Universal Healthcare - A Bad Idea

you would be right if the system were just. but people should not die just because they are poor. And believe me, they are poor not because they dont work, but because they are made to work for less than a dollar per day.

 

The system is very fucked up. I cast equal blame on insurance companies and trial lawyers. Frivilous lawsuits are one of the top reasons as to why our insurance rates are out of control.

 

I agree; people shouldn't die because they're poor. People shouldn't die at all. And while we're dreaming, I'd like a million dollars.

Universal health care isn't going to stop people from dying. What it will do is lower the quality of health care across-the-board and cost enormous amounts of money.

Private health care plans are MUCH more efficient than government health care plans.

 

I agree. I like the European solution to this problem - if the judge deems a lawsuit to be frivolous, both the plaintiff and his lawyer are fined for wasting the court's time. It won't solve all of the problems, but it's certainly a start.

 

Hopefully America can do better than Cube for healthcare. I know we can.

 

kandahar makes me laugh with every post.

 

HuckFinn, you keep missing my point every time. The concept of communism is a good one, but it has never been done properly, thus there has never been an example to use. Greed and corruption are the reasons why communism is so bad.

And you know what? I'm happy with our current healthcare. Insurance picks up a lot of the tab, and there's seperate prices for those people who don't have insurance. So really the expensive prices that the insured people have are used to cover a lot of the costs for the uninsured to make sure prices stay down for them...

 

Universal Healthcare is a very bad idea. For starters, look at how the government runs public housing...! We do not want the government involved any more than absolutely necessary. You should see the unreal amount of paperwork required for me to dispense blood glucose test strips to a diabetic covered with medicare.

I work with this one patient who has lung cancer. The doctor informed her of a drug, not yet approved in the USA, but it is being manufactured and distributed in the UK. Apparently, this is a very novel approach to treating cancer, and the research bill for the manufacturer is very high. Luckily, this patient is wealthy. She orders the drug from overseas, and pays around $1500 per month for it. She has been on it for over two years, and has returned to work now and enjoys the same quality of life she had before the cancer. This was a last resort treatment. They were ready to send this patient home with hospice care only. (What is an appropriate cost for that much benefit???) Here is the problem with government healthcare, since the drug is so expensive, it is not available to citizens of the UK. It is just not on their formulary, period (or wasn't when I researched it about a year ago). I don't want the government making those calls for me. Insurance companies here also have formularies, but they include at least one drug from each class of "medically necessary" drugs. I have filled thalidomide for a cancer patient, with the insurance picking up the $3000 + tab each month. Most of the problems with our healthcare can be directly attributed to insurance. Instead of controlling healthcare costs, they have added directly to the cost with administrative fees. What we currently have is a system very close to socialized medicine. We would be much better served with consumer driven healthcare. Then drug companies, doctors, hospitals, and pharmacies would have to be price concience in order to compete. There is a number of consumer driven insurance products now available. I hope that consumers take a serious look at these products when offered.

 

This is incorrect. Insurance companies get a large discount, so people without insurance are forced to pay much higher medical bills. Hospitals, doctors, and pharmacies have to increase their "usual and customary" charge to help try and offset these deep discounts. Insurance never, ever pays "Ususal and Customary" charges, but the uninsured do.

 

Good luck...medical bills are the number one reason for bankruptcy in this country.

 

What??? You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. There will never be just one drug company. In fact, several drug companies are often involved in the research, manufacture, and distribution of one drug.

It cost over $600 million dollars to get one drug on the market. If companies cannot recoup their research investment and make a profit, no more drugs will be invented.

anti-HIV drugs provide a good example. Brazil has begun manufacturing generic HIV drugs to provide to their citizens. A lot of groups in the US then began protesting for generic HIV drugs to be marketed here. The improvements in HIV treatments over the past 20 years is remarkable, but it still has a long way to go. We have taken this disease from an accute death sentence to a long term, chronic disease. People now live with HIV. The treatments, however, are still far less than ideal, but generic drug companies do not invest in research and development, which is why the drugs are sold cheaper. If we allowed all HIV drugs to be marketed in generic, all advancements in HIV therapy would cease. What the drug companies need to do is charge an equivelent, market adjusted rate to each country, instead of placing a large portion of the financial burden on the US market

 

It's not. It is foolish to see capatilism as selfish. In capatilism, that is, pure capatilism, markets regulate themselves. It is impossible to overcharge and stay in business in a free market. There would always be competition. One other reason drug costs are inflated, INSURANCE! Drug companies are very aware that the majority of Americans have prescription drug coverage, and don't really care how much the medicine really cost. Insurance has created an "almost socialized" healthcare system. That is what is wrong with our system. If it were consumer driven, as I said earlier, prices would come down.

For one example, the price of milk dropped significantly after it was deregulated. We enjoy very cheap comodoties compared to many other countries.

 

right! With capitalism, I will take responsibility for me, and you take responsibility for you. That is NOT selfish. What is selfish is me working 50 plus hours a week, and losing over 25% off the top of my paycheck to subsidize irresponsible people.

For the record, I am not against welfare or medical assistance, etc. I am against the excessive abuse of the system. In stead of being a safety net for individuals who truly need help, the funds are spread too thinly to be substantial for any one individual, but the total funds are so great that it is a LARGE burden to workers.

This medicare reform bill will be an absolute nightmare. I can guaruntee that. Even AARP opposed it. (AARP=American Association of Retired Persons)

 

that money off the top of your paycheck goes to pay for those troops you sent to iraq. tax drops are great, but not really when you think about the consequences. that means there's less for what we need. it's funny how bush talks about making our "primary response" people better and more, but then he cuts jobs to these same firemen and policemen. hospitals are understaffed.

and im really interested to know where you got your info on uninsured rates being higher. here in america, you're wrong. i know you dont believe me, but that's your ignorance speaking.

you said so yourself that the system jacks up rates for insurance companys because they know they can get more from them.

 

No, you are wrong. I have worked in the American healthcare for almost ten years. I know the system very well. Have you ever looked at a bill paid by the insurance company. I just had surgery. The hospital bill was over ten thousand dollars. The insurance paid their contracted rate, which was about $1200. If I didn't have insurance, they would have billed me the full amount, over ten thousand dollars. The system jacks up rates BECAUSE of insurance, not for insurance. They have to inflate their Usual and Customary charges in order to get a decent reimbursement from insurance. In order for it to be considered Ususal and Customary, that is what they have to charge the uninsured.

Where did you get your information from? My ignorance is speaking? I deal with over 3000 insurance plans, including dreaded government insurance, such as medicare. I am ignorant of many things, but not healthcare.

Just for the record, I am also against the exorbitant amount of tax money spent on the Iraq war.

 

PhotoGra1,

Can you please elaborate on what "consumer driven healthcare" would mean? Are you saying we should eliminate insurance companies and just have a "pay as you go" system?

Also, how much drug research and development is taxpayer subsidized, and how much do drug companies spend on those obnoxious TV advertisements? Do you think they're guilty of any price-gouging at all? What do you think about states (or the federal government) negotiating bulk discount drug prices?

 

A massive amount of drug company R&D is taxpayer subsidized... it's almost always universities that conduct the real R&D (actually researching *new* drugs). Their aren't nearly as many advances in drug development as alot of people think their are, alot of it is just looking at different things for the same drug (viagra being the most known example, orginally designed to be a heart medicine that had a now popular side effect).

Another thing done alot is to investigate a drug for, we'll use arthritis as an example... They'll test it for a given population, but won't test it against other medications already on the market. In 2002 their were 78 new drugs released in the US. Only 7 of those were an improvement over their competition, but they sure aren't marketed that way!

If you know much about statistics; they're easily manipulated if you aren't allowed to look at the entire population. Look at the antidepressant studies that showed suicidal tendencies in children... Glaxo, for one, rewrote their CSR (Clinical Study Report) around a specific population to make their drug look better and submitted that to the FDA.

Here's something very imformative along that goes way into depth of what you were asking....

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/17244

 

There are several consumer driven health insurance products on the market. They provide incentives for the consumer to make financially sound healthcare decisions. I will comment on the rest later...

check out http://www.definityhealth.com/marketing/aboutUs.html

 

furmah,
don't dismiss the clinical importance of me-too drugs. A large R&D investment is still required. They still have to do clinical trials. Mobic is a "me-too" drug, but it can be taken by patients with sulfa allergies, Celebrex and Bextra cannot. This is an important product. Viagra is not an old drug now being used for something else. Pfizer was researching a new chemical for blood pressure. In trials, it proved to be ineffective at lowering blood pressure, but they discovered the now popular effects of the drug. This does not in any way discount the value of the drug or the research. Penicillin was discovered completely by accident, in "contaminated" bacteria cultures, and were almost discarded. A lot of science is accidents.

 

It may take you awhlie. Last year I was in an accident and it cost my insurance company over $40,000. I was only in the hospital for a week. I think that included the $6,000 helicopter ride, but I can't remember for sure.