This is just one of many Re-plys, I receive each day. I thought I might share this one with you,,,,,
Thanks. And from one of my favorite pundits, Stella Paul, more motivation to work our tails off in this election season.
June 30, 2012
A Surgeon Cuts to the Heart of the ObamaCare Nightmare
By Stella Paul
The day the Supreme Court ruled in favor of ObamaCare, a friend called me. He's an extremely dedicated, much-loved surgeon, and he was frustrated and livid in equal measure.
"I've actually had a lot of experience working in all different types of environments," he began. "I've worked in a government-run socialized medical care system, and I saw the waste and inefficiency.
"The longer people worked in that system, the less work they wanted to do, because the more you wanted to do, the more they dumped on you. So after a while you stop doing it, because they're not paying you to do more. Why should you do a difficult case, a difficult surgery that will take you hours and hours to do?
"You might start out wanting to do it, but after a while, you just run out of energy, because there's no incentive. You'd have to be a superhuman being to continue to work in that system and not be worn down by it.
"Because nobody wanted to work, it would take an hour to turn over the surgical room. In my private practice now, it takes ten minutes.
"And I saw tremendous waste: closets of stuff that never got used. Nobody cared.
"Capitalism has completely transformed my sub-specialty. When I was in training, a common procedure that I do now took 40 minutes, and people needed a month of recovery. Now it takes 10 minutes, and people can go back to work almost immediately.
"And all these improvements were driven by the financial incentive. Capitalism has had a tremendously positive effect on patient care and outcome in my specialty.
"But when I go to meetings now, I see that there's very little innovation going on. Everything's being impacted by ObamaCare, which, among other things, raises taxes on medical devices.
"You know, doctors are people, and we're being hammered on all sides here.
It's the paperwork; it's insurance; it's transitioning to electronic medical records, so the government can get their mitts into your practice. It's lawsuits; it's rising overhead and decreasing compensation; it's stress upon stress upon stress.
"And a lot of doctors are going to say, 'Forget it. I don't want to do this anymore.' Guys that are 5 or 10 years older than me are just going to give up and walk away.
"Why should I be a slave to the government? You know, it used to be that doctors would do charity work at a charity hospital. Nobody wants to do it anymore, because we're too overwhelmed.
"I work 60 to 70 hours a week, so how am I supposed to fight back against this? Most doctors don't have the time to lobby their congressman or go to Washington. If you're a doctor in the trenches, you've got a stressful job; you've got a family. You're seeing the same number of patients and making half the income you used to make. People are litigious these days, so you've got to worry about lawsuits. When are you going to find time to lobby a politician?
"And the American Medical Association threw us all under the bus, even though only 18% of doctors belong to it. These people are ivory-tower academics, and they're liberals. Most of them are in academic medicine; they get a salary with some sort of incentive bonus. They show up to work and go home. They're not in the trenches like me, figuring out how to compete with other doctors and pay for malpractice insurance and how to hire four people I need to implement the electronic medical records and two people I need to deal with insurance.
"And as a doctor, I get it handed to me both ways. My taxes are raised, and my fees are lowered.
"You know, young people today who go to medical school -- I don't know what to tell them. You couldn't pay me to go to medical school today. Some doctors are going to graduate with $500,000 in debt, and how are they going to make a living?
"You're 32 or 33 years old by the time you finish your training; you're married with little kids. You've been an apprentice for 16 years, and now you're faced with socialized medicine. That's the reality on the ground. How are you supposed to manage that?
"Fortunately, I still love what I do. But I don't know what's going to happen. I think we'll wind up with a two-tiered medical system: a private one for the rich who pay cash and a mediocre one for everyone else.
"When my dad was 91, he had a heart attack and ended up with a stent. He had two more good years after that before he died. After ObamaCare, some government employee is going to decide that he is too old for this and not 'approve' for him to have that procedure.
"It's just a feeling of helplessness. The only organizations that are fighting for doctors are the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, and Docs4 Patient Care."
After he hung up, I went to the website of Docs4 Patient Care and found this statement from its president, Dr. Hal Scherz:
The Supreme Court disappointed the majority of Americans who have voiced their opposition to Obamacare, by upholding significant portions of this truly abysmal law. Their decision has left Americans now wondering what it is that the Federal Government can't compel them to do. This is perhaps the worst decision in the history of the Supreme Court and emphasizes the importance of making the correct decision for chief executive, who controls who sits on this bench.
If you want to cure the sickness that's killing America, you'll find a powerful remedy in the voting booth in November.
Write Stella Paul at Stellapundit@aol.com.
OLY
Complete bull for many reasons to cover just one: job satisfaction for doctors is statistically much much much higher for doctors in public systems because they don't have to turn away people who cannot afford care and can instead do the right thing.
You obviously haven't been around a VA hospital much.
Listening to my son, who worked there at the front desk as the go-between between the patient and doctor, there isn't a doc in the building that cares one whit. To a person they are overworked and underpaid, almost pushing patients out of the office because there are 10 more to get in and only 1/2 hour to do it.
It's what we can all look forward to in the near future.
So you have a the experience of a family member telling you so...
According to the World health Organization study on job satisfaction amongst doctors and nurses job satisfaction is more than twice as high in Norway as it is in the US, the system in Norway is public. The facts speak for themselves.
The WHO tentatively suggest it may have something to do with not having to turf sick people out or refuse care because people can't afford it.
If it was soooo Great, why doesn't the politicians have the same health insurance???? It will be the best doctors for the rich and the new and not as good doctors that are overwhelmed for the poor on the $hit insurance!
Danny, what are you on about? What $hit insurance? That is an American scam, in the UK everybody who is working pays into health care via the government, no insurance companies taking a slice to make their shareholders rich.
Do you know the American health industry JOHN? Many doctors here are opting out of government healthcare and not available unless you have private health insurance! The government health insurance doesn't pay doctors nearly what private insurance does and they refuse to see Government insurance patients! THIS IS A FACT!!! So many will be losing their doctor unless they have the private, much better insurance! Over here the politicians have the best healthcare insurance, If their great healthcare plan was that good, why aren't they on it???? Please you know nothing about America and try to spin your socialist Bull$hit, to the stupid over here hoping they buy into your countries screwed up policies. The UK has turned to $hit! I have been going there on business for over 15 years and see the change! keep your disgusting country.
And do you know why our country is turning to $hit?
It's these damned conservatives who want to privatise everything and turn us into little America!
Yeah OK! Your conservatives are our old left democrat party! Smart and trying to do the right thing and make your country good again! Not another failed entitlement society. Like I said I'm a real democrat! Not socialist. I believe in helping people who truly need it not enabling fools to depend on the government from cradle to crave!
Oh Danny!
Smart and trying to do the right thing! What, like giving the bankers massive amounts of money whilst throwing loads of people out of work, making it harder for people to keep a roof over their heads, increasing taxes to pay for said handout to bankers.
The entitlement society is a good old capitalist con, take the profits but let the tax payer carry the losses, in this case all the unneeded workers.
As a socialist I believe in everybody working, not just those that make a profit for their masters.
Here, here! Except those fools as you describe them are bankers, corporations, tax avoiders and conservative party donors, not citizens.
You obviously don't understand the plan being instituted at all, in the US everyone will be covered by some of the provisions of Obama care, for example as of 2014 insurance plans will no longer have a spending limit so if you catch cancer they won't stop paying for your treatment half way through you also get to choose your own healthcare if you can afford to for extras like alternative medicine, chiropractic etc. no one gets to avoid it.
Josak - exactly how does one "catch" cancer? Is it something that is airborne or do you catch it by human contact?
Also I'm curious in that you claim to "understand" the entire Obamacare plan. Yet there are tens of thousands of pages of regulations, by dozens of different gov agencies that must be written. And until those regulations are written there is no way for Obama, let alone you, to know how this abortion is going to affect anyone. Hence, you must therefore be like a palm reader who can see the future? You socialists are so cool, at least in your own minds!
You're right I guess catch is the wrong word, so let's replace it with develop, mea maxima culpa.
While there are still implementation regulations to be written the entire plan is outlined in the proposal including what those regulations will do, no palm reading required.
Josak - Does Norway have 12 million illegals? ) But do you also know why they are happy? First of all, they are the third largest oil producer in the area and are not in the Euro. They have low unemployment and a growing economy because they exploit their oil resources. Hence, they have the money to support a very small population of about 5 million which is nearly the size of NYC. We have nearly 3 times their entire population in illegal immigrants who receive FREE care and benefits.
And do you realise that the UK and Norway had about the same amount of oil. The UK sold theirs off quickly to give the rich tax cuts.
The Norwegians hung on to theirs and used the proceeds for the benefit of the people.
On and by the way Norway probably has the same or even higher percentage of illegal immigrants.
John your claim on Norway's labor laws and geography make it exceptionally difficult for illegal immigrants to obtain work and benefit from healthcare. Thus, there is no incentive to enter illegally.
But to your ridiculously simplistic claim that the UK sold all their oil assets to give the rich a tax cut is a most absurd comment devoid of fact. The reason I know this fact is that you have absolutely NO idea how much oil either country has within their borders. Norway recently discovered a very large new oil reserve. So my question is how do know the quantity of something that has yet been discovered? And how can Norway's higher production rate lead to a conclusion that they are holding on to their oil?
As to your nauseating "tax cuts for the rich" dogma - both are socialist countries, which has nothing to do with the US passing Obamacare. But more importantly why are you and other liberals so opposed to people succeeding and becoming wealthy by hard work? But yet those "rich" that hold your same views are exempt from your contempt for the rich. It simply reeks of hypocrisy which pollutes your claims.
An absurd comment devoid of fact!
When North Sea Oil and Gas started to come on stream in the early 80s, Norway cherished theirs and released it gradually whilst the UK sold it all off to the highest bidder, usually the US, we are now running out of Oil and Gas whilst as you say, Norway is still discovering more!
I think before you accuse people of making statements devoid of fact you ought to do a little research if you are completely out of your depth.
Sorry, OK Norway is one, who is the other socialist country?
I sincerely hope you don't mean the UK otherwise I'd have to agree that you haven't the first idea of what socialism is.
I was just talking about doctor job satisfaction, while Norway has certain natural resources it is classified as less mineral rich than the US (per square mile) and due to it's cold climate it's farm lands are nowhere near as productive.
IF we want to talk about national happiness we can talk about a whole lot of other countries.
I advise you to read the economic reports on illegals, there is significant debate as to whether they are even economically detrimental, about one third pay their taxes voluntarily and the vast majority do not receive social security etc. many estimates put them as being good for the economy, I am still doing my own research (as an economist) and I am not sure who is right yet but I do know the impact is not economically significant either way.
It is further interesting to note that proportional to it's population Norway has a very similar number of illegal immigrants to the US.
http://immigration.procon.org/view.answ … nID=000788
The Wall Street Journal, in its "Monthly Economic Forecasting Survey: April 2006," conducted from Apr. 7-11, 2006, obtained the following answers from 46 economists on whether illegal immigration has:
benefited more than it has harmed 96%
has harmed more than it has benefited 4%
Josak - 46 economists responded. Who are they? Where are they from? Do they work for liberal think tanks or DC immigration lobbyists? The issues in these surveys are many and one them is "political ideological bias", which distorts outcomes due to either manufacturing or failure to evaluate certain inputs that would negatively impact the desired outcome. My point -- I don't care what 46 economists say until I review their methodology and their input data.
Your "proof" is similar in providing me information from climatologists who are predisposed to believe in global warming and choose data points in their models that support their ideology. Junk science in begets junk science.
Also, these are the same "economists" that are stunned or shocked every week or month about the unemployment rate being "unexpectedly" high.
My brother-in-law is an M.D. here in the U.S. He's been practicing for over 30 years. He's worked in the VA medical system (when it was still pretty good). He's worked in a private clinic setting, and for many years, he has worked as a hospitalist, part of that time by buying into a practice.
It is not easy to recruit hospitalists. They need to be hard workers who do "high volume" medicine. My brother-in-law has said for years that physicians coming up in the profession do not have the same work ethic as his generation. So yes, OLY, the problem of not giving a damn is already here, and the question is, will it get worse? What an utterly daunting prospect.
My brother-in-law has even said that his daughter, who ranks in the top 10% of her current medical school class, would not be willing to do this high-volume stuff. Indeed, she is going into a sub-specialty.
Lest you think that my brother-in-law is completely staunch in defending our current medical system here in the U.S., well, he's not! He takes a thoughtful approach and is ready and willing to give credit where credit is due for some of the things that, say, the Canadian system or the Australian system do with their health care system that we, here, do not. But he also has said that when ObamaCare was being debated, both sides arguing this issue told "some of the biggest lies it's possible to tell."
As it stands, I think the implementation of ObamaCare will mean that Americans, who have very high expectations of our healthcare system, will have to lower those expectations considerably. Expect some screaming and kicking along the way, and rightly so. I guess it will take the rest of my lifetime for us to be resigned to a new paradigm. My own personal plan is to practice preventive medicine to the best of my ability, and stay out of the doctor's office. I can't control everything, but my approach is as sound as I can make it, given my circumstances and lifestyle.
How much lower should their expectations get? The current system in the USA is the most costly in the world. The outcomes of said expenditures allow the USA to be ranked in the lowest third of the industrialized nation of the world. I think you should implement a effort to know what you're talking about.
I've been in the VA system for many years and haven't had a problem, several different hospitals, they all have treated me great and have received excellent care.
Don't really know what your talking about?
in the last 4.5 months I have been under the knife in two separate VA facilities. My experiences were both great for my outcomes and wonderful for the treatment received from the professionals involved with my care. Your observations are not my experiences. Why do you think that is?
Someone needs to tell this doctor that the ACA isn't socialized medicine. Perhaps he wouldn't be so upset.
Sorry dude Socialists don't possess the ability to learn from the past. The answer must be that not enough socialism was applied in that country in order for it to be effective enough.
Two Russians were walking down the street, one asked the other, "Have we really achieved full communism?" The other said "oh no. Things are about to get much worse."
And another guy who does not know the difference between socialism and communism and since he does not know even the most basic facts about what he is discussing can be safely ignored.
Actually I do know the difference between socialism and communism. It's just that the outcome of both systems is the same.
Josak - that's manly of you in suggesting we can safely ignore you, because I find most of the time socialists to be such man-girls. And as far as the differences between socialism and communism -- are you asking on the basis of how many people each ideology is responsible for KILLING or are you seeking more subjective criteria?
I mean isn't it the reality of the issue that in the end we are merely addressing matters of semantecs -- as it is clear both are barbarous failed political ideologies responsible for murdering millions of innocent people? Because if semantics is the issue you are attempting to support one group, such as the Socialist Nazi Party, because they gased 6 million, whereas you are vilifying someone like Stalin predicated on an absurd argument that he was worse because he starved to death 6 million...the bottom line is they were killed!? The real question Josak is -- do YOU know what you are talking about?
Oh, not the socialist Nazi party! Don't they teach you any history in school?
Hey, if Hitler was such a socialist explain to me why he was murdering socialists and communists before he even started on the Jews, who he also thought were communists?
Well you know school... We have one of the worst funded school systems in the developed world and as a consequence some of the worst education statistics in the developed world BUT we do have the most expensive military in the world by a huge margin. It's a fascinating view of the American psyche.
Isn't it just! Americans will approve the spending of unlimited amounts of money to kill Johnny Foreigner but squeal like stuck pigs at the thought of spending a few cents to preserve the lives of their fellow countrymen!
Very strange.
Some of us are mad about all of the government's wasteful spending. Every dollar the government spends that they don't have is a tax on every American.
JH - Was that a story on the BBC or did Obama leak that name to you from his "kill list"? And was Johnny Foreigner a terrorist leader or just a guy hanging out on a park bench with his family? Frankly I haven't heard the guys named mentioned before. Is that his real name or an alias? Perhaps that was the guy Obama actually wasted himself when he went in with Seal Team 6? Anyway let me...thanks )
But seriously - what do you care about how many fellow Americans we yanks kill by denying health care that isn't denied. And those "few cents" actually add up to over $2 trillion dollars.
That said, should an American child not be executed during an abortion procedure - which you liberals have no problem with, the child is born with a debt obligation is $181,000 bucks. Those pennies really add up don't they.
And to the point of abortion - don't you find it bizarre that you're worried about an American's health when 50 million babies have been killed since 1973 via abortions, or over 1 million children executed annually in the US - versus an ALLEGED (means unproven) claim of 45,000 people dying in the US due to a lack of health insurance per year? Don't you find your concern somewhat misplaced?
So essentially we crazy Americans are going to spend well over $2trillioin to cover 45,000 people or $44 million dollars per person. That is Brilliant! This is going to work out very very well...
Yeah, it shows how pathetic the politicians who control each country of the world are and what is being attempted. And it has nothing to do with Peace of any kind. It's all about stripping rights and reaping profit for the conglomerates of the upper 1% of the world's wealthiest.
Increased spending over the last 20 year for the military industrial complex has reduced the spending for properly funding of the educational system. This proves that government officials have been dumbing down society for 2 decades.
Well, there is something we agree on wholeheartedly.
Cagsil - education spending has increased every year since 97, to over 100% increase. The issue isn't money it is teaching and learning. The reason the kids are stupid is the material they are taught or more likely NOT taught. Education has nothing to do with military spending. In fact it is the constitutional responsibility for the government to provide for the common defense, yet there is nothing establishing the constitutionality of federal control of education. Your ignorance is only overshadowed by your misunderstanding or complete lack of education on the Constitution and the limited power of the federal government.
If it is as you say, then why is America's general public so stupid? If they are not stupid, then it must be chosen ignorance. Means, they are egotistically choosing to be stupid, yet fail to see it.
Actually, it's more than that and if you had taken the time to think about the entire situation, instead of solely placing blame where it should not exist, then just maybe teaching and learning you would know isn't the whole problem.
Yes, I know. I've written couple of hubs on America's educational system. But, do remember, that's not the only reason. Religion and Politics need to get out of the educational system. All the BS is hurting our ability to teach properly.
Education and Military spending are all part of the Government's BUDGET! Do not sit there and tell me that one doesn't affect/effect the other. It's absurd to think that they don't.
Understood. I am not advocating for the Federal government to control education. Exactly, the opposite. States should be in control of public education. Federal government shouldn't be involved at all.
Really? I guess I would have to say that you apparently lack insight to what I know and what I don't know. Thus, your statement is a bad perception.
That's the point -- socialists always turn on those they fear, which includes other socialists which then naturally leads to communism and totalitarian rule. And to your point about history and Hitler -- obviously you are correct that you did not learn anything in school as apparently you were not taught the National Socialists German Worker's Party was Hitler's political party. Perhaps it was the term SOCIALIST in the party name that was confusing you?
Not at all, I am perfectly capable of looking behind names and judging actions and nothing that Hitler did suggests in any way that he was a socialist.
I suppose you think that the German Democratic Republic was really democratic and a republic as well!
Dude please -- this blithering idiocy of your childish word games does nothing to advance legitimate arguments concerning the core issue -- Obamacare and the Supreme Court's ruling which expands government's power by limiting American Liberties, vis-a-vis asserting the unlimited power to tax. Claiming the Nazi Party was not socialist defies reality of fact. So there is not further rational purpose the continue dialogue with those refusing the accept fact. Perhaps you believe the moon landing did not occur either?
But what you do well is avoid the actual issues that were at hand, because you lack any credibly logical arguments supporting your position.
So, you have no argument to support your ludicrous claims so you resort to name calling!
Go on then educate this fool, what grounds have you, apart from the name of his party, for claiming that Hitler was a socialist?
This is relevant to Obamacare because there are those sad sacks out there who claim that Obama is a socialist as well.
Shall we do an analysis of how many people have been killed by capitalist regimes vs Socialist ones (I am not a communist) further saying something as stupid as that Nazism which is classic fascism was socialism shows your complete ignorance.
I am sure you as an "intelligent" person know that the hallmark of socialism is public ownership of the means of production... The means of production in Nazi Germany were privately owned, end of discussion.
