FROM A CANADIAN CITIZEN WHO
LIVES IN THE SYSTEM..........
Hey Guys
I saw on the news up here in Canada where Hillary Clinton introduced her new health care plan. Something similar to what we have in Canada . I also heard that Michael Moore was raving about the health care up here in Canada in his latest movie. As your friend and someone who lives with the Canada health care plan I thought I would give you some facts about this great medical plan that we have in Canada .
First of all:
1) The health care plan in Canada is not
free. We pay a premium every month of $96. for Shirley and I to be covered. Sounds great eh. What they don't tell you is how much we pay in taxes to keep the health care system afloat. I am personally in the 55% tax bracket. Yes 55% of my earnings go to taxes. A large portion of that and I am not sure of the exact amount goes directly to health care our #1 expense.
2) I would not classify what we have as health
care plan, it is more like a health diagnosis system. You can get into to see a doctor quick enough so he can tell you 'yes indeed you are sick or you need an operation' but now the challenge becomes getting
treated or operated on. We have waiting lists out the ying yang some as much as 2 years down the road.
3) Rather than fix what is wrong with you the usual tactic in Canada is to prescribe drugs. Have a pain here is a drug to take- not what is causing the pain and why. No time for checking you out because it is more important to move as many patients thru as possible each hour for Government re-imbursement
4) Many Canadians do not have a family
Doctor.
5) Don't require emergency treatment as you may
wait for hours in the emergency room waiting for
treatment.
6) Shirley's dad cut his hand on a power saw a few weeks back and it required that his hand be put in a splint - to our surprise we had to pay $125. for a splint because it is not covered under health care plus we have to pay $60. for each visit for him to check
it out each week.
7) Shirley's cousin was diagnosed with a heart
blockage. Put on a waiting list . Died before he could get treatment.
8) Government allots so many operations per year. When that is done no more operations, unless you go to your local newspaper and plead your case and embarrass the government then money suddenly appears.
9)The Government takes great pride in telling us how much more they are increasing the funding for health care but waiting lists never get shorter. Government just keeps throwing money at the problem but it never goes away. But they are good at finding new ways
to tax us, but they don't call it a tax anymore it is now a user fee.
10) My mother needs an operation for a blockage in her leg but because she is a smoker they will not do it. Despite her and my father paying into the health care system all these years. My Mom is 80 years of age. Now there is talk that maybe we should not treat fat and obese people either because they are a drain on the health care system. Let me see now, what we want in Canada is a health care system for healthy people only. That should reduce our health care
costs.
11) Forget getting a second opinion, what you
see is what you get.
12) I can spend what money I have left aftertaxes on booze, cigarettes, junk food and anything else that could kill me but I am not allowed by law to spend my money on getting an operation I need because that would be jumping the queue. I must wait my turn except if I am a hockey player or athlete then I can get looked at right away. Go figger. Where else in the world can you spend money to kill yourself but not allowed to spend money to get healthy.
13) Oh did I mention that immigrants are covered automatically at tax payer expense having never contributed a dollar to the system and pay no premiums.
14) Oh yeah we now give free needles to drug users to try and keep them healthy. Wouldn't want a sickly druggie breaking into your house and stealing your things. But people with diabetes who pay into the health care system have to pay for their needles
because it is not covered by the health care system.
I send this out not looking for sympathy but as the election looms in the states you will be hearing more and more about universal health care down there and the advocates will be pointing to Canada . I just want to make sure that you hear the truth about health
care up here and have some food for thought and informed questions to ask when broached with this subject.
Step wisely and don't make the same
mistakes we have.
"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch".
"Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote"
=============================
rate
email
print
link to this page
Comments: 79
I pay more than that. What province does she live in?
"1) The health care plan in Canada is not
free. We pay a premium every month of $96."
***
Our USA doctors aren't reimbursed by the government except for Medicare. Rather, it is likely that they are reimbursed by the health care insurance companies. We are hearded through our appoints like cattle, 5 minutes for a cancer consultation, 10 minutes for a yearly physical, etc. That's not health care - it a cattle call! The more cattle they get to see, the more the insurance will pay them.
"3) Rather than fix what is wrong with you the usual tactic in Canada is to prescribe drugs. Have a pain here is a drug to take- not what is causing the pain and why. No time for checking you out because it is more important to move as many patients thru as possible each hour for Government re-imbursement"
***
Same here in the USA.
"5) Don't require emergency treatment as you may
wait for hours in the emergency room waiting for
treatment."
***
Same thing here in the USA. My husband died waiting for a referral for a heart transplant.
7) Shirley's cousin was diagnosed with a heart
blockage. Put on a waiting list . Died before he could get treatment.
***
Um, here in the good old USA.
"12. ... Where else in the world can you spend money to kill yourself but not allowed to spend money to get healthy."
***
Um, here in the good old USA, again.
"13) Oh did I mention that immigrants are covered automatically at tax payer expense having never contributed a dollar to the system and pay no premiums."
***
Same as it is here in Nevada in the USA.
"14) Oh yeah we now give free needles to drug users to try and keep them healthy. Wouldn't want a sickly druggie breaking into your house and stealing your things. But people with diabetes who pay into the health care system have to pay for their needles
because it is not covered by the health care system."
Health care is very expensive here in the USA too.I am lucky right now my kids and I get a PPO plan that is paid for by medicaid. Otherwise we would have no coverage.... like a lot of americans. Since I am on disability we qualify.
In my province the governor has raised Healthcare premiums to nine hundred dollars.
I had surgery several months ago. With all the medications and anti-biotics it came around $800- the government reimbursed me $19.
Shove Canadian Healthcare.
BTW Nancy Kaiser is one of the worst.
Of course we are both over 65 so we have Medicare which we pay a premium to every month plus we have United Health through AARP and it picks up what Medicare don't pay. The total expense for the two of us would be about $500 actually but it is well worth it. With our mecical problems neither of us would be able to get health insurance. In the four years we have been married we have kicked in about 22K for insurance and have received better than 150K in medical treatment. We have NEVER had to wait any great length of time for treatment.
Shattering my left leg last year and dislocating my arm was 2 operations, several ambulance rides. Weeks in the hospital and a few months in a nursing home. At $1100 a month, it will take a lot of years for them to break even, I think.
There are 3 of us on the policy. The amounts for last year were
Totals for all claims in results $386,820.32
Applied to Deductible $7,299.50
Paid out on claims $100,876.38 negotiated rates
Our Responsibility $18,284.79
In one year $386, 820.32....wow.
FYI - I love these quotes:
"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch".
"Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote"
And while it is certainly far from perfect, it is a heck of a lot better than the nothing which 47 million people in the US reportedly have.
I make one suggestion before we revamp the whole system . Stop one small thing: stop rendering care to illegals or demand payment upfront. A huge chunk of healthcare money goes to support and care for people who have no legal right to be in this country anyway and pay nothing into the system that supports and cares for them. There's one huge drain gone. After that, give the free needles to the diabetics and let the druggies catch AIDS and Hepatitis and all those other lovely diseases that they know they can get doing what they're doing. Another huge chunk of money saved.
Do I want Canada's health care system? No. But then I don't want Hilary anywhere near a position of power.
There are horror stories under every form of "health care" known to man. As I read the listing in the article, I noticed some things which seemed extreme but many of them were things I have personally encountered here in the United States.
A major consideration is the fact that persons with any kind of adverse medical history here in the good old United States, cannot get health care at all or the price is totally prohibitive. I am diabetic. Think I can get a policy? Think again. I can't even change Medicare supplements because that is private insurance. The company I'm with has to keep me but no other has to take me.
The argument that anyone can get health care, just go to the emergency room is totally disingenuous! That is well recognized as the single worst way to get health care. And emergency rooms treating diaper rash are the reasons for some of the delays in treatment.
We spend more money per capita in this country on health care than anywhere else in the world already. Insurance companies cherry pick their clientèle. Insurance companies have a basic conflict of interest because they are committed by law to return the best possible earnings to the stockholders and the only way to increase that is to reject claims, whether they are justified or not! Many people will not contest a rejected claim.
I and my wife are retired and on Medicare and between us we are spending $677 per month on health insurance premiums, including supplements and drug plans.
To make a single payer system work correctly, you have to run it as a not for profit organization. Trust me, our government knows how to run not for profit! The Medicare system is proof of this with its dependability, economy and stability. The not for profit has no vested interest in turning down a claim unless it is unqualified.
Turn it over to insurance companies and people are forced to bring suit against such companies to collect if there is a discrepancy. And when you do, you'll be lucky to talk to the same person in the insurance company twice. They will stall you, obfuscate and outright lie to you! I've been there and experienced this phenomenon! They can make a $30,000 bill not worth collecting by suit because they have attorneys on staff with nothing to do except the "paper blizzard" to force you to spend more on attorney fees than you can hope to recover.
There are no "magic pill" solutions to the abomination that has overtaken American health care but a system, not of delivery but of payment, with a non profit single payer system would allow us to collectively insure all citizens and contain costs as well as possible by spreading the costs out over all citizens, except the very poor.
It would equalize the problems of employers insuring because all employees would be insured the same and all companies would be paying into it. As it stands, some companies pay out big bucks to insure their employees and then wind up paying more to cover, through assistance plans, the employees of their competitors who were not insured by their employers and had to seek the assistance.
Make no mistake about it, we will go to a national health care program whether one likes it or not. It is inevitable today. The industry has had decades to solve these problems and instead has opted for maximum profits and failed to do so. The insurance industry has proven themselves very poor stewards of this nations health care and it is time for a change!
We don't have to utilize Canada's or any other one nations system. Some of them, in my opinion, suck rocks. We can pick and choose from the best of them and make modifications as needed. Or, we can utilize the Medicare model as it has the proven qualifications needed.
Since over half of the covered people in this nation are already on a form of socialized medicine this is not that drastic of a change when you think about it. All of our senators, representatives, government employees, state employees, school district employees, Medicare recipients and others already have socialized medicine so it is disingenuous of congress to deny it to all citizens!
..
U wishing you good health and laughter
So who actually WROTE this? Has it been fact-checked in any way?
I don't know very much about the realities of the Canadian healthcare system, but I'd like to have at least some references to back up the claims made here before I take all of it at face value.
Because of this we in American cannot get a good idea as what is the best thing to do. Also, because Health Care is one of the huge emotional things in life we have every motivation to allow emotion to cloud our judgement. We see TV series about doctors from as far back as the 1970s Marcus Welby MD and we want to believe there is such a thing as a doctor that can afford to care about us personally, and that there is always a perfect diagnosis and solution to whatever our problems are.
Sad to say, but the best thing we can all do is to be healthy. As long as we are healthy we can stay in denial or delusion and not really have to worry.
I get that the point of this article is to bash health care in Canada, but I'm sure Canadian Health Care is not exactly the same in Canada, and that some people's experiences are good.
I have very good health care in America ... at least that is what people tell me. I have not had any major problems, but all my minor problems have been problematic. I hurt my back several years ago and occassionally, maybe once a year have some kind of relapse of this. When I try to get painkillers I am treated like some kind of drug addict and when finally I get some I have to go in to prove I am in pain, pay for an office visit and then get a very small dose of pain killers. This insulting process enrages me and the pain is even worse after that.
They use every trick in the book to charge me more and give me as many lab tests as possible. I had to pay $800 of my own for an unnecessary MRI test, and what they charged my insurance company was about 3 times that.
There is no way to get a hold of the facts or the reality. I believe in single-payer health care, or nationalize medicine, becuase at least at some point with enough pressure and political involvement there is at least hope that things will be transparent and self-correcting.
We have to not personalize this and try to be objective which is impossible when you are talking about something as personal as health care. Good points in your article.
> A major consideration is the fact that persons with any
> kind of adverse medical history here in the good old
> United States, cannot get health care at all or the
> price is totally prohibitive.
James you are right on the nose there. I can see you are
an older man ... so I can tell that you know the score as most
of us find out when we really have need of medical care or during
some crisis.
The problem is that so many people so not really get it - it is
not their problem, yet! But it will be for us all, and when we
realize for how many years we have been duped and how
much money has been taken from us for no value and just
given to ??? who ???.
If we are lucky we find out in a non-emergency non-life-
threatening time about how screwed we are, otherwise I
cannot imagine that it would be good for someone's
mental outlook to find out they have cancer and have to
spend their every penny and go into debt to stay alive.
I had a friend with a family who had to do this, while trying
to not get fired from his job and feed his family at the same
time.
This system we have is brutal, maybe more brutal and worse
than the Canadian system for many.
Where does the trillions of dollars of overcharging and profit
go in this country anyway? The people get nothing for their
money "in the greatest country on the face of the Earth"
My wife has had 6 surgeries on her back, two ostoplastys on her hands and two knee replacements because of degenerative arthritis. Back problems live in our household! If you have trouble with getting the help you need, the one recommendation I'd make to you is to ask your doctor for a referral to a pain clinic.
After my wife's last fusion, she was as bad off as before and the surgeon refereed her to a pain clinic. They took it seriously, didn't act like she was an addict and made solid efforts to help her! First they tried cortisone injections which didn't help. Then they tried various pain medications from morphine to fentynl, none of which worked for her and caused various unpleasant side effects.
Finally, the installed a "pain pump" in her side which pumped tiny doses of morphine into the intrathecal area of the spine. Worked beautifully! And with 1/300 of the amount the had given her orally. Unfortunately, after two weeks she had gained thirty pounds from fluid retention. They tried another drug but that one didn't work at all.
Now we are back to square one. So they then inserted two electrical leads in her spine, implanted a subcutaneous generator, and gave her a remote control and a charger. This device sends electrical signals to the spine which tend to block the reception of pain from the trouble area. No, she is not as good as new but for the first time in years we can go on a motor trip of a few hundred miles. She does not spend part of every day laying on an ice pack and she is not taking drugs like there was no tomorrow. Just the added mobility has been a real asset and blessing!
This was originally done before she was on Medicare but Medicare does cover these instruments as they are a proven therapy. They are expensive. Never could get a straight answer from the doctor as it was always "it depends on your insurance" but they are somewhere around $40,000. If one has no insurance at all, some doctors will purchase and install the equipment, selling it to the patient at wholesale to save them some money.
Don't know where you are in this but I'd surely try all non surgical remedies first including acupuncture. Some of these things help some patients a lot. But when it gets too bad they will always trot out the knife. And it helped the first five times, just didn't last too long. Over the years my wife tried acupuncture, chiropractic, traction and ultimately, surgery.
Anyway, I agree with the not for profit idea. The idea that there are people who go their whole lives with terrible problems that could change the whole meaning of their lives and their contribution to the country because of lack of health care is idiotic. We need to start looking at our people as the resource they are and invest in them, but also not try to maximize profit on people. The problem is what is balance. It may be a hard problem, but that doesn't mean we do nothing or stick with this broken thing we have now.
Be Pro active! think advanced care!
One other point I have been thinking about for a while now. Obviously, if we move to some form of single payer system, there is going to be a huge increase in cost because the 47 million people who are not covered in the US currently would then be covered. But I think there may be some eventual decreases in costs as well. The main decrease I have been thinking about deals with the fact that US is responsible for most of the new medicines and treatments that are developed. I have no proof to back this, but I'm sure many people will agree with me when I say that it seems that most new treatments and medicines are aimed at treating symptoms or prolonging life, but not actually curing any particular disease. I believe there is a good chance this is done to keep people on medication and therefore increase profits. But if the US government was suddenly responsible for paying for our health care (via our taxes), don't you think the emphasis would shift from trying to make the biggest profit possible to reducing overall costs? If this happened, we might have a cure for cancer and aids the next day. Jokes aside, at least we might not have to endure those excruciatingly long commercials for Restless Leg Syndrome. I guess my overall point is that it is cheaper to cure a disease than to keep treating it, and if they started developing cures instead of treatments, health care costs would also drop. I understand this is clearly not something you can base or even factor in when coming up with a new health care system for the US; all I'm saying is this might be sort a fringe benefit of moving towards a single payer system. Of course all of this is just opinion, no fact. I really just wanted to hear what some of you had to think about it.
I can understand your line of thinking but I am in complete disagreement with it. We cannot allow something as important as our healthcare be placed in the hands of and under the control of our government! Our government is wasteful at best in it's spending and should never have access to the healthcare funding or lack thereof of it's citizens.
Yes, we have Medicare (a government run program) and I am grateful for that as well as government programs in place for those at or below the poverty level. But to extend their control beyond that would be lunacy.
The less government involvement in our lives, the better. This is the American way!
Quote:
The main decrease I have been thinking about deals with the fact that US is responsible for most of the new medicines and treatments that are developed.
End Quote
You are correct in this accessment. If we allow the government to take control of the healthcare industry we will no longer be the leader in the development of medicines and treatments. Why, because there will no longer be incentives to those that do the research and development of the medicines and treatments. Why would they spend half of their lives in school and the remainder in research labs when their government income would not even pay for their schooling?
Quote:
But if the US government was suddenly responsible for paying for our health care (via our taxes), don't you think the emphasis would shift from trying to make the biggest profit possible to reducing overall costs?
End Quote
No - definately no! The government would then put all emphasis on profit - just as the private sector does now. The main difference being that in the private sector we have a choice. We can either pay the premiums or go without coverage. We have no choice when it comes to taxes.
Quote:
I guess my overall point is that it is cheaper to cure a disease than to keep treating it, and if they started developing cures instead of treatments, health care costs would also drop
End Quote
I agree with this quote but how can we expect cures to be found when those working towards finding cures leave the US to practice somewhere else because our government system won't pay a salary to even compensate them for their schooling?
I don't have the answers nor do I know what would work best but I do know that we do not want our healthcare to be under government control.
I do not see you in Canada either, but whatever.
I am somewhat doubtful that 55% sounds right, but perhaps it is.
I am in complete agreement with James C., and also feel that we would best be served with a not for profit system like disabled people currently receive. It is excellent coverage.
Insurance companies and regulators are a joke. Greed is running rampant at the expense of our people.
"I would like to see the child of a gas station attendant have the exact same medical coverage as a child of a Fortune 500 Company CEO". A wise man said this, and I love the idea. Being healthy should not be a privilege, but a right. Everyone in this country could be afforded proper healthcare, and all major corporations (yes, WAL MART) should be mandated to pay a minimum amount towards employees healthcare.
Dena A., you can sit with your free healthcare and hate Michael Moore if you want to, but again, you have free healthcare.
Michelle and Nic C., "...then look for a job that COVERS your medical costs. There are many many many out there." Unfortunately, not all people can find these "many many many" jobs out there. Yes, I am a lucky one, that only has to pay $100 or so out of pocket for my medical and dental, while my company pays $320 a month for me( in CA). Some of our other less fortunate constituents do not have the money to pay high premiums ( my fiance's employer pays only $100 towards employee healthcare. Their Blue Cross is over $450 per month, for poor at best coverage. If you must be admitted to the hospital, you have a $1500 deductible. Most low income families do not have this available. A family sometimes must choose between healthcare and food. It is not right! I do not believe less fortunate people deserve to be less cared for than I am.
We live in one of the richest nations, yet we have people dying because they are poor, homeless people who are only homeless because they are the mentally ill untreated, and people living in conditions worse than many 3rd world countires right here is the US of A.
For example, right now I think that people can only buy health insurance plans that are certified by their state. We could pass a federal law that allows people to buy any plan that is certified by another state. This would give more competition.
We could have a catastrophic national insurance plan. For example, the government could reimburse anyone's health care bills after they exceed $ 8,000 for the year. The idea is to set the deductible high enough so maybe 80% would not qualify, but so it is low enough that it provides enough of a cap for private insurance companies that they can reduce rates and insure more people. The deductible could be indexed to the rate of health care inflation.
Finally, prescription drugs are a big expense. An elegant solution may be to require drug companies to name 3 or 4 price points for their drug. For example, a company whose drug is now $100/month could set an 'A' price of $5/month, 'B' price of $35/month, a 'C' price of $80/month, and a 'D' price of $250/month.
The Social Security Agency gets your earnings each year anyway. They could issue everyone a card that lists you as having 'A', B', 'C', or 'D' pricing, depending on your income from last year.
Drug stores would be required to sell you the drug for the 'D' price unless you showed them your card.
This way, a person making $10,000 a year would pay less than Bill Gates, but the drug companies would still get their profits.
1) Our Canadian friend's comments are exactly in line with comments I've heard from several other Canadians over the years. When I lived in Buffalo, NY (just across the border from Canada) it was easy to see the number of Canadians coming across the border to obtain treatment. Such people tended to be more affluent and thus were able to access American alternatives, while their poorer counterparts were simply stuck with what their government handed them.
2) Many problems with US health care can be traced to government regulations already in place. The much-maligned HMO's, for example, were created in their modern form after government regulation of healthcare reached a point where costs were starting to spiral out of control. There were private insurance plans and pre-paid plans, of course, but nothing like modern HMO's. According to a Tufts University article, the US Government allocated $370 million in 1973 to create the modern HMO and increase coverage to 40 million people. *That* really worked to lower costs and improve care, didn't it?
We will do well to heed our Canadian friends' warnings. There is no evidence that increasing government command-and-control even further will somehow lower costs.
> That the "health" care industry, needs to FOCUS on
> HEALTH care! That means...pre illness care, be pro-
> active and teach people to care for themselves and care
> for thier children, start caring for us before we are sick,
> before we are obese, before we smoke and drink!
This is something the British do as related in Michael Moore's
movie "Sicko". The give their doctors a bonus for being
proactive and preventative.
The only problem I can see with even thinking this way is
that the American system, and most of what we told is
our heart ... the Capitalistic free-enterprise system is based
on either doing unhealth things to the environment, doing
unhealthy things to people, convinving people that it is
OK to do unhealth things to the environment themselves
or others.
I surmise this is why we have such resistance to any kind
of national health care ... it will have to eventually lead to
a compelete rethinking of the economy and how we live.
Personally I think it is way past time, but those who stand
to lose everything are going to fight it with ever ounce of
energy they can bring to bear.
who can only see the bottom line. They are concerned with
maintaining and increasing profits, so for example, one of the
things we see a lot of is that research money is put into creating
new drugs that do the same thing as another drug about to
lose its patent, and then ad and marketing money and
propoganda is put out there to push the drug in its place,
a drug that does the same thing ... sometimes not even as
well ... to make money.
So lots of the money view of this problem is not what it looks
like. The taking over of almost everything in the capitalist
economy by these folks, who then huddle their wagons and
bring in their buddies and lock out the experts in the field and
take over everthing just making it about money is destroying
the whole system so that an elite class of powergrabbing
rule-manipulating, jargon-tossing fascists can create a society
where the know-nothings(them) rule and everyone else is just
a replaceable employee.
you national $8000 deductible, or whatever there are peoplel out there
who are smart enough to always find the loophole in it. All of a sudden
you will see people going in for colds and receiving $10,000 bills. The
problem has been and always will be that human beings acting in
bad faith as damn smart and determined to suck out and expoit
any money in any system that is not absolutely perfect ... and since
this is a man made political system whatever we come up with is
going to have holes in it.
getting the job of health care done ... delivering a service.
Obviously that is going to have a cost ... but it will also have
a benefit too that will offset the cost.
Remember this is also a conversation about medical, what
about dental health, and mental health too. Like I said earlier,
once we start down this road it is going to have a lot of
rammifications about how we organize our society ... I think
that is the fear ... lost of the status quo.
As Michael Moore pointed out in "Sicko" Europeans have a sense
that their countries care about them and will provide support for
them in life. They have less stress. They know they will not go
broke and end up in the gutter if they have a major illness.
Their governments fear them and want to please them to get
their support and votes.
It is almost the reverse in the US. We fear our government. Look
at the paranoid stories that come out about what our government
is doing .. most people do not trust it and think government is our
to get them. Also, we are living in fear of getting slapped down
by a major illness, it can destroy a whole family for generations.
It makes economic sense to support out people, reduce their
stress level and help them to be productive citizens instead of
using them up and spitting them out.
For the latter I would propose that a system that makes health care available to all citizens in a fair and equitable manner while returning high quality in the actual delivered health service would be, I believe, a good goal.
Americans have progressed to the point of demanding more of our health system than was expected sixty years ago. We don't want to hurt. And who can blame us for that when relief is commonly available for a price.
What to do about it? good question and I can't believe thinking person would say that government should or should not play a role in it, without a sound reasoning process to arrive at that conclusion. To say that government is never successful is both patently false and revealing a lack of common sense.
We have to realize that insurance companies have had decades to come up with viable alternatives to any governmental action. Common sense tells us that opening up insurance across state lines is not going to have more than a minimal effect on things as some states might have a slightly lower cost to deliver health care, if it is too much lower, doctors, nurses, etc. will be moving to the states where they can maximize their earnings. Drugs, a major cost factor, are pretty will controlled by the manufactures throughout the nation.
So, lets look at government, not as a deliverer of health services but as a payer under a single payer system. The examples we have currently include Medicare, the veterans system, Schip among others. Medicare has been established for many years and has served as one of the most successful agencies of our federal government with considerable savings over private insurance plans. Their cost of operation is approximately 3%, far below the 30+ percent of insurance! The plan is standardized and accept everyone who becomes eligible, regardless of current health.
Individuals are allowed to add to this standard through several standardized supplements and most people who can afford it do so. These plans are again, standardized, so that if company A offers a plan F it will provide the exact same thing as company B, and the customer can look at relative costs, knowing the product is equal!
Medicare has the ability to control costs because it is a single payer system! It's actual costs paid are always less than are the costs paid by various insurance companies. On a bill of $1,000, insurance A might pay $300, insurance B at $350 and Medicare pays at $275 or less! Remember, the insurance companies have already negotiated the best prices individual insurance companies can.
The greatest initial expense of a single payer system would be in providing health care to the approximate forty seven million people currently without coverage. However, there are numerous people who are currently without coverage, and who are young and healthy, who would be paying into the system to offset the older persons on Medicare with the infirmities and ailments that tend to come with age.
A single payer system would remove the insurance benefit from the employment equation, and make the other benefits more important to hiring/job selection decisions. The small employer who can't afford insurance benefits to lure employees could more effectively compete with the larger corporations in the hiring process.
Since drug costs are such a large component of the overall picture we should address these costs. First, drug companies spend far more on direct to consumer advertising than they do on research! That practice should be curtailed. That is, unless you think that drugs should be an impulse purchase!
American drug companies are selling to Canada, Mexico and others at a much lower rate than received by our own citizens. Common sense tells you that they make a profit even at these lower rates. Why should the drug lords be free to rape the American citizenry? Many of the patented, and therefore expensive, drugs may not be new at all, but simply a different formulation of an old drug. Morphine has been around forever. However, Avinza is a new compilation of morphine which allows for once a day dosing. The difference is in the fact that you will pay over $130 for 30 of the Avinza capsules. I believe this is an area where cost containment is feasable.
Regardless of Tamara's comment, under the current system we have little choice as we can't afford to go with an insurance other than what is available through our employment. Look at the cost. Through an employer, the cost of health coverage for a family might run 100 to 500 dollars per month. Go on the open market, and your premium for that same family, with comparable coverage, could easily be a couple fo thousand dollars a month. Basically, without employer provided health care plans, most working people cannot afford to have insurance.
By going to a single payer system, the first thing to leave is the profit currently enjoyed by the insurance companies. The second factor is that the insurance would have no incentive to deny claims other than if they do not qualify! Current insurance practice is to deny benefits as often as possible because many people don't realize they can fight it and simply accept the insurance company's word on the matter.
Remember also that today's medical costs are something that many would have no chance to save for on their own. A heart attack, without any surgery, usually costs in the order of $50,000 in today's system and if you have to have surgery, it's lots more.
Bottom line, this is a matter for the American people to decide. Would you prefer to have decisions on your own care controlled by some corporate flunky who will get recognition and probably money, if he can deny your claim, or, would you prefer that decision to be made by someone who has no financial interest in the treatment and who's board of directors you actually get to vote on?
If anyone wants no change then it is obvious they have good coverage already. Anyone who is without coverage or who realizes the risks of the current failed system, will definitely want some kind of change. I believe the single payer system is the right one for the USA.
I don't believe anyone is promoting the Canadian system or the English system. But they are models to study and improve in drafting a proposal for the US. A gentleman I know who lives in Japan refers to their system as the greatest in the world. Whether that is correct or not it would be expedient to examine their's and other systems before adopting one for this nation.
-TAMARA
I agree with James; you really don't offer any proof that government cannot succeed and as he says, medicare is a great example of government being successful in health care.
"If we allow the government to take control of the healthcare industry we will no longer be the leader in the development of medicines and treatments. Why, because there will no longer be incentives to those that do the research and development of the medicines and treatments. The government would then put all emphasis on profit - just as the private sector does now."
-TAMARA
I have to disagree with you on that as well. The government will be responsible for paying for the medical care we need. The hospitals and pharmaceutical companies are still payed for the medicine and care they give, only they will become not for profit organizations. So the government will want to reduce costs. It will not be able to refuse care to people who need it, so instead they will have to reduce costs by doing things such as encouraging cures for diseases instead of treatments and eliminating inefficiencies. To encourage R&D spending on new medicines that are cures for deadly diseases instead of treatments for things like restless leg syndrome, our government could offer grants and subsidies to the companies who consistently come up with the best and most effective medicines. Also, as James said, we need to eliminate all direct marketing of medicines to the public as that is absolutely ridiculous; only doctors should be making any recommendations on what medications we need and it is a complete waste of money.
The one thing I do agree with you on though is that we cannot let any changes we make cause the salaries our doctors and scientists, who will work for the non-profit hospitals and pharmaceutical research companies and provide the great cures and care that is provided in this country, to drop under any circumstances. As long as they are still compensated the way they currently are, I see no reason for any dropoff in the care we receive in hospitals or in the new cures that are produced.
For anything further, I basically agree completely with everything James and Bruce have had to say.
I don't know what to think. Is it parnoid to think that there might be a group that takes the best intentions of the public, and their mandates for social change, and then studies it and transforms it deliberately into utter failure to justify the "government is evil and destroyes everything it touches" slogan that we have heard over and over.
Government in other countries that have worked with social programs do not seem so incompetent or failure oriented. I remember as a kid hearing how socialism was going to make Europe uninhabitable by now ... and Europe is doing better than we are currently. Their people do not have the daily lifelong stress of survival that Americans seem to have. European governments do support their people and believe in general that no one does it by themselves that those who are not wealthy do not have to go under if they experience a life set back. Somehow in America we are in a mental space where we put up with this stress and think it is good, maybe because we find some way to rationalize it.
I guess my question is ... if we go for some kind of nation health care, how do we the people know that it is going to be within our control and not some sham set up to fail to make us regret even taking part in our democracy?
How do Americans demand and get health care, and responsive intelligent government that solves social issues and take them as seriously as it does CEO pay or energy profits?
Another thing I believe would help us gain more control over our futures is at a site called www.nationalinitiative.us. This would basically allow the American people to directly vote on the larger issues in our country, such as the war in Iraq.
And, for the record, if you are allowed to just pay out of pocket for medical care, it's just prohibitly expensive.
Why do you say that social medicine cannot work without giving any proof of that statement? Again, no one is saying that we should take Canada's or England's health care system and copy it exactly. Our police and fire departments are "socialized" as you would put it. Why is this? Because everyone deserves to have the protection they offer. This is no different in health care; everyone deserves to get it. It does not matter if you have, or at least think you have, decent medical coverage. Do you not care about the 47 million people who don't have it or the people who do have it yet are still turned down for the treatment they need? As has already been said, we put more money into our health care system than anyone else, yet ours is still ranked 48th! Our infant mortality rate is one of the lowest among industrialized nations!! To reiterate, yes Canada and Britain have systems that do have flaws. But we all are able to see what flaws they do have, leave them out of our program, and incorporate what is good about them into our new program along with our own ideas. Because of the money that we do have in this country, we have an extraordinary opportunity to create a health care system that the rest of the world can truly admire and that truly cares for all of our citizens!
I was paying $361 a month for my pretty good health plan through my work, the full group cost. The problem that you do not see and is not addressed or talked about at all is that should someone who loses their job, or their medical benefits then go to the private market to get health care, if you are not in prefect health, if you have any pre-existing medical condition, or if your height and weight are not "proportional" you are uninsurable - PERIOD. You are f*cked. If you then get sick you are selling your car or your house and if you recover medically you will never recover economically, so think of what that means to older Americans of those about to retire.
You are aware, aren't you, that over half of the covered citizens in this country are already under some form of socialized medicine? And that there are not a lot of them clamoring to get away from socialized medicine?
I'm certainly willing to consider a non governmental plan to accomplish the needed changes in our system but I've not heard of a single one being proposed by anyone! Have you? And the private industry, with all their great innovation and skills, have failed to come up with anything during the several decades they have had the field all to themselves.
Only a single payer system, as opposed to a hodge podge of private companies, could bring the necessary negotiation power and control needed to accomplish this INHO.
One problem that does often occur with any thing the government does is that it is often deliberately underfunded. Therefore, it might work out well to form a government corporation or at least an independent oversight body to handle the recommendations of funding and evaluations of results for the citizenry.
Thanks for the link! It provided me with interesting information on the Japanese system. Since we would be the last civilized nation in the world to adopt a national health care system we would definitely have the advantage of looking at all the others and mixing and matching for the best overall outcome.
I would agree that a $50 a month policy wouldn't buy much in the way of health care in this country today! I and my wife pay $677 a month and that is including our Medicare, supplements and drugs. And next year the drug portion will be increasing to a 4800 deductible! It's been a lot of years since $50 a month would purchase health care.
Just as you've stated, the loss of a job or extended illness can be totally devastating as you can, under COBRA, continue on the same policy by paying I believe it is 105% of the amount you and the employer together were paying, for the coverage. This is going to be extremely difficult to do without an income! And that does come to an end after a period of time, I believe it is 18 months.
Also, consider that more and more employers are offering insurance as their costs have gotten prohibitive. My son's corporation has offered health care for their employees for years, but to be able to pay it they've had to go to a $1000 deductible. Still beats no coverage, which is common in his industry.
Another example is my father was visiting them years ago and got sick and had to be hospitalized. He needed a blood transfusion, but wasn't able to get one until he was able to find a donor willing to replace the blood. Fortunately his brother was visiting at the same time and was able to donate the blood. I don't know what would have happened if he wasn't there.
James, of course I am aware that other people are on socialized medicine, and they are not clamoring to get away because they need health care. I'm saying that moving the entire country to this system and forcing everyone to participate would be a major problem. My state already offers health care to all children not covered by insurance. If parents make too much money, they can still buy the insurance. I know it's not perfect and adults are left out, but at least it's a start. This is done without forcing all children to participate.
Thank you for your comments and I'm sorry to hear about what happened to your grandparents. But I also must ask what country you are talking about. Also, there is no reason that we cannot stipulate by law that there must be no discrimination of care based on age. Again, I am sorry for your grandparents and your father, but the examples you have given are examples of a socialized health care system not working, not examples of why a socialized system cannot work and there is a difference.
The two horror stories you cite don't carry enough information to be useful. Like, what was wrong with grandma and grandpa? I know that at my age I'm no longer eligible for certain efforts in this country!
Second, the supply of blood is up to the citizens. You can't receive it until someone gives it. In this country we have many people who donate regularly and I can't see any reason for that to change regardless of who is initially paying the bill.
And the matter of giving certain people certain services is a matter for us to decide in the process of adopting a universal health care plan. We can format it to serve as many and as much as we are willing to pay for.
What country were your grandparents in? And your father with his experience. I've signed up to donate because of a person who needed a transfusion and who couldn't get it right here in the good old USA because they didn't have the money, or rather their parents didn't, it was a child. By people donating they were able to receive. So you needn't go to socialized medicine to get these perks!
When my wife was two years old she was taken to the hospital with a diagnosed case of Spinal Meningitis. They asked her father if he had the money and he replied "Yes, it's in the savings and loan in downtown Spokane." They said "Great, bring her back in when you get the money in hand." He did and they then treated her.
Horror stories are easier to find than good, caring health care, that's for sure! And they, in no way, negate the need for changes in our system or prove that a national health care system cannot work. Bottom line is, it can!
I also have a dear friend who moved to England when she got married. She comes back to the United States for all of her healthcare needs because the waiting list in England is too long.
Again, I am not saying that our healthcare in the US is perfect, but it's better than everything I've heard from everyone I've ever talked to from countries who have a national health care system. I've traveled to countries in many continents for months and have talked with a lot of people about this. I've never heard a good story yet.
Medical treatment in the US can be very risky if you are not able to navigate the system carefully. Don't even mention drugs, the US is 12% of the worlds population, yet it consumes 80% of its drugs. Don't talk about taxes until you have good information. See who pays what: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_rates_around_the_world
Poor thing, 96 dollars a month, how about 1000 dollars a month for partial coverage.
Americans spend twice as much as similarly advanced countries for health care, yet the results are statistically inferior to those other countries.
You might want to consider that there are no Canadians that do not have some health care insurance. The US has the equivalent of the entire Canadian population going without any coverage. I've spoken with a number of Canadians. Except for those elite high earning types, Canadians are satisfied with their system. I think that Jean B. could very well be a schill for the American health insurers.
Yes, look at how many people are on ADD drugs for children and anti-depressants for adults. I went to my doctor for an extended cold and he could find nothing wrong and proposed to give me anti-depressents? What a crock. This was Stanford University Medical Center, one of the supposed best in the country.
Let me make clear that I did not accuse you of making stories up! There are enough horror stories in every system that "making up" is unnecessary. What I did say was that there was insufficient information for a third party to objectively make a reasoned conclusion regarding the situation.
People have a tendency to think "well, I said it and I know the situation, isn't that enough?" Of course it's enough for you but for a third party it requires much more.
If your grandfather had a "simple" prostate condition, it should have been treated. I'll agree with that. But this does not condemn all the health care systems in the world. And, unlike you, I've definitely heard from satisfied users of both the Canadian and the Japanese systems. Only know one person on the Japanese system but he was quite enthusiastic about it. I've talked to many on the Canadian system and several have said about a relative "he (or she) couldn't possibly have made it without the Canadian health care program." Yes, I've heard of others who felt entirely different.
The bottom line is that horror stories abound and are not necessarily the standard for any one system including that here in the USA! We need to look at different ones and pattern ours after the best out there with corrections for the shortcomings of what we see. Nationalized health care is a coming thing and whether we like the idea or not, we'd better learn to live with it and try to make it the best possible. It's not going to go away.
James I read your comment and I did not get that impression. To know what we are talking about I was thinking the same thing. Greece is not the first country I think of when I think first world developed country with socialized medicine, so I was curious too as to the omission of the country.
Now I wonder if the grandfather had advanced prostate cancer? Or what? But I understand anyone not wanting to explain the details of something like that. It is a problem that to really understand of a lot of this stuff readers need specifics, and it is hard to talk about ... especially about something bad that has happened to one's self of one's family member.
I hear a lot of good points here ... the thing I wonder is as good as some of these Gather discussion can be, they can also be really terrible, and eventually they fade into history. I wonder how a social web site like this country could entend of manage a discussion like this so that it could lead to some productive action?
I would like to see a next step develop on the Internet.
Canada doesn't have a single national health plan. It has a national health insurance program implemented in each of the 13 provinces and territories. Each province varies in how the insurance plan is implemented, so the public health insurance in Ontario is completely different than health insurance in British Columbia.
Remember, Just because somebody send this to you in an email doesn't make it true.
To me, the part of the US healthcare system that makes no sense is that too many medical desicions are being left to insurance company bean counters, instead of the doctor and patient. My elderly mother costs the system a lot, being wheelchair bound and in a nursing home. She's also on so many medications that she hardly has room for her meals. But before she started costing society huge amounts, the home she's in took about 8 or 9 months to decimate her life savings and those of her deceased second husband. Now she's on Medicaid for the rest of her life, and she is not even allowed to amass any more wealth than about $3,500 total. She gets average-to-good basic care at the home, and society foots the bill through taxes. And who does Medicaid pay? The operators of nursing homes and insurance companies across the land, profiteers all. Services provided my mom and millions of other esteemed elderly citizens of the US are minimized in order to help the homes and insurance companies maximize their profits. This miserliness actually lowers the standard of living at the home. There are never, ever enough aids on the floor, and the food is often cold, tough, or otherwise unpalatable. There are specialists such as dentists and podiatrists who visit the home infrequently and do inadequate work on residents. And for my wife, who hopefully has a little time left before she is confined to such conditions, the effects of unabashed greed are seen in the insurance company's refusal to cover the cost of the 'real' drug, as opposed to the generic version. She had used the 'brand name' drug successfully, but when they switched her to the generic, she found it gave her rashes, didn't work as well, actually had less medicine than the real thing. Just overall inferior. I myself have a chronic condition requiring constant medication using three different drugs. I pay just $3 co-pay for a bottle of one of my drugs, but it costs the insurance company just under $200! Now our health insurance is provided in my wife's union contract. What happens when we retire? Am I to be forced to live an intolerable life because we can't afford $200 a bottle for my meds?
This is all assuming that I don't become filthy rich during the next ten years, but...
This system does not have at heart giving the best care to people, as if they were family. It's primary thrust is "up yours", as they light cigars with the dollars we hand over. Some people in the US would stand up for a free-market system as a matter of patriotism, as if it was in the nation's best interests to let these huge corporations suck us dry, then deny us the care we really need. It's almose like there was a conspiracy to keep everyone just sick enough so that they can continue to live, but will need a constant cornucopia of prescription medication.
I think the best system for everyone would be if greed were totally removed from the equation. People receive the best care when they and their doctors are free to make the very best decisions for the health of the patients, regardless of the corporations' return on investment. This might mean doctors and medical corporate execs would have to give up the top edge of their high-flying life styles, but I can't say I would care a whole lot if that were to be a consequence of providing for everyone to have the best care.
Here is a link to some basic analysis courtesy of snopes.com:
http://www.snopes.com/politics/medical/canada.asp
First, my condolences for your loss.
Thanks for your post. When people talk about waiting for care, what they're talking about is rationing. Many Americans just don't seem to get that rationed care, which is the result in Cananda, Great Britain, Greece, or any other country that has socialized medicine, is just the natural outcome of socializing the medical system.
One fellow mentions that in this country he's already too old for some treatments. I would say to him that, if he has the money, he can get it done--whatever "it" is. That is the natural by-product of a free system. Alternatively, he can probably use the current US system to get care--if he understands how it works and what he needs to do to make his case fit requirements. The problem with socialism is that it takes what is a free-market function and turns it over to specific people empowered to make decisions for others. In other words, the government decision-maker, and not the free market, decide who gets what--and who has to do without.
Just what is "free market" about health care? You can't even go out and buy a penicillin tablet without going to someone, who is licensed by the state, to give him a cut of the dollars, then, should he agree with you and writes you a prescription you must take it to a state licensed pharmacy where a state licensed pharmacist will eventually give you the drug you need. Is that not the correct scenario? And you call that free market? It's already turned over to "specific people empowered to make decisions for others!" Namely, the insurance people. Namely the people I least want making decisions for me!
And yes, some treatments are unavailable as one ages. Shoulder surgery on a seventy year old for instance. In most cases it just ain't done. That is a single example and sure, if one is rich enough you might go to Porto Rico and pay to get it done. Of course, if you need a heart transplant and are "too old" going to a little country like that wouldn't guarantee you a donor.
You've made my case for a single payer system in spades! Instead of "turning it over to unnamed individuals empowered to make decisions for others, lets keep it within an organization that must play by the rules and who's board of directors I get to vote on!
Thanks for the link to Snopes on this sub jet! It would appear that the entire letter is so much male bovine excretion! However, people will frequently accept anything that is said rather than take the chance of having it prove false when it agrees with their basic thinking.
Also, it is unfortunate but surgery sometimes cannot be done on a candidate because they may not be healthy enough to be operated on. ( complications from anesthetic or infections that can occur post op can prove to be fatal to an elderly patient)
Save a Life, Stroke Signs
Also an article on diet might help reduce the risk of stroke here: