"Keep the guvmint out of my medicare!": Insurance Lobby Organizes Elderly Hecklers

But still, it's not profitable for healthcare companies to lower their prices so the poorest can afford the care.

 

yeah I'm not saying don't want everyone covered.. know there's peeps out there who make too much to get on medicare and not enough to get any real insurance- and that's where it's gotta be looked at imo.. I really like what I see especially at standford and they need good money to do what they do- I know you guys are happy with the nhs there, but if you look over here at what people on medicare have to put up with.. it's not the same as someone with health coverage

you look at canada and that's worst case scenario of what nhs is like.. people on waiting lists to get operations they need- they come over here to get it done instead.. read some stories too, you'd be better off with a mexican plastic surgeon than getting a diagnosis up in canada XD

it needs some fixing that's for sure and employers can't afford the way it is now.. thing is if the nhs is in place, all but the bigger businesses will drop health coverage- it's a money thing

 

If you had a system like the UK NHS, no-one would care about needing to afford otherwise. I've had plenty of experience with the NHS over the years, they've always been good. Nice nurses, competant doctors, people who generally care about you.

As it happens, my father works for a US company and so the entire family is covered by a US insurance company. This would enable me to use private healthcare whenever I wanted. I've never bothered. The NHS has never given me less than everything I needed, so filling in the paperwork for the insurance company isn't worth it. Plus, with the NHS I get medicine free. Insurance companies can't beat that.

 

I suspect that if they could sneak themselves into the system, they would.

No, moral hazard drives the price up. The people most likely to take out private health insurance and pay the high fees are the people who estimate that they are most likely to need it: those with chronic conditions, the infirm etc. Those who are at the peak of health and can't afford the fees risk doing without, or with a minimal package (typically, the young you mention). The likelihood that a customer claims goes up. Insurance companies raise fees to compensate. The cycle continues.

Except that, as combhino (and Arnold Relman, the editor-in-chief of the New England Journal of Medicine in the 1990's pointed out, this is not a free market. People need health care. They must make a transaction. Even more than people must fill their tank. Which brings me to:

Try paying $1.00/gal. You'll note that small fluctuations notwithstanding, gas prices are pretty tightly controlled in the US, as they are over here.

 

Food is a more immediate need than healthcare. I can't remember the last time I went to the doctor but I can't go more than a few days without eating. Why not provide "free" food for all. As a matter of fact. If you stopped people from eating certain foods, you could lower your healthcare costs (oops, that's already started).

I don't understand the challenge of paying $1 for gas but we pay less than you guys do based on how involved each government tampers with the industry. Just because government profits from the oil industry doesn't mean they keep costs down. On average, oil companies make around $.09 from a gallon of gas regardless of the current price (only about 6% of the oil companies in America use for gasoline is oil they themselves drew from the ground, the rest is purchased on the global market which dictates the price more than anything). Meanwhile, state/federal government makes about $.39/gallon for virtually no added value to the product. AND, they highly regulate the industry which does add cost to the price of the product. If we could build more refineries and/or they could drill in more places domestically, it may not get the price down to $1 but I bet it would get closer than any government solution.

I guess the bottom line and then I'm done (and this time I mean it)
I think you in the UK have done better at running a social service, I don't know if it is dicipline, expectations, or what. But we have social medicine in America and it has only grown to a bankrupt system fraught with waste and subject to manipulation to serve self interests of polititians. Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security are insolvent. We are not good at it. We do not gain efficiencies from large government programs. American's have appetites based on growing the pie. Central planning does not grow the pie.

 

that's interesting.. well your health care is good then

we only see what's happening on this side of the ocean.. community hositals are pretty much the pitts here.. see more people loitering than patients the nurses look like they graduated from the school of hard knox- like kaiser here, go to emergency room and your admitted right away.. community, they will stick you out in the lobby bleeding and cops walk through the lobby looking for their next victim well quite not that bad- but it's not the same you get the point

so if I was on nhs, that's where I'd end up with sanji giving me the rubdown (with my pants unbuttoned) and rookie nurse trying to find a vein for the 5th time

 

If you were on your current social healthcare system, yes. Fair enough. I don't deny that social healthcare in the US right now (medicaid I believe) seems pretty horrific.

But that could change! You guys spent way more on your healthcare per person than we in the UK do, more than any other country in the world in fact, but our healthcare system is the 18th best in the world, and yours is the 37th. France, a country which has a similar principle to ours in it's healthcare comes number 1.

I understand why some people are objecting to the idea of increasingly socialised medicine in the US, and know that a lot of other people are being heavily misled by insurance company adverts and republicans who are doing their best to make out socialised healthcare as the devil incarnate. But you guys could have a way better system than you currently have, and exist in a country where no-one would ever need to worry about getting sick because they couldn't afford it.