Josak -- the fascists were the Italians, socialists = Nazis, commies = Soviets. Why is the truth so difficult for you to accept? This type of semantic gamesmanship, in which you are attempting to be far smarter than what you actually are is the problem. So lets play your trivial little mind game - socialist/fascism/communism - are cut from the same cloth with different patterns. Even Marx claimed one needed socialism to occur before mutating into communism and fascism is essentially a totalitarian dictator that disavows socialists. But truly, your are attempting to prove a distinction where none exists. It is like attempting to distinguish the difference between slave owners and holders -- HINT: they're different in name only.
But as a public service I shall provide the you the methodology that shall allow you to visualize and grasp the socialist/fascist/capitalist dilemma. Imagine a round clock with numbers, and it makes no difference the style of number. 11 o'clock = Socialism. 12 o'clock = Communism and 1 o'clock = Fascism. And finally 6 o'clock = a capitalist Republic, because technically capitalism is not political ideology, but rather an economic model.
To answer your other question - YES, PROVE with numbers and not your generalized bloviating, which are based on legitimate cases of genocide and murder - and don't give me the millions killed in war.
School's out son!
The Nazi's were socialists in name only....perhaps they added the word 'socialist' to their party to trick the German people.
How, exactly, do you define socialism Onusonus?
What can be added. This is the reality of the situation caused by Obamacare - there is no upside, because when you step in a cow excrement you don't rationalize it by calling it - freshly mowed grass!
We have an expression to cover your type of behaviour,it's called "turkeys voting for Christmas".
Perhaps you meant to say a "turkeys voting for Thanksgiving". After all this is the US and not your little British Island. But I imagine that creates images of a bunch of farmers destroying the British Army and bringing the King of England to submission. Perhaps your positions are based on your yearning for the day that Americans finally destroy themselves with the same parasitic form of socialism that is destroying England and the whole of Europe.
If you think that the UK is socialist then you prove without doubt that you either have no idea of what the political situation is in the UK or you have no idea of what socialism really is.
Or perhaps both apply!
The UK does have a socialized health care system for the most part.
That hardly makes us a socialist country, especially when you consider that the present government is waging all out war on the health service.
Relative to the U.S. of course the UK is socialist. This is what I mean with people being honest with themselves about the reality. Regardless if reality doesn't conform to your ideology, does not negate the reality. For instance, Obama's team stated today that the Obama administration did not argue before the Supreme Court that Obamacare is a tax, when taped transcripts proves otherwise. Similarly you want to think of your country as being free, when in fact it is not. The problem with evading reality is that it prevents you from identifying and fixing problems of government intervention. But being the fact that you are British, it is no wonder you agree with a socialist program such as Obamacare. Your own politicians Daniel Hannan asserts the UK is a socialist State. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Luo67VD6wJ0
Ok seriously, I think you need to consider your own reasoning. Socialism is not relative anymore than being alive or dead is relative, socialism is defined as system where the state owns the means of production, if a state owns the means of production and is leftist then it is a socialist state, but let's make this very clear, if the governemnt does not own the means of production it is not a socialist state therefore we can say with zero doubt that the UK is not socialist.
Lion, John admitted he was a socialist! He will spin and divert anything that doesn't fit his ideology. He will give his one line answers and think he is king. Bottom line my friend you can not help or teach people when they just want to mooch off the system and blame everybody else for their problems.
Danny, what do you mean by "mooch off the system" I hope it doesn't mean what I think it does.
You maybe do not like my short answers but they aren't libellous like that one.
With more than enough input from private healthcare providers. We also have hospitals and clinical staff which were built, bought and paid for tax payers. However, these assets are also at the disposal of private health care companies. Private healthcare is partially funded by the state in the UK. Private healthcare providers do not fund social healthcare in the UK. Where do the NHS's debts really originate?
Nice diatribe.
I've seen just the oppositive working in a psychiatry department of a major medical university. In the 1990s, the insurance companies demanded accountability, and we had to demonstrate what where were goig to do and what the outcome was. This everntually is leading to DSM-5, the global encyclopedia of mental illensses.
People can mock universial heaalthcare, but I praise it becuae my clinic had to turn peopel away: Doctors who lost their isnurance and their minds taking their own pills; pastors who lost their parish and their insurance; small business owners who lost everything and got hooked on drugs to control the pain. But no--sorry we cnn't help you because you do not have insurance.
And this is while I'm doing pro bono up the ying yang. But you cannot work for free forever when school costs $200,000, and generally a bankruptcy.
*3% of doctors surveyed in a recent DPMA poll said that they were seriously considering quiting the medical profession as a direct result of Obamacare!
I have seen much much more than 3%! they are stating a source that a lot of doctors do not agree with. I have friends and family that are Doctors and most will only take private Cadillac insurance or cash. As they said, Would you take on more work and get paid less!
My bad, it was 93%! Sorry, not proofreading my reply the first time.
Also quitting and just eliminating Medicaid and Medicare from their practice are two different things. so 3% in that case is probably more correct.
So that's 3%, 83% and 93%, hm right, got that.
http://dailycaller.com/2012/07/09/repor … obamacare/
It's 83% John.
Trying to find something to dismiss what you do not like John? I can find many mistakes you socialist made. Even Obama said we have 57 States!
You don't know your socialists from your elbow!
If Obama is a socialist then I'm the King of Siam.
I don't want to know Socialism, It has proven not to work and as Thatcher said eventually you run out of other peoples money! Later King John
At one time it was proven that man wasn't capable of flight also. Thank goodness we didn't just give up....
*shrugs* This kind of response would only be a surprise to liberals that believe Uncle Sam has unlimited pockets and is the greatest organizer on the planet.
Some know better already, but the rest will discover the sad truth in a few years.
Well actually if Uncle Sam wasn't the greatest organizer on this planet, America wouldn't be the power that it is.
What does France, Italy, Canada, Germany, Sweden, Norway, United Kingdom, Canada, (just to name a few) all have in common? 1. They all have government ran healthcare that is far more efficient than our private sector ran healthcare. 2. Their citizens have a longer life expectancy and healthier. 3. They all out rank us by far when it comes to healthcare (we rank #37 - Way to go!). Josak is correct by pointing out that one guy doesn't speak for all healthcare professionals.
All the rich from those countries come here when they are ill! will not be like that much longer.
http://www.city-journal.org/html/17_3_c … hcare.html
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig10/leboe … uten1.html
http://www.biggovhealth.org/stories/
http://articles.cnn.com/2009-07-06/poli … M:POLITICS
The rich will always go against the grain.
There are also hundreds of people who leave the U.S. to obtain affordable healthcare in other countries!
For me, it means one thing: hope.
I'm willing to pay for my health care, but getting turned down for preexisting conditions for years was terrifying.
The insurance I now have is crap and covers very little, yet its premiums eat the bulk of my income. And of course, it has a lifetime expenses cap which will kick in within 20 years, after which I will have no insurance.
obamacare says even people with health issues can get insurance, and can't be cut off in their 60s (at which point, under the OLD system, their health care expenses go to the state since the insurance industry won't pay them, and they wind up having to use more social services.)
The system that Obama has implemented was devised, pushed hard, and endorsed by prominent Republicans from Lamar Alexander to Orrin Hatch to Mitt Romney to JohnMcCain. But now that the Democrats have adopted their proposals, they've backpedalled and started calling it socialism to fool everybody.
Does everyone REALLY have such selective amnesia? The videos the GOP produced supporting this system a few years back are still on the web! I can't believe people are falling for their changed script. If they were still pushing it as they were just a few years ago, you'd say it was a good thing.
You hit the nail on the head! Republicans now have selective amnesia! Like a bunch of little kids! Okay when it was their idea but didn't get it done. So now the President gets it done and it's the worst thing in the world! What a joke!
GG not all republicans supported this Utopian propaganda. And I assure you no conservatives support Romneycare or Obamacare or any other socialist government run system. Preconditions could be handled with a one page bill, creating a high risk pool and creating a competitive market place where 100's of companies compete accross the country or the world, instead of few sanctioned companies allowed in your state.
There is one thing for certain -- it does not take 2,700 pages and another 10 to 20 thousand pages of regulations to fix the problem of preexisting conditions. And remember this, when it comes time to ration care, which there will necessarily be due to an explosion is costs -- pre-existing conditions is going to be one of the primary factors in determining your level of care and whether or not you get a procedure.
Because health care in the UK is cradle to grave we have no pre-existing conditions, though how a condition can exist before it exists rather baffles me!
A "pre-existing" condition is a condition that exists prior to becoming insured by said company.
It means you had it before you bought the services. You didn't get it while you were covered.
Aye Cagsil, but it still sounds crazy to me,like these folk who'll talk about "a white good" and really mean a refrigerator and not some arcane religious practice.
What it effectively means is a genetic underclass, if you are born with a serious medical defect in the US then you had better be from a rich family or you are in serious trouble.
Apparently now debt collectors are posing as emergency room staff to get you to pay your medical bill before you go in and threatening to deny you care if you don't because doctors are not allowed to turn anyone away, the WHO initial report already links it to several deaths, they also ambush you while you are still groggy from anesthesia and get you to sign payment plans with massive interest rates. Honestly you guys have no idea how lucky you are in respect to healthcare.
I agree with making companies eliminate that from their practice. But, in doing so, the price of care is going to go up, because government regulations which will affect people and effect company profits.
The company can make up the loss by increasing it's margin(this could be done in a couple of ways such as looking for cheaper suppliers or cutting employees) or by increasing it's cost of services.
There's a possibility they will do ALL 3 to raise profit. The government cannot honestly control what a company will do.
Indeed they can't and that is why everybody who is claiming that it is socialised health care is wrong. It does nothing to eliminate the biggest cost and that is private profit.
But, government's involvement isn't going to reduce or eliminate the private profit. To think it is is just foolish.
That's not what the Affordable Health Care Act does.
John, the Affordable Health Care Act does not reduce a private companies profits.
You saying it does is ridiculous because that's not what it's designed to do.
Hang on, I never said that it would reduce profits, in fact I said exactly the opposite, what I actually said was
"It does nothing to eliminate the biggest cost and that is private profit."
No problem - two nations divided by a common language
To be fair there is an annual fee on the insurance companies of about 60 billion total but otherwise unfortunately true.
But Josak, who will actually pay the fee?
It wouldn't by any chance be the policy holders would it?
part of Obamacare makes it really hard for insurance companies to lift their prices except to account for inflation and it has been made clear that they won't be able to raise them for the taxes because the cost is compensated by the new customers they are about to receive, it is far from perfect and I would much prefer the Australian system or even the British one but it is written with good intentions and some thought.
It's good, unless their new expenses for having to cover things they can't currently afford to cover exceed a few percentage points of current expenses. If that's the case, and they aren't allowed to raise rates, they'll go bankrupt. Obamacare doesn't address the reasons why healthcare costs are high in America.
Over 1/3 of Americans pay an extra $1500/year in healthcare because they are obese. Another 1/3 pay more into healthcare for being overweight.
America pays for 35% of pharmaceutical research worldwide. Other countries have price controls, so Americans end up disproportionately footing the bill for worldwide drug research. We pay twice as much per capita compared to all of Europe for research.
Physician and nurse salaries in the US are nearly double the OECD average.
Malpractice lawsuits cause US doctors to practice more defensive medicine than other countries. The US spends more on 'frivolous' procedures than other countries.
John H - Pre-existing condition is a condition that existed prior to an individual seeking insurance. But then you knew that...I hope!
You missed the point that in socialized healthcare there can be no pre-existng condition. So for a person in that system it is a baffling idea. The ability of all companies to refuse insurance to babies with congenital conditions even when both parents are lifelong clients being obscenely baffling.
I was aware of how the expression was used, I was and am puzzled by the mangling of the language. "An existing condition" means exactly the same thing without the pretentiousness
The PRE-fix "PRE" in PRE-existing condition is more than PRE-tentious, John.
It's PRE-valent.
The insurance companies use (and abuse) it routinely to PRE-judge applicants and PRE-vent them from being eligible for healthcare coverage.
Here's how unfair it is.
Candidate A, Candidate B and Candidate C are all white males age 48. All three are a bit overweight (BMI 29) and all take medication to keep their blood pressure in check.
All candidates are identical in terms of their risk exposure for the health insurer.
Candidate A is self-employed. He is middle class (although struggling in this economy). He applies for individual coverage. He is DENIED.
Candidate B works for a 20-person architectural firm. Candidate B is ACCEPTED -- no health questions even asked. Why? Because his employer has a group policy with the insurer.
Candidate C's income is below the threshold to receive Medicaid. Thus his healthcare is paid by the governent.
THIS is just one of many inherent disparities and inequities and of American health insurance as it now.
THIS is just one of the many problems Obamacare seeks to redress.
Socialized healthcare is terrible. My mother country has had it for many years, and when it is first put in place, everyone is happy, but over time, money becomes tighter and tighter, and the good doctors bail, while the crooks and quacks stick around. That is what history has taught me. Not only that, but its common sense when you think about it.
I am disappointed in Americans for thinking that they should just do what Europe has done. Just because our healthcare system has gone down, that does not mean that we should adapt another bad system.
I am very interested in the system Romney proposed. It is the only time that I have heard an intelligent, fair and truly beneficial plan being brought up.
Of course the liberal media were so afraid that people would hear that and see the light, so they cut that little line out, "I like to fire people", to try to demonize him and stop people from listening to what he really said.
"I like to fire people," means that we are the boss and we can fire our insurance company. I like t fire companies that are not serving me right too.
American's don't understand how crappy government healthcare is when the doctors know that you cannot fire them. And you really can't. I don't care what weird excuses someone comes up with. When you are not the one hiring, you have no control and IT SUCKS!
Ok so how come #1 No country that has passed public healthcare has ever got rid of it #2 Polling in countries which have it Like Australia how public support of over 95% #3 every country which has passed it has seen an increase in health stats. #4 The healthcare in the US costs three times as much per person than the one in Britain for fewer hospital beds, more infant mortality and a lower life expectancy. #5 Every single one of the 35 countries with a better healthcare rating than the US according to the World health Org ranking has public healthcare.
Years of potential life lost is a measure of how many years of life are lost for every 100 000 people let's compare the ratings from other countries vs US ratings in the US the male YOPLL is 6291 years now lets compare that with public healthcare countries: Australia: 3946 Iceland: 2994 (less than half) Italy: 3605 Finland 2995 Hell even the much criticized Canada is doing much better at 4168.
All the evidence shows that public healthcare is more effective.
Oh also the ACA has a section that will add a doctor review panel which will make firing bad doctors much easier than it is now.
Because socialist countries lie about their statistics in order to make their system look good. Cuba is a prime example.
That is right Onusomus.
I have asked Josak why he does not move to Cuba and he has one million excuses. I have spent my time in Cuba and am grateful to the U.S. A.
This is a free country and we are all free to leave any time we decide that this is not where we want to live. socialists love speaking about the glory of Europe and Cuba, but for some reason they never leave the U.S. A to the greener pastures of Cuba.
As you know I lived in Cuba several years but i have all my family here and i live here to be close to them, there is nothing strange about this, public healthcare has nothing to do with Cuba it is something that all successful nations have passed or are in the process of passing.
I knew a guy who escaped Romania because America had a real healthcare system that saved his wife's life. That would have never happened with Romania's socialized medical system. France's system is racking up a huge deficit too, and women in Canada are more likely to die of breast cancer than in America, for now.
In fact in the late 1960's Canada implemented federal price cuts and as a result drug research dropped by more than 50%.
As America is the leading manufacturer for drug research in the world, one could only imagine the devastating effect that socialized medicine will have on every other country just because of this failure in our policy.
Do you even realize that Obamacare does not touch drug research?
Mexico receives more medical tourism than we do, even Cuba with it's tiny capacity gets about half as many medical tourists yearly as the whole US.
Even New Zealand receives medical tourism from the US because surgeries there cost 15% of what ours do here for foreigners with higher success rates, the US is just not a very popular medical tourism destination except for the very rich.
The federal price cuts in Canada were indirectly related to the drop in Drug research, and yet they still caused it to drop drastically. the same thing can happen when the wasteful government takes over. The mere idea that the US government is capable of even balancing a checkbook is laughable, and now we want them to take over our health care system. The fact is that socialized medicine evolves into a two tiered system which does not affect the rich but drags down both the middle class and the lower class. The Obamacare tax however, will get more than 75% of it's revenue through the middle class.
Healthcare in Mexico is very affordable because they use the free market, and Cuba as I said before lies about their statistics. They have an undocumented infant mortality rate because they don't count the children who die within the first few hours of life, their hospitals are dilapidated, dirty, and bug infested, and many people who enter Cuban hospitals die from malnutrition.
They don't like the truth! they spread the BS lies that fit their agenda. If Cuba was so great and have all this great stuff we don't how come people risk their life on these ridiculous made boats to come here? Does Cuba or Mexico have ILLEGAL ALIEN PROBLEMS???
http://www.floatingcubans.com/
I have given you the truth hundreds of statistics on lower running costs and better health results from public care systems all of which can be found on the last page (I have plenty more to add) a particularly striking one is that 45 000 Americans die every year because they don't have insurance and more than 30 000 die because their insurance spending limits run out both of which things Obamacare will fix. It is you who ignores the facts and figures presented by international independent sources (the truth) in favor of what you want to believe.
Additionally this discussion has nothing to do with Cuba but since you insist on bringing it up 30 000 people a year go to Cuba for healthcare every year about a third of them from the US.
You want anyone to believe 10,000 US citizens go to CUBA for medical????? Please, you need to stop taking whatever your taking! That is almost as bad a Pelosi and Wassermann!
Check the stats for yourself. Medical in Cuba is better for many operations and costs a tiny fraction.
Not only that but they do so despite the fact that it is forbidden by the US.
Palinites don't read statistics. Newspapers either. Sarah herself already proved that.
Yeah and your great Pelosi is so much better! Joke! done with you with that idiotic post
I sincerely hope you get to vote for Palin again this year, Danny.
She's your kind of people!
I will gladly take a true American over a idiot like Pelosi or Wassermann.
You get what you deserve my friend. very sad for you!
Lets see who's crying in November, Danny boy. Mitt the twit ain't gonna make it. Four more years of your whining and complaining I suppose. Oh well, we've put up with it so far. Looking forward to four more years of your hilarious inane gripes.
Yeah like you said in 2010! Funny that was an ass whipping big time and Oh yeah how about the Wisconsin recall????? Oh yeah You thought that was going to work too. And Obummer won there by 14% Keep dreaming dreamer!
Wish in one hand and cr*p in the other! Vote for another moron this year too, Danny. You've got some good experience doing that already.
your too brainwashed for your handouts to realize the truth. Whatever.
If you ever get one you can do what you like with it too. Brain, that is!
Romney is far from a Moron! He is a true American, You can't say the same for the socialist in the WH now! Anti-American church for 19 years. Hanging with socialist and Marxist all his life(in his books) enough for me. also a LIAR in CHIEF!! do you need me to post all the lies from YOUTUBE in his own words?
Told spanish audience he couldn't do something then goes against what he said and did it,
Says he will not tax then try to hide it shadily by calling it a penalty when in fact it is a tax!
I have tons of others but don't want to waste my time, I know you want that handout and will do anything to defend.
prove 10,000 went to cuba for treatment!
Medical staff
According to the World Health Organization, Cuba provides a doctor for every 170 residents,[50] and has the second highest doctor-to-patient ratio in the world after Italy.[51]
Medical professionals are not paid high salaries by international standards. In 2002 the mean monthly salary was 261 pesos, 1.5 times the national mean.[52] A doctor’s salary in the late 1990s was equivalent to about US$15–20 per month in purchasing power. Therefore, some prefer to work in different occupations, for example in the lucrative tourist industry where earnings can be much higher.[17]
The San Francisco Chronicle, the Washington Post, and National Public Radio have all reported on Cuban doctors defecting to other countries.[53]
Black market healthcare
The difficulty in gaining access to certain medicines and treatments has led to healthcare playing an increasing role in Cuba's burgeoning black market economy, sometimes termed "sociolismo". According to former leading Cuban neurosurgeon and dissident Dr Hilda Molina, "The doctors in the hospitals are charging patients under the table for better or quicker service." Prices for out-of-surgery X-rays have been quoted at $50 to $60.[54] Such "under-the-table payments" reportedly date back to the 1970s, when Cubans used gifts and tips in order to get health benefits. The harsh economic downturn known as the "Special Period" in the 1990s aggravated these payments. The advent of the "dollar economy", a temporary legalization of the dollar which led some Cubans to receive dollars from their relatives outside of Cuba, meant that a class of Cubans were able to obtain medications and health services that would not be available to them otherwise.[55]
Yeah great healthcare and do you think doctors here will work for $20 of purchasing power a month?? They can do this because they are a communist country. Keep drinking the koolaid my friend. LMAO
I have the World Health Org report on Cuba for 2011 on my desk, i am sure you can find it online, additionally according to experts like this and those cited within:
http://next.eller.arizona.edu/courses/o … %20Kim.pdf
without the ban on travel from the US that number would swell to about 450 000.
I see you chose a very choice section of the wikipedia article and ignored all the parts where it compared the Us vs Cuban health stats but regardless this conversation is about public healthcare not Cuban healthcare Cuba is jut one of dozens of countries which have public healthcare and it is one of the poorest.
For the record Cuba has a lower infant mortality than the US, lower death under five rate than the US, higher life expectancy than the US, far better years of life lost index than the US and and AIDS rate which is leas than a sixth of that of the US amongst many other things all this at about one tenth of the cost per person of the US.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog … orld-obama
Again that is due to the fact that infants who die within the first few hours are not counted as live births and they provide their own statistics. That's what communists do, they are famous for lying to the public.
Again, you are showing your ignorance! You choose to believe a dictator who hands out SEVERE punishment for anyone who speaks bad about them??? Are you kidding me???? Please step back and think about what your saying! You are very gullible! You believe stats that were provided by a dictator! DUDE YOUR FUNNY!!!!
Twenty bucks a month, yeah that's worth ten years of medical school! With that kind of money American medicine would go the way of the dinosaurs.
Do you understand how real value works? it's worth noting that that the World bank defines poverty as not being able to afford food and housing regularly in the Us 15% of people are classified as poor in Cuba just 1.5 (again independent statistics) coming back to the point at hand this thread has nothing to do with Cuba but with public health in General, over 50 countries have public health (most of the rest do not because they cant afford it) so why are we focusing on Cuba?
Eventually this will also happen here if this really gets going.
According to Katharine Hirschfeld, criticizing the government is a crime in Cuba, and penalties are severe.[81] She noted that "Formally eliciting critical narratives about health care would be viewed as a criminal act both for me as a researcher, and for people who spoke openly with me".[81] According to Hirschfeld the Cuban Ministry of Health (MINSAP) sets statistical targets that are viewed as production quotas. The most guarded is infant mortality rate. The doctor is pressured to abort the pregnancy whenever screening shows that quotas are in danger.[81] Once a doctor decides to guard his quotas, patients have no right to refuse abortion.[81]
According to previous research about other socialist countries such as the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China, Marxist "revolutionary" efforts have included such practices as "deliberate manipulation of health statistics, aggressive political intrusion into health care, decision-making, criminalizing dissent, and other forms of authoritarian policing of the health sector designed to insure health changes reflect the (often utopian) predictions of Marxist theory".[81] These practices are well documented for the former Soviet Union and China.[81] Their existence was virtually unknown in the West during the Soviet era and Western social scientists cited favorable the health statistics supplied by the regimes in the USSR and China.[81] Social scientists did not look critically at the ways they were created and maintained by state power.[81]
Many Cubans complain about politics in medical treatment and health care decision-making. There is no right to privacy, patient's informed consent, or right to protest for malpractice. The patient has no right to refuse the treatment, including for religious or ethical reasons. For example, Jehovah's Witnesses cannot refuse blood transfusions and a Rastafarian cannot refuse an amputation on the grounds that it goes against Rastafari biblical teachings (Rastafari teaches that the body must be whole in order for it to resurrected on Judgement Day). As a result, the experience can be dehumanizing.[81] After spending nine months in Cuban clinics, Katherine Hirschfeld asserted in her paper "My increased awareness of Cuba’s criminalization of dissent raised a very provocative question: to what extent is the favorable international image of the Cuban health care system maintained by the state’s practice of suppressing dissent and covertly intimidating or imprisoning would-be critics?"[81]
In 2006, BBC flagship news programme Newsnight featured Cuba's Healthcare system as part of a series identifying "the world's best public services". The report noted that "Thanks chiefly to the American economic blockade, but partly also to the web of strange rules and regulations that constrict Cuban life, the economy is in a terrible mess: national income per head is minuscule, and resources are amazingly tight. Healthcare, however, is a top national priority" The report stated that life expectancy and infant mortality rates are nearly the same as the USA's. Its doctor-to-patient ratios stand comparison to any country in Western Europe. Its annual total health spend per head, however, comes in at $251; just over a tenth of the UK's. The report concluded that the population's admirable health is one of the key reasons why Castro is still in power.[82] A 2006 poll carried out by the Gallup Organization's Costa Rican affiliate — Consultoría Interdisciplinaria en Desarrollo (CID) — found that about three-quarters of urban Cubans responded positively to the question "do you have confidence to your country's health care system".[83]
In 2000, Secretary General of the United Nations Kofi Annan stated that "Cuba should be the envy of many other nations" adding that achievements in social development are impressive given the size of its gross domestic product per capita. "Cuba demonstrates how much nations can do with the resources they have if they focus on the right priorities - health, education, and literacy."[84] The Kaiser Family Foundation, a non-governmental organization that evaluated Cuba’s healthcare system in 2000-1 described Cuba as "a shining example of the power of public health to transform the health of an entire country by a commitment to prevention and by careful management of its medical resources"[85] President of the World Bank James Wolfensohn also praised Cuba's healthcare system in 2001, saying that "Cuba has done a great job on education and health", at the annual meeting of the Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Wayne Smith, former head of the US Interests Section in Havana identified "the incredible dedication" of Cubans to healthcare, adding that "Doctors in Cuba can make more driving cabs and working in hotels, but they don't. They're just very dedicated".[86] Dr. Robert N. Butler, president of the International Longevity Center in New York and a Pulitzer Prize-winning author on aging, has traveled to Cuba to see firsthand how doctors are trained. He said a principal reason that some health standards in Cuba approach the high American level is that the Cuban system emphasizes early intervention. Clinic visits are free, and the focus is on preventing disease rather than treating it.[87] Furthermore, London's The Guardian newspaper lauded Cuba's public healthcare system for what it viewed as its high quality in a Sept. 12, 2007 article.[88]
Yes I do Socialist JOHN!!!! Any fool who wants to talk about Cuba to the USA is a fool! Case closed. Do you actually know anything about the US??? Do you live here??? Keep your UK healthcare 1 doctor for every 600 patients. We don't want to be you, you should be glad we protected your sorry country, or you would possibly be dead or a slave and might have to actually do some real work.
Only I was thinking, how do such statements as:-
"In 2006, BBC flagship news programme Newsnight featured Cuba's Healthcare system as part of a series identifying "the world's best public services". The report noted that "Thanks chiefly to the American economic blockade, but partly also to the web of strange rules and regulations that constrict Cuban life, the economy is in a terrible mess: national income per head is minuscule, and resources are amazingly tight. Healthcare, however, is a top national priority"
and
"In 2000, Secretary General of the United Nations Kofi Annan stated that "Cuba should be the envy of many other nations" adding that achievements in social development are impressive given the size of its gross domestic product per capita. "Cuba demonstrates how much nations can do with the resources they have if they focus on the right priorities - health, education, and literacy."[84] The Kaiser Family Foundation, a non-governmental organization that evaluated Cuba’s healthcare system in 2000-1 described Cuba as "a shining example of the power of public health to transform the health of an entire country by a commitment to prevention and by careful management of its medical resources"
support your argument?
That is what you posted Danny!
As I said, Palinites don't read very well, not even the things they claim to know so well. No wonder they stay so confused all of the time. I don't know what to think about people who post data which goes against their own argument. Well, actually I do! They vote republican!
No wonder those Tea Party protest signs are all misspelled!
That's ok Randy...at least they know why they are there:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8Nkn_Hn … plpp_video
And you will notice after being confronted the little baby ducks are scurried away by their union handlers. They don't know crap about anything they aren't fed the information of.
Coming from a Faux News aficionado, that is a hoot, JS. Don't fret, I won't ask any more hard questions for you to dodge.
You see John, I posted the whole section with everything in it! I do not do what you socialists do and just edit to fit my views! Anyway if you truly know how to read you can clearly see it was propaganda from a communist regime. There was a woman from Cuba who has stated clearly in the thread that she was from Cuba and how they operate, but you socialist twisting people like to spin your nonsense. Sorry... Be real
The BBC and Kofi Annan belong to a communist regime!
You be real, if you can.
I found out it is useless to even speak with you and your twisted socialist ideology. You admitted your a socialist and that is all I need to know. Just collect your free stuff and go about your business.
In other words, you realise that you made a bit of a gaffe with your post and rather than admit it and move on you try to distract by passing petty insults!
It doesn't work with me and I doubt if it will actually work with many here.
No I didn't make a gaffe! I was honest unlike you and posted the whole section, instead of editing like you socialist spinners do! You are the one telling a person who lived in CUBA for 20 years how they operate! when something doesn't go as you claim all you socialist just spin $hit to fit your nonsense. By the way just came back from the UK a few weeks ago, GOD is it getting disgusting over there, you are being taken over. Like I said just collect your free stuff on the backs of others until it runs out!
Having lived in Cuba for many years as recently as five years ago I completely agree with Kofi Annan.
Who exactly are the UK getting taken over by... (I get a sinking feeling about this)
You deliberately posted a whole section extolling the benefits of Cuban health care as part of your rebuttal of Cuban health care!
Yeah right.
Yes it is getting disgusting over here and we have been taken over by those damned Conservatives.
The study also pointed to problems within the system, these included;
Low pay of doctors
Poor facilities—buildings in poor state of repair and mostly outdated.
Poor provision of equipment.
Frequent absence of essential drugs.
Concern regarding freedom of choice both for patient and doctor.[89]
Complaints have arisen that foreign "health tourists" paying with dollars and senior Communist party officials receive a higher quality of care than Cuban citizens. Former leading Cuban neurosurgeon and dissident Dr Hilda Molina asserts that the central revolutionary objective of free, quality medical care for all has been eroded by Cuba's need for foreign currency. Molina says that following the economic collapse known in Cuba as the Special Period, the Cuban Government established mechanisms designed to turn the medical system into a profit-making enterprise. This creates an enormous disparity in the quality of healthcare services between foreigners and Cubans leading to a form of tourist apartheid. In 1998 she said that foreign patients were routinely inadequately or falsely informed about their medical conditions to increase their medical bills or to hide the fact that Cuba often advertises medical services it is unable to provide.[90] Others makes similar claims, also stating that senior Communist party and military officials can access this higher quality system free of charge. [10] [11] In 2005, an account written by Cuban exile and critic of Fidel Castro, Carlos Wotzkow, appeared showing apparent unsanitary and unsafe conditions in the "Clínico Quirúrgico" of Havana; the article claims that health care for Cubans occurs in worse conditions in the rest of the country.[91]
An article in Canadian newspaper National Post, based interviews of Cubans, finds that in reality even the most common pharmaceutical items, such as aspirin and antibiotics are conspicuously absent or only available on the black market. Surgeons lack basic supplies and must re-use latex gloves. Patients must buy their own sutures on the black market and provide bedsheets and food for extended hospital stays. [12] The Cuban government blames the shortages on the embargo and states that those with more severe chronic diseases receive medicines. [13] However, other sources suggest that hose with such diseases lack medicines. It is also suggested that in some cases the local non-dollar stocks have been shipped abroad. [14] [15]
The U.S. State Department has argued that during the economic depression "the Cuban government made a deliberate decision to continue to spend money to maintain its military and internal security apparatus at the expense of other priorities – including healthcare." However, one study found that "the available data show that the fall in Cuba's medicine imports in the '90s didn't correspond to a significant lowering of the government's healthcare spending. Budgetary support for peso-denominated spending – i.e., labor costs of medical professionals, operational costs of hospitals and clinics – has remained strong. Attempts to blame medical shortages in Cuba on resource misallocation are thus misguided, or at least wrongly nuanced."[92]
A recent ABC-TV 20/20 report on Healthcare, based on footage taken from within the island, criticized Michael Moore's portrayals of the Cuban Healthcare system in the movie Sicko. In that film, Moore took a number of Americans to a hospital in Havana where they bought affordable drugs, and were given treatments for free that they could not afford in America. The report highlights the dilapidated conditions of some hospitals that are accessible to regular Cubans by pointing to the bleak conditions of hospital rooms and the filthy conditions of the facilities. The report also addressed the quality of care available to Cubans by arguing that patient neglect was a common phenomenon. Finally, in discussing the infant mortality rate, the report highlights the government's alleged efforts to promote abortions of potentially infirm fetuses and other alleged government efforts to manipulate the rate.[93]
This just shows your credibility! You believe what is said by a country that has a dictator and if you speak badly about them the penalty is severe. Please know what your talking about you look foolish!
Would you take your wife or daughter there for an abortion? ITS CHEAP!!!
I guess you just believe the messiah and his political socialist and Marxist cabinet and democratic fools say. I guess you know more than doctors who actually see the patients! If they retire or quit what do you have???? Like every other socialized country month waits to see a doctor!
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/fo … 52650852/1
www.youtube.com/watch?v=77Lf7k-Q-jo
http://www.forbes.com/sites/sallypipes/ … alth-woes/
blog.heritage.org/2012/03/14/side-effects-doctors-fear-obamacare/
communities.washingtontimes.com/.../health-care-reform-organized-..
www.nypost.com/.../opinion/.../obamacar … he_mds_...
online.wsj.com/article/SB124208383695408513.html
www.nypost.com/.../opinion/.../slashing_doc_pay_...
http://bostonherald.com/news/opinion/op … o_quash_it
blog.heritage.org/.../top-five-reasons-obamacare-is-bad-for-doctors/
www.humanevents.com/.../doctors-hate-ob … e-than-...
www.humanevents.com/.../obamacares-most … sequenc...
www.capoliticalreview.com/.../top-five- … bad-for...
http://www.sunshinestatesarah.com/2012/ … acare.html
Yeah their health care is so good that's why their national anthem is "row, row, row your boat..."
Haha. That is a good one Onusonus.
Very true.
if I were back there, I would do anything to escape. Even the smell of that country makes me sick.
Danny - is that a 57 Buick? But seriously, these countries do have illegal alien problems - everyone one is leaving illegally!!
Onusonus, that is pure hogwash! For being a top industrialized nation, our healthcare ranks in the gutters. We need to reel in the costs and make itaffordable for all, with excellent care! Care provided by American citizens being trained, as opposed to services being provided by foreign doctors in our hospitals. Affordable healthcare is a must for all, along with better education to stimulate these professions to our young people!
I have been in the healthcare field for over 20 years. We have the BEST quality healthcare hands down. I regularly see people, my family included, leaving their free healthcare to get good care here.
It's obvious that American healthcare is not perfect, but it is one of the best in the world and that is due to competitiveness brought on by the free market. It is tragic that America has decided to fix the system by taking a step backwards into such a self destructive system.
We will not go backwards if the socialist in chief is defeated!
2012, I know you won't forget it either. Let's talk again in November when Obama wins again. I'll buy you a consolation beer, and a glass of milk for Onusx2!
I really do not think it will be that close, I believe many people are just being quiet because they don't want to be accused of being a racist!
People see he isn't what he claims to be.
yes you will have the freeloaders who want their handouts who will follow him to their death, but I have to believe more are smarter than that.
Many thought he would bring people closer....more divided than ever!
I know many dems who voted for him that aren't this time. I live in NY which is very liberal.
Skarlet, These people are so far gone they do not even want to listen to people like you who come from there or Doctors who are saying they will have to retire or get rid of some of their current patients because they will not accept the payment from the government. If they get their way they will find out in the long run....hopefully not for everyone else sake.
Funny according to the international body in charge of measuring this we have the 37th in the world.
you are so gullible! where did they get the true stats from????? From the dictator??? You seriously need to go in a corner and think about what your saying! you're either lying to yourself or I truly feel sorry for you.
I guess even if the you heard it from the horses mouth you wouldn't believe it. I'm done with you.
the World health Organization collects it's own data.
Again I'm done with you! WHO GIVES THEM THE INFO THEY COLLECT??????? If you really believe they give the correct numbers your beyond help! Many who fled that great country you think it is so wonderful tells about the conditions and what they do with aborting anything that may cause a problem. You want equality and you think equality is killing innocent babies? you have a serious warped mind. Are you like Pelosi who stated a CHILD isn't a child until the third semester?
Lets play devils advocate here for a minute say everything is correct about Cuba which it isn't. They pay doctors $20 a month, they have a dictator, are communist/socialist. people who work in the tourist business make more than doctors! think that can work here???? Seriously I'm done with you.
They collect their own info directly. I am not proposing a Cuban system of healthcare I am proposing public healthcare as is had by dozens of countries most of which have better economies than ours.
I believe we need to fix and make our healthcare better. There is much better ways to make this possible, but both parties need to put politics aside and stop getting in bed with the healthcare system and the low life attorneys who are destroying it. The cost of malpractice insurance is ridiculous and who pays for this? WE DO WITH HIGHER COSTS, no other country has lawsuits like we do. Also if they just stopped the monopoly and let insurance companies compete across state lines would lower cost by almost 30-40% competition brings cost down. if these were implemented then many more can afford healthcare and the few who can't we can help. I used to be a democrat which I believe I still am but the democratic party is turning socialist. I'm a democrat because I believe we should help the less fortunate, but not enable people, which is being done to keep people down so they vote for them. I take my country over any party any day! If you truly look into Obama , from his own books to his actions and lies, he is clearly a socialist!
It's called propaganda Josak.
It's a progressive staple.
Firstly those are independent World health organization statistics not state ones second we are not talking about socialist countries we are talking about almost every industrialized country in the world, from Canada to Australia and New Zealand to the whole of Europe this is one huge conspiracy of socialism you see here. Your comment is rubbish.
His comments are always rubbish, as you'll discover.
Josak - of course people want free stuff, but giving people what they want by taking it from others is not LEADING...it's called pandering. I have no obligation to provide you with anything, just as you owe me nothing.
Lion's den, health care in the UK is not "free" we all pay for it out of taxes.
This, though you will no doubt scream "unfair" costs us considerably less than your second rate (or should I more accurately say 37th rate) health care costs you.
US is not 37th in healthcare. The WHO study is pathetically misleading, probably intentionally so.
50% of the 'ranking' is determined solely by life-expectancy. Life expectancy is not the same thing as health-care. The US has a high homicide rate compared to other countries, so all those people who are murdered count as negatives to how effective our healthcare system is. It's irrelevant.
Another 25% has to do with how much people pay for their healthcare. So you're not looking at how well the system works, you're looking at how much it costs. It makes a system like the US where you pay for insurance out of your paycheck look worse than a system where the government pays for it out of your taxes.
The figures didn't account either for obesity rates, which America leads in. Obesity is not a failing of the healthcare system. Along with obesity, America has more heart problems, blood pressure/blood sugar/diabetes/etc etc etc problems. These are failings of our society, not our healthcare. Too much McDonalds.
When life expectancy is adjusted for things like homicides and accidents, the US actually leads the world in life expectancy. We're the best in the world at treating cancer, and as far as I can tell we run right along with the OECD average for diabetic treatment.
Oh those vile WHO people! and their communist conspiracy. Why not Years of Potential Life Lost then?
100 000 people let's compare the ratings from other countries vs US ratings in the US, the male YOPLL is 6291 years now lets compare that with public healthcare countries: Australia: 3946 Iceland: 2994 (less than half) Italy: 3605 Finland 2995 Hell even the much criticized Canada is doing much better at 4168.
Again, you can't just pull a figure and claim it has something to do with healthcare when it doesn't. America has more YOPLL because we have higher homicide rates, higher obesity/diabetic rates, etc. Those higher rates take people at younger ages more in America than other countries, but it has nothing to do with healthcare.
In 2006, the U.S. had 36 diabetes-related lower-limb amputations per 100,000 people compared with an OECD average of 15. In the U.K., a country with what Pearson calls a very strong primary-care system, incidence of lower-limb amputations was four times lower than the U.S. at 9 per 100,000 people.
The diabetes thing not so much though... yes I know the Us diabetes rate is higher by about 20% but that does not account for the 400% improvement on our stats in the UK.
