Why Trade U.S.’s Health Care Problem for Britain’s Catastrophe?
A series of recent polls showing that his health care proposal has fallen out of favor with a plurality of the American people — and that a majority are no longer predisposed to support a “universal” health care plan as they were before finding out that such a sweeping program would cost them money — has caused President Barack Obama to shift the focus of his health care overhaul evangelism.
Cast for the duration of his presidential campaign and the first six months of his presidency as a solution to the no-longer ignorable “crisis” of the 45 million American uninsured, Obama abruptly abandoned so-called “universal coverage” as the raison d’être for his single-minded pursuit of a health care overhaul, deciding instead to focus on the cost of health care for all, insured or not.
On July 13, Rasmussen Reports released a poll showing that more people (49 percent) opposed Obama’s health care proposal than favored it (46 percent) — the first time a major poll had produced this result. Further, according to a Rasmussen poll published July 18, 61 percent of Americans believe high costs are the biggest problem the nation’s health care system is currently facing. By contrast, only 21 percent had a lack of so-called “universal coverage” as their chief concern. Ten percent cited quality as the biggest problem with the health care system, and 2 percent said inconvenience in getting care.
These poll results seem to show that our health care system really isn’t in as much trouble as some would like us to think it is. After all, if the cost of lifesaving health treatments, rather than the quality of those treatments and access to them, is the biggest worry of a population, things just aren’t so bad, no matter what demagogues in Washington may say.
These Rasmussen polls also seem to show the folly of adopting the style of socialized medicine practiced in countries like Great Britain, where the cost of health care is far down the list of concerns, but where the quality of and access to lifesaving and life-prolonging treatments are incredibly serious problems.
Anecdotes revealing the high human cost associated with government-run health care gone wrong, United Kingdom-style, are endless. Emergency room patients have been left in ambulances outside hospitals for over eight hours, in order for administrators to technically (and perversely) comply with a government decree that patients be seen by a physician within four hours of entering the hospital. Disabled children are being made to wait up to two years for wheelchairs because the government can’t — or won’t — provide them in a timely manner. The average wait is five months, and which children even receive such equipment then is determined by government lottery.
Women are being prevented from giving birth by cesarean section because bureaucrats in charge of health care have decided the procedure is too expensive — a rationale being offered by the National Institute for Clinical Effectiveness for its rationing of care and denial of dozens of lifesaving and life-extending drugs, treatments, and procedures.
Earlier this year, a three-year-old girl had a heart operation delayed for the third time because of a lack of hospital beds.
Earlier this month, a veteran of the British military had to pull out 13 of his own teeth with pliers because he didn’t win the national lottery held to see which National Health Service patients would get a chance to see a dentist this year.
These stories, and more like them, are commonplace events in the government-run National Health Service (which Obama adviser and former nominee for Health and Human Services secretary Tom Daschle has openly said he wants the U.S. system to emulate).
“Were he to succeed in doing so, it would be an unfortunate outcome for all involved.”
Everything about this man brings an unfortunate outcome!
Mr Emanuel:
While I think Obamacare is a giant, stinking roadapple, let’s make an important distinction: In the UK the NHS actually owns the hospitals and employs the medical personnel: the Soviet system, with Soviet-grade results. This is a different thing from government insurance paying private hospitals, as in Canda (not that Canada’s system should be emulated, but it isn’t as ghastly as Britain’s).
The sole objective of Chimpy the Kenyan is to destroy the middle class in America, nothing more, nothing less! He doesn’t care about cost and has no concern for the quality of care. His only concern is to put absolute control over the well being of every member of the American middle class in the hands of ACORN trained bureaucrats who will then exchange health care for loyalty to Obama.
Let’s start wwith insisting the any new system MUST cover members of Congress and all public sector employees.
To Whom It May Concern:
I have yet to have a simple basic question answered by anyone. It is a question that I firmly believe is important and fundamental to the health care debate. Here is a copy of a letter I sent to my Congressman, John Sarbanes, D MD. I have yet to receive an answer.
“Dear Mr. Sarbanes,
I would like you, personally, to answer one simple question:
If HB 3200 is such a good bill for this country, WHY is/are Congress, the President, VP, and all federal employees specifically exempt from the provisions of this bill?
After all, if it is good enough for the rest of us, it SHOULD be good enough for you, your family, Congress, the President and all federal employees.
Richard A. Vail
Pikesville, MD
Don’t forget the 15 million illegal aliens “Obamacare” pledges to provide cradle to grave healthcare for. I’m certainly not going to let my Dimocrat senators and congressman forget them. Why…..Why must Americans pay for healthcare (or anything else) for foreigners who DO NOT BELONG HERE!!!?
The Democrats and their mega-paged ‘mandates’ are behind this in conjunction with Prezzy. Let’s not just blame the self-loving, teleprompter DohBama for all of this ugliness. This is ‘team-work’. Every disgusting ‘proposal’ by the Dems is right out of the Cloward Piven playbook.
This ain’t gonna end well.
The French system is based on patients choosing their doctor, paying him and being refunded by Social security. That means bad doctors don’t prosper and you aren’t forced to bring your children to a doctor you don’t trust
Also you can have surgery both in public and private hospitals so unlike in UK you don’t have to wait for six months while your problem gets worse and worse.
