Universal Health Care... make your argument.?

There is NO excuse for the current system we have: too much governmental meddling and the FEW insurers that dominate are corrupt. Read:

http://www.newsmax.com/medicine_men/medical_insura...

However, UHC is NOT the way to go.

IF Universal Health Care (or socialized medicine) worked, then why are ALL of the systems rationing care, relying on private segments, and still going bankrupt?

The NHS, the oldest system, is in Britain:

"“Staff are being laid off, and deficits are at an all time high (£1.07bn for 2005-2006)” (Hazel Blears, Labour Party Chair and Minister Without Portfolio, labourachievements.blogspot.com/2006/08/23-investment-in-nhs.html).

In the National Review Online article, Coburn & Herzlinger state “more than 20,000 Brits would not have died from cancer in the U.S.” Just recently Alex Smallwood of the BMA (British Medical Association) was quoted in the Scotsman as saying: “’Rationing is reduction in choice. Rationing has become a necessary evil. We need to formalise rationing to prevent an unregulated, widening, postcode-lottery of care. Government no longer has a choice.’” (Moss, “NHS rationing is ‘necessary evil,’ says doctors,” 26 June 2007).

"Comparing Canada with other industrialized countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) that provide universal access to health care, a study released by The Fraser Institute in May revealed that Canada spends more on its system than other nations while ranking among the lowest in several key indicators, such as access to physicians, quality of medical equipment, and key health outcomes.

...

In 1999, Richard F. Davies, MD, described how delays affected Ontario heart patients scheduled for coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery. In a single year, for this one operation, 71 patients died before surgery and another "121 were removed from the list permanently because they had become medically unfit for surgery;" 44 left Ontario and had their CABG elsewhere, such as in the USA. In other words, 192 people either died or were too sick to have surgery before they worked their way to the front of the waiting line.

One of the reasons Canadians are slow to acknowledge the problems with their system is that general practitioners have been relatively easy to access and reasonably efficient at providing everyday services for common complaints, such as colds, sprains, aches and pains.

As time passes, however, more and more Canadians are confronted by the halting quality of their system when they face complex and expensive medical problems. They often cannot get timely or appropriate care for bone fractures, prompt treatment for cancer, or non-emergency surgery such as hip replacements. Their doctors complain that they are unable to help them and the government pleads shortage of funds.

...

Canadian physician frustration with their inability to provide quality and timely care is resulting in a brain drain. According to one poll, one in three Canadian doctors is considering leaving the country. A doctor shortage looms, as the nation falls 500 doctors a year short of the 2,500 new physicians it needs to add each year to meet national health needs, according to Sally Pipes, a policy expert formerly with the Canadian Fraser Institute.

Another casualty of the lengthy waiting periods is Canada's much-vaunted equal access to medical treatment. Even though medical emergencies allow some people to jump ahead in the waiting line — making others wait longer — a survey published in the Annals of Internal Medicine medical journal found that more than 90 percent of heart specialists had "been involved in the care of a patient who received preferential access" to cardiac care based on non-medical reasons including the patient's social standing or personal connections with the treating physician."

Jewish World Review June 11, 2004 written by Dr. Cihak

AND

"The biggest Canadian fiscal drain comes from the single-payer medical system. "Current model of health-care delivery leading us down the path to financial ruin," states the lead editorial in the Calgary Sun. Health-care costs would consume 50% of Alberta's budget by 2016 (according to the Fraser Institute) or 2017 (according to Aon Consulting, a firm hired by the Alberta government). Health care would devour 100% of the provincial budget by 2030, if present trends continue.

...

An estimated 90,000 Canadians sought medical care outside their country in 2005. The cry "no two-tiered system" could be replaced by "set our patients free," stated a lead editorial (National Post 9/18/06)."

Jewish World Review Dec. 1, 2006 by Dr. Glueck

So why no total collapse yet? Because “illegal, for-profit health-service centers” have “proliferated” in Canada and are so accepted that the head of one became the president of the Canadian Medical Association (“Individual Freedom vs. Government Control,” 1 August 2007, nationalreview.com).

