VA Hospitals: No Longer The Best Example Of Socialized Medicine?

I remember when people who criticized socialized medicine would get the response:

"Well the VA is socialized medicine..."

This was said with the idea that the VA represented socialized medicine that worked. So will that still be the case now considering the recent VA scandals?


This is from 2011.

When socialism works in America - The Washington Post

 

With the amount of hospitals in any particular system there are always going to be scandals from time to time.

VA operates the nation's largest integrated health care system, with more than 1,700 hospitals, clinics, community living centers, domiciliaries, readjustment counseling centers, and other facilities


How many of those are having issues?
How many are "not working"?

I'm sure those apposed to "socialised" healthcare will throw the baby out with the bathwater.

 

The news I've been hearing with these VA hospitals reminds me of some of the issues I've read about with systems like those in Canada and some other countries involving long wait times. We don't yet know if more problems with the VA in other areas will be getting exposed.

 

That,s strange. You already know there are problems in other hospitals? That's the thing, if the majority of the hospitals are having problems that probably means there is a problem with that particular system, and it needs to be reorganised. It doesn't nessarily need to be privatised.The private sector probably has issues too (well, we know this)

 

I'm not against gov't having some amount of role in providing health care. But the problem seems to be when you have a total or largely gov't run system like with the VA. People are going to need options outside that gov't system. The veterans were in a situation where they didn't seem to have options outside the VA system and this is what contributed to the VA system becoming backed up which then led to the long wait times.

Private Hospitals Could Take Some Pressure off VA - ABC News

 

To those who say a lack of funding is the problem with these VA hospitals this may provide some clarity on that.

Katrina vanden Heuvel says Congress has 'slashed funding for veterans' benefits' in recent years | PunditFact

 

Yes, wait times in Canada are generally longer than in the US. It is a consequence of providing health care for all, regardless of income or social standing.

 

http://www.va.gov/healthbenefits/cost/insurance.asp

Is it the case too many are dropping their private health insurance?

The NHS 'outsources' some of it's care/surgery etc to help with waiting times.
But it's still free at the point of service, and we don't have to have private healthcare insurance (or not expected to).

The VA seems rather removed from my idea of 'socialised' healthcare.
The only thing similar seems to be the staff are government employees.

There seems still a large financial individual burden on the 'veterans'.

It seems to me it is an attempt to slightly elevate them and remove some but not all of the medical costs.

I don't really have to worry about the cost of any treatment I have.
I pay taxes and It ALL comes out of that.

The VA needs get real, IMHO.

 

What types of solutions have Canadians been putting forth to solve those problems with wait times?

 

Other than a few isolated cases that can be attributed mainly to negligence, nobody really dies as a result of being on a wait list here. I don't really see it as a big problem. I'd rather wait a couple of weeks for a surgery than not be able to afford it, if the system were privatized.

 

I read that article.

It claims that

Could VA spending have increased over the past decade, while still leaving the VA underfunded? I would argue yes, since Bush got us into not one, but two ass-backwards wars that have dramatically increased the number of disabled veterans needing healthcare.

I don't know enough about the VA to know if most or all of its ills are related to being underfunded. However, simply the fact that the VA budget has increased over the last decade does not mean that it is not underfunded if you don't take into account an increase in the number of veterans needing care.

It is also not the case that the private healthcare system is without scandal.

 

Can you compare given one is the general population and the other is just 'veterans'?


http://www.nhs.uk/choiceintheNHS/Rightsandpledges/Waitingtimes/Pages/Guide to waiting times.aspx

 

Indicative of priorities. War,(business) the instruments of war,(business), leading to the spoils of war (business)= Priority 1.(money).

Those who go to war (fodder) and use the instruments of war (business) are of a lesser priority upon their completion of servitude to the instigators of war. (business).

So---they get what the instigators (military-industrial complex=business)) deign to offer.

Not much different than any other large organization.

 

What a load of old bollocks. Seriously.

 

Why, thank you.

No--you're right. Wars are a moral and necessary endeavor carried out with the highest of intentions, right in line with what's best for all of us. No money made there.

 

Someone may have already said this by now... but currently the system is NOT working at all in this country. It takes vets arriving back a very, very long time to get care or treatment. Way too long. From what I've heard the system isn't too bad for older vets who've been in the system for a while but at the beginning it is not working at all on a HUGE scale. Vets are dying from all kinds of things while waiting for treatment. Vets who go and try to get treated for depression or ptsd end up killing themselves or other people while waiting to get treatment. The system DEF needs changed to become (much) more efficient.

There was an article in Time magazine about it last week. I'm not sure if you can find it online or not.

I'm not saying myself that the system needs to be privatized but I am saying something needs to be done to make sure that people who risk their lives for their country can get treatment much faster.

 

Not quite.

Maybe I should have just quoted the middle section.

This is bollocks:

"Those who go to war (fodder) and use the instruments of war (business) are of a lesser priority upon their completion of servitude to the instigators of war. (business)."

In other words the VA/government don't give a shit sbout them.
That is bollocks.

 

This one? http://time.com/108499/veterans-affairs-health-problems-investigation/

 

Idk, Odon... I'm not saying whether or not "the VA/Gov doesn't give a shit about them is fact" but I will say this...
When they want to send them to war they are quite timely on that and have the money to spend on them. When they've been coming home, they have been having trouble getting the same time and money spent on them. Whether that equates to the VA not giving a shit about them, can't say but I CAN say that most likely a lot of them FEEL they only cared about them when they wanted them to go to war.

No it was a longer one. From the magazine. I'm not sure if you can get the magazine ones from the website without putting your subscription info online, which I haven't done. But it did come out right around the same time.

 

I'm not referring to the hard working doctors and workers at the various VA hospitals. I'm talking about those that hold the purse strings-----they are the ones that allocate. Obviously, not enough is allocated to ensure proper care. The blame goes to the top.(politicians). And who, in the end, are the top most responsive to? Well, that's become clear---to me. And in much more than the efficacy of veterans care.