Now my purpose isn’t defending socialized medicine (IMHO the main reason the French system is better is because it is less socialist than the British one) but to point that basing solely on the British system is unfair when discussing the merits or lack of, of socializeed medicine.
These are desperate lies. The fact is that more than half of all bankruptcies in the US are due to medical costs. That’s a little more than a “cost problem.” And it simply doesn’t happen in any other developed country. Here’s the link:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/06/05/bankruptcy.medical.bills/
5. Saltherring:
“Why…..Why must Americans pay for healthcare (or anything else) for foreigners who DO NOT BELONG HERE!!!?”
Answer: To break and then ‘remake’ our country so that the Commie Pinko B-tards can make America a third world hell-hole where we are enslaved to the ‘system’ and when we are not ‘viable’ any longer we are ‘put out of our misery’ while the ‘Elites’ live large, eat the best food, have their ‘heat and air conditioning’ and their HUGE ‘carbon footprints’ etc.
Sorry about the run-on sentence above but this kind of F*CKERY is not MY America and I’m mad as hekkies.
Mr. Vail,
Thank you for your comment. You pose a very good question, and one which President Obama and his Congressional allies don’t want to address. Everybody knows Obama and Congress have, as the President put it in last night’s press conference, “great health insurance.” The problem is that the coverage he and his Congressional allies are attempting to foist on the rest of us is far from “great.”
If it were on par with what he and Congress are receiving now, then neither Obama nor his Congressional allies would object to Reps. Roy Blunt (R-MO) and John Fleming’s (R-LA) amendments to HR 3200 that would automatically disenroll all federal elected officials from the President on down from their current “great health insurance” and replace that insurance with the Democrats’ proposed “public option” — government-run insurance plan — as their sole source of health coverage.
They won’t be passed, of course — nor would a still more hard-hitting proposal (which none have made to date) requiring that those federal elected officials who want to subject us to government-run care enroll their *children* in the public plan as a sign of their confidence in its superiority.
I doubt we’ll hear anything about that in the future, either.
8. Shef Rogers,
Tell Prezzy to stop smoking cigs.
Tell Michelle to lay off of the fat laden foods [her ass needs its own damned zip code]!
We are an obese, overly drugged, dumbed down society.
You want to improve medical care? Learn to care for yourself, take good care of yourself, eat right, stay fit and actually give a flying frick.
A doctor should be your last option, not your first.
It takes a LOT for me to go to a doctor because I trust myself more than I trust some doctor who will prescribe me crap that will probably have worse side-effects than my damned symptoms in the first place!
Meh. Sorry about the rant but…hmm…no, I’m not sorry about my rant. I’m peeved.
4. Rich Vail,
You won’t get an honest answer just like you won’t get anyone to say they even ‘read’ the whole dooftastic ‘plan’ for ‘the rest of us’.
Delia #11: News flash: everybody dies. Even people who take perfect care of themselves. It’s insane to pretend that it’s our fault that we get sick and die. We all die, and most of us will die slowly and expensively. The only question is whether it’s right that we, unlike any other first-world citizens, should be bankrupted in the process.
So, last night I turn on my TV to see Obama reading to me. Bleh! I watched bits and pieces and my favorite comment from him was when he answered a question by stating that our medical costs are high because we bounce from doctor to doctor having the same tests ran.
So, how come we don’t just streamline that process? I worked in a doctor’s office and at a hospital…that information IS shared. Most insurance companies will not pay twice for the same test!! Is he stupid?
Another thing he stated was that if the government is involved then they will cut the cost of our care by eliminating necessary treatments. WHAT???? I’m sorry but if I want or need a procedure that’s between me and my doctor. People need to educate themselves so THEY can decide.
I’m a federal govt employee and I do have great benefits. I pay a little over $200 a month on medical insurance and very rarely use it. But it is nice knowing it’s there. I have family members that are not insured and it’s scarey. But sometimes I wonder if I just put that money into a savings account to use for infrequent medical care would I come out with more? IDK…
I’m a surgeon, a board-certified otolaryngologist who used to perform tonsillectomies, so naturally I awakened from the hypnotic slumber for a little bit during Obama’s press conference last night. The man has just revealed himself as a colossal ignoramus when he was talking about that operation.
First of all, most kids with sore throats are seen by pediatricians, not surgeons. The pediatrician refers children to a surgeon if he or she believes a child might benefit from surgery. There is no “kickback” for this referral possible or legal. Thereafter, the surgeon decides whether the child needs surgery, and by no means is it necessary to operate on every child thus referred. Nor is it the practice! How can Obama not know that, if he has set out to reform the entire edifice of medical care in this country?
Incidentally, surgeons collect about $60 for the average tonsillectomy here in Florida. Though it is thankfully not that common, every year children die from complications of this operation, as it really is fairly major surgery. It’s one of the leading causes of surgical death in children. Who wants to take on a risk like that for 60 bucks? Not me.
8. Shef Rogers: In regards to bankruptcies for medical bills, even with insurance you can end up broke. Co-pays for specialists takes a lot of money. I had a very ill child years ago, in and out of the hospital for 3 years. I finally decided to take him to Scottish Rite and they found out what was wrong, treated him appropriately and he’s been fine for over 15 years now. I couldn’t work because he couldn’t be around other children. Then his father injured himself at work and was put on disability. We were broke, had it not been for family and friends we would have been bankrupt.
