIMPLE?????

If it were in place for all, believe me, no one would dare touch it....they'd be shot if they tried...

[Rosemary2205]

57. I'd like to believe that "no one would dare touch it"

I guess I just don't have kind of faith in either side anymore.

[Gloria]

61. Well, it would be like Soc. Security...under threat, but enough strong voices

to protect it (I hope) esp. if people got really pissed off....another "Third Rail" issue....

[MadHound]

58. Like corporate run health care has performed real well.

Sorry, but we need a drastic change in our health care system, and UHC is the logical step. It can be set up such that future presidents and leaders can't fuck with it. Canada, England and the rest of the developed world has done so, why can't we?

[Rosemary2205]

59. We CAN - I'm not sure we WILL.

Even a quick read of this thread makes it clear I am not in favor of the status quo either.........

[mmonk]

60. So you have experience with one?

What's good about an insurance industry run healthcare system? I paid out around 35,000 last year counting premiums, co pays, and uncovered expenses.

[Selatius]

62. Medicare is NOT a failure!

Just as Social Security is NOT a failure. Those two have been successful precisely because they operate outside the whim of the White House. If you want single-payer health care, keep it out of the hands of the White House.

[Mr Rabble]

63. Our "Democrat" reps huh?

None too subtle.

Yeah, and the idea that public funds should actually go to help, you know, the people, is just impossible right?

[Rosemary2205]

65. SHOULD isn't the same as WILL

We SHOULD spend public funds to on the people. We've recently chosen to spend most of the public funds on the elite instead.

[Mr Rabble]

66. Right. So then make sure that we actually enact

single payer, government run healthcare.

That way, there will be no corporate interests bilking the funds. Government pays doctors directly. Much more difficult to steal when there are no billion dollar contracts.

Private healthcare virtually guarantees that corporations will exert influence on politicians to steer government funding toward them, and away from us.

In the end, our politicians are no more or less craven than those is France or England and yet they all manage to have a vastly superior healthcare system, run by their governments- at substantially lower cost.

Pretty tough to argue with real world results isnt it?

[ConsAreLiars]

67. Are you saying you have no understanding at all of the differences among single payer, universal,

socialized and government run medical care? That you think that they are all the same? Stunning.

[Chief]

84. Differences

I, for one, DON'T understand the differences between the 4 types that you described above. Can you explain them?

[Djinn]

71. works fine in the rest of the industrialised world

and in several developing nations as well. Are Americans really THAT sick/special/stupid/lazy/greedy that it can't possibly work there?

ANYTHING "bestowed" on you by benevolent Dems can be changed by a future govt, does that mean you don't want them to do anything at all if they win?

oh sure, in a perfect world I'd love it

Yep only perfect countries have national health - go travelling and see why that comes across as an utterly bizarre statement to anyone outside the US

[Xenotime]

72. So you want to see children go without healthcare... So nice of you.

[Rosemary2205]

75. Your snottiness is noted.

Thank you. That's EXACTLY what I want.

:eyes:

[sss1977]

74. I respectfully disgree.

[libnnc]

76. The rest of us want to work for change.

If you can't run with the big dogs, you best stay on the porch.

I want a universal, socialized system. I want the government to foot the bill.

You best stay at the house and let the rest of us get to work.

[Hoof Hearted]

77. Dance while you can indeed. Shame on you for not understanding the need of

you fellow human beings.

Rest easy in the assurance that your privileged position will always entitle you to holier than thou care.

[B Calm]

78. We're looking at your claim and I'm afraid it has to be denied. You

should have seeked a referral before making the claim. Your now only option is you can file an appeal....

[Donald Ian Rankin]

79. I strongly disagree - the NHS provides better value for money.

Those Western nations which do have government-run health services - i.e. pretty much all of them other than the US - have mostly got better health care, for better value because it's not being siphoned off into profit margins, than the US.

This makes it fairly clear that free-at-point-of-use, tax-funded, government-run healthcare is the best approach, I think.

[Perry Logan]

80. I think the right to healthcare should be in the Bill of Rights. There's no freedom if you're sick.

[warren pease]

94. Right bleeping on, Perry.

I initially thought you were a bit of a centrist, but that's probably because I sometimes don't recognize subtle satire without the :sarcasm: icon. Just an occasional failing of my sense of humor, which has been severely tested these past seven years.

However, I just looked through your journal and damn if we don't agree on just about everything.

Now about that plane into the Pentagon...


wp

[Vinca]

81. If you're against any government run medical care, apparently

you are for pain and suffering because that is what's happening. 18,000 people are dying every year because they can't afford health insurance. That's six 9/11s. You'd think we'd throw as much money at this problem as we put into invading an innocent country after 9/11. I hope, for your sake, you keep the insurance you apparently have. If you ever find yourself in line with the rest of us - those the insurance companies don't want at any price - your opinion will change in a hurry.

[blondeatlast]

87. You can opt out of Medicare, too--just don't enroll. Let us know your feelings

when you become eligible, okay? I'll bookmark this thread for reference; I'd suggest other DUers do the same, especially the youngsters...

[graywarrior]

88. This is why we keep voting for the same dynasties over and over

We're too afraid to make the change, even though we know it's good for us. Hell, I don;t want to live in fear that we might have another Bush. We're all gonna die someday, so does that mean we don't have the best health coverage in the meantime?

[ProfessorGAC]

89. Wow! Talk About Risk Averse!

The current system isn't working like it should. Single payer won't work. You can't trust anyone. So, we should do nothing?

Not exactly the most compelling argument.
The Professor

[hunter]

91. So you got run over by a truck, but you wouldn't have it any other way?

You fear "socialized" medicine. That makes no sense.

If my wife and I lived in a land of single payer medicine we'd be doing very well for ourselves.

Instead we have muddled through in a world of COBRA plans that bite and then time out, medical collection agencies, damaged credit ratings, limited work opportunities because we simply can't get private medical insurance, rejected claims that we have to argue with, and very early on in our marriage, many pages of hospital bills we couldn't pay.

Health insurers will do everything they can to shed clients who require ongoing medical treatment. If multiple insurers are required to provide healthcare to all, then each insurer will still do everything in their power to avoid the costlier clients, including legal sleights of hand that are clearly corrupt and unethical.

The U.S. healthcare system is broken and expensive because the U.S. public blames the victims of poverty, chronic illness, and even simple accidents for their plight. We are racist, we are sexist, we are gullible, and our politicians are bought. Otherwise we would have the same sort of healthcare system much more civilized nations have, a healthcare system that runs smoothly, has reasonable costs, and is not the principle causes of financial ruin for the middle class.

[Mutineer]

93. I've seen the VA Healthcare system in action.

And it sucks ass. I don't have hope for a government run system for all of us by any means. I'd love the IDEA of it, but seeing how screwed up and lousy the VA system is, I don't think it would honestly work.

[warren pease]

98. It sucks because it's underfunded...

And BushCo has cut the VA budget every single year since the 2000 coup. ALL single-payer systems fail if they're not properly funded.

For 17 straight years, Thatcher and then Major tried to get Brits to swallow the for-profit, privatized US health care model by gradually pulling funding from the NHS, which created long lines because of staffing reductions; long waiting periods for needed services because the same number of patients had fewer docs and medical staff to see -- and those that were available found themselves working more hours for less money; deteriorating medical centers and clinics because there was no money for proper maintenance; and falling behind the technology curve because there was no money to buy cutting-edge (no pun intended) marvels (like Gamma Knives, machines that actually perform non-invasive brain surgery but cost a mint).

This was all intended to sour people on the NHS and cause them to be more receptive to privatized alternatives, like the fine US model in which parasites skim significant percentages of gross income for things like executive compensation, shareholder return, paper-pushing, real estate investing, an army of claims "adjusters" whose job it is to "adjust" your claim into a black hole where it remains unpaid for months or years, maybe a week in Barbados for the top 100 sales people... All of these activities are funded with money stolen from rate payers who contract with these companies to get their medical bills paid and not to double the CEO's salary and stock options every six months, or buy the new marketing VP a second home just outside of Vail.