You just go to the hospital, they fix you up, they give you your medicine (free, where I live) and you leave. That's it, and no bills. Doesn't it sound great?

 

You mean like having a welfare state? We've got that too!

 

In the UK we do. If you need it. Income support, jobseekers allowance, incapacity benefit. Not letting the poor starve seems like a moral imperative in a civilised and advanced country.

edit: Or to provide a serious answer: everyone needs food, but not everyone will need expensive cancer treatments. However a lot of people who get cancer won't be able to afford the expensive treatments. So do you let everyone who gets unlucky enough to catch something which is expensive to cure, while not having insurance just die? Or does everyone pay a little bit every month and then whoever is unlucky enough to catch something nasty gets treated, paid for by everyone, because everyone can get sick. The only difference between our system and yours is that you have to make a choice of insurers, but we automatically pay into a single big insurance fund (you can pay into a private one too if you like). Sure, it means less choice for us, but what do we care? Our system is far better than yours for actual healthcare, and we pay less for it.

 

Not for all. We have one too. - My point is, that in healthcare, the rationale is that everyone needs access due the dire need. Food is more dire and you only supliment the need, not provide it outright, like with NHS

 

yeah it does.. long as I don't have to elbow someone in the face to get a room- in a big city that's exactly what it'd be like too.. you should see the difference in hospitals here- it's almost night and day between community and those that take private insurance

I'd like to see va hospitals get upgraded if this does go through least.. I just can't see employers keeping healthcare insurance for employees- and then you get shafted on both ends if they do anyways..

 

Dude, we have the NHS in london too. My dad's used it plenty of times (he lives there). That's a city with a population of 7.6 million people. You don't have to elbow people in the face to get a room. Sure, they'll put you on a ward for most things, but if you need a room, you'll tend to get one.

It can work. I'm not saying it's guarenteed to (that'd be foolish), and I'm not saying that whatever form of socialsied healthcare the US gets over the next few years will be perfect. I'm just saying (without meaning to boast) - our healthcare system is better than yours, we pay less, and we don't need to worry about not being able to afford insurance, or being able to afford becoming ill.

It's a better way to live. If you guys could actually get that, you'd be insane not to.

 

This is what makes me proud to be British. I pity those poor people on the other side of the pond. And the poeple opposed to reform hold up the NHS as a bad example...

 

url]http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8199615.stm[/url] just thought id post an update.

Im glad all these people are sticking up for the NHS, we might complain about it sometimes, but i don't know anyone who would do without it. Fox news managed to find the one person in the government that seems to hate the NHS (think he's the same one who became popular last year after blasting brown in the european parliament with mainly lies which got onto youtube) Edit (yes he is, no surprise there) . One rich conservative boy who's lead a privileged life hates the NHS, can't say im surprised.

I still don't know why people over there are debating over the NHS when the Obama isn't even try to make the US health care system like the UK's, he's just trying to make it more fair and cover everyone, not just those who can afford it.

 

I think from this thread, people can see that the NHS is one of the things we British can be most proud of. Sure it has many flaws, but look at the alternative. *Looks across pond and shudders*

 

Damn, this often happens on this forum, go to make a comment only to find Nexxo has already done it

The free market ideal generally works well, but only for things where there is a choice. you need to have the choice whether to buy/use an item/service for it to counter the greed inherrant in the system.
Healthcare is not a luxury, as Nexxo pointed out, when you get sick you NEED treatment. there is no choice.

Free market + no choice = nothing to stop the price rising to the absolute maximum people CAN pay (note: not necessarily afford to pay)
different health companies adds a minute amount of variance in the prices due to competition, but due to the service being essential, it's always going to be as high as possible.

It's actually the same reason i hate the current governments attempts to privatise every utility/service that isn't nailed down. Whilst it's not quite as bad (not essential services but nearly so), there is still minimal choice, so minimal competition which leads to higher prices. Free market just doesn't work properly in these areas IMHO

Indeed, it may not be as good as it could potentially be*, but it really does work well and is worthy of the praise it gets

*getting rid of Labour's fascination for NHS stats/targets at the expense of actually treating people would be a good start for example

 

Hey, I pointed it out first. *Shakes fist at Nexxo's fame*

I <3 you really Nexxo

 

And I pointed it out the complete first *Shakes fist at both of you*

 

*cowers at the sight of all the fist shaking*

 

Food is cheap. Most people can afford it. When they can't there is a benefits system (you have food stamps, addressing the need even more specifically). However as spec points out, health care can get very expensive. People are more likely to find themselves in a predicament in which they cannot afford to buy their own health care than one in which they cannot afford to buy their own food.

And I made sure to point that out! I can't help it if others can't read...

And sorry, Sir Digby, for not giving you first credit.