On that note, when you file bankruptcy because of medical bills, you can work it where the only things you write off are the medical bills. You keep your home, car, boats, etc…The paying customers get the bill through increased fees.
JFM, you’re right, though since a few years the ministery of social health, willing to reduce the “deficit” wanted to impose that we choose our family doctor for goods, cuz some persons had doubts about diagnostics and went to consult one ore more doctors, and these visits were paid back on the national health care insurance. Well we can still consult a few different doctors, but at our expenses, I find it normal.
Otherwise, the poors are cared under CMU, means that they have nothing to pay. As most of these persons are also “unemployed” or “inadapted” for work, and as they semingly feel bored too, they tend to squat doctors, dentists offices, there is a polecmic raised among ~27% to 30% doctors that refuse to receive the kind of consumeriseurs of health care anymore.
I know that for being true, I had an employee who used to visit doctors once or twice a week, get new and expensive glasses each year (when we only can each 2 years), new teeth… and day off for illnesses.
I’m glad that the national health system is starting to control such abuses, and there were many, also from administration employees.
So, it isn’t a bad system when it is well administrated.
President Crisis is at it again. Were there ever in America so many crises! No. And there still isn’t. Each new crisis is President Crisis seeking control by another means. He’s the little Commie who cried crisis.
The health care control bill will make every single solitary problem worse,from making cost higher,making some medical services unbearable,to making doctors even less concerned and all health care information more of a hide-the-thimble exercise.
13. Shef Rogers,
Well, thanks for depressing the hell outta me.
Sheffy, answer me this:
Should we pay for illegals in our country or oust them? If we give ‘amnesty’ to all of the illegals in our country, do you honestly believe that won’t cripple our country and ‘max’ us out?
“It’s insane to pretend that it’s our fault that we get sick and die.”
Sheffy, people make ‘choices’ every day about what they eat, how much they ‘move’, what line of work they do, what they drink etc. Of COURSE we are all going to die one day, that’s the cycle of life, but, some people *do* choose unhealthy choices and *I* don’t want to pay for those people. When I’ve gotten sick my husband and I have PAID our bills in FULL. Even when I was deathly ill with an allergic reaction and I had to be rushed to the E.R.
14. Ms. Attitude,
200 bux a month saved up would be pretty sweet. Think about it. If you take good care of yourself and you hardly even need a doctor visit…that’s some nice cash that’s YOURS and not paying for some other person who abused their body.
k.pablo, thanks for the info re: Obama’s lying about tonsillectomies. How many mistruthes were in that presser lsdt night…
also national health insurance only pays back 70% of the doctors fees, some medecines (confort medecine), not at all or at 30%, this si varying till the 70%, and till 95% for the elders (poors) or for grave illnesses
News Flash: Lifestyle plays a significant role in determining both the quality and number of years of life. Sounds like Shef is yet another beacon of the success of our edumakational system, much like sheesh/jharp, and Shadow/Blarty. “What mommy, you mean I won’t be as healthy if I eat nothing but soda and cookies, wah, everyone else should be forced to bear the burden of my poor choices so that I don’t have to”.
As a non-smoker, Obama can go **** himself if he thinks I’m going to pay to have the tumors removed from his lungs.
22. gnomepunter:
“As a non-smoker, Obama can go **** himself if he thinks I’m going to pay to have the tumors removed from his lungs.”
ROTFL! Amen to dat!
We have not even begun to debate health care. Yesterday’s presser accomplished quite a lot in exposing the fallacy of the crazy arguments the POTUS is still clinging to, trying to salvage an enormous costly, and unnecessary overhaul of another big slice (~16%) of our national economy.
If it’s only a matter of cost, what’s wrong with looking at the crazy cost items already in existence? The insurance doctors are paying to protect themselves from frivolous malpractice claims is a huge burden. When I go see my doctor, I want to talk to him, not to him and the ghost of a lawyer second-guessing him. Why should I pay two professionals when I need only one?
Deregulation worked for air travel, why can’t we use it for health care? When it comes to health care, the ghost bureaucrat jokeying for position with the ghost lawyer in my flesh-and-bones doctor’s office, is another item on the invoice, and I don’t want it, regardless of how I share the payment with my insurance.
The premimum I pay is artificially overblown by these unnecessary burdens, and if we get rid of them, everybody’s insurance premium will come down, and the issue of affordability will evaporate. Let’s get rid of the red herrings, the green houses and the oh-so-subtle shades of red and blue of our POTUS’ electoral logo.
The president has been heavily invested in the narrative of failure of the system; why should we expect anything else of him and the blue team.
My question to the prez in an uninvited town hall: Which government agency is now or will ever be “deficit neutral?”
14. Ms Attitude
“he answered a question by stating that our medical costs are high because we bounce from doctor to doctor having the same tests ran.”
Thanks for your common sense observations of His Silliness. I am 65 years, have dealt with life-changing medical issues for years and I have NEVER “bounced from doctor to doctor” having the same tests run.
During the 1990′s, in spite of having major medical insurance, we ended up with co-pays totaling almost $10,000, on income of less than $40,000 a year. Guess what? We didn’t go whining to the government. We didn’t go under. We didn’t lose our house. We MADE ARRANGEMENTS WITH THE DOCTORS TO PAY THE BILLS OVER TIME. The last of that will be paid next month.
I think one of the biggest problems in this whole pile of crap is that somehow people have bought into the nonsense that we, as individuals, “shouldn’t have to pay for our health care.
For a 4 year period of time, (ending 3 months ago) I had NO medical coverage. Hubby and I talked about that seriously. First time in our lives that had happened to either of us. We couldn’t afford to purchase a personal policy and because of existing bills, couldn’t afford premiums to buy coverage for me through his part time job. Therefore, do you know HOW WE TALKED ABOUT THIS?
We concluded that (SURPRISE!!!!!!) our HOUSE was our medical insurance! (which means we accepted responsibility and knew the risk) We talked through the fact that if we had catastrophic and unavoidable expenses, it would unfold like this:
1. We try to arrange payments with the medical facilities involved. That failing,
2. We would let them “proceed to judgment” (against the house) knowing we would pay the judgment ourselves in time or upon sale of the house. If we saw that would not suffice, then,
3. We would put the house on the market, and SELL IT IN ORDER TO PAY THE MEDICAL BILLS AS FAR AS POSSIBLE….and THEN CONTINUE MAKING PAYMENTS until it was paid off.
Now that I have turned 65, I have part A Medicare; am paying $96 a month for part B; and, paying State Farm $146 for a supplemental policy to cover the remainder.
I am truly sick of the giant assumption that either (a) we should not expect to pay for our medical care or that (b) NO ONE is ABLE to pay for their medical care.
We have NEVER made (before taxes) more than $50,000 a year, and we have ALWAYS either paid for our policies or paid (100%) for our medical care.
Let’s change our language, folks, and stop accepting that the government should”fix this”. It’s none of their business and it’s a welfare mentality that says it is.
Or, if we want to keep on with that silly mindset, then I have a question for you: Where’s the insurance program for my purchase of groceries??????
Before you say there’s no connection, think it through.
If I don’t get groceries, I will die!!
It’s not fair that rich people can buy better groceries than I can.
I want to know where the grocery guarantee is.
I watched the President’s “press conference” on health care reform last night. Then, this morning I heard a “news report” on the press conference on NPR’s “Morning Edition”. “Good Lord!”, I said to myself,”Did these people watch the same program that I watched last night?” It’s a rather eerie fact that, even though the “journalists” present at the press conference did not ask the President any tough questions last night, and he still managed to fumble and obfuscate in reply, that NPR managed to excerpt only his most lucid remarks for the radio broadcast’s sound bites. If this is what the American public is taking as the facts on this whole debate, they might as well be reading the erstwhile Soviet daily, Pravda. The only half-way specific and “hard” questions were asked by the DeMoines Register reporter. Was I the only one watching as the President waffled and mumbled all over the place and continually dug his way deeper into a rhetorical ditch? Where was the guy who knows everything about everything at that point? He looked like he was desperately hoping that a teleprompter somewhere in his field of vision would suddenly come to life and have the answers he clearly did not have himself. No matter, Mr. Obama. Your loyalists in the Congress will find a way to bludgeon every Democrat who disagrees with this health care boondoggle into submission. Nancy Pelosi, Henry Waxman and Harry Reid will not rest until this travesty is passed. When and if it passes, we will have another day that will live in infamy.
Destroy our economy for squalid healthcare? Leftists MUST do it, the party is always right! (They did it in Britain, so we have to do it here, you know.)
Oh, and then there was the last question at the President’s “press conference” last night. What was that all about? Let’s see. We have a “black” President. We have a really idiotic incident that occurred in the last 48 hours involving a “black” person. ( Not a man, a person! )Result? We had better get our “black” President to weigh in on this critical situation on national television, even though this “press conference” is supposed to be focused on health care, because, Lord knows, only a “wise black President” could render the final verdict on this most unfortunate occurence, and we don’t want to let such an event go to waste. And then, what did Barack Obama proceed to do in response? Well, he should have said something neutral and dismissive. Instead, after a few disclaimers, he launched into a full-blown discourse on the evils of racial prejudice, etc. etc. Geez! I take the time to watch the guy to hear what he says about health care ( even though I believe virtually none of it ) and then I get rewarded with a sermon about racism? Please. Can’t we just assign these productions to the Comedy Channel on late-night cable and be done with the pretense that the White House is transparent and “post-partisan” and all that manure, and that the main stream media are actually capable of holding this administration accountable in any real way?
22.gnomepunter “As a non-smoker, Obama can go **** himself if he thinks I’m going to pay to have the tumors removed from his lungs.”
Sorry. Too late.
You’re already locked in to paying for every bit of medical care this sorry sack gets for the rest of his life. As a former POTUS, he receives, courtesy of the taxpayers, lifelong, excellent, top of the line, privately-run medical coverage and care.
Everyone can parse out stories to support one side or the other, but one increasingly consistent one is that health care for the elderly blows in this country. My mom fell and broke the same wrist twice within a span of a few years: the first time I took her one of the supposedly best hospitals in the Boston area, and not only was it one of those cliche all day affairs at the emergency room, but they ended up not setting her wrist correctly. The second time occurred when she was on vacation in London, and there not only was she taken care of quickly, and with no paperwork (!), but they actually set the wrist correctly. Most of my relatives live in England and Ireland, and the elderly ones across the board don’t have a 10th of the medical horror stories I hear from friends with elderly relatives in this country. Anecdotal info, perhaps, but still….
PLAIN TALK: WHY OBAMACARE IS NOT THE ANSWER
This is just a rush to failure.
http://greensrealworld.blogspot.com/2009/07/plain-talk-why-obamacare-is-not-answer.html
The NHS is far from perfect, but it works pretty well most of the time. Of course if you take your opinions of the UK from shrieking tabloid headlines, you’re going to get the wrong end of the stick.
Not sure that the same system would work in America though – it’s too big.
Chicken Little in the White House: The sky is falling! The sky is falling!
Obama is not stupid; however, is an ideologue. He has a vision of America that is a socialist country and government has their finger in every fact of our lives. He is surrounded in his cabinet by like minded ideologues, and the liberal wing of Congress is like minded. Yes, votes have consequences, and this is the consequences of voting for someone without really taking the time to see who he was. The information was there on the web and also in books, but the Republican brand was poison, and the media failed in their job of vetting him. Our future is not bright, but their are options and we can start by supporting the Tea Parties. Politicians respond to public pressure just as they respond to money. Another option is initiating recall and impeachment petitions against the politicians. They may not pass, but if enough of them are initiated, maybe the pols will get the message.
Nobody anywhere wants children to wait for wheelchairs.
I have worked in the N.H.S for the last 20years but i don’t blindly support it.
Not everything is covered by the N.H.S. The plan is to contribute towards equipment.
This is because carers of the disabled also get,disability allowance,tax relief,constant attendance allowance,vehicle tax exemptiom,incapacity benefit,free prescription’s, even free hospital travel costs, mobility cars………………….
People shouldn’t really defend the dashing gentlemen who pulled his teeth out,he is on benefits and doesn’t pay tax.
Again the N.H.S does not include everything,he should put his six pack down and get a job..
It is not the case that caesareans are too expensive it’s the reason of why they are done.
I am a midwife and surgery is based on clinical need. Women are demanding caesareans for convenience against doctors advice.
All surgery has risks,if anything goes wrong they sue us even though they wanted it.
There seems to be a lack of understanding of the N.H.S and i don’t think anybody here wants to know more.
Many people continue to confuse rights with entitlements. Rights are freedoms of action, such as the right to life, personal liberty, free association, and speech. Entitlements are optional benefits awarded to individuals which they would not otherwise ordinarily receive. Rights are fundamental and inalienable; they cannot be taken away without grave moral consequences. Entitlements are embellishments, and as such may or may not remain permanent, and their loss does not constitute a grave moral hazard. There is no right to healthcare. We may, as a society, decide to “entitle” everyone to healthcare ( in which case, we then become the guarantors, i.e. payors of last resort ), but this benefit is given as a result of the consent of the benefactors. It is not a right.
Want a non partisan definitive evaluation of socialized medicine versus our current system in the US? Take a look at the Swine Flu “epidemic”. Perhaps if patients could see their doctors in the UK at the onset of symptoms (like we can in the US) they would not be growing worse and spreading the disease. Perhaps if they could get prompt treatment, they would not be dying from it at much higher rates. Here we are treated early and effectively, quarentining patients, and protecting the society at large. The UK’s NHS has failed. The Canadian system is also problematic and the fatal incidences there are also far higher. Argue with that. Those are the facts.
Clearly – the NHS defenders here need a dose of reality – and swine flu is it. Your system works for bumps and bruises and routine issues, but stumbles badly when it counts. I don’t want to give up access to lifesaving medicine so that the costs can be spread out until medical care itself isn’t cost effective. Funny that the left argues that abortion must be legal because backroom abortions will result – and yet they want to turn our entire medical system into a backroom operation. Only the rich will have it. The middle class will have to wait – as they must in Britain. And they are suffering and dying there in much greater numbers.
This isn’t a Republican issue, this is an American issue, and if Democrats don’t step back from the precipice, they are going to drive themselves into the wilderness. Obama is losing ground among independents – not partisans. Not to mention the ENT doctors are infuriated at the accusation that they go around slicing and dicing children for profit. How appallingly ignorant!
There are those who say the press conference gave us no news, but I think Obama said some things that are noteworthy. Cops are stupid racists and doctors are butchers.
How to win friends and influence people…. some Harvard genius! Harvard is really taking a hit lately on its reputation. Perhaps they could ask Lawrence Summers to come back. He can’t be any worse that an idiot professor who locks himself out of his own house and thinks it’s okay to antagonize the police, or a law graduate/POTUS who thinks high medical costs stem from doc hopping. What’s in the water at Harvard these days?
37 Gerald
Along the lines of what you point out…..why not just create a new “medical welfare program” and using a couple of billion dollars to BUY policies now available for the uninsured?
Rush ran the figures the other day….it would be a whole lot cheaper that what His Silliness is demanding.
None of what he is demanding has to do with “health care” anyway. America has the top (or close to) health care in the world. What he is demanding has to do with control and destruction of yet another segment of the American economy.
