Re: Why healthcare in the U.S. is "expensive" (and why Andre's a lumberjack he's ok...)

In article <1191497414.269244.327240@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Stephen Morgan <grauniad2liberty@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On 4 Oct, 01:23, PolishKnight <mar...@xxxxxxx> wrote:
In article <1191429690.136738.101...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Stephen Morgan <grauniad2libe...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

[...]
Yeah, socialism is the worst possible system except for all the
others.

That was said by Churchill, I believe, about democracy. He fought
nazism or, if you didn't know, National Socialism, that had taken over
most "first world" countries in Europe...

He was stoned during the 1945 election campaign and soundly thrashed
in the polls. He didn't actually become an elected Prime Minister
until 1951. People thought more of socialist policies than of heroic
speeches.

Yet, you rewrote his quote.

Turns out democracy didn't feel the same way about him as he
did about it.

One could say the same about the recent immigrants and their multiple
offspring, eh? :-)

Health care is "cheaper" in other western countries because:

1) Rationing and waiting lists. HMO's in the USA catch a lot of flak
for rationing but they're actually not bad compared to most socialist
health care in these countries. Many Americans CHOOSE to pay more for
PPO's for a better doctor selection.

Most "socialist" countries don't have waiting lists, only the UK which
has historically low levels of government health funding.

2) Medicaid: Most of these "socialized healthcare is cheap" claims are
based upon the U.S. blowing trillions on almost UNLIMITED NATIONAL
health care for senior citizens.

How many other first world countries DON'T provide almost unlimited
care for the elderly?

Nearly all of them don't provide almost unlimited care for ANYONE.

Untrue. Anyone who needs healthcare anywhere in western Europe gets
it. Full stop.

I guess "full stop" means after a few weeks or so... :-)

Ironically, national healthcare in the states is being held up by a
special interest group wanting to hog all the benefits for themselves.

I love class warfare. Marx had a point...

3) Cheap USA made drugs. It's strange to me that Canada is able to
negotiate a better volume discount for their 33 million citizens (more
or less) when many HMO's in this country probably have that kind of
subscriber base, but there you go. Good for Canada and Europe, but not
a testament to their healthcare system being "better".

It means a single national provider can get cheaper drugs. It is, in
other words, evidence that the non-American system is better in that
it allows better deals to be struck and drugs to be cheaper.

This would seem to imply that America shouldn't adopt socialist
solutions such as national healthcare because they'd still be "American"
solutions.

America should apply the most efficient system, in this case one that
originates elsewhere.

Hmmm, originates elsewhere...

It's strange how the left in Europe no longer embrace "diversity" and
welcome muslims and third world immigrants and their wise natural ways.

For example, third world countries have a much smaller carbon footprint
so if you just give up electricity, running water, etc. you'll protect
the earth AND have the most "efficient" system!

How about it? Care to embrace alternative solutions? :-) (Oh, wait,
give a few years with those low birthrates and you will!)

Tell you what, if your country still exists as it is in 40 years we'll
give it a thought...

4) The Breck Girl: John Edwards made billions using class action suits
to shake down big-pocketed pharmaceutical firms and doctors where he
pocketed half (or more) of the monies.

I don't understand this reference.

The Breck Girl is a joke by Ann Coulter about John Edwards metrosexual
tendencies to spend huge amounts of money on his hair and makeup.

He sent his wife after Coulter to try to argue with him. He wasn't man
enough to do so himself.

That's not really relevant ot healthcare then.

You may wish to sweep it under the rug, but one of the Democratic
party's biggest contributors are the trial lawyers. They would be more
than happy to see people die from medical problems provided they can
make a buck (or more) off of it...

This is one of the cases where democrat party corruption is useful...

5) The AMA medical union, er, "association" that discourages foreign
doctors from coming to the USA to practice, sets high arbitrary
educational standards (do you feel more healthy because a doctor
studies
"pre-med" for 4 years rather than just going to medical school?), and
allows hospitals to exploit doctors for years as interns.

Again, this is the same everywhere in the developed world. The BMA and
GMC double up for the role in Britain.

I was suggested one area to cut costs besides nationalization.

As I say, there doesn't seem to be enough profit in cutting costs for
the companies involved to do it. So much for the profit motive.

These are costs beyond the companies' reach.

Government bureaucrats wouldn't do much to reduce those expenses either.
Hell, they'd probably shoot them higher.

6) Illegal immigrants. You don't think they paid for all those anchor
baby medical bills by picking lettuce and doing daycare for career
women, do you?

The British population is 10% immigrants. A twelth of those in the
last couple of years.

Er, you must have missed the part about illegality. Are you familiar
with the term? And our percent is a lot higher.

Economically it doesn't matter if they're legal. They're still doing
low paid jobs and sucking on the NHS.

Wrongo.

It's ironic that the business supporters of amnesty for illegals only
enjoy such cheap labor because the illegals are willing to work under
the table and for less.

20 years ago, Reagan made an immigration compromise and passed laws
against hiring illegals in exchange for an amnesty. Those millions of
illegals are not out in the fields anymore.

It's ironic that those who claim to care about the working class and
want to help raise wages are encouraging businesses to grant amnesty for
workers who are willing to forego and undermine decent workplace
standards.

If you like, you could have some more of them if you like. They LOVE
socialism! Their high birthrates can offset the darwinistic dieouts of
career women...

We've got plenty already, thanks.

What?!?! I thought the left LOVED "diversity" and getting rid of those
problematic white people.

Now, all of a sudden, the consequences of self-hating cheap sentimental
white guilt are becoming obvious. Don't worry though: You'll get MORE!
Lots lots more!!!

7) Affirmative action. Russian doctors are told to not bother trying
to
get an internship because the slots are made available for women and
minorities first.

The NHS has a problem: their highest ever GP numbers are ephemeral
because they're all part time women. Not a private/public issue.

I understand that the British health care system has a worse reputation
than Canada...

As I say, the NHS has historically low levels of funding. Almost all
other nationalised systems are better. The NHS, however, is the
cheapest. Or was until the Thatcher/Blair era introduced various
privatre contractors to do the catering and cleaning anyway.

So... the caterers and cleaners are to blaim for doctors taking weeks to
get around to checking on their patients! That explains it!

As you can see, there's lots of fat for "private" healthcare to cut AND
difficult for a liberal socialist program to address.

Yet the fact remains cheap public healthcare and expensive private
healthcare. Obviously the profit motive is an insufficient motive for
efficiency.

The fact remains that... you haven't made your case. In that vacuum,
I'll show the opposite:

http://www.leftwatch.com/archives/years/2002/000019.html
"Researchers at the Institute for Global Health wanted to test the claim
made by the British National Health Service that its use of resources is
among the most efficient of any health care system in the world. So it
compared the cost-efficiency of the NHS with the cost-efficency of
Kaiser Permanente, the largest HMO in the United States. The results
were recently published in the British Medical Journal and did not
reflect very well on the British system.

The researchers chose Kaiser Permanente because it was similar to the
NHS in a number of ways, including the way it is organized, the amount
it spends to deliver health care, and services provided.

The main findings of the study were that those covered by Kaiser
Permanente had significantly better medical access than those covered by
the NHS.

Kaiser Permanente patients spent, on average, more than twice as long
consulting with physicians. Whereas it took 13 weeks for 80 percent of
patients referred to a specialists to actually see a specialist, 80
percent of similar people in Kaiser Permanente's system saw a specialist
within two weeks. Ninety percent of Kaiser Permanente's patients who
needed inpatient treatment or surgery had such surgery within 13 weeks.
Only 41 percent of NHS patients who need such treatment had received it
after 13 weeks.

Most HMO's have policies limiting the amount of hospitalization they
will cover, and such policies are generally very unpopular. But the
clear implication is that the more money spent on hospitalization, the
less that can be spent on providing access to other forms of care, such
as specialists and surgical procedures.

In other words the HMO rations care, even after cherry-picking people
who can afford to pay their rates and who aren't too big a liability

Most people in the states get their HMO health care through their
employer.

If they are unemployed and buy privately, yes, the HMO's may not want to
cover them BUT they then often qualify for medicaid and then get
UNLIMITED care anyway. (Hence, the inefficiency of the system.)

You're comparing apples and oranges: A semi-private health care system
in the states where workers are employed privately and seniors and the
disabled get ultra good care and drug companies make a profit to Western
Europe where they buy drugs from the U.S. and give everyone so-so
medical care.

the NHS provides care for all based on medical, rather than financial,
grounds.

So I can just walk in and get care?

The USA's health care system has the burden of 30 million illegal
immigrants.

As Alain Enthoven notes in a Commentary that appears with the study, a
major reason for the differing efficiency is competition. People who are
insured by Kaiser Permanente have a lot more options to switch to an
alternative provider if they are dissatisfied, whereas customers of the
NHS have very limited options, since the NHS is supported by their taxes
regardless of whether they would prefer an alternative system. "

They have the right to go private if they do wish. The UK spends less
government money on healthcare per capita than the US government, so
that argument falls flat.

But Kaiser Permanente is not a government department...

If you like, compare HMO's who "cherry pick" to, say, the UK which
"cherry picks" their immigrants...

If anything, a government "solution" would be unacceptable from the
get-go for nearly EVERYONE:

1) Seniors won't be happy with basically everyone jumping on board of
their private gravy train. Woo woo! Choo choo!

True. The NHS was always for everyone, superceding the National
INsurance system which only covered the working population.

As I addressed above: No socialist country has unlimited health care for
the elderly...

Except for every country in western Europe, of course.

http://www.canadafreepress.com/2005/brussels112305.htm
"Like all Belgians, my grandfather had paid wage-related contributions
to cover health insurance throughout his entire professional life. The
Belgian health care system is a so-called pay-as-you-go system. Today's
young and healthy do not set money aside for their own future needs, but
are compelled to pay for today's sick and elderly. As my grandfather had
never needed much health care, he had been a net contributor to the
system. Now was the first time he was going to claim something back.

He had his operation in May. In November he was dead. The prostate
operation had gone fine, but afterwards the hospital had given him an
antibiotic drug that caused complete deafness. Though there were other,
but costlier, drugs available, the hospital gave the old man the
cheapest one. "

2) Doctors who are established after years of being exploited by their
benefactors (the AMA) are not going to want to become mere government
union employees. (For most people, that's a step up. For them, BIG
step down!)

The NHS originally put senior doctors in charge of hospitals, GPs were
contractors taking a capitation for each patient.

3) Pharmaceuticals and hospitals: There's billions of big lobbyist and
campaign contribution money there and it won't be going to Hillary for
her to slash their profits to nothing to try to (appear) to make
national health care efficient (for the first year or so.)

True, I can't see Hilary, Obama or the rest actually DOING it. Surely
that shows what a good idea it is.

Here's the thing:

If this is such a good idea, maybe leftists in America should move to
Europe? Oh, wait... no JOBS!

Plenty of jobs.

Ironically, in Britain which is more market based than western Europe
and scrimps on healthcare even by your admission. :-)

So the solution would appear to be... for Europe to be more like the
USA!

Unemployment about 4%. Less in Britain. Of course,
loads of immigrants with jobs. Personally I think American leftists
should try to organise and convert their fellow-countrymen.

They do. Non-stop. The problem is that the country"men" who convert
don't have children hence their need for voting rights for illegals.
Darwin would be proud.

From yahoo news and wikipedia:

German unemployment hits six-year low of 9.2%. -

French unemployment is back "under" 10%.

Spanish Unemployment 7.6%

Where's this "4%" figure you came up with?

National healthcare is such a big dog (with fleas) that I'm amazed the
Democrats didn't bury it in the backyard. It's disliked and distrusted
by most Americans, HATED by politically powerful groups, and guaranteed
to be a flop out of the gate.

I don't think a referendum would agree.

You didn't read my analysis:

There's the:

1) Doctors
2) Seniors
3) Conservative white males
4) Most of their wifes (literally in Utah :-)

The illegals can't vote (well, most of them anyway), the welfare
recipients usually don't vote, and the Democrats biggest supporters,
criminal felons, also are not allowed to vote.

No party runs on a public-healthcare platform, so we don't know. We
only know that every country with such a party votes for it. No
country votes to get rid of it.

All the more reason why it won't be adopted in the USA: There's a fear
that it's a one-way system and no way to get out of it if it goes bad.

As soon as these other problems are taken care of, we'll vote it in.
Promise. :-)

So why's Hillary and the faithful still pushing it?

I guess it's a matter of religious faith: She believes in socialism and
her own lies. It's wildly popular with the hipster set and she can't
back away from it now.

Some facts (from here:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare#Economics
)

The UK has a longer life expectancy, lower infant mortality, etc..

Healthcare is just one factor in this. Don't worry though, with your
immigration rate (and birthrate) you'll catch up to us soon enough, mate!

The
UK spends an average of less than half the American spend on
healthcare (as none is being leached off in profits).

See above. The UK gives a different service level and has different
obligations.

There is no way in which British healthcare is inferior, as witnessed
by the higher life expectancy and so on.

Only because you "cherry picked" the mostly white women and men that
have long expectancies in this statistic while ignoring the larger
minority population in the U.S. which has different reasons for low life
expectancy that is seperate from national health care.


A Bentley costs more than a jeep too.

So does a rocket powered car with no wheels.

What?!?!

The US spends a
HIGHER percentage of it's national budget on healthcare. The UK
government spend pays 85% of UK health costs, the higher US spend only
44%.

Obvious solution: keep taxes the same, spend them more efficiently by
adopting the English model.

So take our illegals off of us as well as our minority population,

Plenty of our own, thanks. Why don't YOU take some poor and huddled
masses?

Er, we already have thank you and we still have more jobs than you guys
do. Amazing.

convince the seniors to accept rationing,

There's no rationing on the NHS, the only rationing is the American
rationing-by-wealth.

Now that's denying the nose on your face.

You are a true believer. That little denial from you deserves an
"Amen". Keep up the faith!

and take over our
pharmeceuticals industry and sell us cheap drugs and we'll be on track...

I think it would be better for you if we keep importing your drugs.
Are you Americans never happy with your balance of payments deficit?

Er, I'm ok if this is one of the many reasons why the USA won't adopt
national healthcare.

That was the whole point of my article.

Amen.

regards,
PolishKnight
.

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