[travior]

PrimeDirective PrimeDirective:

Brenda Brenda:

]If you don't want the doctors taken away from the government funded hospitals (thus paid less) to private healthcare, you have to. It's what happened in Canada, the money-driven doctors went to the US because they can make more...

You make it sound like the doctors are bad for wanting to earn more for themselves and provide a better life for their families?

Also if a private run hospital manages to pay better wages and deliver better services for you then I fail to see why that success should be hindered?

The US system works fine for the uber-rich or the dirt-poor. Poor slobs like me that are caught in the middle pay through the nose. Even WITH my company's health plan, I have to pay $3700 for the birth of my twins. I'm lucky they didn't have to go into the NICU or it could have been up to $5600 because my wonderful private health plan's out-of-pocket limit was raised this year to save the company money.

If the US had a system like Canada, it would have cost me $0 (in Sask at least, not claiming to know what each individual province's policies are). I'm well aware that no system is perfect, but at least I wouldn't be having to juggle trying to pay enough each month to the doc's that can charge whatever they want because they can get away with it and you have no choice but pay them or have your house taken from you.

One example that pisses me off is the Anesthesiologist. The assistant performed the work and billed me $470. Her supervisor stood in the doorway and monitored the situation without performing any duties and his bill was $960! And that was for about 20-30 min of "work"!

The corporate health plan system does not function properly for the average working person.

[ManifestDestiny]

travior travior:

The US system works fine for the uber-rich or the dirt-poor. Poor slobs like me that are caught in the middle pay through the nose. Even WITH my company's health plan, I have to pay $3700 for the birth of my twins. I'm lucky they didn't have to go into the NICU or it could have been up to $5600 because my wonderful private health plan's out-of-pocket limit was raised this year to save the company money.

If the US had a system like Canada, it would have cost me $0 (in Sask at least, not claiming to know what each individual province's policies are). I'm well aware that no system is perfect, but at least I wouldn't be having to juggle trying to pay enough each month to the doc's that can charge whatever they want because they can get away with it and you have no choice but pay them or have your house taken from you.

One example that pisses me off is the Anesthesiologist. The assistant performed the work and billed me $470. Her supervisor stood in the doorway and monitored the situation without performing any duties and his bill was $960! And that was for about 20-30 min of "work"!

The corporate health plan system does not function properly for the average working person.

Tort reform. They charge so much cause of insurance costs for malpractice.

Changes these laws could reduce costs by 30 to 40 percent. It wont happen though!!!!!! The Democratic party is the Lawyer party. They are all lawyers Obama, Clinton,
etc. Lawyers and their PAC's donate $180 million to the Democrat party!!!!!

But everyone is worried about big OIL which donated $90 million to both parties!

http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.php?ind=K01

[bootlegga]

ManifestDestiny ManifestDestiny:

My company that I own gladly pays 975 dollars a month for Health insurance for my family of 4 so it comes out to 250 per month per person. thats freakin cheap in my book.

Not in my book...that's more than I used to pay all YEAR for coverage here in Alberta. Even families only used to pay $88 a month. No wonder there's so many people without coverage.

[bootlegga]

Scape Scape:

I've got to give it to you MD, you have more spine on this issue then the entire democratic senatorial body combined. They are clearly in the pocket of big pharma and the health care industry but let's be frank here private health care has its own version of wait lists in terms of no coverage. Let's take the example of MJ and his private doctor. He got the best treatment money could buy and still died at 50 because of Oxycontin and Demerol. His own money killed him and that doctor is taken out of circulation treating only one person when in a single day that doctor could have been doing rounds and treating hundreds of people in the same day and actually saving peoples lives.

Here’s the problem. As long as the health insurance industry is permitted to be the primary paymaster, the cost of medical care will continue to soar, not least because the insurance industry is so concerned about minimizing its own outlays that it is forcing the system to devote nearly 30% of every health care dollar spent to administrative costs (compared to 3-4 percent for Medicare, and even less for single-payer systems like Canada’s). That’s true whether there is a so-called “public option” government-run health insurance plan or not. Note that 30 percent of America’s $2.5-trillion health care bill per year is $750 billion a year, a sum which does absolutely nothing to make a single person more healthy or less ill. Even if one were to assume that the lion’s share of those administrative expenses were only for the private funded portion of America’s health care system, and for Medicare, the state-run but partly federally-funded portion that is famous for its paperwork mess, and the uninsured, who also consume a lot of paperwork when they do get treated at hospitals under mandated free-care provisions of at the expense of local governments, we’d be talking about 30% of $1.5 trillion, or about $450 billion going to administrative costs every year—still a staggering sum.

Donny_Brasco Donny_Brasco:

ManifestDestiny ManifestDestiny:

Lets say you are single you make $60,000 a year in Canada and lets say you pay 20,000 in income tax which is about right may a little low. and 20% percent of that goes to "free healthcare" that $4000 a year thats $333 dollars a month. So no its not good!

I pay $333 by your logic, you pay $975.

So for 3 times as much you are expected to live 5 years less than me.

Thats a real good investment. Honestly, please pay more maybe they can make that a more like 10 or 20 years less...

Excellent points!

[canadian1971]

ManifestDestiny ManifestDestiny:

GreenTiger GreenTiger:

We have many people who are dying because they can't get simple medical help. There are other problems that people have that are much more complicated. Up north they can get treated, in many cases down here your rooked.

And in Canada they have people dying cause they cant get medical help cause they have to wait!!!!

Better to die waiting for help then to die because you can not afford help.

[Chagrin]

llama66 llama66:

ManifestDestiny ManifestDestiny:

llama66 llama66:

$975 a month? wow! I pay nothing and I get just the same services. what you pay is not proportional to what you get,.

You might pay more a month for your "free health care" but you cant know this cause the goverment does not tell you how much of the taxes you pay per month goes towards healthcare.

Lets say you are single you make $60,000 a year in Canada and lets say you pay 20,000 in income tax which is about right may a little low. and 20% percent of that goes to "free healthcare" that $4000 a year thats $333 dollars a month. So no its not good!

Or maybe you are happy making peanuts pay very little in taxes and it does work out for you. So then you are a leach off the sweat of others!

Thats fine, stay with your broken piece of shit system, stay with the stem that forces families to re-mortgage their houses because they can't afford medical insurance, stay with the system that dumps the poor and destitute because they are poor and destitute and can't afford proper health care, I'd rather pay for health care and know I can go to the hospital anytime and know I wont have to worry than live in a nation that taxes its citizens and doesn't give a shit whether is citizens live or die. I'm happy that in Canada all citizens have access to health care. perhaps the its time you realized the USA is not as great as y'all make it out to be, in fact I'd rather live in Russia than the USA, at least there they take care of their citizens.

Your post here is void. I highly doubt you've been here or been treated medically in the US; you just go by what the media tells you as well as online sources. I'd place money on that. Pathetic. Your hatred for the US is apparent, and I guarantee you'd not choose to live in Russia.

[Brenda]

$1:

Tort reform. They charge so much cause of insurance costs for malpractice.

Changes these laws could reduce costs by 30 to 40 percent.

Good point, MD

[ShepherdsDog]

canadian1971 canadian1971:

ManifestDestiny ManifestDestiny:

GreenTiger GreenTiger:

We have many people who are dying because they can't get simple medical help. There are other problems that people have that are much more complicated. Up north they can get treated, in many cases down here your rooked.

And in Canada they have people dying cause they cant get medical help cause they have to wait!!!!

Better to die waiting for help then to die because you can not afford help.

dead is dead.

[travior]

I agree that the malpractice suits are a huge problem. I have nothing against someone sueing for a just cause, but the cost of the frivolous ones and the huge awards for some are rediculous. And, like you said, we have a bunch of lawyers making laws that only lawyers can understand and putting in loopholes that allow lawyers to screw over anyone they wish.

No system is perfect but what we have here leaves much to be desired. What is the point in having such a high standard of care if nobody can afford to access it? The pharmasutical industry is just as bad. The co-pay for just ONE of my wife's meds is $90 for a 3-month supply. And I have to get it mail-order and pay $90 at one time instead of $30 every three months (which is easier to save up at one time). If I buy at my local pharmacy the co-pay triples after 2 refills.

[ManifestDestiny]

bootlegga bootlegga:

ManifestDestiny ManifestDestiny:

My company that I own gladly pays 975 dollars a month for Health insurance for my family of 4 so it comes out to 250 per month per person. thats freakin cheap in my book.

Not in my book...that's more than I used to pay all YEAR for coverage here in Alberta. Even families only used to pay $88 a month. No wonder there's so many people without coverage.

And your taxes pay for what???? we know its not defence. You dont have to worry about that one.

[Brenda]

$1:

you just go by what the media tells you as well as online sources.

And I take it you have been critically ill in both countries and can tell us "the truth" from your own experience?

[ShepherdsDog]

$1:

And your taxes pay for what????

we haven't really figured that one out yet.

[ManifestDestiny]

canadian1971 canadian1971:

ManifestDestiny ManifestDestiny:

GreenTiger GreenTiger:

We have many people who are dying because they can't get simple medical help. There are other problems that people have that are much more complicated. Up north they can get treated, in many cases down here your rooked.

And in Canada they have people dying cause they cant get medical help cause they have to wait!!!!

Better to die waiting for help then to die because you can not afford help.

You make alot of sense!

[ManifestDestiny]

bootlegga bootlegga:

I pay $333 by your logic, you pay $975.

So for 3 times as much you are expected to live 5 years less than me.

Thats a real good investment. Honestly, please pay more maybe they can make that a more like 10 or 20 years less...

$1:

Excellent points!

Only if they were true!!!!!! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... expectancy

[Chagrin]

Brenda Brenda:

$1:

you just go by what the media tells you as well as online sources.

And I take it you have been critically ill in both countries and can tell us "the truth" from your own experience?

I do not claim to know about Canadian healthcare and its practices. I have been treated in the US and it is nowhere near as bad as what people make it out to be.

This llama guy seems to know everything about US healthcare. No one I know has ever had to re-mortgage their houses to pay for medical bills. That's just fucking absurd.