As I have pointed out before, one of his gifts to the political scene is that he keeps rolling out grenades with the pins pulled at such a high rate that the public (much less any serious Congressional personnel) has very, very little opportunity to actually absorb, think, develop a response, interact, etc. before the next 2-3 “must be done RIGHT NOW” thing is brought out.
Tax and Trade doesn’t have to with energy and Obama care doesn’t have to do with medical care.
God help us.
Kids seeing surgeons for sore throats? Bouncing from Dr to Dr having the same tests run?
Clearly Obama is every bit as out of touch as he appeared to be last year.
He has never run anything, done anything, taken responsibility for anything; always just Captain Bullshit. Nothing new here except people are beginning to pay attention and see the pattern.
The UK’s NHS has failed
Evidence please? As opposed to half-baked regurgitated shriekings from the tabloids.
Facts the media is hiding:
Hospitals and providers are already providing $ Billions of dollars in free care each year. Much of it goes to that unsubstantiated number of 47 million uninsured.
All people can be seen in an emergency anywhere in this country at anytime. Nowhere in the world is this possible. Not even in Sweden.
There are 1700 social service programs funded by the state and federal governments that provide various forms of health care, food, medicine and mental health services.
Lawyers and frivolous law suits drive up the cost for medical devices by 20 percent, drugs by 50% and medicine by 25%. That is not only because of increased malpractice rates but defensive medicine. This is the only country that expects 100% perfection from its medical providers.
Medicare and Medicaid scams are few and far between. What the government calls Medicare fraud could be nothing more than them retroactively deciding something should not have been covered. Most of the scams relate to an interpretation of the rules. Doctors are not trying to scam the system for money. They are trying to figure out what can and cannot be billed. The media describers them as criminal. Less than 1% of the doctors are shysters and they are uncovered pretty quickly. By the way most of them are foreign nationals.
Managed care companies add another 25% to premium costs for administrate overhead and bureaucratic billing procedures.
The way to decrease the costs for medical care in this country is pretty simple. You could reduce expenses and expand choices in a free market. But then again how can we grow the government if free enterprise is allowed to prevail.
“Why Trade U.S.’s Health Care Problem for Britain’s Catastrophe?”
I’d think you guys wouldn’t have to stoop so low as to lie in the headlines.
Just where do you get off claiming our health care reform proposals resemble anything close to the U.K.’s system.
The U.K. has socialized medicine for God’s sake. It’s one thing for the commentators to not know the difference, it’s quite clear they ain’t too bright.
But the author of the post either intentionally lying or too dumb to know the difference? Give me a break.
U.S. HEALTHCARE: CUT YOUR LIFE SHORT
Obama promised HOPE and CHANGE. The media never asked what frightening changes Obama planned for Americans.
WORLDNETDAILY.COM
July 22, 2009
Obamacare for old folks: Just ‘cut your life short’
Health plan provision demands ‘end-of-life’ counseling
By Bob Unruh
The version of President Obama’s universal health care plan pending in the U.S. House would require “end-of-life” counseling for senior citizens, and the former lieutenant governor for the state of New York is warning people to “protect their parents” from the measure.
At issue is section 1233 of the legislative proposal that deals with a government requirement for an “Advance Care Planning Consultation.”
Betsy McCaughey, the former New York state officer, told former president candidate Fred Thompson during an interview on his radio program the “consultation” is no more or less than an attempt to convince seniors to die.
“One of the most shocking things is page 425, where the Congress would make it mandatory absolutely that every five years people in Medicare have a required counseling session,” she said. “They will tell [them] how to end their life sooner.”
McCaughey also said the Obama administration is suggesting that medical care be withheld from seniors based on the expected years they have left to live.
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.printable&pageId=104719
Obama’s Civilian National Security Force
Obama promised change. The End of America as we know it:
Obama: “We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwaAVJITx1Y
PRAVDA: America’s Descent into Marxism – Brief Video
http://www.solutionsfromscience.com/
Circulatory disease deaths per 100,000:
# Canada: 219
# United States: 265
Child maltreatment deaths per 100,000:
# Canada: 0.7
# United States: 2.2
Digestive disease deaths per 100,000:
# Canada: 17.4
# United States: 20.5
Infant mortality rate per 1,000 live births
# Canada: 5.08
# United States: 6.3
Intestinal diseases death rate
# Canada: 0.3%
# United States: 7.3%
Proability of not reaching age 60:
# Canada: 9.5%
# United States: 12.8%
Brits endure severe problems in healthcare. Where is the money going that highly taxed Brits pay? Britain is Islamic paradise for Muslim males:
In Britain, Muslims and Islam are Elevated above All Other People and Religions. Is there Anyone in the UK Government Who PROTECTS the Rights of NON-MUSLIMS? Polygamy is against the law in Britain and punished by up to seven years in jail. The law is applied to everyone except Muslims. Provided Muslims marry multiple wives overseas, Muslims are richly rewarded and given welfare benefits for their multiple wives and their children. Some Muslim men maintain two separate homes, driving between each home.
This money should be going to Brits healthcare!
Mr Harp
First of all you don’t give any source and second in case you didn’t made up the data you “forget” those data who favor United Staees like probability of early detection of cancer and rates of survival.
JFM:
Here you go.
