17-Pound, 4-Month-Old Baby Denied Health Insurance for Being Too Fat

[Emma]

 

[paperview]

i havent MADE a claim, emma
i ASKED a QUESTION

Then I suppose we wait for an answer

I wonder....will he tell us.


hmmm.

Isn't that nice.

I ask that question and Dive con neg reps me for it and tells me to "Fuck off."


How adorable.

 

[Modbert]

What's with all the "gotcha" questioning. Honestly, this is pretty simple:

1.) Our current Health Care System is a failure.

2.) Every other Western Country that is industrialized but TURKEY has some sort of public option. So unless the entire world is Socialist all of a sudden, something is up here.

3.) Things that involve human life such as Health Care in this case should not be for for-profit. How would people feel if the police force or fire force were for-profit? "Oh sorry, unless you pay us a extra 50%, we're not going to help come put out your blazing house fire."

4.) Health Care can have a non-profit solution even, however this is a case of putting Big Business over the American people. This is not a case of Protecting the Constitution or anything such as that. This is a case of protecting the Corporations bottom lines. Though I suppose an industry that combined with the drug companies has given over $1 trillion to lawmakers across the country in the last ten years don't need to say much except snap their fingers.

 

[DiveCon]

Then I suppose we wait for an answer

I wonder....will he tell us.


hmmm.

Isn't that nice.

I ask that question and Dive con neg reps me for it and tells me to "Fuck off."


How adorable.

yeah, whine about a neg rep some more
bitch

 

[DiveCon]

so ANSWER IT

 

[paperview]

I wonder....will he tell us.


hmmm.

Isn't that nice.

I ask that question and Dive con neg reps me for it and tells me to "Fuck off."


How adorable.

yeah, whine about a neg rep some more
bitch

You call it whining when someone exposes what an asshole you are.

That's OK. I can live with that.

 

[Ravi]

It cracks me up that so many think non-profits don't pay big salaries to their employees.

 

[Modbert]

It cracks me up that so many think non-profits don't pay big salaries to their employees.

Of course, it's like people who believe some charities don't pay their CEOs. What do people think they're doing it for? Out of the kindness of their heart?

 

[DiveCon]

Isn't that nice.

I ask that question and Dive con neg reps me for it and tells me to "Fuck off."


How adorable.

yeah, whine about a neg rep some more
bitch

You call it whining when someone exposes what an asshole you are.

That's OK. I can live with that.

ah, she projects again

 

[Si modo]

Isn't that nice.

I ask that question and Dive con neg reps me for it and tells me to "Fuck off."


How adorable.

 

[Emma]

so ANSWER IT

 

[paperview]

so ANSWER IT

Poor baby. Why can't he answer his own question?

We are on tetherhooks here.

 

[Modbert]

This is why I don't debate the health care issue as much as I use to on here. It either boils down to logical fallacies or personal attacking. And to think, I'm suppose to be the one who is young and immature according to some.

 

[Kat]

This is why I don't debate the health care issue as much as I use to on here. It either boils down to logical fallacies or personal attacking. And to think, I'm suppose to be the one who is young and immature according to some.

 

[JW Frogen]

what next...something has to be done.

I agree, I think the US should sell all obese babies to the Chinese for fuel.

Ms. Liberty has charged up her credit card, America has a huge trade deficit, something has to be done.

There are a lot of fat, useless babies in America who could be put to good use.

Tsk, tsk. Everyone knows obese babies are carbon-based fuel. Don't you care about the environment?

You have thrown me into a PC moral dilemma.

What to do but drink?

 

[Charles Stucker]

Blue Cross used to come into the hospital after office hours and start sifting through patient charts (yep, they're allowed) looking for anything to justify forcing patients out of the hospital.

I don't give a fuck what people call me. Socialist, communist, marxist. Give it your best shot. I've been watching crap like this happen to these patients for over 25 years and I'm sick of it. We need a fucking single payer system. Period.

There was an Old Man,
Who broke his right hip,
A fall with élan,
Just one tiny slip.

Off to the doctor,
They rushed him with speed,
But what a shocker,
The hospital’s greed.

They fixed up the bone,
But passed on the knee,
No need to moan,
Twas just surgery.

They filled the old man,
With opiates galore,
His Medicare plan,
Their profits to soar.

And then when he died,
They exclaimed with false tears,
You know that we tried,
He had too many years.

Medicare and Medicaid were supposed to “Fix” health care. However those programs fall under the Government Corollary of the Theory of Supply and Demand (to wit, whenever the government Supplies money for a good or service, those who provide the good or service will Demand more money for said good or service)
We had a problem (People could not afford decent health care)
The government threw money at the problem (Medicare and Medicaid)
The problem grew worse
More government money does not appear likely to fix the problem.

The question seems to be; how do we, as a nation, fix health care in the United States? This is not a proper phrasing of the question. The proper question should be:
What are the properties of an ideal national health care system and what government policies would aid in striving toward that goal?

The ideal health care system would need
Universal Coverage
Affordable Prices
Uniform High Standards of Treatment

I will readily concede that the current system needs work in all three aspects, but also contend that all three are either difficult to define in a useful sense or elusive once defined, or both. Universal coverage is easy to define - everyone has access to treatment. It is also impossible to deliver, as the case of an individual who chooses to live twenty miles from the nearest neighbor illustrates. Affordable prices are difficult to define, as what one person can readily afford another might find onerous. Consider the wastrel who has massive credit card debt, to the point of barely being able to eke by and make minimum payments; they may find a $50 monthly fee would bankrupt them, even if they developed a chronic ailment requiring regular treatment that would fairly cost the provider over $2000 each month. Treatment standards are debated among professionals; what one calls the best that can be done another might dismiss as quackery.

Begin with an observation from a insurance study which revealed 90% of malpractice suits originated with 5% of doctors. Get rid of those doctors; ban them from ever practicing medicine in the USA again. This has the dual effect of lowering prices (as malpractice rates go down) and increasing standards (by eliminating a large source of substandard treatment)
Having (at least partially) addressed Quality let us see what might be done about cost.
Put a cap on Lawyer earnings from malpractice suits, for example $10,000. My personal experience has been that when lawyers get involved the quality of health care drops, so this has the dual effect of lowering malpractice costs and again raising quality of care. Do not cap Victim reimbursement, just the amount the lawyer can gain.
Make it easier for aspiring Doctors to gain a degree by giving them a scholarship option - X years service in needy areas at lower cost and the government pays their school bills. The Government will need to watch closely to insure school rates don’t spiral up from the scholarships. This might aid in both reducing prices and increasing coverage.
I realize the cost of researching new medicines is unlikely to go down - it is profits which drive companies though the extremely costly phase of research and without those profits few new medicines would become available. Some changes in the FDA might reduce the costs, but my understanding is that the bulk of the expense lies in the actual research and jumping through FDA hoops adds only minutely to the final price. We may have to accept that new medicines are too pricey for common availability until a few years profits defray the amortized research costs, but it is also possible that, if the government monkey were removed from citizen’s backs they could give more to charitable funds that could make some of the new drugs available to some citizens.

My final conclusion is that there exists no panacea cure for the problems which face health care, but government money is apt to prove a cure worse than the ailment.

For those interested, the old man in the poem actually died because a quack of a physician prescribed a new antibiotic for a resistant urinary tract infection which was almost certainly nonexistent. The Doctor prescribed the medicine despite it carrying warnings not to give to patients with serious injuries (a broken hip), the elderly (he was 82) or patients with heart problems (the pacemaker in his chest should have been a clue). The doctor was clearly trying to milk Medicare for money. The game old bird died after months of trying to fight the effects of the drug, which destroyed his gastric balance. He had managed, after going home, to break the forced habit of opiates the step down facility used to keep him sedate, but could not regain the lost strength which the treatment had cost him and perished after months of struggle. All because the current government sponsored system does not work. He was my father.
Forgive me if I cannot endorse yet more Big Brother intervention.