US diabetes rate isn't 20% higher than UK's. In 2000, the US had a rate of ~6.5%, while the UK had a rate of ~2.7. That's 240% in 2000, I'll leave it up to you to find more recent figures.
That puts the US below the OECD average for amputations, and those figures you cite don't account for severity of diabetes. Do you know what the differences in diabetes types is between nations? It's a fairly meaningless statistic.
Besides the fact that the UK system is better than the US one in most ways it's a flawed comparison because the US spends twice the percentage of it's GDP than the UK does on healthcare and still gets inferior results.
It's a joke statement because the quality of care overseas is no better than the quality of care is in the U.S. at this point and NOT EVER has the quality of care been better outside of the U.S.
Your statement lacks truth.
The quality of care in the U.S. has been downgraded over the last decade or so. Why? Because there are so many patients versus doctors.
Big Pharma continues to control society through pathetic drugs which are not helpful but have dangerous side-effects. Ask some of the patients.
Doctors don't give a damn about their patients anymore and if any did, then they are few in number, since American are stupid about their health or their education about health.
For the high price we pay we should have the best healthcare and the best outcomes in the world.
And since we are the greatest country in the damned world we deserve the best damned healthcare. Isn't that our right as Americans!????
But here we are, growing sicker, fatter, lazier and stupider.
Healthcare to the average American today means sitting in front of our TV and absorbing drug advertisements, then going to the doctor and saying, "I don't feel right. Give me that purple pill I saw on TV and FIX ME!"
Exactly. It's not our healthcare system, it's our society. It's a problem of education and personal responsibility.
Don't forget corporate responsibility. That should be in the mix, since fast food companies like McDonald's spend billions of dollars persuading people to eat badly. They have a deliberate strategy to hook children in their product and develop a life-long loyalty to junk food.
I agree though, that in this instance it's not all down to the healthcare system. Australian's too, have very high obesity levels and we are 4th in the world for diabetes, despite universal healthcare and widespread public education campaigns. It seems to be cultural - a sedentary lifestyle and a dependence on convenient, processed foods. Fatness is a malady of advanced capitalism.
There's a reason why I'm such a proponent of personal responsibility. I grew up eating some fast food, and I liked it, but when I grew up I learned it's not good for me, so I don't eat it anymore(I've had 1 hamburger in 2 years). In my mind, it's up to me to educate myself(and anyone else who wants to listen, not many do) and my family.
No, companies like McDonalds and Wendy's shouldn't be trying to act like their food is healthy and all that, but ultimately it's the responsibility of the individual who is eating it.
It applies everywhere. Finances are mostly a matter of personal responsibility. People who didn't get themselves under huge mortgages didn't do as poorly as people who did. I get upset watching something like Property Virgins and seeing a young couple buying a 4 bedroom 3 bath 2 garage house at the very top of their budget. They say they can make it work, but if either one of them gets sick or loses their job or gets demoted... they won't be able to make it more than a month or two. On the other hand, my parents rented until they could buy a home. They lived there for a while, improved it, sold it, and bought a better home. They did that some 8 or 9 times together, and built a lot of wealth and equity that way, without ever going into debt or risking their livelihood.
People should stop blaming the government, blaming the rich, blaming the insurance companies, blaming blaming blaming.
I get what you are saying about personal responsibility and I agree with you about the folly of the big mortgage to buy a Mc Mansion...people expect/want to have at the beginning of their lives what it took their parents a lifetime to achieve. Why do they expect this? Why do they think they have to have the cavernous house, the big car and the kids at private school in order to achieve happiness? Largely because they've been persuaded into believing that's where happiness lies, even if they have to go into huge debt to do it. They are *the aspirational* .
Yes, buying beyond their means is their own fault but there are always those willing to exploit their aspirations. In some situations people get into difficulty because they are financially clueless and get caught up in a spiral of ever-increasing interest rates. For example, prior to the GFC the banks actively encouraged debt-financed consumption via heavy high-risk borrowing and the sub-prime mortgage lenders had no qualms about making fat profits out of the vulnerable, knowing there would be a fair chance people wouldn't be able to meet their interest payments after rates were adjusted. If people are foolish enough to get ripped off by a profiteer they must take all the blame - the profiteer has no responsibility at all?
I just can't see the overall picture as so black and white as - "blame the poor, the obese/sick, the financially indebted, it's all their own bad choices". Things are a lot more complex like than that.
You are very correct, we should have the best and cheaper healthcare. Problem is all politicians are in bed with the insurance and drug companies and will not let them compete for our business which brings costs up big time. also malpractice insurance and the low life attorneys with frivolous lawsuits is another big problem.
Then why is US infant mortality 34th in the world?
Pick any reasonable measure you like and I better some country is better than the US as measured by it.
Except for cost. The US is #1 for percentage of GDP spent on healthcare.
I see a "cherry picker". And how long has America been in existence versus those of other Countries? Let me see you dig up the totality of statistics for all time measurement. Then we'll talk.
The U.S. infant mortality rate? Has so much more to it than any BS statistic organizer can come up with. Do you really think they took the real effort to investigate it? Not likely.
However, if we must travel down this road, let's do it. Infant mortality? Stupid people breeding. As government has so appropriately ensure that would happen by dumbing down society for the last 20 years. I'm sure infant mortality has risen. Not to mention, I'm pretty sure there are tons of egotistical morons who will become a parent and not have a clue as to what to do. Some might even kill their child because they rather not be stuck with it.
Did you investigate to see how many infant deaths are related to an oppressed woman? Did you investigate to see if the parents of the child were actually responsible for the infants death? Probably not. It's okay. Neither have I. Why? Because, it's useless information which isn't needed because it has nothing to do with actual health care.
It does have to do with the responsibility of the individuals who did decide to create the child.
You would be correct, now. I'm sure you pick a bunch junk to discuss about America's health care industry. Putting it under control of government is ridiculous. It's already screwed up...government(America's) will only make things worse. That's all it knows how to do.
That isn't a doubt when the U.S. spend $2 trillion on welfare programs. Every $2 trillion spent on welfare is another $2 trillion + interest owed to the Federal Reserve Bank.
...Ok this is like talking to a child. people who should not have children do, that occurs all over the world, sometimes their inability to care for their children causes their deaths and contributes to infant mortality but again that occurs everywhere, the major factor in how many infants die is how good the healthcare they receive is, the differences between different states are primarily related to that separation in healthcare.
Really?
All one sentence?
And you start off like...ok this is like talking to a child?
I mean seriously.
First off, yes people make a responsible choice for themselves about bringing in a child to their relationship. And, there are more dumb ones making irresponsible decisions about having children, because they have the mentality that they can go on State funded assistance, while the children grow up.
No need for work? No desire to work?
People having more children than they can handle or afford is yet another stupid move.
Pick any reasonable statistic you want. Stupid people are world wide, good preventive, contraceptive and pre-natal health care is not. And stupidity about one's health is something a good healthcare universal system improves. It is one of the most reliable statistics because death is reliably recorded in first world nations.
I picked infant mortality because along with average lifespan it is a widely accepted litmus lest for healthcare standards.
But of you can find any reasonable (non-cherry picked) population-wide measure of overall health where US is #1 I might understand why you are so sure Iceland, Australia, Canada, UK etc suck in comparison to the great US of A.
Or even pick a delivery metric like how many people get an annual check up or how quickly the recover from surgery. Anything.
You being anxious about me picking a statistic, already tells me that you'll show me something which mostly favors you position. Which, I'm not worried about to begin with.
Education helps.
Too bad that's not something put into place in America. And don't think for a second that the Affordable Health Care Act is a good healthcare universal system. It's not.
I'm sure death is reliably recorded according to you. I'm also sure that after so many years of being a missing person...you are more certainly declared dead. There's always more to statistics than what the statistic were compiled for in the first place.
Interesting. Good to know.
I wouldn't attempt it. Because I already know the system in which I grew up in, is no longer the system I live within now.
There's nothing presently great about the U.S. of A. My original statement stated now isn't good with regards to quality of care. The quality of care in the U.S. about 20 years ago was the best in the world, which was the main reason for people all over the world coming to America for medical needs.
Again, I don't need statistic from other places outside of the U.S., nor do I need to provide them.
The crux of the argument isn't about how America stands up to the rest of the world, and that's never been the issue.
My continued argument about the quality of care. The Affordable Health Care Act does NOTHING to raise the quality of care. If anything, it's going to get worse. Not enough doctors or medical professionals. Why not? Piss poor education.
I've already explained why mortality rates don't measure healthcare.
None of these rates are focused on medical causes. US has 4 times as many traffic-related deaths per capita than the UK. So in all of the US's mortality rates, we have an extra 30,000 people per year who are counted as dying, for no other reason than being in a motor accident. It doesn't focus on medical causes, so these rates don't work for measuring the efficacy of healthcare.
Great point. We have 100,000 gunshot wounds that they don't have in G.B.
The quality of care simply means how ell cared for the average patient is, the average patient in many countries is better cared for than the average patient in the US despite the fact that US costs are much higher and US spending is much higher.
Shift from diagnosis and treatment (especially with Big $ Big Pharma drugs!) to prevention and wellness is very late in coming to US.
But it is happening.
And yet we still have people (at least one hubber, probably more) who INSIST that conditions like heart disease, diabetes and obesity are not related to healthcare.
Diabetes, heart disease, and obesity aren't caused by healthcare. You can't say a country has poor healthcare because it has high obesity rates.
THat's actually not true for a variety of reasons, for example in Australia where i am now people's doctors are also their nutritionists often, they set out diet plans and exercise regimes and monitor their patients health and well being, because doctors visits are quite cheap it makes this possible.
Yeah, that's great and all, but it really has nothing to do with healthcare. It's a matter of education and how much society cares about themselves. Americans don't care. It's why we have people eating crap all the time. Their doctors will say not to, they know it's not good for them, but it's convenient and they like it.
Just because a doctor says 'you should eat healthier' doesn't mean a person will do it. I'm all for educating, but educating is not the same thing as treating.
There is a big difference between telling people to eat less and setting out a nutritional and exercise plan for them then getting them to come in every week to measure their progress and help them and it is absolutely part of healthcare unfortunately in the US that would be way too expensive.
Ok, if you want to say the education of Americans in regards to healthy living is worse than other countries(I think it's more apathy than education, no doctor can force someone to follow a plan if they don't want to, and Americans aren't good at doing that), then I agree with you.
But that's not really the issue. The truth is, healthcare treatment is better in America than anywhere else.
Right. You're wrong about the cost and the results and which is better, but you didn't actually argue anything specific so...
The US spends 15.3% of it's GDP on healthcare the Uk spends 8.2 the Us spends 6719 dollars per person on healthcare the UK spends $2815 despite this the UK has better statistics in almost all of the general litmus tests for healthcare (regardless of how many excuses Americans like to use)
With that much smaller expenditure the UK gets the same amount of doctors 25% more nurses and a lot more hospital beds per person.
You're missing the mark comparing strict GDP to GDP. You have to compare GDP per capita to GDP per capita, and compare that to healthcare costs. As GDP rises, so does healthcare spending per capita, in every country. That eliminates between 50-75% of the discrepancy alone.
As for 'excuses', do you think it fair to count the extra 38,000 people in the US who die every year from traffic accidents and murders as 'failings of the US healthcare system'?
"You're missing the mark comparing strict GDP to GDP. You have to compare GDP per capita to GDP per capita, and compare that to healthcare costs. As GDP rises, so does healthcare spending per capita, in every country. That eliminates between 50-75% of the discrepancy alone."
that is precisely why I included the spending per person just after it.
Well firstly we have to measure how common those accidents and murders are in relation to other countries then we should note that healthcare absolutely often plays a part in if someone dies from a murder attempt or traffic accident.
So yes I would consider it an excuse, if we found the problem was our murder rate then I would suggest we follow the prison examples set by the countries with lower rates of it but conservatives oppose that too.
It's not about spending per person, it's about spending per person as a factor of GDP. As a country's GDP rises, so does its' spending per person. Read this for more:
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/ … ch-part-i/
There are a lot of reasons for high spending in America. For instance, America pays for twice as much pharmaceutical research as compared to all of Europe combined. We pay that because we don't have the price regulations of other countries, so other countries effectively stick us with the bill. On the flip side, we get new drugs more quickly and effectively than other countries, which is one reason why our treatment rates are better in many areas.
If someone dies from a traffic accident, especially if they die within 24 hours, it has very little to do with healthcare and more to do with the severity of the crash. I bet though, if you could find something on the subject, you would find higher survival rates for similar crashes in America.
But you completely dodge the point. We have 38,000 people die every year(in excess compared to the UK, from a percentage standpoint) in accidents and murders. That's not a matter of healthcare systems. Those people detract from the US life expectancy.
If you allow for accidents and homicide rates, the US actually has the highest life expectancy in the world.
Wait, so now murder rates are a healthcare issue?
I'm sorry but no... you are missing the mark on this one. You cannot compare healthcare cost by viewing GDP/Capita since it is a social cost (like defense for instance), so it has to be viewed in respect to the total output of the country, and the claim that "as GDP rises so does health care spending" goes completely against your false argument about the fallacy of comparing "strict" GDPs.
Statistically, the US is in fact #1 with 15-odd-% of its GDP and considering that it also has one of the highest GDP/capita in the world this means that the discrepancy in reality is even greater, not smaller when comparing it with the UK for instance.
Mortality from things such as car accidents are merely a reflection of a larger population, a factor which is taken into account when calculating the healthcare spending/GDP ratio. It is not a matter of fairness but of math... and math doesn't lie.
It's not a claim that spending per capita rises with GDP. It's a fact. You can look at countries overall as a comparison, those with higher GDPs have higher spending per capita. You can also look at individual countries' historical rates. As GDP rises, so does spending per capita.
No, it makes the discrepency less. US has a higher GDP, so there is an expected higher spending per capita. It doesn't account for all of it, but it accounts for a good portion of it(in some instances the majority of any discrepancy).
And, as I've said before, the US foots the bill twice as much per capita for medical research than the rest of europe. The US also has better treatment of major illnesses than the rest of the world.
No, accidents and homicides are not adjusted in mortality rates. They are included. So the 38000 people in the US who die from accidents and homicides every year(38,000 is the number that is statistically outstanding compared to rates in the UK) are included in the mortality rates, meaning they bring down the life expectancy for the US. When life expectancy is adjusted for accidents and homicides, the US has the highest life expectancy in the world.
Math doesn't lie, but you have to understand it. If you expect X to be larger than Y by 20, and X is larger than y by 25, then the real difference is only 5, not 25.
Ok this would look like an argumentum ad hominem however on the basis of your answers it is evident that you do not understand the methodology of the calculations which you are citing so I choose to forgo reiterating my previous statements.
Instead I would make another argument; how is it possible to spend almost 100% (adjusted for population size) more than nations with comparable GDP/capita while leaving 10% of the US population without any coverage whatsoever?
There is not one, other developed country in the entire world, where a person can be driven to bankruptcy by premium payments or illness, and healthcare is a right of citizens of other nations and not a privilege or a commodity.
I've told you the reasons why we spend more. Our doctors and nurses make about double the OECD average. We have to pay double our share for medical research compared to the rest of Europe, in the form of high drug prices. We have more defensive medicine because of threat of lawsuits. I've pointed out most of the main reasons for high healthcare costs, but nobody wants to hear the truth.
If we had a responsible government like some EU nations, I wouldn't be *as* against the idea, but we have a very fiscally irresponsible government that would/will only make things worse.
Great post! only problem is these progressives just want their government cheese! They do not listen to logic. They actually think everything is really free! you can not help people like this.
These same fools keep voting for Nancy Pelosi! This imbecile says some of the stupidest things ever and they have the nerve to talk about Palin. need not say more! You can write a book on all the asinine Pelosi statements.
YA, Like, Let's PASS IT FIRST,,, Then,,, READ IT... 2,700 PAGES??????
OLY
How about Unemployment benefits are a big bang for the buck! enjoy here a just a few!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trcP9EUX … ure=fvwrel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oE-z38pXUAo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mpfi4E-f … re=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8hMJVXt … re=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOJ1n2jJ … re=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vO0lqny … re=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IepLtfNS … re=related
And they have the balls to talk about Palin??? WOW
Thank you Skarlet for expressing Obamacare succinctly -- it SUCKS!! But honestly, I cannot stand seeing grown men in skirts and pom poms cheering on Obamacare. It's like the Japanese cheering the arrival of the Atomic bomb thinking it's going to be like a really big fireworks display! And Obamacare is the equivalent of offering the Japanese people sunglasses so the mushroom cloud does harm their eyes.
We certainly enjoyed our socialized healthcare while I was in the military! Though to be honest, we complained about it and how it was inferior to civilian or private care, etc.
Fast forward now that I'm out of the service and have private care.....I'd give my 1st born to again be in the 'socialized care' of the military. As have the other prior service I talk to.
The USA is the top Medical procedure country in the world! We are the highest cost but the absolute best! That is why all the rich come here from the socialist countries! The USA comes up with most of the new medicine because of our capitalistic structure that rewards success! most of the socialist/communist countries do not produce much because they do not give people incentives to build big companies. They take 60-75% of the profits.
I know someone in Greece that would like to export extra virgin olive oil but the government wants so much that it isn't worth trying to start the business!
Proven fact when you give benefits for too long people get lazy! they have studies from here in the USA and Denmark that shows the longer you have unemployment benefits the longer people stay out of work! If it was 26 weeks most found jobs from the 18-24th week when made 52 most found work from week 46-52 and now when 99 most who returned to work was from week 89-99. same in Denmark! Entitlement societies always have major problems because you always run out of other peoples money! We can not be the land of the free if Government has to take care of you from cradle to grave! Anyone who thinks anything is free is a fool!
"I think we'll wind up with a two-tiered medical system: a private one for the rich who pay cash and a mediocre one for everyone else."
Hmm... sounds like what we already have in this country!
Half of all healthcare dollars are already spent by the government, folks. (That's before anyone heard of Barack Obama.)
A tiny percentage of the population accounts for the vast majority of the healthcare spending.
I forget the details, but I read somewhere that if we could significantly reduce a particular preventable illness (it might have been obesity), healthcare costs would not even be an issue.
Obesity, heart disease and diabetes have skyrocketed since the 1970s (along with McDonald's stock price). Surprise, surprise, healthcare costs account for the vast majority of the increase in consumer prices since that time.
Food for thought (no pun intended).
To me it means the end of what our nation was built upon with the states allowed to govern themselves and the people being able to choose what how they live their lives. It marks the beginning of European Socialism coming to our shores
Yes it is very sad. The basic lessons learned through the poor quality of healthcare in other countries that have taken on this system have not been learned by democrats. This is why the president is labeled a socialist. He lied about it not being a tax, and for some reason the AHA is such a good idea that all of the government has exempted themselves from paying into it.
That is pure tea party hogwash! Keeping watching limbo, beck, oreilly and hannity and the next thing you'll think Kansas has ocean front property!
So what is this tax the middle class will be getting? Define middle class and the amount taxes will be raised?
every individual who refuses to buy health insurance will be taxed $695 a year by 2016; phased in from $95 in 2014. Families without insurance in 2016 will pay a $2085 penalty; not to exceed 2.5% of gross income. Employers with 50 or more employees who are not providing health insurance will be assessed a tax of $2000 per employee with the first 30 getting a pass. So, for a company with 49 employees, the choice is (1) don't hire another worker or (2) only hire temps from that point forward. Employers with 200 employees or more cannot opt out of providing health care insurance; they are mandated to provide it under the law.
As of 2013, individuals making $200,000 per year and families making $250,000 a year will be assessed an additional 0.9% on their normal Medicare payroll tax. People and families in this same income bracket will be hit with a 3.8% surtax on investment incomes. But, prior to that surtax, the capital gains tax and dividends for all individuals will be raised from 15% to 20% in 2013.
For the last two years, there has been a 10% tanning tax and that will remain under this week's court ruling. On January 1, 2013, a medical device tax of 2.3% will be applied to any device costing over $100. This will effect the cost of manual and motorized wheel chairs; artificial hips; stents used in heart patients; defibrillators; and whole host of other products. In effect this 2.3% tax will just be added to the cost of almost every device you can find in a hospital. And, that cost will only wind up being passed onto all of us in the form of higher insurance rates.