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_cir_dis_dea-health-circulatory-disease-deaths
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_chi_mal_dea-health-child-maltreatment-deaths
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_dig_dis_dea-health-digestive-disease-deaths
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_inf_mor_rat_tot-health-infant-mortality-rate-total
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_int_dis_dea_rat-health-intestinal-diseases-death-rate
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_pro_of_not_rea_60-health-probability-not-reaching-60
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_res_dis_chi_dea_rat-respiratory-disease-child-death-rate
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_hea_dis_dea-health-heart-disease-deaths
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_hiv_aid_dea_percap-hiv-aids-deaths-per-capita
Posters are getting muddled up between entitlement and health care.
No one is entitled to have 15 kids to 13 mothers and expect the tax to get a bigger house.
When it comes to health we believe that health shouldn’t be based on ability to pay.
In a democracy policy reflects society,it’s not political it’s humanitarian.
For someone to lose their job,their house never mind his life even when they do have insurance is shocking to us.
43. says
All people can be seen in an emergency anywhere in this country at anytime. Nowhere in the world is this possible.
Jul 24, 2009 – 6:25 am
What? i rest my case!
I know nobody wants to know more,but i will try.
http://www.nhs.uk/news/2009/03March/Pages/NHSwaitingtimesQA.aspx
http://www.chooseandbook.nhs.uk/
Nobody is arsed what health system you all have,it’s the mis-representation about the N.H.S of which we support here.
It is not a left wing policy,even Thatcher didn’t get rid of ,introduced changes yes, but not abolished.
#46
We don’t want to refuse care based on religion.
Btitish muslim’s pay taxes.’The muslim’s are not all terrorist’s.
During the troubles in Northen Ireland we did not blame ‘The catholic’s’.
Turning ill people away based on religion would not sit well.
The medical bankruptcy claim at #8 is grossly misleading. See my analysis of the Himmelstein study here. Not to say that there isn’t a problem–but puffing the figures isn’t accurate.
Child maltreatment deaths per 100,000:
# Canada: 0.7
# United States: 2.2
Pray tell how health insurance explains this huge difference?
News flash: everybody dies. Even people who take perfect care of themselves. It’s insane to pretend that it’s our fault that we get sick and die. We all die, and most of us will die slowly and expensively.
You are quite confused. Some deaths are indeed slow and expensive. Cancer, for example. Some are slow and relatively inexpensive (like Alzheimer’s.) Heart attacks are fast and expensive per hour, but a lot of those are done in a few hours or a couple of days. AIDS is turning out to be a slow and moderately expensive way to die. Yes, the decisions that we make have substantial influence on how we die, and sometimes on how expensively we die.
And yes, the claim about bankruptcy is largely false. Not entirely, but largely.
Circulatory disease deaths per 100,000:
# Canada: 219
# United States: 265
Perhaps related to the fact that Americans are more obese than Canadians? I couldn’t find numbers for men, but 33% of American women are obese–compared to 19% of Canadian women. How is single payer going to make Americans exercise more and eat less?
Hospitals and providers are already providing $ Billions of dollars in free care each year. Much of it goes to that unsubstantiated number of 47 million uninsured.
Also much of that care, because it is provided in an E/R, is much more expensive than if those uninsured had coverage and went to a doctor. Because the uninsured are often waiting until it is a crisis, there are doubtless that some very bad outcomes relative to getting the uninsured into some sort of insurance plan.
Of course, hospitals that are providing this care are generally sticking either the taxpayers (if it is a publicly owned hospital) or the insured patients, with those costs. That’s part of why coming up with some method of getting the uninsured covered isn’t quite as expensive as it looks, since it would reduce the costs that we are getting stuck with through taxes or cost-shifting.
Medicare and Medicaid scams are few and far between. What the government calls Medicare fraud could be nothing more than them retroactively deciding something should not have been covered.
I wish this were true. Here’s a 7/24/09 news account involving clear-cut fraud. From the same day, in Atlanta, a fraud involving billing Medicare for wheelchairs for people that didn’t need them.
From 7/23/09, a Staten Island doctor billing Medicare for services provided by doctors that didn’t work for him anymore.
From 7/22, an Ohio man sent to prison for Medicare fraud again involving wheelchairs for those that didn’t need them.
On 7/14, in Wichita, someone who ran a drug and alcohol abuse program pleaded guilty to submitting claims for services that were not provided.
Here’s a 7/10 story from Miami, where several doctors pleaded guilty to providing services that were either not medically necessary or in some cases even provided.
Fraud is so widespread (and not just against government insurance programs), that it takes quite a bureaucracy to track it down and prevent it. And no program that relies on private providers can prevent this: not Obama’s plan; not single payer. Only a socialized system has a prayer of stopping this, and that just moves the fraud to a different level.
I saw someone praise the French system as being less socialist than the Brits. Well remember the hottest summer in Europe in 2003 when the French medical services let thousands of old people die in their beds during their August must have vacations. They killed more people than the US army did when they invaded Iraq the same year.
There is NO SOCIALIST European medical system or for that matter NO SOCIALIST MEDICAL SYSTEM in the world that works. Period end of debate. If there is please show yourself.
