Forced health insurance

manju

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I think Americans should really start to ask why it costs millions of dollars to get FDA approval for drugs and why we can get iPods and iPads for a few weeks' wages while medical devices, bought in bulk, go for tens of thousands of dollars a pop. The best way to decrease health care costs and improve health care quality in the US is to remove the monopolies and the bureacracies.

The high cost of health care in the US is justified and allowed because a human life does not have a quantifiable price tag attached to it. It would be unethical in America to let a person die because it was just too expensive to keep a person alive.

That is why so much Medicare money is used to keep terminally ill elderly patients alive to extend their lives just a few years or months or days. I believe that something outrageous like 80% of the Medicare health care burden is to provide for only 5%-10% of the population of the frail elderly in intensive care to extend their lives a few months or if that. My 89 year old aunt was in the intensive care for 3 months and racked up a $650,000 bill which the government paid for. She never made it out of the hospital. It is no wonder the Medicare system is going broke.

If there is a drug, treatment or procedure that would save your life, the value of those things would be as valuable as your life. Life does not have a monetary value so all those things can be as expensive as the medical industry decides. The cost of the drug and all the medical costs ends up being what you would be willing to pay to save your life.

There is no cost ceiling other than what you or your health insurance or your government will be willing to pay to save your life. There is no free market system at work here to curb costs.

I think you are terribly naive to think health care costs will go down and care will improve by simply removing monopolies and the bureaucratic system. To be replaced by what? 6 hospitals competing for one patient who can't afford treatment? It simply isn't a sustainable or viable model to keep a nation healthy.
 
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gymfresh

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This bill doesn't help the poor. It punishes them for not having the money to buy health insurance. If the law were currently active, I would be punished for not having money. That's what it boils down to. It doesn't help the poor...it's requiring them (us) to buy something we already can't afford, or face a penalty. It's the most ass-backwards thing ever

Great, you just made one of the best cases for universal health care that is paid for through our income taxes. What the Affordable Healthcare Act does is very similar, but it leaves in the (private) middleman and instead of burying the cost in your taxes, it breaks it out. Whether through taxes or a premium invoice, it still amounts to universal participation -- it's the only way to run the national risk pool efficiently and effectively. What's that? You don't feel you should be part of the American risk pool? Mexico's not that far away.

Seriously, have you been asked for a dime? Have you considered going on the web and asking the White House or HHS how someone in your situation will actively participate in the next phase of healthcare reform? Their answer may pleasantly surprise you.
 

Blacksun

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Yes, in a market system of health care, people who can't afford treatments wouldn't be able to get them. That may mean that a lot of us won't be able to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars of public funds on treatments that aim to extend a very poor quality of life for only a few months, and I don't really see this as a bad thing. If one wishes to extend or improve the quality of his life, it should be at his own expense, or at the expense of parties who voluntarily participate in the transaction--not at the expense of coerced third parties such as the tax payer.

There is indeed a cost associated with the extension or improvement of a human life, and it should be up to the owner of that life to be concerned with paying it. I don't see where the right to force others to contribute to the payment of costs associated with buying medical care comes from.

What's that? You don't feel you should be part of the American risk pool? Mexico's not that far away.

I am really not a fan of "love it or leave it" arguments. They're not convincing at all. Would you be convinced if someone said, "The USA has a Christian populace and Christian or post-Christian inspired culture; if you don't like that, then the Middle East isn't far away"? I certainly wouldn't. Just because the current legal, cultural, or social system is a current way doesn't mean that we must like or even accept it.
 
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FuzzyKen

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The chances of this plan standing "as is" is virtually nil. What was passed without doubt was a disaster. The same was the case in 1965 when the original medicare was passed and it didn't work either. Over time it was fixed and it is now a lifeline for all in old age and when insurance companies have in the past had the right to simply deny coverage.

I have a 24 year old Son. My Son, because of cancer of the tongue right now is virtually not insurable under any circumstances because of this. He is a cancer survivor at age 24.

In the end, like it or not this is going to evolve into a single pay system and then there will be optional extra coverage for the idle rich which buys you luxury when you're ill. That will be what the current coverage evolves into.

They had to start somewhere and it was and still is a disaster. This disaster will force all of it back to the table where the problems will eventually be ironed out.

I want to watch a Court Judge tell an unemployed Father of 5 that he is going to have to buy health insurance with zero assets. It is not going to happen as it now stands and the ability to force a private individual to purchase a commercial product is again a farce.

This will go "bye-bye" and then the negotiations for something that will work will begin again. All that was passed was a framework for some kind of national health care plan everything right now is GOP scare tactics because they want people to think that the existing disaster is going to actually "stick" which it won't.
 

Blacksun

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But one is still forced to participate in a national health care plan, isn't he, unless there is the ability to opt out?
 

gymfresh

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You don't get to opt out of police or fire protection; your taxes automatically make you one of the subscribers to this (except in extremely rare instances). There are roads you may never travel in your life, but as an American (Californian, Angeleno, whatever level of government) you don't get to say, "Hey, I don't drive the 405 so I'm not contributing to its improvements or maintenance." I'm gay and don't (won't) have any kids, but I still pay taxes that support public schools.

There are just some things that are bedrocks of a civilized society. Basic health care is one of them. Frankly I don't care if it's through taxes or compulsory premiums; it's 6 of one, half dozen of the other. People would be whinging the same way if the cost of public education stayed exactly the same but was charged separately.
 

itsthepopei

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You don't get to opt out of police or fire protection; your taxes automatically make you one of the subscribers to this (except in extremely rare instances). There are roads you may never travel in your life, but as an American (Californian, Angeleno, whatever level of government) you don't get to say, "Hey, I don't drive the 405 so I'm not contributing to its improvements or maintenance." I'm gay and don't (won't) have any kids, but I still pay taxes that support public schools.

There are just some things that are bedrocks of a civilized society. Basic health care is one of them. Frankly I don't care if it's through taxes or compulsory premiums; it's 6 of one, half dozen of the other. People would be whinging the same way if the cost of public education stayed exactly the same but was charged separately.

the answer to the last question is yes
 

Klingsor

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You don't get to opt out of police or fire protection; your taxes automatically make you one of the subscribers to this (except in extremely rare instances). There are roads you may never travel in your life, but as an American (Californian, Angeleno, whatever level of government) you don't get to say, "Hey, I don't drive the 405 so I'm not contributing to its improvements or maintenance." I'm gay and don't (won't) have any kids, but I still pay taxes that support public schools.

There are just some things that are bedrocks of a civilized society. Basic health care is one of them. Frankly I don't care if it's through taxes or compulsory premiums; it's 6 of one, half dozen of the other. People would be whinging the same way if the cost of public education stayed exactly the same but was charged separately.

Thank you. I was going to weigh in with a similar point, but wouldn't have expressed it nearly as well.

We tried privatized police and firefighters in this country. It didn't work very well, or we would have kept it that way.

Someday people will say the same about healthcare.
 

Klingsor

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They had to start somewhere and it was and still is a disaster. This disaster will force all of it back to the table where the problems will eventually be ironed out.

You call it a disaster; I call it a step forward. Glass half full or half empty?

I agree that this bill is only the beginning of a long, difficult process, as we sort out healthcare in this country. But at least it *is* a beginining, after a century of talk with no action.

That's how it will be remembered.
 

Blacksun

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There are just some things that are bedrocks of a civilized society. Basic health care is one of them.

I disagree. I'd say that the state exists solely to protect its citizens from the criminal element in society and foreign aggressors. Apart from that, there is no particular reason to believe that state-provided health care in the US will be particularly good or will succeed in the state goal of providing "basic health care" to all Americans--let alone that state-provided health care will decrease the cost of health care.
 

lucky8

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I think one of the issues that the health care bill didn't touch is why drugs and medical devices are so ridiculously expensive in the US. We can socialize health care costs all we want, and while that (barring severe corruption and bureaucratic issues) may prevent unfortunate people from going without care, we still might end up shelling out $700 for an ER visit.

I think Americans should really start to ask why it costs millions of dollars to get FDA approval for drugs and why we can get iPods and iPads for a few weeks' wages while medical devices, bought in bulk, go for tens of thousands of dollars a pop. The best way to decrease health care costs and improve health care quality in the US is to remove the monopolies and the bureacracies.

The capitalist model just doesn't work with healthcare. Now I don't know what model would work in America, but the capitalist model isn't it. We need to address the actual costs of healthcare rather than the insurance side. The whole reason there is insurance is because healthcare costs are so high. Patent lives are too long, and medical companies are too profitable. The premise behind capitalism is charge as much as you can while you can. Mostly, I have no qualms with this. But with healthcare, companies are always going to be able to charge higher and higher prices for the drugs and equipment because the demand doesn't ever decrease.

People will say if medical companies can't make huge profits we wouldn't have advances in medicine. That's a crock of shit. There is enough worldwide competition (America isn't the holy grail of medical advances, not even close) that our species would still see incredible advances in medicine. I say we start by reducing medical patent lives to 4 years. Besides, once patents run out, the manufacturer of the brand name drug is most of the time the same manufacturer of the generic one as well. So they still maintain their monopoly...it's just that the extended patents allow them to milk us out of our money for those few extra years. Doesn't help that a lot of these companies are in bed with our politicians...just like the insurance industry.

Insurance companies would LOVE to have me on their plan. Virtually no risk and all reward for them...ya, they got what they wanted out of the bill...
 

ConanTheBarber

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America isn't the holy grail of medical advances, not even close

Lucky, I wonder what the actual facts are here.
Do you have them?
(I have no idea what the truth is, but I would have imagined that the U.S. did produce a disproportionate number of advances ... and would probably be in first place, though how close behind the competition might be, I couldn't say.)
 

Blacksun

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Insurance is a very bad answer to high costs, though, because it doesn't decrease costs, it simply socializes them. Worse yet, people who have insurance are less likely to shop around and are more likely to purchase treatments, tests, and drugs that they don't need, as they're not going to be paying more to get them.

I think the best model for health care is a high deductible insurance plan. That way, one pays out of pocket and shops around for day to day ailments, and yet one is covered in case of severe emergencies like surgery, cancer, or injuries.

There are other ways to decrease health care costs, too. We could loosen licensing standards for doctors (or remove them entirely and let people decide what sort of qualifications they'd like their doctors to have), and decrease the costs associated with getting FDA approval for drugs or medical devices.
 

lucky8

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Great, you just made one of the best cases for universal health care that is paid for through our income taxes. What the Affordable Healthcare Act does is very similar, but it leaves in the (private) middleman and instead of burying the cost in your taxes, it breaks it out. Whether through taxes or a premium invoice, it still amounts to universal participation -- it's the only way to run the national risk pool efficiently and effectively. What's that? You don't feel you should be part of the American risk pool? Mexico's not that far away.

Seriously, have you been asked for a dime? Have you considered going on the web and asking the White House or HHS how someone in your situation will actively participate in the next phase of healthcare reform? Their answer may pleasantly surprise you.

I would love affordable health insurance. And until I was laid off, I was in our current national risk pool. What you've failed to understand here is I now don't have a job. I don't have any money. Like a large amount of other Americans, I've been pretty much paycheck to paycheck since graduating college. So now I literally cannot afford to be apart of the risk pool, even if it wasn't a choice. So under the law, I would have to cough up extra money that I already don't have to pay a fine for not having money to purchase an individual plan. You liberals have a very distinct way of distracting yourselves from the point at hand and spinning it around to something it's not. This thread is about wanting health insurance and not being able to afford it. I want health insurance, but I can't afford it. How does fining me make any sense? It sure doesn't solve the problem. Face it, the key proponent of this bill actually hurts the segment of the population you guys want to help the most.
 

lucky8

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Lucky, I wonder what the actual facts are here.
Do you have them?
(I have no idea what the truth is, but I would have imagined that the U.S. did produce a disproportionate number of advances ... and would probably be in first place, though how close behind the competition might be, I couldn't say.)

Ok, you're probably right on this one. The US has made many advances in the medical field. But in today's modern society, there are a plethora of other countries with the same capabilities as us. I guess that's the point I was trying to make. I'd like to see some numbers here too.
 

lucky8

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Lucky, I wonder what the actual facts are here.
Do you have them?
(I have no idea what the truth is, but I would have imagined that the U.S. did produce a disproportionate number of advances ... and would probably be in first place, though how close behind the competition might be, I couldn't say.)

30 Significant Medical Achievements and Their Country of Origin
So far this is all I can find. I'm sure there's more out there, I just need to take the time to look some more
 

ConanTheBarber

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30 Significant Medical Achievements and Their Country of Origin
So far this is all I can find. I'm sure there's more out there, I just need to take the time to look some more
Those show great distribution of medical advances, to be sure.
But so many of them are old.
The discovery of penicillin, for example ... goes back to 1928.
I was curious more about who's making the cutting-edge discoveries right now.
Aspirin ... hard to nail down its exact history, but you could say the Bayer company first produced something like the modern product in the final years of the 19th century ... though Hippocrates was using the bark and leaves of the willow tree for pain suppression back in the 4th century BC.
The UK epidemiologist A.B. Hill first conceived of proper clinical trials six decades ago or so.
The Andalusian physician Abu Al-Qasim al-Zahrawi performed the first surgical operations a millennium ago.
There are also much more recent discoveries mentioned, such as Viagra.

What I'm curious about is: Which nation is producing the greatest number of medical inventions right now?
In the past five years, for example, how are medical patents distributed?