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DesideriScuri -> RE: Why is US medical care so expensive? (3/3/2012 6:58:41 PM)
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ORIGINAL: tazzygirl
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How long do you have a right to live? How long? If I die before I reach my "right to live" age, are my survivors allowed to sue for wrongful death?
Logan's Run? lol
What you are blissfully missing is this...
At some point, everyone accesses health care. Its either when the problem is minor.. or when its major.
Whats driving up health care costs is that people without insurance have to wait until the major... and then hospitals cannot turn them away.
A man has chest discomfort... if he has insurance, he will go to the hospital. If not, he will hope and pray its only heart burn, take something over the counter, and lay down. It doesnt get better... it gets worse... and he had to wait. Now he is off in a ambulance when someone could have driven him if he had left sooner. Now its code mode when he hits the ER, instead of a quiet but quick assessment and tests. Now its permanent heart damage when it very well could have been avoided.
Yet another non-answer to the question. (I know why, though, so it's okay)
Very much an answer to your question. The fact that you do not like the answer makes it no less valid But, yes, I can see why you would refuse to address it. (and thats ok)
At what point does that answer address how long you have the right to live? Or, if you don't live to your "rightful" age, whether or not your survivors can sue? That isn't answered. At all. And that makes it a ....drumroll please....non-answer.
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Aha! So, now you're admitting that your choices will have consequences for more than just yourself. If you choose a slovenly, over-consumptive lifestyle, you will have a financial impact on anyone else that lives a better lifestyle than you and is thrown into the same risk pool as you. You are now shedding responsibility for your actions.
NOW I am admitting? Dude, maybe you should spend some time and review topics on the health care bills and then the law to see what my position is. You are clueless about many things.
Don't need to. I take your posts on the threads that I read and respond to. Now, if you're going to tell me that your beliefs are different from what you've been posting here, that's one thing. I highly doubt that, so I might know more about your beliefs than you think.
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Yeah, we're such a backwards country. We've not gained anything from being based on Capitalism. We didn't build the largest economy in the World because of Capitalism.
(Pssst...yes, yes it does work...if you let it)
A country that is going under because of all that Capitalism that was left unchecked.
yeah, we all see how well it worked. [8|]
Sorry, wrong again. It wasn't Capitalism that was unchecked. It was (and still is, btw) Corporatism that has been and still is unchecked. Corporatism that is rampantly supported by both parties. The regulators were asleep at the switch, well, they were too busy watching porn on our dimes, actually. The regulations were in place already. The Congressional report even states it. The Congressional Report even went so far as to finger the Federal Reserve as the ones who are tasked with preventing this sort of thing and that they failed to do that.
You want to go into the horrible institutions that are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac? You want to go into how they fucked us and are still fucking us? How much they've paid to those in charge of overseeing them? How Dodd, Frank, Waters, et. al. were talking about how well they're being run, how well they're being managed up to one week before they became insolvent?
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And none of these other countries profit from new technology developed there? Do you want innovation in your country or outside your country? We aren't the only country that spawns innovation and new technology. I just have this silly fantasy of maintaining the US as being one of those countries that spawns innovation and new technology.
You do realize that more health care tourism leaves this country than enters it, yes?
A McKinsey and Co. report from 2008 found that a plurality of an estimated 60,000 to 85,000 medical tourists were traveling to the United States for the purpose of receiving in-patient medical care; the same McKinsey study estimated that 750,000 American medical tourists traveled from the United States to other countries in 2007 (up from 500,000 in 2006)
As far as medical inventions....
30 Significant Medical Achievements and Their Country of Origin
I am not arrogant enough to believe the US is the best, brightest and baddest super power on earth.
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Btw, you do know that hospitals treat first and ask about insurance later in cases of emergency, right?
And that matters....how?
It matters in the cost of health care. You remember, the topic we are discussing?
Those who dont pay are driving up the costs to those who do. Hospitals and the like wont be left holding the bag, the public is.
Regardless of how you attempt tp spin it... the free market/capitalism wont pay for those who dont pay... you will. Thats why, last time I checked, a stitch in the ER cost over 600. So they charge more for all their services to compensate for those who dont pay.
Bottom line.
Joe has no insurance.
Joe has untreated high blood pressure. (Treating would cost roughly 100 a month.)
Joe has a stroke (because people like you decided he should suffer the consequences of his lack of insurance)
Joe shows up at the hospital via ambulance. *and, by law, they cannot turn emergencies away)
Joe is admitted and has everything done stat (one of those words that also means... expensive)
Joe has right sided paralysis related to the stroke.
Joe isnt able to be discharged because of his condition.
He now has the state taking care of his expenses.
You are paying for his medical care to the tune of 250,000 depending on how long he lives and if he makes a full recovery... if not, that amount will go up.
All because people felt he didnt deserve universal health care.
No, this isnt the first time I have said people with insurance pay for those without. And I suspect you know that. I am guessing you will disappear in a few months [;)]
It's true, I may be gone in a few months, but it certainly won't be because of anything going on in the message boards, or in the world of politics. It will have to do with the reason I'm on this site in the first place.
And, no, health care is not a right. It's a privilege. If it's a basic human right, we need to give it to everyone, not just US citizens or people who go into our hospitals. You see, basic human rights have been more or less defined in the Declaration of Independence. The 3 biggies are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. They are the so-called "Natural" Rights. Every human has them. Every one of them. And, it's these natural rights that we work towards spreading 'round the world.
If I am forced into doing something regardless of what I want, that infringes on my right to Liberty. Someone not having the ability to pay for a health care procedure is not an infringement of the right to Life.
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