Jharp: Nice try. Your numbers prove the US is still the best place for health care in the world. Our rates would be better is we excluded illegal aliens who contribute the the skewing of our statistical data. Considering the vastness of our boarders and diversity of our population it is incomprehensible how you can compare us to these tiny homogeneous countries. And don’t forget who validates these numbers? I don’t trust anything our government tells us so why should I believe a foreign government that is trying to justify its health care system.
Bottom line it is what Obama-care would do do each and everyone of us that is the issue, not a bunch of bull**** statistics. Our ability to access health care is what matters.
They just want Control. The more they control the more power..
Name any large undertaking they run well…
The Government is bankrupting the country, oh o.k. lets just give them something else to screw up.
Make no mistake .. It IS the government (politicians) that have brought us to the current state of affairs. They now sit there and tell the moronic sheeple that they (the governmental politicians) can save the day…
wake the F up you brain dead sheep…
How many times do you have to be run over by a Mack truck before you come to the understanding you should not play in the street??
Man it is just amazing how dumbed down the typical American has become..
We are witnessing the fall of the American Empire and everyone is fiddling while America is burning down.
No one is smart enough to ditch the P.C. crap and take care of business.
Obambi comes on the tube practically every day and reassures us all that “His” plan is working…
He is nothing more than a 3rd rate propagandist with a Socialist agenda, but hey many are ecstatic thinking Obama is going to fill their car up with gas and make their house payment… FOR FREE!
Such a sad commentary on the rapidly vanishing American experience.
Then why don’t the GOP come up with a way to insure ALL Americans? That’s all we want, I don’t care what you call it, or who sponsors it. This is the richest country in the world, and having access to health care for the uninsured is a birth right.
If England’s system is such a catastrophe, why is it that they rank lower than us in deaths due to heart disease, cancer, diabetes, etc, etc. Could it be that people will actually seek help if they can afford it?
tommyd,
what do you mean by “government” got us into this mess. Do you mean Obama, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Reagan, Carter, Ford, Nixon, or Kennedy? I think you mean the black guy, right? And to name any undertaking the government runs well, let’s see, when I mail a letter it get’s there every single time, on time. NASA has been to the moon, built a 100 billion dollar space station that works really well. Our military is the best in the world, well trained and works very well. The CIA, FBI and SS all work very well to protect us from criminals. The building and maintenance of our national interstate system of roads, highways and bridges work very well. Social Security has been paying seniors for over 60 years without fail, that works very well (although, it could use some fine tuning, like removing the cap so rich people can pay more). The Fed grant system and student aid has allowed countless individuals who otherwise could not, get an education. Aid to developing countries, and ongoing support to fight diseases and starvation and disasters seem to work quite well. I could go on for hours. So b4 you call our government ineffective, think again or maybe you should just turn off Fox Entertainment and watch the real news on CNN.
To tommygun: be careful what you wish for — the 2003 heat wave was a very extreme event that affected most of Europe, with France getting hit the hardest. Indeed the timing was very bad: August is vacation month over there, and not just for people like doctors, government officials and such — families took off as well, oftentimes leaving their elderly relatives at home. And bear in mind that most of France is still very rural. So with that said, France’s estimated population in 2003 was 60,144,000, and there were 14,802 deaths attributed (using “excess death” rates) to the heat wave. A little math shows this to be .0246% How bad is this number? Well….
Let’s look at the Chicago heat wave in 1995. A big city urban area brimming with hospitals, doctors, and emergency personnel all within a short drive — so how do their heat wave deaths compare: a population about 2,783,726 and 739 deaths (also using “excess death” rates) equals .0265 percent.
How do you like them apples? As a sauce or up your butt?
Since when is health care a birthright? The last time I checked in capitolism you actually have to work for what you get. Oh, thats right, Obama is a socialist trying to ram his agenda down the Americans throats!
Interesting post and well researched positions. Although I don’t think Obama’s current solution amounts to completely socializing our health care system. These days there is less of an inclination for employers to want to cover the cost of health insurance for their employees. The trend is that health benefits from employer-based insurance are falling as premiums rise. Also, for many of us it is difficult to think about starting a small business knowing we won’t have health insurance and probably won’t be able to afford it out of pocket. So, big corporate employers are stuck with the bill and the burden that makes flexing the size of the workforce rather cumbersome.
What we need is an affordable portable benefits system to take the responsibility of health insurance off the backs of employers and enable the kind of flexibility that will benefit a more mobile workforce and encourage entrepreneurship. Creating this type of system has less to do with socialism versus capitalism than finally accepting that the health of the American working people is our #1 public utility and must be supported in order for our global influence to be maintained.
The healthcare issue is not one of Obama’s making. This has been coming for a long time. Ask Newt Gingrich and his Center for Healthcare Transformation.
Another problem is that many hospitals are facing a rising bad debt problem. The high cost is partially to offset care for the poor. Health care providers cannot legally close their doors on the poor and uninsured and yet every year more reimbursements are cut. I can appreciate that people fear the implications of any goverment mandated program that affects our health. (Although increasing gov’t pressure on big tobacco has been a good thing for everybody.) I wonder how would the Right recommend we solve hospitals rising bad debt problem from all the uninsured seeking treatment and who must continue to be cared for?
I waited from 2000 to 2008 for an answer to that question while things steadily got worse for healthcare providers, and I’m still waiting.