Japan doesn't fare any better:

"According to Japanese legislator Takashi Yamamoto, who was just diagnosed with cancer, "abandoned cancer refugees are roaming the Japanese archipelago." Patients are told they¹ll never get better, even when treatments exist, and many are not even informed of their diagnoses. Cancer mortality rates in Japan have been steadily climbing and are now more than 250 per 100,000, while U.S. rates are now around 180 per 100,000. (Glueck, “Far East illustrates the limitations and dangers of universal health care,” 26 January 2007, jewishworldreview.com)

Sweden:

A May 2007 article the National Center for Public Policy Research ran called “Sweden’s Single-Payer Health System Provides a Warning to Other Nations” (Hogberg, nationalcenter.org) indicates that this government with good GDP ($31,600) and relatively low unemployment (5.6 percent) had a single-payer system for much of the 20th century. They covered basically all health care costs and as a result, had to ration health care, and found themselves with waiting lists for both surgeries and doctor visits. In the 1990s, there was a move toward semi-privatization which reduced those problems, but they have re-emerged. In that author’s, view, the reforms were not permitted to work as they were not full-on free market ones.

The much lauded French system raises some questions as well. From their Embassy site (ambafrance-us.org) they state that 96 percent of the population receives free or 100 percent reimbursed health care. They state the system is part of their Social Security and is funded from worker’s salaries (60 percent), “indirect taxes on alcohol and tobacco and by direct contribution paid by all revenue proportional to income, including retirement pensions and capital revenues.” They state that it appears that health insurance pays less to its doctors in France than in other European countries, but that 80 percent of the public have supplemental health insurance, typically from their employers. If they’re providing so well for the needs of the public, why is there a need for “supplemental” health insurance for the majority of the public and what about the additional cost that imposes? The site states that the poorest have free universal health care, funded by taxes. Long-term illness sufferers are to be reimbursed for their treatments. They do have private clinics, as well as public hospitals, and not-for-profit healthcare. In fact, “private medical care in France is particularly active in treating more than 50% of surgeries and more than 60% of cancer cases.”

Private insurance, which the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) site said in a 2004 report, was held by 92 percent of the French, helps to cover both vision and dental care which are not well covered under the government system. “The public system is facing chronic deficits and recent cost containment policies have not proved very successful.” The government is interested in having more of the tab picked up by private insurance (Buchmueller & Couffinhall, “Private Health Insurance in France,” 2004, oecd.org).

In the US, Medicare is going bankrupt. In 1998, Medicare premiums were $43.80 and in 2008 will be $96.40--up 120%. "Medigap" insurance is common because of the 20% co-pay required for service. Medicare HMOs are common because they reduce that burden without an extra charge in many cases. HOWEVER, many procedures which used to have no or a low co-pay NOW cost the full 20% for the HMO Medicare patient. ALSO the prescription coverage they tended to offer has been REDUCED in many cases to conform to the insane "donut hole" coverage of the feds. Doctors are leaving Medicare because of the low and slow pay AND because the crazy government wants to "balance" their Ponzi scheme on the backs of doctors.

"That dark cloud lurking over the shoulder of every Massachusetts physician is Medicare. If Congress does not act, doctors' payments from Medicare will be cut by about 5 percent annually, beginning next year through 2012, creating a financial hailstorm that would wreak havoc with already strained practices.

Cumulatively, the proposed cuts represent a 31 percent reduction in Medicare reimbursement. If the cuts are adjusted for practice-cost inflation, the American Medical Association says Medicare payment rates to physicians in 2013 would be less than half of what they were in 1991."

http://www.massmed.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=vs_...

Clearly, government run health care does NOT work anywhere it is tried. Further support for the problems in the US:

Oregon's at least honest about the FACT that ALL government health care IS RATIONED care:

"But the real-life story of 18-year-old Brandy Stroeder may come to embody a harsher truth: namely, that even as we perfect more and more advanced medical procedures, not everyone is going to have access to them. And, as Americans struggle to come up with an equitable health care system, that even the best-intentioned system can seem heartless when forced to balance the good of thousands against an individual's suffering.

The story began last fall when doctors told Brandy, who lives with her single mother in a weather-beaten farmhouse about an hour south of Portland, Ore., that she was likely to die within a year unless she got a simultaneous lung-liver transplant, an operation that has been performed fewer than a dozen times in the United States.

Under Oregon's unique Medicaid system, which openly rations healthcare in order to provide basic care to as broad a population as possible, Brandy was eligible for a liver transplant or a lung transplant, but not both. In January, and again after a review in May, the state-run health plan said no. There wasn't enough data to show the $250,000 procedure was worthwhile, the health plan's administrators said, and the plan didn't cover experiments.

But Brandy wouldn't take no for an answer. A tough, determined young woman who had managed to work part-time at a photo studio, baby-sit her boss's children, coach the high school football team and maintain a 3.2 grade point average between numerous and prolonged bouts in the hospital, Brandy wasn't about to give up her life without a fight. She sued the state of Oregon, charging that it was making a flawed moral choice in refusing to save her life. Since then her caustic, articulate criticisms of the Oregon system have given a vivid sense of the obstacles any universal healthcare plan for the nation would face.

"They'll pay for an alcoholic to get a liver transplant because they've been drinking all their life," she says, sitting with her mother at a rickety picnic table under a cherry tree by her front door. "They'll pay for a heroin addict to get cured, to help someone kick the cigarette habit. Those are things people do to themselves. If you put it to a vote the people would say pay for some girl's operation instead of some alcoholic's liver transplant or some crack head's needles. I just think it isn't very fair.'"

http://archive.salon.com/health/feature/2000/07/07...

Texas has also been the boldest in supporting the growing-in-popularity "futile care theory":

"Texas, however, has become ground zero for futile-care theory thanks to a draconian state law passed in 1999 — of dubious constitutionality, some believe — that explicitly permits a hospital ethics committee to refuse wanted life-sustaining care. Under the Texas Health and Safety Code, if the physician disagrees with a patient's decision to receive treatment, he or she can take it to the hospital ethics committee. A committee hearing is then scheduled, all interested parties explain their positions, and the members deliberate in private.

If the committee decides to refuse treatment, the patient and family receive a written notice. At that point, the patient/family has a mere ten days to find another hospital willing to provide the care, after which, according to the statute, "the physician and health care facility are not obligated to provide life-sustaining treatment."

Since the patients threatened with death by ethics committee are often the most expensive to care for, it will often be difficult for families to find other institutions willing to accept a transfer. But the futility deck may be especially stacked against Houston patients. Many city hospitals participate in the "Houston City-Wide Guidelines on Medical Futility," raising the suspicion that participating hospitals will not contradict each other's futility decrees.

If so, this would mean that patients seeking refuge from forced treatment termination will have to be transported to distant cities, as has already occurred in a few futile-care cases, perhaps even out of state. Illustrating the level of hardball some hospitals play against patients and families, the Clarke family's lawyer Jerri Ward told me that St. Luke's agreed to pay the $14,806 transportation costs to transfer Clarke to a hospital in Illinois — more than 1,000 miles away — if the decision to transfer is made on Thursday (4/27). If the family doesn't decide until Friday, the hospital will pay only one-half of the cost of transportation. Thereafter, it would pay nothing."

http://www.nationalreview.com/smithw/smith20060427...

So, let's look at what DOES work: the free market. We do NOT have a free market right now--the federal and state government’s horrendous attempts at managing care AND the stranglehold a few large insurers have on insurance are THE cause of the problems we have. When doctors say NO to the domination of third-party payers, things get better.

Read:

http://www.azcentral.com/community/gilbert/article...

A doctor owned and run hospital that sees everyone gets care, no matter what happens to the bottom line.

http://www.simplecare.com/ a doctor-driven group where reasonable rates are charged.

Note you can go to a walk-in clinic at Wal-Mart or CVS or the like in many cities and get many of the most typical reasons for seeing a doc addressed for under $100.

The price of LASIK has DROPPED dramatically over a decade. Plastic surgery is CHEAP. Compare a major procedure like a tummy tuck with the bill an uninsured patient will get for a medically necessary appendectomy WITHOUT complications.

So what is a person who has done his research supposed to do to address this mess? There IS an answer and it does START with a government-offered health insurance plan BECAUSE millions are on government plans NOW and we can't dump them overnight. The author wants it transitioned to private insurance over about 30 years--time enough to work out the kinks so the most vulnerable don't pay the price.

Elements of this system include:

CATASTROPHIC care coverage (all anyone NEEDS--no reason why any time someone feels like visiting the doc his neighbor should pay). That coverage would include one PHYSICAL per year with follow-up visit because that IS market-sense. Prevention is ALWAYS cheaper as well as more moral. Also one ER visit per year IF needed (how to stop ER abuse is addressed in the book).

The coverage would be AFFORDABLE:

sliding-fee scale is used AND there is a limit to the out-of-pocket expenses.

It is a BETTER deal than current Medicare and other plans because:

NO "donut hole"--if a medicine is NECESSARY, such as chemo drugs, it's covered--but no ED or fertility coverage. People can pay out of pocket for the drugs which will still exist.

NO ridiculous low caps on NECESSARY procedures which is the NORM now so that a plan can claim they "cover" a procedure and foist $50K or so onto the patient's back. Who has that much laying around?

How to fund this? It IS explained in the plan and resolves another taxpayer abuse. It removes employers from the problem of providing insurance and it doesn't increase taxes on people either.

The PDF (NOT the blurb) has the plan and the book addresses many of the problems in the current system and has ideas on how to resolve them, including bringing prescription med prices down under this plan.

http://www.booklocker.com/books/3068.html

Republican health care plan is very simple.....Don't get sick. I like your post. It seems to me that we can have AFFORDABLE health care without having a bureaucracy tied to it. Universal health care in the single payer sense won't work in the US but something that involves the insurance companies and people paying into the system yet doing so without high taxes would be the ideal way to go. I believe we can do it. Unfortunately partisan and radical plans on both sides won't fly. A compromise may be what we settle for and that is fine as long as it is open to change. One thing for sure. Our ability to provide quality health care to everyone in the country is very bad. Our system is disgraceful when compared to other industrialized nations. Most people believe something must be done but what we do is where the contention is. Surly with the mix we have in Washington today I am not expecting any changes. After Jan.20, 2009 if the mix is right we will possibly see progress in health care reform. If we don't elect progressives there isn't likely to be progress so vote progressive if you want health care reform. Don't criticize, for those intent on doing so, the Democratic plan unless you have an alternative. Any plan is better than none. I have not heard of any plan from the right so unless they have a solution to the health care problem they should not complain.

Our health care system does stink, the HMOs have ruined it. The answer though is to not have the bureaucratic government to run it. They can't even run social security. health care is not a right under the bill of rights. Should the ultra rich have free health care as well? if health care is free, more people will be milking the system that don't need to be seen. This will hurt the people that truly need a doctor's care. This will also but a tremendous strain on doctors now, who are already leaving the profession in the thousands.

So we will be left with either not enough doctors to treat millions of people in the population 65% whom may not even need to see a doctor at that time. Or maybe even worse, you have unqualified doctors filling up the shortages and then we are in a worse predicament.

Keep health care out of the government's hands please, I would rather pay, then have them screw it up

well emerled Knight, you can leave, there are many exits

I am Canadian.

I have been in the hospital several times.

I visit my doctor on a regular basis. (a doctor of my own choice)

I have never received a bill for any of the above, and I do not wait months for a doctors appointment.

Some will say that there are Canadians who go to the states for treatment, and this may be true, But I feel they are taking medical time away from Americans, and that is wrong.

Our system is not perfect, and we are always trying to improve it, but quite frankly It is a much better system than you have in the U.S.

And a last point, out health care is not free, we pay taxes to pay for it, and while our taxes may be higher than yours, a single illness in your country can bankrupt you, here it can not.

Actually, America's healthcare system is number 37 on the list from the World Health Organization, but that does seem a little ridiculous considering we have so many research institutions and so much money to pour into healthcare compared to other nations. I think something definitely needs to be done.

Fricken America and it's want for money. The American Medical community is the largest scam in the history of scams. I can't believe I even live here while fat health care managers sit on their lazy bums smoking cigars, while at the same time ripping loads of people off as they make millions.

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