Fortunately for the Brits and the NHS, they kicked the Tories out in 1997 and Tony Blair, of all people, emerged to end privatization and resume adequately funding the NHS for the first time in nearly two decades.

Of course, because you can never really keep the greedy parasites in the for-profit health care system down for long, Canada's Harper government has been pulling more or less the same shit as the Tories did in the UK. US insurance companies have been salivating over Canada's roughly 33 million people for years and, in Harper, they see an opportunity to make significant headway.

However, Canadians consistently say they're very happy with their health care system and want no part of a US-style system, so it looks like Harper is going to get his ass kicked out of power if he ever tries to take the country in that direction.

Anyway, long story short, that's what BushCo has been doing with the VA. Cutting funding, creating hellholes where people die rather than recover, short changing the VA and diverting funding to private firms instead, who of course make their money not by improving the VA system, but by destroying it in hopes that it will soon go completely private so that the mass thievery can begin in earnest. Here's an article that describes the VA problem, and here's a particularly disgusting excerpt from it:

According to the Army Times, the memo described how privatization caused as many as 250 members of the staff to leave in what appears to be a cost-cutting measure.

A company called IAP Worldwide Service, run by a former Halliburton executive, took a $120 million contract to run portions of the hospital’s services called facilities management. Immediately after, facilities management staff was reduced to 50 privately employed workers.

So don't blame the concept behind a single-payer, universal-access, high-quality health care system for everyone -- including vets. Put the blame squarely where it belongs: around the necks of the BushCo bastards, who will literally do anything, no matter how vile or revolting, to make an extra nickel for themselves and their cronies.

As one of the great sig lines around here goes (paraphrasing): A nation that won't care for its existing veterans has no business creating new ones.

A - bleeping - men.


wp


Edited to add this revolting bit of info from the above-linked article (emphasis mine):

The drive to reduce or gut veterans’ service dates from the beginning of the Bush administration but received a public airing in January 2005 when Pentagon official David Chu ironically told the Wall Street Journal (1-25-05) that the cost of veterans’ benefits was "hurtful" to national security.

It has long been the policy of the Pentagon to reduce access to services and to mandate that various departments withhold information from veterans about which benefits they may be eligible for. Additionally, the Bush administration has ordered increases in fees for the use of medical benefits to veterans.

[Rosemary2205]

123. Thank you for putting it so well.

The concept is wonderful -- the political jerks have destroyed it.

Someday we'll have another GWB who thinks "the cost of benefits is hurtful to national security". And the other side will sit by and let them destroy our healthcare like they've done the VA.

[mdmc]

96. Govt. mental health treatment is better then any private ins.

The govt. is more efficient and generous then anything the free market can produce.

I really don't think you know what you are talking about or are so comfortable that you don't feel the lack of private care.

[mdmc]

128. please post a private insurer that is just as good

:kick:

[porphyrian]

97. Government funded isn't the same as government run.

Nor is the President in charge of all of the other programs, like public education, libraries and firefighters, that you aren't expressing the same concern for. Medical professionals would run a universal medical care system, not the President.

[leftofthedial]

99. if we all would just get sick and die

and transfer all our money into corporate coffers at the same time, it would solve the whole problem

[hunter]

101. No, first you must work all your life for crappy wages.

Then spend everything you may have saved on expensive prescriptions and procedures that may or may not work.

Then, when all your money is all gone, and the big corporations can't flense another nickle from either you or the meager government programs that support you, that's when you should die to maximize their profits.

[leftofthedial]

102. good plan!

:thumbsup:

[leftofthedial]

100. If we had health care like most any other developed nation,

it would become like Social Security. Thieving politicians would be afraid to try to mess with it.

[Javaman]

103. Don't worry, it's never going to happen. as long as whomever gets elected

continues to take money from the insurance and pharma corps, it will never ever happen.

[LeftHander]

104. Why are so many people without healthcare...?

WHY?

Because they can't afford it. Because our health care is about a healthy profit not healthy people.

One hand you have hospitals raising prices as insurance companies clamp down on payouts...

The best customer in this model is some one who pays a huge fee for insurance and never gets sick.

Hospitals won't treat people if they can't pay. Insurance companies won't cover people that are sick...

...does that sound screwed up to you?....but it is fucking brilliant to investors...

[SyntaxError]

106. I say, if we're willing to blow hundreds of billions of dollars in Iraq...

then we should could easily put that money to better use here in our own country.

[Horse with no Name]

107. If I am understanding you correctly, and I think I am

I take it you are very well insured and you don't want to "risk" losing what you already have for something that may not work?
What about the folks that have nothing?
I will tell you. The people that are very well insured WILL probably lose small perks--one of them being the gloating they have handing their insurance card to the receptionist--it is ESPECIALLY gratifying AFTER someone less fortunate hands their Medicaid/Medicare card. It kind of gives you a "kick in the class"...eh?:sarcasm:
Single payer will take care of EVERYONE.
Now, it may not pay for that fancy dermatologist who you see for a pimple on your face every month, but the basic needs will be met...for everyone.
Isn't that MORE important?

[Rosemary2205]

124. You don't understand and you thought wrong.

I am not well insured. I have detailed that upthread.

[LSK]

109. you have lived in Europe and Canada???

And Australia and New Zealand??? How about Norway? Sweden? Israel???

HOW THE HELL WOULD YOU KNOW IF YOU ARE AGAINST GOVT MEDICARE SYSTEMS IF YOU ONLY TRIED ONE????

[JerseygirlCT]

111. Government run health programs (medicare/medicaid) have

historically been better able to deliver good care at a better price. They do a better job than private health insurance companies.

Now, I'm not opposed to a single-payer system with a non-profit administering it rather than the gov't. But putting profit in the mix is where we go right off the rails.

[KittyWampus]

118. the government would NOT be running the medical system. It'd just be financing it.

[Skittles]

122. LOL

please educate yourself and start by using the word DEMOCRATIC when proper so you don't sound like some kind of repuke hack

[Rosemary2205]

125. Hey!

Fuck you too sweetheart. :hi:

[mdmc]

129. Please post a link to a private insurer that equals medicaid's

mental health coverage.

[Tyler Durden]

130. No offense, and as politely as I can put it...You are a fool.

The BILLIONS paid to insurance companies NOW could fund the most amazing Single Payer system the world has ever seen, and the government would do what governments do best: WRITE THE FRIGGIN' CHECK.

Simple. Easy. Works for the rest of the industrialized world with not HALF of our resources.

[mdmc]

133. kick

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

126. You sound like one of those people who have bought the Republican lie that "government" is bad.

Al Gore addresses this issue in many of his speeches.

Your post is just baffling and sad. You and your husband have already depended on the government safety net that you decry. You have no affordable private options and yet you still would are against a "government" run system. Well, Social Security disability is government run, so is Medicare and Medicaid and so is Social Security. Since private options are ABSENT for 47 million Americans, including you, apparently, about the only possible solution IS government run healthcare.

The free market has FAILED in healthcare. They have had lo these many years to provide affordable, sustainable healthcare and drug coverage and they have FAILED. Healthcare was "horsetraded" as you put it to the private sector a long time ago. The concern now is to take it back for the common good. That's right, the "common good". What a concept.

Maybe the solution is to have government run healthcare but to allow people like you who oppose it for illogical, befuddled, idealogical, bs reasons opt out. If that turns out not to be the case, I am sure that you can just deny yourself any benefits that the rest of us chose to provide you with.

I bet you own your own copy of "The Fountainhead" with Gary Cooper and Patricia Neal. Do you find it as hilarious as I do?

[Industrial Democracy]

131. Government IS bad, however

some things are handled poorly by the private-sector and can be done better by the public-sector. Health insurance is one of those things. Our current system is horribly inefficient-- compare administrative costs of Medicare, Medicaid and Canada's system to the private-sector-- the waste in the private inurance industry is mind-boggling. Then, of course, there are the not so minor problems of escalating costs and declining, uneven coverage.

[mdmc]

132. even the trolls understand that universal health care is the way to go

:toast: