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What hell is wrong with health care in the States!?!

Everything is wrong with health care in this country. And if you're lucky, you can be one of the insured who pays $45-100 per month in premiums to have the insurance company flat out refuse to pay for a dammed thing you need to have done.
 
Alpha Romeo said:
Quit your bitching. I find that there is something wrong with this story. 45K for illnesses like that dont make sense. Unless she had surgery...which the article doesnt specify.
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Regardless of the facts of that specific article, there are serious, undeniable, and simply disgusting problems with American health care -- mainly the lack thereof for those most in need. The lack of universal health care is pathetic, immoral, and embarrassing.

My mother had to declare bankruptcy after my childhood diagnosis of juvenile diabetes and subsequent hospitalization. When parents have to go bankrupt to keep their children alive in a nation as wealthy as ours, there is a serious problem.
 
Everything, because the term "Socialism" is frowned upon as if it's a bad
thing(well for rich money grubbers it is) and so Conservatives use it in their
scare tactics.
 
I've never known anyone who had a problem with their health coverage. I'm sure it has happened... but never to anyone that I have known (*knock on wood*).
 
Very little is wrong with healthcare. You find a place to work that has insurance and you work there. Or start a business and pay for your own. Although if we stopped giving it away to people who are in the country illegally it would certainly be less expensive.
 
Gertch said:
Very little is wrong with healthcare. You find a place to work that has insurance and you work there. Or start a business and pay for your own. Although if we stopped giving it away to people who are in the country illegally it would certainly be less expensive.
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So people who are unable to work jobs with benefits don't deserve health care? Or should we require that all employers provide coverage for workers, both part-time and full-time?
 
Health care in the U.S. is screwed up, no doubt. There are many, many reasons.

1) Health Insurance is not required, the way it essentially is for you. For example, imagine car insurance. It's required to drive. Now, imagine if some people didn't have it, but everyone's car still got fixed. What's gonna happen to the rates of the people who pay? They'll go up. Strike 1

2) MOST health insurance comes from people's employers, so the cost is essentially invisible. This leads to the problem where people get the "I have to have the best" mentality. Now, obviously, some treatments are going to be expensive and you have to have them, but there are many times when cheaper ones will do but people insist on the "best" treatment possible since they don't really see the full cost of that. In other words, we're not frugal about it. To bring back the car analogy, imagine if EVERYONE wanted BMWs for all driving tasks, no matter their actual need. Strike 2

3) And strike 3 is that we're all freaking terrified of fixing EITHER #1 or #2! I could write another whole essay on that, but the short version is that there are fixes for both of those problems but the average citizen can only imagine the worst, dumbest fixes. So that's what we imagine and we crucify any politicians that suggest fixing either of these problems.
 
thestrangequark said:
My mother had to declare bankruptcy after my childhood diagnosis of juvenile diabetes and subsequent hospitalization. When parents have to go bankrupt to keep their children alive in a nation as wealthy as ours, there is a serious problem.
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Not to rub it in, or anything, but at 24 I was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes...juvenile...after a bout of acute viral pancreatitis. I spent over a week in hospital...didn't cost me a dime.
 
T'Baio said:
thestrangequark said:
My mother had to declare bankruptcy after my childhood diagnosis of juvenile diabetes and subsequent hospitalization. When parents have to go bankrupt to keep their children alive in a nation as wealthy as ours, there is a serious problem.
Click to expand...

Not to rub it in, or anything, but at 24 I was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes...juvenile...after a bout of acute viral pancreatitis. I spent over a week in hospital...didn't cost me a dime.
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And it continues to cost me several hundred dollars a month just to stay alive. :borg:
 
T'Baio said:
That would cost me...NOTHING!
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True dat my Canadian brotha :p

I'll pay my taxes...I've gotten more than my money's worth in health care. And no, we don't have long wait lines or sub standard care thank you very much...my mom was a cancer survivor (she died from complications from diabetes...had been cancer free for 10 years) and my dad is a cancer survivor (cancer free for 7 years) because they were caught early and effectively...and it didn't cost them or me as their child one red cent.

:techman: I love my country
 
Gertch said:
Very little is wrong with healthcare. You find a place to work that has insurance and you work there.
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And THIS is the #1 problem with our country today. Through health-costs we have KILLED entrepreneurship, which is what grows the economy and made us great in the first place.

I used to own a business, but I gave it up solely because of healthcare. Now I sit in a cubicle all day, not adding much to the economy one way or the other.

And I find it MADDENING to see comments like this where people not only accept the death of our economy, but seem to actually be cheering it on as the "way things should be." Really??
 
thestrangequark said:
And it continues to cost me several hundred dollars a month just to stay alive. :borg:
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Unfortunately, insulin and needles and lancets and BG strips and such are not covered by government health care. But that is taken up by other insurance, which most employers are required to pay...I believe if you're a business with more than ten full time employees, you have to pay health benefits. I get insurance through the university I go to. All students are required to have health care, it's added to your tuition but is only $100 a year...and that covers everything. So it's really cheap.

I love my country.
 
thestrangequark said:
So people who are unable to work jobs with benefits don't deserve health care? Or should we require that all employers provide coverage for workers, both part-time and full-time?
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Hey, slow down. I didn't know we required a 20 page detailed report with each post as to what should be covered and what not.

Many states have programs that cover low income/disability citizens. And in Mass the wonderfully caring Democrats force you to have healthcare or penalize you monetarily. I guess that makes it easier to buy it. You know, new math ... or something.
 
I'll tell you what's wrong with it. Go to your doctor's office and you'll see it. Clocks, pens, mouse pads, notepads, pen holders, foam stress relievers that you squeeze in your hand and everything else schwag-like that can be printed upon with a drug's name.

How much do you suppose drug companies invest to make these little gizmos and gadgets just to give to and sell their wares to the doctors?

They spend undoubtedly millions of dollars on these products and they just up and give them to doctors' offices just to promote their product.

If they didn't make these things, do you think the price of prescription drugs would go down? Do you think they'd be able to send that much many more malaria and TB drugs to third-world countries?
 
Trippy said:
T'Baio said:
That would cost me...NOTHING!
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True dat my Canadian brotha :p

I'll pay my taxes...I've gotten more than my money's worth in health care. And no, we don't have long wait lines or sub standard care thank you very much...my mom was a cancer survivor (she died from complications from diabetes...had been cancer free for 10 years) and my dad is a cancer survivor (cancer free for 7 years) because they were caught early and effectively...and it didn't cost them or me as their child one red cent.

:techman: I love my country
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You know what - you two are 100% correct. I hope you would help me encourage all the enlightened progressive liberals to join you in Canada so they can enjoy the benefits of universal healthcare. :techman:
 
Gertch said:
thestrangequark said:
So people who are unable to work jobs with benefits don't deserve health care? Or should we require that all employers provide coverage for workers, both part-time and full-time?
Click to expand...
Hey, slow down. I didn't know we required a 20 page detailed report with each post as to what should be covered and what not.

Many states have programs that cover low income/disability citizens. And in Mass the wonderfully caring Democrats force you to have healthcare or penalize you monetarily. I guess that makes it easier to buy it. You know, new math ... or something.
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My point is that by not investing in a true universal health care system we are creating a society in which the worth of a person's life is directly tied to his income.
If you've ever had any experience with the feeble government aid offered to (some of) those with low incomes and disabilities you'd know that it's horrifyingly inadequate, inefficient, and unacceptable.
 
The crooked insurance industry. We have the best health care in the world if you have money. Without money though you might as well be getting treatment from a witch doctor.

Jason
 
Gertch said:
You know what - you two are 100% correct. I hope you would help me encourage all the enlightened progressive liberals to join you in Canada so they can enjoy the benefits of universal healthcare. :techman:
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Heaven forbid there be liberals in the United States! :eek:

:p

Oh ya, the majority of Americans voted for one :D
 
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