If you have, what Congress defines as a "Cadillac" health plan -- a plan costing more than $8500 per individual or $23,000 per family -- you will be assessed a 40% surtax on that plan. So, in effect, an individual with an $8500 a year plan will see that cost rise to 11,900 or, at least $32,200 a year for a "Cadillac" family. Now, while it is true that most of those Cadillac plans involve the wealthy, some middle class families that include someone who is seriously ill, have chosen Cadillac plans because the cost under normal insurance would be a lot higher. Also, like a lot of what Congress does, there's no automatic annual cost of living increases on the definition of what is a Cadillac plan; meaning that, eventually, normal plans will become Cadillac plans without a Congressional "fix" every year.
ObamaCare also imposes a sales tax (called the Premium Tax) on all health insurers to pay for the new health insurance exchanges. In doing so, it is estimated that premiums for the average family will go up by 1.9% in 2013 and 2.4% in 2014.. Eventually, the tax could add as much 3.6% to the average annual cost of health care insurance; driving up the 10-year costs by $5,000.
Lastly, ObamaCare greatly expands Medicaid. About 57% of the cost of Medicaid is picked up by the federal government. The balance is paid for by state programs (basically, some form of taxes). The expansion of these programs will only force many cash-strapped states to raise taxes on its citizens to pay the increased cost of Medicaid.
All these taxes, all over the place, were imposed intentionally by the Democrats so that no voter could specifically look at one tax for ObamaCare as being targeted to them. Instead, they might see their health insurance premiums go up over here and dividend taxes going up over there; making it difficult to connect the dots and blame ObamaCare for the two tax increases.
I am amazed nobody pulled up, Obama Care, to see what is in it, SO,
Here it is, along with some interesting comments.
OLY
http://patriotupdate.com/oldsite/storie … ll_HR_3200
Total annual Obamacare funding: 392 billion.
210 from people earning more than 200 000 yearly.
60 from insurance companies.
32 from pharmaceutical companies.
302 of 392 billion is completely separate from the middle class in any way, other sections like the Cadillac tax will mainly affect the very rich.
Can you do the maths? Let me help you, it's not 75% from the middle class.
Edit: Sorry I mean to address this to Moshka
Tea Party? What a joke! Why not move it up a notch and post something from MAD
Magazine! I do get amused by the way Tea Party rally signs are so often full of misspelled words though.
The only income tax increase will be on people earning $200 000+ yearly (not middle class) there will be an extra tax if you use sunbeds (but frankly that's on you) an extra excise tax if you own health insurance which costs more than 27 500 (not middle class) (for Cadillac insurance plans the tax can be waived if the owners can show significant hardship would result from the increase) a levy on insurance companies (not middle class) excise taxes on pharmaceuticals (not middle class) that makes up more than 90% of the Obamacare funding and except for the sunbeds none will touch the middle class.
So that is obvious bull from ignorant people (what can we expect from the tea party.)
Wrong again you MSNBC puppet. The rich all have insurance it is the middle class from 26-35 that may not want to buy insurance because they may want to save that money for a down payment on a home or start a business or new car...whatever. but they are the ones being forced to buy! Rich people have insurance! Also this age group isn't a huge burden on society on healthcare, Also if they were in an accident the auto insurance picks up the medical! so I do not want to hear that lame a$$ nonsense. This is a TAX on the MIDDLE CLASS pure and simple. I know it may be hard for you to comprehend because of what they teach you on MSNBC and Huffington post. read the bill it is ONLINE!
Unlike you I have read the bill in it's entirety and I am well aware of what is in it, the conversation was about the Obamacare tax not about people having to buy insurance, there they are simply purchasing a service.
They are forced to buy something from a private company through the government! There is no way you read the bill!!! that is hogwash! There are just about 20 different taxes in the bill, anyone who isn't a freeloader or socialist doesn't like the bill especially the doctors. If the true middle class doesn't want to buy insurance for any reason, they are penalized! that is a TAX!!! if you can not understand that simple logic, then even if you did read the entire bill you do not comprehend very well. Like I stated, the rich have insurance it is the Middle class who will not! they might feel they can save that money for 5-10 years to put a down payment on a home or whatever, they don't have that choice anymore! IT IS A TAX!!!! If it wasn't a Tax then the bill would have been declared UNCONSTITUTIONAL!!! You can not have it both ways.
You read the bill, Tell me about how they will set up a committee who determines if it is profitable to receive health care and how they determine it? It is towards the end of the bill, give me the page# lets see how much you read. Shouldn't be very hard to do if you truly read it. I will be waiting.
Also tell me how it has States expand Medicaid! what it will do to some states and how will they cope with the expansion.
You are aware that the definition of tax is that it must be used to raise revenue for the government?
Obamacare doesn't accomplish this hence it can't be a tax...no matter what the Supreme Court ruled.
I anticipate the only outcome for me being lower healthcare costs as I will not be subsidizing free emergency room healthcare for the uninsured.
Best in the world at CAUSING cancer, I think he means.
I don't remember where I read it but I think he is correct, that the US has on most cancers the best survival rate because the US medical system has focused on cancer treatment. It does not prove the first thing but I think it's true.
But it isn't the best survival rate as such, rather the best diagnostic rate.
They are better (faster) at diagnosing cancer but there is no evidence that cancer sufferers in the US live any longer than in other countries, just that they are aware of their condition for longer.
No, best at treating it. People who have the means often come to America to get treatment.
America's medical tourism is not really significant, between 60 to 80 thousand people a year, to put that in context Cuba gets 20 to 30 thousand a year and it is a tiny island where people from the nearest large country are not technically allowed to go, we are not a popular country to come for medical treatment overall.
http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba596/
We're best at treating 13 of 16 types of cancer.
Five year survival rate! Like I said, you're just better and faster at diagnosis.
But obesity, heart problems, high blood pressure, blood sugar, diabetes are all tied in with health care.
You just cannot say that illness and disease are nothing to do with health care.
Cripes, I've got high blood pressure and I go to my doctor for treatment for it, not the cobblers or the vets, or the hairdressers!
No, obesity is not caused by poor healthcare. It's caused by Americans having more sedentary lifestyles and eating more fatty, low-quality fast foods. America has a treatment rate on par with the OECD for diabetes and heart problems, but has double the number, percentage wise, of people with these problems.
If you get treatment for high blood pressure, it wasn't the treatment that caused it. Americans are definitely NOT the most obese people in the world because of the healthcare system... to say so is ridiculous.
It's education and lifestyle that causes it. It's people who never get off the couch except to grab another slice of pizza or another cheeseburger. Healthcare is not the same thing as what you eat.
Oh of course it wasn't the treatment that caused it!
But to say that the treatment of it isn't health care is absolutely ludicrous.
Treatment for these things has more to do with diet and lifestyle than anything. That's not healthcare, that's lifestyle. Americans are stupid, lazy, and fat.
So, say, a diabetic is in hospital having a lower limb amputated, that isn't health care, that's life style.
No, that's an operation. But poor healthcare didn't cause that person to be diabetic. The US has diabetic rates 100-400% higher than other OECD countries. It's not because of our healthcare system.
Who ever said it was?
As far as I recall the question was whether or not the US had the best health care in the world.
The question wasn't what percentage of the population suffers from any disease but what percentage of the population has a satisfactory outcome to their disease.
Right, and when I bring up facts about outcome, people just dismiss them. We are better at treating cancer than anyone else. We're also above the pack for treating diabetes, but there is no research on treatment success by diabetes type, so it's hard to know for certain. We also have the highest life expectancy in the world if you exclude accidents and homicides.
No, you're better at diagnosing cancer, big difference.
You aren't above the pack at treating diabetes, review the post in which Josak compares amputation rates between the US and UK.
I already asked you about that. You didn't answer. You not only have no evidence to back up your claim, but your claim also undermines your own position. Why are we better at diagnosing sooner if other countries have easier access to better healthcare?
I also addressed Josak's post. Those studies don't differentiate between different types of diabetes, but if you just control for % diabetics, the US is above the OECD average for treatment. Maybe not the UK, but again, US has worse diabetes problems so we also have a worse severity of the problem... more people with more serious cases.
A lot of people across many nations, Germany, US, Romania, others, contributed. The point is, the funds for pharmacuetical research mostly come from the US.
Actually, it was discovered by a doctor in Toronto.
No, Banting put the final piece in the puzzle, he didn't 'discover' it.
Regardless, my point is how the funds for pharm. research companies' R&D projects comes mostly from Americans.
Here, read this, if you can
http://www.citizen.org/documents/ACFDC.PDF
Well, I do know if I had lived in the US during my cancer I would not have been able to afford the treatment I got here, even with insurance. I'd still be paying it off after 15 years.
Seeing as the socalled Obamacare was modeled after Romneycare, why would you want Romney as President? And when Romneycare was adopted, Republicans were for it. So which is it? Are Replicans hypocrits because President Obama got it passed? And if because of this law Obama is called a liberal among other things! How can you consider Romney a conservative? He also would be a liberal with the same ideas as President Obama.
Many citizens in our country are so enamored with Obama that they don't realize Obama is a Republican. The paradigm for the Republicans have shifted so far, that Right is now center and Left is..........out of bounds and Communism.
All of this because of the election of Obama, it has some frothing at the mouth like madmen.
Here is a complete report which directly refers to this discussion:
WHY IS HEALTH SPENDING IN THE UNITED STATES SO HIGH?
http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/12/16/49084355.pdf
a key point which opponents of healthcare reform consistently avoid from this paper: Americans spend nearly $3000 per person per year more than
Swiss people, even though Swiss people have about the same level of income.
And an overview of the historical life expectancy stats
http://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?QueryId=36371
And what does that paper say? It says that services are more expensive in America. It means that we are paying more for doctors, nurses, drugs, and equipment. It also shows how we pay double our fair share for drugs because we don't put price controls on pharmaceutical companies. It also shows the defensive medicine practiced, where expensive tests are performed at double the OECD average to limit liability.
That's why we spend $3000 more per person than Swiss.
Doesn't matter why, you still spend it.
Hardly a defence for being shafted.
Does matter why we spend it. If you know why, then you can see what the problems are and aren't.
For instance, doctor/nurse salaries. They are higher in the US. Why? Has nothing to do with healthcare, it's because the cost of education is so high.
Drugs. We pay double the OECD average for the same drugs. The OECD artificially holds down the prices, and drug companies actually lose money on their drugs in Europe. We're the ones who are paying for all the R&D. If we had the same price floors, we wouldn't have most of the research and innovation that we do. America foots the bill for the world when it comes to drug research, but we're the ones who have it wrong.
You're telling me that all the drugs companies are American!
Believe me, the drugs companies know how to make a whacking profit in the UK.
Drug companies are multi-national. They spend billions on R&D, then they have to sell drugs at half price in Europe. They don't make profit in Europe, they make it up in America. Yes, there are certainly going to be some exceptions, but the general theme is absolutely that.
Pharm. companies operate off of profit margins in the 10-20% range. Between EU and America, they average 75% of American prices for drugs. EU is about 50 and America is 100. So if they make 15% profit at 75%, how much profit do you think they are making at 50%?
Yeah, sell their drugs for double the price in America.
$100 a year for genetic AIDS drugs, $10,000 a year for branded.
I don't know about you but that looks a lot more than a 10-20% profit margin.
Branded drugs cost more because the company that spends billions doing the R&D gets the patent for X years to make up for it. After the patent expires, generics can make the drug without having to spend billions to research and develop it.
If no pharm. companies were given patents, they wouldn't be able to earn enough money to pay for R&D. We wouldn't have very much R&D at all in that case.
Do you understand anything about how pharm companies operate?
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/co … 67257.html
Do you understand anything about how drugs companies work?
14% on R&D!!
http://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewherp … new-drugs/
Try to keep up. Pharm companies would never be able to spend this much money by selling their drugs for generic prices.
Do you know what 14% of a large pharm. company's budget is? How do you propose they earn that money selling drugs at generic prices?
14% is 14% no matter what the size of the company. In the case of a large company, it is peanuts, probably a lot less than is paid to shareholders..
No, 14% is different depending on the size of a company.
Let's take, for instance, Novartis. $58 billion in sales. 14%(Not sure if that is what Novartis spends or not) of $58 billion is $8.1 billion(I'll have to check, I think they spend closer to 10).
What would happen if they weren't allowed to charge their 'ridiculous' prices? Let's say they charge $1 per unit on average for branded, and $0.15 of that is profit. What would happen if they were only allowed to charge $0.20 per unit? They would have $0.65 that they lost on every unit they sold.
Their revenues would be $11 billion, not enough to cover operating expenses let alone pay for R&D. It wouldn't work.
As I suggested, read the article that I posted.
I did. You haven't addressed a single fact that I have put forward. Not one. You just make broad dismissals of everything I say.
Come on, how is Novaris going to pay for $8 billion + of R&D every year by charging 10% or 1% of their current prices?
They do not understand that people who invest in these drugs do it to make a profit along with helping people. They aren't stating that some companies do not produce any good medicine and lose money. The socialist mentality is to blame everyone else for their problems and envy the ones who make loads of money by taking a chance to come out with something useful. The first part of helping yourself is to take responsibility for yourself and never quit till you have what you strive for! They don't understand that! very sad. BLAME, BLAME, BLAME!!!
THE EVIL RICH PEOPLE!!!
It's worse than that, they expect that somehow companies should be able to spend $8 billion on research and only make $100 million in sales. When the government 'provides' everything for them, through taxing and raising public debt(which increases cost of living, essentially stealing money from everyone), they get the mentality that everything can be done for free, somehow, if the government just carries the debt.
They actually spend more on advertising than research!
Answer the question!
Seriously, it's sad. How can they pay for their $8 billion in research if they have to reduce revenues by 90-99%?
You can't answer the question because it's impossible for them to pay for R&D if they have to charge generic prices. You can't admit something that is clearly fact, if you don't already agree with it.
I can show you Pfizer's financial report that shows their tax rate, but you won't believe it.
But they don't pay for R&D, well nothing like all of it, the major cost is born by the tax payer and academic institutes.
Their $8 million is a load of flim flam.
And will Pifzers financial report show taxes nett or gross?
Haha. Ok.
So, companies pay 14% or 17% or 12% or whatever on R&D. - John Holden
Actually, they don't. - John Holden.
How much do they spend on R&D then? Obviously we can't count on financial statements, those are flim flam.
I love it. Just like my thread about GE taxes. The predictable response is 'the financials are lies'.
Ok John, here is a challenge. Find me a reliable, 1st-party source for a pharm. company and how much they spend on R&D without looking at financial statemtents, because you claim those are flim flam.
Then, find me a study that looks at R&D expenses, but the study can't use any data from financial statements.
You will never get it and he will change the subject...I guarantee it! That was too simple to prove if he is correct. I will be waiting and watching! DON'T HOLD YOUR BREATHE!!!!
I'm not holding my breath. I should check my thread about GE's taxes to see if John said anything about that...
I've seen that statement so many times on these forums. 'You can't trust those financial statements'.
Well, where do you get your information about expenses if not from financial statements?
I know, get them from unverifiable sources that back up your side!
BTW, tax rates are calculated on taxable income.
http://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/eff … z1zrpt8Kc0
Pfizer's effective tax rate was 31%. But, I can post the financial to prove it and you'll just claim it's flim flam. When facts don't agree(especially 1st-party sources), just ignore them. That's the way to truth.
John, from now on, for fun, you aren't allowed to use any verifiable facts in your arguments, cause you don't believe in them.
31.5% actually, but the year before it was 11.90%, in fact the average over the last five years was 18.34%.
You were saying Danny?
18% is 'almost nothing'?
I'm glad to see you acknowledge the truth, earlier you said they don't really pay taxes. 18% is more than the bottom 99% of Americans pay on average. Heck, it's more than what the top 5% pay on average.
And how does it compare with what other companies pay?
What do you mean by other companies? Pharm companies? All companies? Research companies?
Average effective tax rates vary from 10-41% depending on industry.
US industry as a whole, that's whole, not hole!
BS...other countries do drug research. Canada has developed and is still developing many drugs, as is Germany...as are many other countries.
In fact, most of the big drugs companies appear to be Swiss.
I swear, can't you think for yourself? Where do the pharm companies get their money to do their R&D?
Actually, yes, I can think for myself unlike some who just swallow everything they are spoon fed!
Then where would they get their money for R&D if they weren't allowed patents on their products and had to compete with generics?
$100 against $10,000 dollars isn't even remotely competitive!
I take it you didn't read the article that I posted that explained how little R&D drug companies actually do.
John, do you think that US pharm companies pay 35% taxes?
Your own Citensizens Jssuticse report gave them credit for paying 35% taxes...
So, obviously, that study can't be trusted.
If it fits what he wants to spew, he will believe it! watch the pattern.
Do you think he will say
Ok, so they are wrong about taxes, but they are right about everything else!
?
Do you have anything to add or did you just join this thread to insult people?
Oh, I'm the national sport of Danny, he only ever posts to insult me. If he ever posted anything relevant I'd probably die of shock
Most people on these forums aren't here to actually discuss anything. Most people aren't here because they care about the truth. They care about their side.
That's why if I post a link to, and describe in detail, a financial statment showing GE's tax rate at 20%, liberals will say 'nu-uh' and quote a NYTimes article that was based on a non-financial document.
That's why if I post evidence that the US pays for nearly all pharm. research worldwide, people will say 'nu-uh'. If I explain that drug prices are one reason why our hc. costs are so high, they will say 'it doesn't matter'. Who cares if the US is the one paying for drug research... the US should be like Europe and force pharm. companies to sell drugs so cheap that they lose money off of them. Yeah, that will do great things for the world. It would be so great if we drove every pharm. company out of business...
In all my time discussing and arguing on forums, I have had 5 people admit to a fact that they didn't originally believe in when I presented it to them. An undeniable fact, and 99.9% of people simply deny it because it doesn't fit their 'side', or they just ignore it.
5% of people admit and 99.9% deny! That's another thing you haven't quite got the hang of!
Did you get as far in the report as how much drug companies actually put into R&D compared with the tax payers and academic institutes?
Obviously not or you would not continue to insist that they carried a huge burden.
Seriously John, you are so against actual discussion you look so hard for something to gripe on that you find things that aren't there. I said 5 people. NOT 5%. If you weren't just here to attack the 'other side' you wouldn't make mistakes like that.
I'm looking at pharm. companies' financial statements. Novaris spends over $8 billion in research, with your own 14% figure.
So answer the question. How are they going to pay that much charging 90-99% less?
Yes, you did say five people and not 5%, my apologies.
No need, I fess up when I get it wrong, but ta anyway
Who said anything about charging 90-99% less, I just pointed out that there was more than a 10-20% difference between $100 and $10,000!
Well, the average difference between generics and branded is about 85%. Your example though of 100 vs 10,000 is where I get 99%.
If someone is forced to charge 100 vs 10,000, they lose 99 % of revenues.
But I'm not saying anybody should be forced to charge $100 rather than $10,000.
If that wasn't your point, then I have no idea what it was.
Companies charge high rates for 'branded' drugs to recoup the costs of R&D. That whole conversation has degenerated with you dismissing your own previous figures because they don't fit your viewpoint.
So whatever your point was, it isn't anymore.
But they don't pay anything like all the costs of R&D, others pay far more but the drug companies see all the profit!
John, we've been over this. You gave a percentage. I told you what that percentage means dollar-wise for one company. You dismissed my figure.
You're not willing to discuss that aspect, so stop bringing it up.
Novartis pays over $8 billion a year into R&D, and even by selling their drugs at branded prices, they only make ~15% profit. That means they could afford to drop the price of a $100 bottle of pills down to $85 and break even(but that would lead to bankruptcy), but they can't charge generic prices and still do the research.
I owned a few businesses, If I paid $5.00 for an item and sold it for $20.00 I didn't make $15.00 profit! What about my overhead? Advertising, rent, electric, employees etc...
So, you're saying then that your profit would need to be many thousands of % to cover overheads etc?
No, you need to sell a lot of product to make your business profitable. Just pointing out that if something costs $5.00 and sell it for $20.00 $15.00 isn't the actual profit.
Boy, am I glad you pointed that out to me Danny, and here was I thinking that overheads paid themselves!
He is pretending that they don't have to spend money on R&D. He posted an article that claims it only costs $50 million on average to bring a new drug(including the cost of failures) to the market.
Novaris alone is spending enough money to bring 120 new drugs to market every year at that rate.
120 new drugs or 120 remodelled existing drugs?
So now you think the FDA is going to approve something that is useless? Do you think you can get a patent on something that is basically the same? I think not! Have you ever gone for a patent? expensive, thousands of pages to fill out and expensive attorneys to handle for you.
Well the drugs companies manage it. And I believe they have one or two attorneys in their pay.
You believe??? You see when you have a mentality like that how can you really advance yourself? Just like our current president, He likes to blame Bush, ATM's and anything else. Real leaders take the blame! It is their responsibility to get things to work properly. He had all the arms of government! If he didn't Obamacare would not have passed in the first place. He didn't balance the budget the first two years??? why is that? He didn't get immigration done, why not???
OK, have it your way. US drug companies don't employ any attorneys, they probably don't employ tax accountants either, and I doubt if they can even rustle up one lawyer!
Good heavens Danny, you are so naive!
So by your thinking everyone is corrupt! All the attorneys and accountants. I'm not saying they don't have attorneys or accountants, they need it for business, your thinking is they are all corrupt.
How on earth do you get to the conclusion that I think they are all corrupt!
DannyMaio wrote:
So now you think the FDA is going to approve something that is useless? Do you think you can get a patent on something that is basically the same? I think not! Have you ever gone for a patent? expensive, thousands of pages to fill out and expensive attorneys to handle for you.
John Holden wrote:
Well the drugs companies manage it. And I believe they have one or two attorneys in their pay.
That is how!
You've lost me there Danny boy, nowhere in either part of the message, your post or my reply do I see even the slightest suggestion of corruption.
You claimed they reinvented the same medicine, under another name. That is impossible but you said they have people who handle the pharma companies like they get it approved by buying people(which is corrupt)
What in the world would make you think it is impossible to be bring a duplicate drug to market with another name?
The FDA has been in the pocket of corporations for decades. So please...
Yes, I said that they remake drugs, proven fact.
I did not say any other the other things you accuse me of.
Prove they are in the pocket!, Have you ever tried to get a patent??? And if you claim they are in the pocket that is corrupt! So you did say that.
What are you on about?I never claimed anybody was in anybody else's pocket!
And what has "Have you ever tried to get a patent" got to do with anything either?
This is common practice and these patent battles occur between big pharma companies which fight to get the right to extend a patent or file it under another name and cost billions.
I'd like to add that Novartis is Swiss, not American.
Your article put that as the average, so lets say 60 new drugs and 60 modified drugs.
But, that doesn't happen. These companies are spending billions whether you believe it or not, and they aren't coming out with hundreds of new drugs every year.
No of course not:
the first 5 of the twenty was your investment, the second 5 is the return on your investment. The third 5 and up is your profit.
Yes and each business is different, the ones who basically provide a service can do much better on average because they do not have to buy products to sell and sometimes the products can have a short shelf life like produce, so if you do not sell, it goes into the garbage! Many factors in business and Believe me, I learned the hard way!
So, you're saying then that your profit would need to be many thousands of % to cover overheads etc?
Er, where did it say that? I read 16% against 27% across other industries.
Er...
"According to the OTA, “The net cost of every dollar spent on R&D must be reduced by
the amount of tax avoided by that expenditure. Like all business expenses, R&D is
deductible from a firm’s taxable income.”
§ The OTA revised DiMasi’s calculation, subtracting the expenses that are tax deductible
under Section 174 of the federal tax code and the opportunity cost of capital.
§ The tax deduction reduces the cost of R&D by the amount of the corporate marginal tax
rate (currently 34 percent). This means, in effect, that every dollar spent on R&D costs
$0.66.15 The OTA concluded that DiMasi’s original $231 million figure (in 1987 dollars)
was $171 million (in 1990 dollars) after accounting for the R&D tax deduction."
So, do you agree with them about taxes or not? You already said not, so why do you think a report that is so far off about a simple subject like taxes is right about everything else it says?
I didn't say we are the only ones who do research, but we are the ones who pay for it.
Ok, let's say PharmCo A makes $135 million in a year. Multi-national companies get about 35% of their income from America, where they can charge double the prices. So they sell 65 units for $1 and 35 units for $2
Of the $135 million, $20 million is profit(15% profit margin).
Ok, so it costs PharmCo A $115 million to research and produce 100 units of this drug. That's $1.15 per unit.
They sell the units for $1 in Europe, and lose $0.15 per unit. They sell the units for $2 in America, and earn $0.85 profit per unit. See how Americans pay the bill?
If you took out the American income, you would have a company producing 65 units for $75 and only making $65.
We pay for the research, no matter where it is done.
Then again, the US produces a lot of useless drugs and are over medicated as a rule. Depressed? We have a pill for that. Shy? We have a pill for that. Overweight? We have a pill for that. Overly passionate about things? We have a pill for that. Can't get it up? We have a pill for that.
And many of those pills are just existing ones that have been tweaked to escape the patent.
And how many drugs go out of favour and are replaced by other "better" drugs, well in actually fact, they don't go out of favour really, their patent expires and the miraculous new replacement is just the same old drug in a slightly modified form, re-patented.
@JaxsonRaine from your previous 10 posts you made the case that US citizens are being seriously fu.ked in almost every way possible by big pharma & private healthcare and it is you the people who pay for this...
How on earth can you claim that the Obama health care plan is worse than the status quo then.
It is simply not true that the US pays for R&D since as you are so keen to point out pharma companies are privately held internationals... which by default infers that the statement that the US pays for anything should be considered a failure by your system if taken as true.
What the OECD papers states is that although the US healthcare system costs the american people 3000$ more annually than the Swiss you get worse healthcare and practically no primary protection.
More importantly I have yet to hear of a plan on behalf of right wing cronies who have been swindled into defending policies that hurt them and their families, since the vast majority of this demographic are not exactly the paragon of capitalism but instead the bottom of american society, to defend the greed of the 1% in the name of personal liberty which is then squandered on being a redneck.
Can you please explain this to me?
The only way in which we are being f..... is in that we have to make up for what the rest of the world doesn't pay the pharma companies because of price controls.
If the US copies Europe and puts price controls on pharma. companies, we will see much less revenue for these companies, less R&D, and less life-saving drugs. It's not a good thing to cripple researchers.
It is true. The US pays twice what the OECD pays for the same drugs. I gave a simple math example that shows where the profit is in that scenario, it all comes from the US.
It doesn't matter if a pharm. company is multinational. They still make their profits by selling to the US. look at my earlier post for an example. 35% of sales to the US at double the price.
Again, we have better healthcare than the rest of the world, although it is expensive and some don't have access. We have better diagnostic and treatment rates.
We pay more because of drug prices, physician salaries, and many other reasons. Switzerland pays half what we do for drugs. Pharm companies lose money selling drugs there.
I believe that free markets with minimal intervention work best for human development, and history agrees with me. I'm not defending policies that hurt my or my family. Yeah, things could be better, but Obamacare won't do anything to address healthcare costs.
HERE ARE A FEW REPUBLICAN PLANS THAT ARE SITTING ON HARRY REIDS DESK!!!
A Plan for Replacement
IN PROGRESS: On January 20, 2011, the House passed H. Res. 9, a resolution instructing House committees to develop legislation replacing the job-killing health care law. Committees are currently doing their work to hold hearings and examine solutions to lower costs, increase access to quality care, and strengthen the doctor-patient relationship.
Vote Result • Text of the Resolution [PDF]
Enact Medical Liability Reform
Skyrocketing medical liability insurance rates have distorted the practice of medicine, routinely forcing doctors to order costly and often unnecessary tests to protect themselves from lawsuits, often referred to as "defensive medicine." We will enact common-sense medical liability reforms to lower costs, rein in junk lawsuits and curb defensive medicine.
Purchase Health Insurance across State Lines
Americans residing in a state with expensive health insurance plans are locked into those plans and do not currently have an opportunity to choose a lower cost option that best meets their needs. We will allow individuals to buy health care coverage outside of the state in which they live.
Expand Health Savings Accounts
Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) are popular savings accounts that provide costeffective health insurance to those who might otherwise go uninsured. We will improve HSAs by making it easier for patients with high-deductible health plans to use them to obtain access to quality care. We will repeal the new health care law, which prevents the use of these savings accounts to purchase over-the-counter medicine.
Ensure Access for Patients with Pre-Existing Conditions
Health care should be accessible for all, regardless of pre-existing conditions or past illnesses. We will expand state high-risk pools, reinsurance programs and reduce the cost of coverage. We will make it illegal for an insurance company to deny coverage to someone with prior coverage on the basis of a pre-existing condition, eliminate annual and lifetime spending caps, and prevent insurers from dropping your coverage just because you get sick. We will incentivize states to develop innovative programs that lower premiums and reduce the number of uninsured Americans.
GAO found that malpractice insurance premiums in FL in 2002 were between 100,000-200,000 per year for general surgery.
Yes I have always maintained that tort reform will bring prices and premiums down some.
Of course that's another no-no.
The right thing to do is to let states compete across state lines that will reduce prices greatly! Both parties are holding us hostage by being in bed with Insurance companies!
Also the Lowlife Attorneys with the malpractice insurance is driving costs up!
Many things can be done to make things better! Obamacare isn't it!
85% of doctors do not like OBAMACARE, Many who are close to retiring will do just that...Retire early, They will have to see many more patients and lose money seeing them. Many have already stopped taking medicare patients because they do not pay enough! So when Obama says you can keep your doctor...that is if they want to take medicare, many will not have the same doctor.
The penalty will be for the middle-class! The rich have money and will have health-care, the middle-class worker from 26-35 that feels they rather save their money for a down payment for a home or to pay off their college will be the ones penalized! Why would the rich who have plenty of money pay the penalty??? Commonsense doesn't work for these people.
I'm one who will pay the tax. Im healthy and saving for a home. I'll pay cash for a house, in full, next year if everything continues this way.
But meh, tax me for being healthy.
Like I stated, You are in the middle-class and not the 1% they say will be paying the TAX(penalty). If you were in the 1% you would have all the money you need to buy the house and have health insurance.
Glad you are working hard and striving to make your life good! That is the True American way!
John.
http://www.pfizer.com/files/annualrepor … al2011.pdf
Pfizer. Page 16. R&D expenses = $9.1 billion.
What do you think they are spending all that money on?
They paid over $4 billion in income taxes last year and only $9.1 billion on R&D!
Only $9.1 billion?
You have refused to explain how these companies are supposed to finance their R&D, still thinking they charge way too much for medicine.
Luckily, they are only allowed to charge 50% in Europe compared to America. Don't worry about it, we'll pay for the R&D that will bring about the next life-saving drug that will benefit everyone.
But they don't finance all their R&D, the lions share is financed by others.
John. The $9.1 billion is their share that they finance themselves. Their money they spend themselves.
Dick Cheney's secret moon base. Gotta run that thing on batteries you know.
Frankly, I don't care how many Americans you kill by denying health care, in fact the more the merrier (you know I'm only joking, love you all to bits really)
What I'm objecting to is the claim that you have the best health care in the world and that anybody who says differently is a commie pinko fag and a liar to boot. That any statistics that say otherwise are not to be trusted.
I'm not going to enter into the abortion debate here, wrong time, wrong place.
You are discussing big pharma as this poor little industry which cannot make ends meet
the billions in R&D which you are so often mentioning is just a number which is always less than the annual profits of the company, and I might add it is tax deductible and also includes attempts to renew patents on generics so they limit the production and extend the branding of a given drug.
One important issue I need to point out... In a free market system, it is strategically stupid for a pharmaceutical company to develop cures for diseases since once that disease has been eradicated, the cash flow stops.
No pharma has ever invested in R&D for the CURE for HIV, for example, while there is a whole line of branded (expensive) TREATMENTS... now the scientists who are working on this are looking for a cure, however, the company would not put funds in developing a cure, since it would be slaughtering a cash cow by doing this, and instead the develop treatments on the basis of their research.
If big pharma invented the vaccine for Polio, instead of a university professor, we would most definitely still have it as a disease on this planet.
There's a huge problem with your argument. One group of people, if they could develop a cure for 'X', would absolutely do it, because they would all become insanely rich for doing so. You can say they would do better just treating it, but the group that 'chose' to cure it would come out ahead of the pack and steal all that business away from everyone else. If it were so easy, someone would do it to make a few quick billion.
This is how a country fights back and takes care of its population:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world … 17944.html
What is even more interesting is that it costs way less than that number of $9.1 billion which you are throwing around like it means something, to bring life saving medication to a nation three times the size of the US.
Ok, that article about India has nothing to do with 'fighting back'. It's still the pharma companies who made those drugs available in the first place, even if it takes a while for them to become 'genericable'.
India isn't developing drugs, it's purchasing generics. What does that have to do with the cost of developing new drugs?
I see political trolls (or are the shils) are spewing up more of these disinformation threads and posting their twaddle for twitter or whatever - I don't know why you guys respond to them any more, I rather liked the threads a while back where the puppeteer kept his own trolls debating twaddle with garbage until they gave up. Makes one wonder why HP doesn't ban the clear multiple personas.
Who are the trolls, I don't know if you're referring to me or not
I haven't even bothered to read most of the comments in this thread as many are just too stupid to give any credence. I just held out a hat and asked if it fit anyone
Oh come off it Lions Den, by insisting that the Nazis were socialists you show your total ignorance.
Medications from Canada, Discount
http://www.medicationscanada.com/
This might be of some help to some of you.
OLY
JH -- Look if you want to defend the Nazi's murdering millions of innocent women and children knock yourself? You are probably correct, because the main argument the Jews had when entering the gas chambers was an argument over whether or not the Germans were socialists or fascists. Most of those shot in the back of the head voted socialist and those entering the gas chamber voted socialists. But truly JH you're arguing over semantics regarding the arguable difference between fascist and socialist, which the definition of a term fascist is continually debated amongst scholars. .
Hey, I'm not defending anybody, least of all Hitler.
If you really think socialists are fascists then I am really sorry for you, but you are beyond reasoning with.
There are many differences between socialism, communism and fascism, unfortunately Lions den your ignorance is all encompassing. First I just want to deal with what Marx said about socialism being essential in creating communism.
so·cial·ism/ˈsōSHəˌlizəm/
Noun:
#1 A political and economic theory of that advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the state.
#2 (in Marxist theory) A transitional social state between the overthrow of capitalism and the realization of communism.
Directly from the dictionary, socialism definition #1 is what I and I believe John subscribe to, it's an economic system that functions on the basis of public ownership of the market, particularly the means of productions.
The second definition is the Marxist one, socialism Marxism is very different for example socialism as Marx envisioned it would be leaderless, a spontaneous worker's cooperative which is different to the initial definition. As can easily be seen just from looking at the dictionary when Marx said socialism would be a stage in the achievement of communism he referred to something very different to the definition we use.
But the Socialism being different to Fascism thing is easily solved, socialism as seen in the definition is a system wholly based on the idea of public ownership, without public ownership of the means of production socialism cannot function but in Nazi Germany the means of production were never owned by the state, without state ownership you cannot have socialism so with zero doubt, they are very different and Nazi Germany was fascist.
There are many other differences for example fascism is nationalistic and traditionalist, for Germany Hitler was convinced that Germans were the genetically superior people on earth and that they were descendants of the Teutonic Knights in Italy Mussolini focused on recapturing the glo9ry of the Roman Empire, socialism on the other hand is far more internationalist.
I know you will just write a meaningless refutal of this comment because ignorance is hard to break but at least others who may read the comments who half a working brain will see the facts.
Also, socialism does not recognise borders or parameters which separate human beings, whether they be national, or based on religion, sexuality or gender. Socialism embraces the philosophy that all human beings were born equal. The foundations of naziism, therefore, are the polar opposite to those of socialism.
Thank you for that lecture Josak - I feel as though I had been transported back to a poly sci debate at UCLA. And yes you are correct in many of the definitions you were kind enough to look-up. And thank you for your confidence in my refuting your scholarly endeavors with meaningless drivel. So as not to disappoint you my friend ....
Socialism - is an economic/political system whereupon gov maintains control over all economic decisions, and therefore owns the means of production. For all intents and purposes a socialist government controls all facets of human life. To assume otherwise defies logic because without economic liberty what is liberty?
But I understand you and your fellow socialists attempts to distance yourself from national socialism under Hitler. It is an attempt by the left wing educational elite, whom like yourself are socialists, who are attempting to rewrite history. It is understandable for socialist to attempt to disavow all connection to Hitler's atrocities, which were permitted because of two elements associated with human frailty - weakness of Germans to stand up to their government and the second was the ease with which Jews went to slaughter -- without fight or dignity.
So more to the point as you and John H continued support of socialism via parsing the "EVOLVING" truth. And only in the land of socialism, such as Obama's and Holder's and your's - can the truth "EVOLVE".
But let us assume for the moment you are correct, (I realize that is something you fantasize about, unfortunately it will remain a fantasy) it is only logical that at some point on their march towards fascism Nazi Germany was necessarily a National Socialist State before turning to fascism - which then creates a fun debating topic in academia.
But I applaud you in your continued efforts to divorce yourself from the reality of history and your efforts, together with your comrades, to change that history. The fact is socialist, fascists communists - are all relatively the same and without question end in the same dictatorial blood bath these dictatorial regimes always end in.
Also Josak there is NO such thing as a "refutal" perhaps you meant rebuttal.
Accept your political ideology like a man, and by accepting the truth of your socialist roots, shall set you free from the associations of your ideology of the past.
My simple point, before you went all Webster, was that regardless of the differences in academic debate, in which good socialist want to disavow Hitler -- in the end does it matter with 6 million murdered? But should you want to continue your defense of Hitler and mass murdering under the name of socialism -- feel free. Because in the end, according to you Hitler was lying about being a socialist if in fact he was a fascist, which begs the question as to why socialists lie about their true objectives. Do socialists lie to implement a fascist agenda?
So you wrote that much without saying anything at all of substance then bizarrely went on to claim that I supported the Nazi murders, my real name is Joska it's a Polish name and many of my relatives in Poland were killed precisely because they were socialists so that in itself make your argument laughable but I also think the implication is insulting and patently inaccurate.
The terms we are discussing and their differences are a simple mater of definition, anyone with half a brain can pick up a dictionary and see that socialism, communism and fascism are radically different or since I am apparently a member of the leftist "educational elite" (even though I went to school in a mud brick single room school with 80 other kids) let me simplify it for you (I wouldn't want to talk over your head) Pick up dictionary, look up words, see different, left, right, nationalist, traditionalist, state ownership and means of production. Good boy.
Jaxson, you say "the definition of a term fascist is continually debated amongst scholars." and yet even though these scholars continue to debate, you have made your mind up and know exactly what definition to apply!
"Socialism - is an economic/political system whereupon gov maintains control over all economic decisions, and therefore owns the means of production. For all intents and purposes a socialist government controls all facets of human life."
Thus proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that you do not understand socialism. I suggest that you give up trying to mould socialism into an image that suits you and if you can't actually find out what socialism means that you leave it alone and stop showing yourself up.
JH - I know you are hooked on the social ownership of the means of production as your sole differentiation between fascism and socialism. Certainly, you can claim all day long that socialism is the "societal ownership of the means of production" - but at the end of the day the means of production is "controlled" by the government. Your view of the utopia created by socialism is a theoretical version. Socialism in practice elicits deficiencies of human nature and the natural human instinct for those in power to seek total absolute power. And those deficiencies were expressed by Hitler, the German military leaders and the German people, whom like yourself, convinced themselves that they were right and just.
But the good news is that you admitted, by your failure to address the core issue, because you are attempting to distance your socialist views from those socialist views held by Hitler. Admitting you have a problem is the first step to recovery. Congratulations!!
And guess what - your little socialist bud, Obama, wants to 'EXTEND BUSH TAX CUTS... AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!". That Obama is quite the socialist big thinker...just like Bush was -- but didn't people like you claim Bush was a Nazis? What's that saying "One Obama in the gulag (I know it's Russian) is worth two in the Bush?" Something like that anyway - but I'm confident in your mind you believe you know the answer.
And by the way, is not the ownership of stock in a "public" company actually - societal ownership of the means of production, which is the pillar of socialist ideology?
I take it that you didn't read the link that I posted purely for your benefit!
Skarlet, I had a stroke a couple of years ago. Within an hour of an ambulance being called I was in hospital, I very shortly afterwards had a brain scan, no waiting or any sort of hold up.
I have no desire to push my leftist views, I just don't want to be in the position where I have another stroke and am without insurance and therefore treatment!
Here Lions Den, argue with this if you can -
http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-hitler.htm
It's BS, For one.
On a particularly real note- I am originally from Europe and have learned from numerous real life experiences that socialism, leftism, and government healthcare is dangerous.
Most of my family still live in Europe, but my still leftist cousin was living here when she discovered at 44 she had breast cancer. She was treated here, and recovering fine,until several months later she had a very small lump in the lymph area. She then got the wild notion to go and have some "free" care in England, and they killed her.
I am a nurse and I know this for a fact. They simply did not have enough staff to catch her problem in time, and she went into a grand mal seizure. If she had stayed here she would still be alive.
People don't realize that you get what you pay for period! Mitt Romney gave the best example of a healthcare system that sounds smart, and fair. Unfortunately, the liberal media jumped on it and cut out the line, "I like to fire people."
Truly amazing how people will be manipulated by that. I also like to fire insurance companies that do not serve me well!
If health care was so wonderful in the US why did she decide to come to the UK for treatment, I thought the US was supreme at treating cancers!
And how exactly did they kill her?Lethal injection? Gas? Pillow over the face?
I'm sorry for your loss, I too lost a lover to breast cancer but she got the best treatment possible.
Hello!
I said she was a leftist... She THOUGHT she would get wonderful care over there. She did not appreciate what she was getting here.
She needed a brain scan, but in order to keep costs down, they let her wait, and basically ignored many of the warning signs. Also, they were short staffed.
That would never happen here.
I could write a huge article about it, but I am trying to keep it brief. I am a nurse, and there is NO Way that she would have been allowed to go like that.
Rather than argue out of a desperate desire to push your leftist views, it may be wise to open your mind to the fact that it is totally impossible to get the best of anything that you do not directly pay for.
John, John, John, John. They killed her with negligence Einstein. Enough of your condescending vomiting. My first question is how is that you know with certainty that she received the best care possible? You ASSUME that fact, much like you assume a great deal. But the reality is that we have yet discovered the "best" cancer treatment. Therefore, what system will discover the best cancer treatment - the UK Gov, the US Gov or the private sector in America that is motivated by the entrepreneurial spirit?
John, the reality of the situation is that you sound like a sad pathetic leftist attempting to argue a personal and professional point as expressed by Skarlet. I know that snotty little leftist tone and it is most infuriating. A man would have have wished his condolences about her cousin passing and dropped the issue. But apparently the male species is in short supply in the UK. So too are good tennis players. Cheers!!
<sigh> I don't know and I can't say that she received the best care possible, I do know that what ever failing there was (if any) was not as a result of socialised medicine. I do know that my friend did receive the best care possible.
I'll leave the rest of your message ignored, which is the best thing to do with it, though I might throw in a comment about people who are so fixated on their ideas that nothing will shake them.
The problem is what about the people who can't afford it.
Taking one anecdote to suggest UK healthcare is inferior would also be a mistake. The stats are roughly equivalent with the US, better in some areas, worse in others.
@Skarlet,@LionsDen - it never ceases to amaze me how seemingly intelligent individuals can constrain their views to imposed bubbles of understanding, and still insist that they are the ones who are more knowledgeable.
For fu.k sake, Cuba has a better health system that the US, they might not have all gadgets and gizmos, but they somehow manage to provide a healthier life for their citizens and at the same time export more doctors through Medecins Sans Frontieres and direct help programs, to developing countries than the wealthiest nations of the West. There is a doctors for oil program between Cuba and Venezuela, and we all know oil revenues can buy you a lot of care anywhere in the world.
This idea that right-wing Americans actually have a clue of what is going on beyond your borders is so absurd that it would irritate me if I didn't consider it funny, mainly due to the fact that less than a third of US nationals have a passport and the media is not exactly providing you with unbiased international news.
One advice... see 'Sicko'. I find Michael Moore annoying but he managed to get a very comprehensive view of why it sucks to be ill in the USofA.
In order for me to be able to obtain a tourist/business or student visa for the US, I need to pay for an insurance plan which will cover up to $250,000 or somewhere in that neighborhood. I am sorry but this is ridiculous.
startupninga - have you been to Cuba? How do you know? I'm going to listen to you when thousands flee Cuba annually? Wow - Cuba and Venezuela as the basis for your argument for success creating a successful health care model when these countries. Okay you've made your point - You're a commie!
The problem you point to regarding a visa is NOT because of business or private insurance companies - but rather politicians and political policies. My question is why you would want to come to the US, when Cuba and Venezuela are your commie states of choice? And if you haven't been to the US how do you know anything about the quality of life -- Michelle Moore? And your claim that Cuban doctors help more people around the world is bulls**t. Not to mention what country do you think many of the medicines used were developed in America? Penicillin? HIV drugs to Africa? And your "gadgets and gizmos" that are developed in the US help save lives. Cuba and Venezuela don't add any value in research and development in the world. In fact these countries cannot even develop an economy.
Correct information would be hard to obtain through a michael moore movie. In the moore realm healthcare in cuba is right at the top. Cuba does have good cigars though, this is their main contribution to healthcare.
@LDM - First of all let me put it out there... I've been to more countries than you know exist the US including and I have seen the best and the worst of world for myself. Yes, I am a commie, and I'm quite proud of that fact... It made me look for problems to be solved and not opportunities to be exploited in the enterprises which I started and which thankfully enabled me to get out of the rat race with twenty odd years of age.
I know one FACT... the UK has a higher rate of social mobility than the US, and it is still a monarchy, I seriously doubt that there is one right winger on this site who makes more than $250,000 annual income and you are the ones who are screaming free market, free market, right to choose, right to choose... Any person who is gullible enough to fight for and support those who prevent him from making an honest wage is a sad excuse for an individual, since an individual has to be capable to think for themselves and analyse the information he/she receives through the prism of personal impact.
Those who still blindly cling to ideas in this glorious 21st century, are known by one name and one name alone which I would gladly attribute to you on the basis of your replies... A FANATIC & A FUNDAMENTALIST
Really? Why then, does the OECD say that the UK has the worst inter-generational earnings elasticity? Children are linked more to the earnings of their parents than any other country in the OECD.
Unless you are talking about some other form of 'social mobility' than income? Maybe us American's are too rigid in our class system. Come to think of it, none of my family has ever been a part of royalty...
http://www.oecd.org/document/51/0,3343, … _1,00.html
Jaxson, by what I see from this link, the US is "very" distant from the UK in this analysis of income mobility. Doesn't this fact from a source which you yourself cited prove that the whole idea that America is the "work hard, move up", free market, individual liberties, capitalist heaven where only hard work is rewarded, is nothing but a myth?
I checked the methodology of the analysis your link and by what I see they exclude variables which I consider paramount in such an study and they used empirical estimates from other studies which used a similar methodology and population samples to their own.
I would like to put forward the following view:
http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/why/evi … l-mobility
and their methodology so you compare:
http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/why/evidence/methods
"Doesn't this fact from a source which you yourself cited prove that the whole idea that America is the "work hard, move up", free market, individual liberties, capitalist heaven where only hard work is rewarded, is nothing but a myth?"
On behalf of Jaxon, yes it does cast doubt on the myth of America the land of equal opportunity rewards for hard work, dilligence, ambition. Horatio Alger died a long time ago.
It has never been that way in the US. The Horatio Alger stories have done a lot of damage to people's self worth and esteem.
"The characters in his formulaic stories sometimes improved their social position through auspicious accidents instead of hard work and denial."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horatio_Alger_myth
Yes, they have. And the myth puts the blame on individuals born into poverty and has bad implications for public education, health and other government policies.
There was some truth in the myth early in this country's history when the westward migration occurred and fertile land was free for the taking and later when the homestead laws were passed making free land available to anyone who would live on it for a year(?). My grand parents homesteaded in the Nebraska sandhills around the turn of the 19th century and by dint of hard work and persistence became successful cattle ranchers.
Thanks for the Wikipedia link on Horatio Alger. Very interesting.
Half of Americans are able to raise themselves by at least one quintile over the course of a decade. I've brought this subject up before, the US actually has great income mobility. It's just when people look at it as a factor of income inequality that they say it sucks.
This just proves how UN -American you truly are! Please do not mention you are a Patriot, That would be a BIG MYTH!!!
What, all true Americans view their world through rose tinted spectacles!
YES JOHN!!!! REAL AMERICANS ARE PROUD!!! we have many like you, Socialist/Marxist who drag the system! People need to take care of themselves and stop looking for the freebies and blaming others for their lack of courage, enthusiasm and Will to be successful!
When people stop blaming others and taking matters in their own hands and being responsible for themselves and their family, Then things will be great!
If you didn't have the US behind you, the terrorist would have taken over your weak country! And yes it is WEAK!
There is a difference between being proud and being delusional! One can be both proud and realistic you know.
BTW, whose troops had to go into Afghanistan and flush out the caves because your troops couldn't do it?
LMAO, OK... The UK does one mission and you complain? Do you honestly think our military could not flush out some cave monkeys? Come on now John.
Well your military seemed to think they couldn't so who am I to argue?
Again, do you really believe the US Military can not flush out a cave??? John...please.
Your own generals say of the British Army that if it were as well equipped as the US army its soldiers would be invincible, capable of standing up to any army in the world, including the US army.
I'm a real American and I would like to say your trashing of our allies is embarrassing.
Just in case you didn't read everything that was written, Anyone who trashes the US is not an ALLIE!!! Maybe you were out sick when that was taught!
Really? Please tell that to the families of British soldiers who died alongside U.S. soldiers in Iraq. I'm sure they'd love to hear you call their country weak, too.
The truth is The UK has a very weak military! they are relying on us if anything major happens! Anyone who doesn't know that is just clueless and should not be posting!
You go on believing that Danny Boy!
You'd soon change your tune if we left you to it, left you to defend your own oil supplies.
When we went to help in Libya, The french and the UK had just a handful of missiles, Yeah that is strong. Many Countries rely on the US for protection, It is very sad that people can not see the truth! We save other countries Billions of dollars because many rely on us if a big problem arises. Please explain the missiles on the rooftops of peoples homes in the UK for the Olympics? I really want to hear this one.
What we need is to get rid of the people that I term "dinosaurs". These are people who still believe we live in Colonial times LOL! They still believe each man goes out with his rifle and hunt squirrels for his wife and daughter to fry up.
We have, or at least are trying to evolve past that time. However, we have individuals with the mentality you displayed who are holding us back.
Persons who relish a dog eat dog world, a survival of the fittest society. With our technology and science we should have moved past that manner of survival.
Until people learn to cooperate and kill the "me and mine" attitude this society will not evolve any further.
Firstly, the methodology link you provided doesn't address the methodology of the social mobility chart they posted from The Spirit Level.
Secondly, a chart that ranks from 'Low' to 'High'? Generally speaking, a solid study, based on statistics, will use actual statistics in plotting. Not 'How your country rates on a scale from Bad to Good'.
Thirdly, looking at income mobility as a factor of income inequality is misleading. Since the US has higher inequality, they say 8 times in the 20:20 methodology they use, that means the US has to have more upward mobility to have the same actual income mobility.
So if you compare the US to Country A which has an inequality factor of 2, you would have to have the following situations to call each country 'equal'
US: Income change from $20,000/year(USD) to $160,000/year
Country A: Income change from $20,000/year(USD) to $40,000/year
Those two situations would be called 'equal' income mobility. That's why it's stupid to look at income mobility as a factor of income inequality. I personally think that increasing your income by 8x is better than increasing your income by 2x.
I seem to be a bit buzzed so bare with me... who gives a sh.t if best treatments for cancer are available in the States when only trust fund babies receive the best of your healthcare system and everyone else has to settle for whatever their health plan covers.
It's not like you are all equally treated in hospitals.
startup - you are an obtuse dolt to put it mildly and you represent the classic reason why abortion was legalized in the US. Unfortunately imbeciles like yourself are unknown to us until far into the future because your ilk are a product of socialist indoctrination within a failing global education system. However, my rationalization with abortion is in the belief that by sheer mathematical probabilities we eliminate a number of your kind annually.
As with most commies, you vomit forth statements that are devoid of fact or reality. You make assertions you know nothing of what you're speaking of. When an American goes into a hospital, there is no way to know whether they are rich or not. The fact is that if someone is in an accident or put into the hospital they get the same treatment regardless of who they are. The issue in quality of care is generally the quality of the doctor not the system. Let me tell you something -- Stupid and "buzzed" is no way to go through life. So get off the pipe and get a grip on reality.
Hey Lion you might want to chill.
Have you ever been banned here? You can't get too personal.
No wait seriously AHAHAH seriously? the guy who is always complaining about too much government power and advocating personal liberties wants the government to be able to force people to give birth even if they don't want to. That's hypocrisy in unbelievable measure.
I think abortion is immoral but I believe it is the right of the individual to decide what can and can't be done in their body which means I respect liberty a hell of a lot more than you do.
Women should have the right to do with their body as they choose. It's the distinct other baby human that we are talking about. Quite often a different blood type and definitely different DNA. Let's get your facts straight on this issue.
Why don't you tell us what you really think?
You know the truth hurts! He spoke his mind and gave many facts to back up his claims. All you do is post articles from ridiculous left wing propaganda outlets. I also know people like you will report him because you want to shut him up because he speaks the truth and you don't like it.
Why should we report him and deprive ourselves of watching him flounder and dig even deeper holes to lose himself in?
You say, CONGRESS. Now, you are aware that we no longer have a Congress..
MONEY AND POWER. MONEY AND POWER.
That is what most people can not see or understand today.
Our Whole Government has gone, SIDEWAYS.
OLY
Many more doctors will be doing the same! Let them drink the koolaid! when their chickens come home to roost, It will be funny to watch them try and spin it!
As thought, Lion has been Banned! The lapdogs are not man enough to standup for themselves and go crying, like kids do to their Mommies! No guts! I'm telling Mommie! Do you feel big and bad? What a bunch of wimps!
Where is the backbone? I guess when you make a lot of sense and support it with facts and logic, it really hurts and they have to try and silence you!
This is the mentality of the weak cradle to crave looking for hand outs socialists/Marxists far left!
Get off the tit!
For those of us just coming into this conversation (or deciding if it's a conversation worth joining) would you mind explaing who the "Lion" is?
And are you equating Hub Pages with Marxist/socialist mentality?
I'm so confused.
(yeah, what else is new, I know)
Lion is a hubber who made a lot of comments like this one:
startup - you are an obtuse dolt to put it mildly and you represent the classic reason why abortion was legalized in the US. Unfortunately imbeciles like yourself are unknown to us until far into the future because your ilk are a product of socialist indoctrination within a failing global education system. However, my rationalization with abortion is in the belief that by sheer mathematical probabilities we eliminate a number of your kind annually.
As with most commies, you vomit forth statements that are devoid of fact or reality.
now Danny here is saying he shouldn't have been banned
No words in that post were bad! he was immediately banned, so your guess would be wrong!
I personally feel this is a site to express yourself and if you have it out with someone, they comeback and say something and it is over! Why all this cry baby stuff? like I stated, Be a man.
He did not say the F word or anything worth getting banned for! That is my personal opinion. He expressed his feelings and again in my opinion not worth being banned for.
Ever hear the saying" sticks and stones will break my bones but names will never harm me"
Again People need to grow a pair and GROW UP!!
Calling someone an obtuse dolt and an imbecile = questionable. I could see the moderator spewing Diet Coke out their nose on those.
But...
Calling aother huber an abortion -- not once, but twice in the same post -- is pretty much off the charts personal insult.
And my guess is startupninja wasn't even the one who reported him.
How could I have missed this colorful spewer and when is his ban over?
Well I recall that it started out with the fact that the president is a big fat liar, and then a bunch of socialists said it is a good idea. (no surprise there).
Wow.....way to take that way out of context.
Obama NEVER WANTED A MANDATE. He had to put one in there because it was the only way to get any sort of bill passed.
"Mandate" has become the four-letter word of the Affordable Care Act.
And the sole point of fixation for those who won't even be affected by the bill but are determined to oppose it anyway.
If I were Obama right about now I'd be saying, "Hey, don't blame me for forcing you to purchase health insurance. I wanted to give it to you for FREE. But noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo...."
So you want Obama to lie some more? I know you really do not think anything is really free....DO YOU?
No. I do not think anything is free.
But there are quite a few hubbers on here who seem to believe that healthcare is free if it's provided in the Emergency Room.
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.
Like I stated many times, If the politicians, right and left would get out of bed with the insurance companies and let us compete across state lines, we would see a 20-25% reduction in costs.
If they stopped the lowlife attorneys with the frivolous malpractice lawsuits will reduce Malpractice insurance for Doctors and bring costs down.
Then have the insurance companies not deny for preexisting conditions and able to keep young adults on till 25.
This will make it much easier for many to get insurance, only big problem is the ILLEGAL Aliens! We will always have them in emergency rooms. Obama care doesn't even take them into account.
Obama supports comprehensive immigration reform. He has increased greatly the number of illegal aliens deported. Try sticking to the facts for a change!
Well, MM, Lion, I do not know. I just came up wit this Question, in My little head, so, I thought I would throw it out.
I have read most of ALL your comments, and, have learned a thing or two.
I can't beleive all the Re-plys I have received on this, but, It is OK with me.
At least I am aware of the thoughts you-all have.
Thanks to ALL of you for your time.
OLY
Sorry to be unclear, OLY. I get what the thread is about. And it's testament to the timeliness of your chosen topic that we're up to 400 plus posts. That's pretty cool.
I was mostly looking for clarification on Danny Maio's defense of Lion.
I've seen that and would prefer to talk about Obamacare.
You do know that hub pages has a word filter right? and if you use words on that list it gets a mod to come check your post, my guess is in his incoherent ramblings lion used more than a few of them and was thus banned,while it is richly deserved I am actually disappointed it was quite funny watching him rant nonsense.
I think you Spew a lot of nonsense and looked foolish with many statements you made. You pretty much said people who don't think like you are stupid and don't make sense etc... That is also degrading, should you be banned?
Again, no backbone. that is the problem.
The government can't give anything out for free.
Everything has a cost. Every good, every service has a capital cost.
Well it's interesting you bring in the word "capital" Jaxson Raine.
Because it seems to me that America's current system is the epitome of anticapitalist.
Why do we burden our best capitalista with providing health insurance for their employees?
Don't we want American businesses to be more competitivt? Yet we saddle them with this rapidly growing albatross.
How about we release them from the financial bondage of carrying group health insurance?
How about we do the right, logical thing and provide healthcare to ALL our citizens -- not just the old ones and the poor ones -- because it's the right thing to do?
Just a thought.
I use capital in the broad sense, everything costs time, labor, money, or resources. There is no 'free'. Calling it 'free' is a lie.
If the government provides us 'free' healthcare, they pay for it by either taxing us, or by taking out debt(which is a direct tax anyway).
It doesn't matter where the money comes out of the system. If the employer pays $200/month for an employee's healthcare, the employee is receiving $200/month in non-cash compensation. If the employer pays $100/month and the employee pays $100/month, then the employer can pay the $100/month to the employee, at which point it is paid out. Same result. If the employer/employee pays nothing, the government can tax $200/month from the employee. Same result, only now the government, notoriously inefficient and irresponsible with money, is in charge of your healthcare money.
The service will be paid for one way or another. The only other option is to redistribute wealth, and make the wealthy pay for everyone.
It doesn't matter. If the employer has to pay $200/month, the employee receives $200 less per month. Since all corporations do this, they are all competitive.
If all corporations paid nothing into healthcare, they could give the $200/month directly to the employee. Again, they would be just as competitive with each other, as the total employee compensation would be unchanged.
Again, it won't make any difference to the employers. It won't change employee compensation.
If you are advocating redistribution of wealth, I say that is a violation of freedoms. If you are advocating each person pay for the system through taxes, then you really haven't done anything. People will still be paying for their healthcare(and those who can't pay taxes won't be paying for it).
Very true--fixing holes in the road and repairing unsafe bridges, paying public school teachers enough to attract competent applicants, paying for effective local, state and federal government functions and national defense requires sufficient tax revenues which thanks to the likes of the little creep Grover Norquist are very hard to achieve.
Come on, we get sufficient tax revenues. It's just that we grow our spending by more than GDP every year.
You cannot increase spending by 5-8% every single year and expect to be able to pay for it. Yeah, for a while you can pay for it by increasing taxes, but eventually you will reach 100% taxes, $0 revenues, and crazy levels of spending.
Here's a crazy idea... What if we only spent, say, what we brought in. We could grow our spending at the rate our revenues grow. Really, we could fit a spending budget from not too long ago in our revenues today, and increase at a realistic rate every year.
He is an UN-American grubber! Looking with his hand out and trashes this great country! He has one liners, spew BS from the liberal media like it is gospel...It is only gospel to the puppets who believe it!
People like that deserve nothing! They probably do not add anything to society and a drag to the system. People need to learn how to take care of themselves.
They talk about I live in Detroit near Canada and never seen a Canadian come here for medical! Anyone with brains knows if they had money they would use the US Medical system! We are the best. Yes we cost a lot more but you get what you pay for! Why do the politicians have better plans than the people??? These fools do not have a clue! Like I said we suck so bad that we have the biggest problem with Illegals! That UN-American should go to another country and feed off their tit!
Nothing is ever enough for these people! We supply safety-nets and these people want bassinets!
We have quite enough military spending, thank you. In fact, it could be cut in half and we'd still be fine. Why are so many conservatives worried more about the money we spend to help sick people than about the money we spend to kill people?
I'm sick of all excessive spending.
Any program that automatically grows spending more than the rate of increase of revenues is irresponsible.
Oh, so you are for abolishing the Bush tax cuts, then?
I'm for a simpler tax system all together.
Put effective corporate and personal tax rates at 20% maximum. We'd do better with corporate rates at 10-15%. That would actually make us competitive in the international market.
We don't need higher taxes. For the most part we need less spending.
And which department gets the lion's share of our federal spending?
MILITARY.
Maybe we should start there?
Mom...don't you know that the war would only be wrong and bad if it had been started by Obama? Seeing as it wasn't, it has to be defended at all costs.
The problem is only partly spending increases. It's also tax cuts starting with Reagan and promoted by the little vermin Grover Norquist.
Agreed. As soon as conservative politicians spend more time talking about cutting defense spending than they do about food stamp recipients, then they will have achieved credibility when it comes to their complaints about government spending.
If you understand what the government IS suppose to do, It is Protection! Anyone who thinks this world is just so wonderful is a fool! I guess Missiles on rooftops in the UK for the Olympics means everything is just peachy! WAKE UP!!!!!!!
If we want to remain safe, we can't cut defense spending too much.
One thing we need to do is spend a lot more money on cyber defense and cyber warfare technology. We spend so many billions of dollars on projects, only to have foreign powers hack our servers and steal our information.
There are plenty of people who would love to watch us fall behind in defense.
These people don't see the truth, that we protect many other countries and they have minimal soldiers and defense because we protect them!
Yes some countries wish we weren't as strong to try and take advantage.
You don't actually defend the UK Danny, you make us more vulnerable to attack because we are seen as being hand in glove with you, all out of the same mould.
We can quit invading countries that don't attack us and save tons of money. How about let's do that?
Every post you show how you hate the US and I personally feel you shouldn't receive a dime from the country you despise soo much! very sad for you
Disagreeing and arguing on how you think things should be does not mean you hate a country. It just means you believe in facts... If that were true then everyone who attacks Obama can be said to hate the United States as well for showing disrespect for the presidency.
Facts????? From MSNBC? Huffington Post? NY TImes? Please, I haven't seen any facts, just charts that leave out critical info on getting the true numbers.
The true role of the US government is to protect our country! anything else is useless! The states should have the say to do whatever they choose.
Now, now, it's really wrong of you to accuse Ralph of hating the U.S. just because he doesn't defend everything our government does.
Oh, wait, you don't defend everything it does, either. Do you hate the U.S.?
Show me just ONE post where he said something AMERICAN and Proud!!! I dare you to find JUST ONE!!!! then talk to me! I have been seeing things from him for years! Like I said when people stop blaming others and take control of their own situations, that's when things will change!
Like blaming the poor, like blaming illegal immigrants, like blaming Obama...
Yes! You see there is a clear difference, We are not blaming the poor, we are blaming Obama and the far left for enabling people to keep being poor! Big difference. He had advisers tell him many things and if he doesn't believe in it, he doesn't follow their advice. He had a non partisan group advise on the economy and he dismissed it! he only follows the Marxist and socialist in his cabinet! Every one of them are KNOWN Marxist/socialist! No secret! But he doesn't think like a socialist....no! his books wreak of socialism but he isn't a socialist....no!
Was Lyndon Johnston a socialist too? Was Roosevelt?
Lyndon Baines Johnson's policies laid the groundwork for socialism.
Teddy Roosevelt was calling for was a sort of a socialistic nationalism, in which the government would take things away from people who got things that he didn’t think they should have [and] give it to the working man. They talk about ‘the square deal,’ ‘fairness,’ all of these new mandates for government—something the Republican Party has walked away from in very decided fashion.
I would like to see if Canada had all the Illegals as we do and how that would be on the economy.
We have our fair share of illegal aliens...we just don't blame them for every single wrong in the country. Many come from the United States...
You have nothing in numbers to compare to the US. Your fair share?
Estimates range between 35,000 and 120,000 unauthorized immigrants in Canada.
Between 7 million and 20 million illegal immigrants are estimated to be living in the United States
Your fair share?????? You don't know what fair share is!
what you have in your whole country cross the border every week!
Keep your lies. Facts...Your fair share...what a joke.
Not lies. Your country has 10 times the population of Canada. So...if you count it by your standards there would be over 1 million illegal aliens. Not as high as the US but we still don't blame them for things beyond their control.
It seems lately that an American hiding out in Canada has been picked up at least once a week.
Quite a few American seniors come across the border to buy cheaper prescription drugs.
What a ridiculous statement form someone who clearly can't defend his position with a rational argument.
@PrettyPanther because they believe in Pro-Life! lmao
I guess you have inside info of our military and all info on threats etc... Nice to know we have a classified person writing on hub pages! wonderful.
But you knowing all the inner details of our military is far brighter? PLEASE!!!
Oh, come on. You're being ridiculous. When will you start complaining about $7600 coffee makers and hundreds of aircraft that have never flown in combat?
Oh, I forgot, that $200 a month some need family receives in food stamps is so much more wasteful, right?
Your the ridiculous one! you are just so spoiled by our protection, that you think nothing can happen.
I love how you try and twist things, I never said we shouldn't help people that truly need it, we have many who abuse the system and have a president that puts food stamp commercials on TV to promote being a beggar!
Catching every single person who abuses the system wouldn't pay for one day in Afghanistan.
So, why do conservatives spend so much time talking about such a minor portion of the budget? It's a waste of everyone's time.
Well you seem to know what we need to spend militarily? So you must know something we don't.
You seem to know, too, since you are defending the bloated defense budget while worrying over abuse of the system that is a tiny portion of the federal budget.
Fraud and government waste is a lot more than you claim! It is so typical how you far left people try and twist to fit your agenda.
Like I just stated, the bush tax cuts for the 1% would equal 8 days of government spending! that is a spit in the ocean, but you defend that like it will really do something big?
@MM - you are right, it wasn't me who reported Lions Den Media I even penned a civilized rebuttal earlier only to read in later posts from the rest of you fine people that he was banned...
Too bad I would miss getting into an in depth discussion with a Nazi like him/her
Warning: The Supreme Court May Be Hazardous To Your Health
July 11, 2012 by John Myers
Warning: The Supreme Court May Be Hazardous To Your Health
PHOTOS.COM
Patients have to take a number at Canadian health clinics.
Unless you are living in a cave, you know that last month the Supreme Court made one of its most controversial decisions since Roe vs. Wade. Conservative Chief Justice John Roberts sided with the four “liberal” members of the court and upheld the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). Many Americans who were upset about the decision vented that anger on Twitter. I find it bizarre that many Americans tweeted about “moving to Canada” to enjoy better medical care.
“I’m moving to Canada, the United States is entirely too socialist,” tweets @wallyweldon.
“The supreme court upheld Obama Care. That’s it. I’m moving to Canada!” tweets @lucasdargis.
As an American who has spent more than half my life living in Canada, I want to say this to wallyweldon and anyone else who is packing his bags: Stop! Even if Obamacare remains, the quality of medicine has a long way to fall before it will reach the rock-bottom levels that my wife Angie and I live with in Canada.
A Typical Trip To The Doctor
The red light on the old alarm clock read 7:00. The morning news began with the top stories. It was the first Monday of the month, so my wife and I began our pilgrimage to the emergency clinic in Calgary, Canada. My extended family saw one doctor for 40 years; but because he retired and there are so few doctors in family practice, we now have to visit day clinics.
This particular Monday was during winter. A blizzard had rolled in off the Rocky Mountains, making the roads almost impassable. We felt strong enough to walk 3/4 of a mile in snow-drifted sidewalks to the clinic to get the prescriptions we need for Angie’s lupus and my asthma.
The real emergencies the clinic deals with every day are a shortage of doctors and waves of patients. Some of the patients, like us, just want a refill of a prescription; others are junkies, looking for a sympathetic doctor to give them their fix.
It might seem ridiculous to walk through a blizzard to get refills of medications that we have both been taking for years. But that’s universal healthcare in Canada.
You can’t simply phone your doctor and ask him to call in a refill. That is against the rules. Under the guidelines here, prescription renewals have to be personally handed out during an office visit. This allows the doctor to pocket the same fee he would get if he were attending someone with a broken leg.
By 8 a.m., we saw the illuminated lights of the clinic through the falling snow.
The clinic doesn’t open until 9 a.m. but a line had already started on the front steps of the clinic. There were no benches, so the people in line huddled beneath the snow.
We were lucky that day. The snowstorm made it difficult for people to arrive early. Only four others were ahead of us; more than a dozen were behind us.
There was a complication. The snowstorm had delayed the clinic staff. At 9:15 a.m., the doors opened. We dutifully walked in and collected our numbers — just as I did as a kid at the barbershop. Over the next half hour, we sat and waited for our number to be called.
Checking in allows us to be seen by the “doctor of the day.” Chances are about one in two that we have met him before, because they rotate in the city.
At 10 a.m. we were called to the examining room. The handsome doctor with a Polish accent seemed genuinely to care. (Often, the doctors are desperately tired or simply fed up with their job.) He took a few minutes to learn about our ailments. Then he passed us our prescription slips. At 10:30 a.m., three hours after we began, we began the walk home.
Medical care in Canada seems like the Dark Ages. It has been especially hard for us because, just more than a decade ago, we would make appointments in Spokane, Wash., to see our doctors at Rockwood Clinic. There, fine coffee was served in china cups, and rarely was the length of the waiting-room stay more than a few minutes.
No ‘Free’ Car Wash
Two decades ago, I was sitting in the showroom of Sutherland Mercedes, a car dealership in downtown Spokane. The shop in the back was changing the oil on my 20-year-old 300D Mercedes-Benz.
As I sat in the corner, a respected cardiologist was looking at a new car with his second wife. She couldn’t have yet been 30; he was pushing 60. The salesman showed them the most expensive Mercedes sedan on the showroom floor. The wife loved it. To close the deal, the salesman mentioned that, if they bought the car, they could have free car washes from the dealership for as long as they owned it.
“You hear that?” gushed the wife. “Free car washes!”
I had to stifle myself. Across that very street was the Lincoln dealership with the then-new Town Car. If you bought it, you didn’t get a free car wash. However, the Lincoln cost half what the Mercedes did.
That sums up healthcare in Canada. Almost everyone up here thinks Canada has “free healthcare.” The truth is Ottawa and the provinces foot the bill for universal healthcare. It is a spending program that has made Canada’s government debt levels soar.
Canadians have become so indoctrinated that even intelligent people don’t account for the fact that the average family in Canada pays roughly 50 percent of their income in taxes each year just to fund the healthcare system.
To meet the growing expense, governments will have to raise taxes and even further reduce the quality of healthcare. While this is not a winning blueprint for a society, it seems that the U.S. Supreme Court is willing to embrace it.
Perhaps the justices should have read this quote in The New York Times on Feb. 28, 2006: “This is a country (Canada) in which dogs can get a hip replacement in under a week and in which humans can wait two to three years.”
Calgary has many great things going for it. It is a hub for energy and a progressive city in so many ways. Yet I miss the United States and the healthcare system. In the United States, doctors had the time to treat patients like patients — not just a number in line.
Yours in good times and bad,
–John Myers
Editor, Myers’ Energy & Gold Report
Anecdotes do not measure up to facts, data, statistics. For the facts about Canada's healthcare system, read:
http://jimmiles.hubpages.com/hub/Single … are-Please
Below is from your link and the KEY thing is If you need heart or lung surgery the US is the place to be! Yes many can not come here because they do not have the funds but if you gave a choice...What would they pick????
Look, I’m not denying that some people with means might come to the United States for care. If I needed a heart/lung transplant, there’s no place I’d rather be. But for the vast, vast majority of people, that’s not happening. You shouldn’t use the anecdote to describe things at a population level. This study showed you three different methodologies, all with solid rationales behind them, all showing that this meme is mostly apocryphal.
Maybe that’s why the manuscript was titled, “Phantoms in the Snow.”
This is an excellent Hub... it makes the entire case for the single payer system. Compared to that sci-fi story "trip to the doctor" at least the hub presents valid arguments over and over and over again backed by factual data.
I sure as hell would like to know if Canadians would rather have a US like system instead of what they have now... this statistic has been heavily avoided by the propagandists.
propaganda? I clearly showed how the author clearly stated he would rather be treated in the USA then Canada if they had the choice! Do you pick and choose what you like? Bottom line is Yes if you didn't have health-care you would love the Canadian system or any other socialist/commie horrible health-care.
The system isn't GOOD health-care it is just health-care. Do the Rich in Canada use that health-care? Do the politicians? NO they do not! We have clinics here in the US which is just about the same as your handout garbage system.
We didn't become the strongest country by being socialist and commies! And no other country has people sneaking in because we suck! It is because they have an opportunity to better themselves!
I don't see Russia, China, and other countries having Illegal Alien problems as we do! Those are FACTS!!
yeah and go right ahead and read the comment section of this particular article:
http://theincidentaleconomist.com/wordp … -the-snow/
which is referred in the Hub. Take your time read all the comments and see what a real discussion on healthcare looks like.
There is one amazing point which was brought up there, and when I went over it I was screaming DUH...
Answer me this, if the US system is so great, how come you are the only ones who have it... ?!
Why no one else adopts it in that form, and why is Universal Healthcare present in practically every other country on Earth?
Hint... it's not because you are the smartest nation on the planet.
I live across the Detroit river from Canada, and I have yet to meet a Canadian who would trade their health care system for ours.
Well, maybe that means that it's not the doctors or care-givers that are at fault, but rather the middlemen (=insurance companies/ gov't administered). Personally, I have no say in how insurance companies approve or deny my claims, or otherwise run their businesses. If my government did it, I would have much greater access to the forces which shape their policies.
Is it really an argument over who's doctors and hospitals are better? Why is it assumed that changing payment policies would suddenly degrade US quality of care standards?
The argument is over which SYSTEM produces better results and at lower costs. Canada wins on both counts. Some Canadians do come to the Sloan Kettering, Mayo Clinic and Cleveland Clinic for difficult procedures for which comparable facilities aren't available where they live. And some do have to wait in line for non-emergency treatment. However, the overall results are better and the cost is significantly lower. [One-percenters like Romney no doubt get better care than the average Canadian. That comparing apples and oranges.]
Thanks, Ninja! If socialized medicine is good enough for the U.S. Military, it ought to be good enough for everyone! VA care-givers may be understaffed and overworked, but that is not a systemic problem, it's one that's easily fixed by creating more JOBS.
For anecdote lovers: My local VA is extremely efficient, although understaffed. Every appointment I've taken my friend to, he's been seen early, and received excellent care. He's had VA care for almost all of his 92 years, since he was medically discharged from the military during WWII! (He also has Medicare, and his dealings with that system have been positive, as well.)
We don't need to reinvent a new bureaucracy or a new system; it's already there. You don't need thousands of pages, just one simple amendment to the current Medicare law: remove the restriction to people "65 and older." This would expand an already-working system, allow vastly more choice of care providers and thus competition between them, and create jobs in the process (which I thought were capitalist principles, not socialist!?).
Or so it seems to me.
"Single women put Obama on top, in new poll"
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/sing … 13797.html
Interesting choice of words for the title. And I know damn well it wasn't an accident either.
This is a repost of a comment by a Mark (it summarizes things so well I simply had to put it on here).
So Mark says:
"You would benefit from actually living in the US and getting a first-hand look at what the American health insurance system looks like. I pay thousands of dollars a year into Medicare even though I can’t use it; I then pay thousands of dollars for my own health insurance; then I pay a fee every time I go to the doctor; and then I get an additional bill from the doctor when the insurance company decides that it’s not going to pay a big chunk of the bill. I’ve had HMOs, PPOs, POSs – seven different insurance plans in 10 years across four different jobs – and they’re all the same. I’ve had to switch doctors four times because the plans all have different rosters.
Oh, but as part of the lucky 50% of the country that has private health insurance, surely my care is better than what I got in Canada? Surely the doctor’s offices are so much more technologically advanced, and the doctors so much better trained, with so much more time to spend with patients?
Yeah, I don’t think so. We pay a ton of money and then pay a ton more money when we get sick, and the entire system – aside from MRIs and orthopedic surgery, which you pay through the nose for – is no different than what I had in Canada. Dealing with insurance and having to change doctors all the time makes it even worse.
I’d much rather wait to get a friggin MRI on my knee than go bankrupt because I have cancer."
I advise all to go through the comments they are worth the article a hundred times over !
Taxpayers who were in the bottom quintile in 1996 found themselves in the following situation in 2005:
29% increased their income by $17,705, or 153%, adjusted for inflation.
14% increased their income by $37,982, or 328%, adjusted for inflation.
10% increased their income by $67,142, or 581%, adjusted for inflation.
5% increased their income by $159,292, or 1379%, adjusted for inflation.
Taxpayers who were in the second lowest quintile in 1996 found themselves in the following situation in 2005:
27% increased their income by $20,277 , or 69%, adjusted for inflation.
15% increased their income by $49,437 , or 169%, adjusted for inflation.
8% increased their income by $141,587 , or 484%, adjusted for inflation.
The median person in each quintile increased their income by the following percent, adjusted for inflation:
Bottom 20% - 90.5%
Second 20% - 34.8%
Third 20% - 23.3%
Fourth 20% - 16.6%
Fifth 20% - 10%
Upward mobility is very much achievable in the US. The average, median person in every quintile achieves it.
my post which triggered your mobility tantrum referred to social mobility which has a few other factors which are very nicely presented in a table on the methodology link which I posted. The good or bad scale is merely to demonstrate the final results in an observable manor which is precisely why I provided the link to how it is obtained.
the ' "very" distant ' remark is sarcasm and if you are unable to recognize that then you should be worried mate..
since we strayed of topic please help me understand your point of view by providing me with answers to the questions in my previous post... relating to healthcare
Answer me this, if the US system is so great, how come you are the only ones who have it... ?!
Why no one else adopts it in that form, and why is Universal Healthcare present in practically every other country on Earth?
Hint... it's not because you are the smartest nation on the planet.
thanx
Oh yes, classic. When someone posts data you don't like, attack the person. That's called 'argumentum ad hominem', by the way, and has no place in discussion or debate.
The original link you posted is about social mobility. The chart is a chart of social mobility on a scale of 'Low' to 'High'. The methodology you posted isn't about the chart. The social mobility was pulled from other studies, and the methodology page you posted defines social mobility as "Correlation between father and son’s income".
You seem to think that all the factors on your methodology page have to do with social mobility, but they don't.
You didn't provide the link to how it is obtained. You don't understand that the methodology link you posted doesn't explain the methodology for their source. To look at that, you have to look at the methodology for The Spirit Level.
And using 'Low' to 'High' is irresponsible, and makes me think someone is pushing an agenda. When