Equality for All!!!

[Care4all]

The first and easiest thing to do with healthcare is to place strict limits on liability awards and place caps on liability insurance costs to medical service providers.

Medical malpractice insurance is high, if this is what you are talking about when it comes to liability Navy....but limiting awards or even capping the cost for doctor's coverage will not help that much....neither deal with the underlying problem of what is causing the very high cost to doctors for their medical malpractice insurance or hospitals for their medical malpractice insurance...it may treat the sympton but not get to the root of what is causing the prices to go so high.

There are 2 main reasons malpractice costs go up and medical malpractice lawsuits or their awards amounts to less than 1% of the cost of our health care today...so limiting the amount that one can sue for or be awarded for the medical malpractice put upon them with injuries is NOT what is affecting the cost of health care to be so high(besides, why in the world would we have our government determine this cap for this industry while other industries are not so lucky to get the gvt to cover their asses in such a manner...that would be favoritism of our govt towards a private industry!)....well, not directly....the cost of medical malpractice insurance is prohibitting to many doctors, and could cause the price of healthcare to be higher through doctor's fees....

So, what are the reasons for malpractice insurance being so high...

1. Insurance companies invest in the stock market to make their overall profit goals....when the market does poorly, they raise their customers healthcare insurance, malpractice insurance prices to make more profit in these areas of their businesses to compensate for the lack luster market investments. they have made.

2. Less than 10% of all doctors have been involved in medical malpractice....these 10% that have been sued and financially punished for medical malpractice are REPEAT OFFENDERS...on average, they've had about 3-5 malpractice suits which they have lost and were at fault.

These are bad Doctors that should lose their license and the AMA should have a better system of getting rid of the few bad apples that they have...INSTEAD, these repeat offenders, keep their medical licence, go unpunished and continue to be sued for their medical malpractice put upon their patients.

This in turn makes medical malpractice insurance be extremely high for the 90% of the doctors that will never, ever commit medical malpractice, because they are left to help pay for the cost of what 10% of the Doctors commit, medical malpractice....

I think the AMA should get rid of the bad doctors instead of keeping them on, and this will solve a great deal of the problem...ya know?

And also, if the AMA won't do this, then the medical malpractice insurance providers should have the option of dropping their coverage or charging them, and them alone, the fees needed to cover their malparactice mistakes and not make the others getting insurance that are never at risk of committing malpractice, the guys holding the bag...or paying the bill.

I didn't address number 1. on the reasons....I am uncertain what can be done...but maybe if insurance companies were insurance companies and not so diversified in to investing in to mortgaged backed securies and stuff like that which huge corporations tend to get in to...we wouldn't have them raising our insurance costs to cover their own bad ass investments not related to health or malpractice insurance?

I gotta go for a bit...I will try to address some of your other solutions when I can later on Navy!

Care

 

[auditor0007]

I'd be happy too Nik , I have posted data on this several times in the past and will be happy to post it here. I fail to see how I was making a pronouncement about things however for your satisfaction here you are.

(AP) A letter from the Moncton Hospital to a New Brunswick heart patient in need of an electrocardiogram said the appointment would be in three months. It added: "If the person named on this computer-generated letter is deceased, please accept our sincere apologies."
Canadian Health Care In Crisis - CBS News

As reports over the last year from the Kirby Senate Committee and the Romanow
Commission attest, our Canadian Health Care System is in crisis...
http://www.cwhn.ca/resources/kickers/crisis.pdf

THE NHS is facing its biggest crisis in its history, it was revealed today.

The British National Health Service will be short of a massive £15billion after 2011 and may not ‘survive’ if left unchanged, a report by the NHS Confederation said.
Daily Express | UK News :: Crisis for NHS as £15bn shortfall revealed

The financial crisis facing the NHS must be tackled by cutting waste rather than frontline staff and services, warn experts.
Dire predictions of a huge budget shortfall of between £8bn and £10bn over the three years after 2011 will not leave the NHS unchanged, according to the NHS Confederation.

It says rising costs caused by an ageing population and new treatments will outstrip any modest increases in the pipeline.
NHS crisis should be tackled by cutting waste rather than staff say experts | Mail Online

I'd be happy to provide you with anything else you would like as well Nik but I didn't feel it needed to crowd up my original post.

Those systems are in crisis because they are underfunded, plain and simple. We pay double what they pay. They need to pay more. If they increased funding by 50%, their costs would still be 25% lower than our own, everyone would be covered, and they would have excellent service.

No one is suggesting healthcare is free, nor should we or can we make it free. However, it should be available to everyone and everyone should contribute at least a minimum toward their own care. By removing the insurance companies and their profit margin, there is no reason that actual funding to healthcare would be decreased, yet we would reduce costs by at least 25%.

The issue that those of you supporting our current system never address is the fact that the current system has driven costs out of control, and to top it off, there is no end in sight. Costs are estimated to double again, in real dollars, over the next 20 years. Then who will be able to afford healthcare? Healthcare costs will consume 50% of the average stiffs income. They won't be able to afford, nor will their employers.

And the worse it gets, the sooner we will move towards removing the insurance companies out of the picture. The bottom line is that our entire economy will collapse if healthcare costs reach the point of eating more than 30% of our GDP. There just won't be enough left to keep the rest of the economy going. Those who have gained wealth over the years will lose it all.

Fewer Small Business Owners Can Afford to Offer Healthcare, but Split on Solution

Based on this survey, the number of small businesses offereing healthcare insurance dropped by 32% because the cost is just too much. Guess what will happen as the costs continue to increase; fewer and fewer companies will offer health plans. We are headed to a real nightmare unless something changes soon.

 

[Fraulein Hilda]

Underfunded means they can't raise taxes fast enough to pay for them.

Because people were lied to about it the real cost.

Take note of that.

 

[Oddball]

Those systems are in crisis because they are underfunded, plain and simple.

Riiiiiight.

Whenever any big gubmint boondoggle falls flat on its face -like they all do- Plan A is always to bitch about the program being "underfunded"

See: Gubmint schools.

 

[Fraulein Hilda]

The only costs that are out of control right now is the cost of government. They are the only entity not shrinking commensurately with the economy.

 

[STAND4LIBERTY]

Well let's see first let me address your issues again Nik I posted Canada's issues with their healthcase system in a previous post for you to read. If you don't care to read it I cannot force you. The other question you addressed to me was about paying more. Our GDP is much higher than any nations on this planet. So it follows that as a result we are going to spend more on healthcare as we would on any other service in this country.

As for what both you and Care asked me about what I suggest on healthcare I have many suggestions and they do NOT include Govt. mandated healthcare or for that matter Govt. sponsored healthcare. To me this is an issue of service costs out of control. There are many factors that drive those costs among them as in my previous post the high costs of liablity insurance, high costs of illegal immigrant health care, lack of regulation where its needed. The first and easiest thing to do with healthcare is to place strict limits on liability awards and place caps on liability insurance costs to medical service providers. The second thing that can be done and thats quite obvious is as well, is to finally get the illegal immigration issue solved and take the stress off the states and private medical providers of having to provide literally billions of dollars annually in free medical care. Other things that can be done is set limitations and caps on costs for those insurance providers that offer health coverage from state to state. Still even more things you can do is provide tax incentives and grants to companies and Federal loans to companies wishing to go into the medical insurance business to promote competetion. All of these things can be done to drive down costs and make healthcare more affordable for everyone. Still more things you can do is address the Pharm. patent issue. For example, when the FDA issues a patent the FDA can require the companies offer a percentage of their drugs through state programs Free or at little cost to the consumer. You both asked me what I would do, well those are just a few things I suggest that could be done. the problem is that of the 47 million people that are not covered according to US Census how many of those don't need or require coverage or for that matter want it. Healthcare I'm afriad to break it to you both is not a "right" however the commerce and business of healthcare falls within the framework of what our Govt.s charter. I suggest rather than look to other nations who's healthcare systems are underserved because they are run by one entity, we fix the one we have and stop condemning companies because they happen to make a profit.

Navy, while I don't disagree with any of your specific recommendations unfortunately you're missing one piece of critical information that is required to make a valid assessment of them, specifically quantifying the actual regulatory costs. The government has no idea how much the current regulatory framework is actually costing the healthcare delivery sector, without such information one cannot possibly intelligently determine which regulations need to be removed or altered.

This is an ongoing problem with law makers most often they do not take the time to quantify the costs of regulation or examine potential unintended consequences prior to implementation, nor do they go back and continuously review and update existing regulation to remove any unforeseen costs or remove unintended consequences post-implementation. We have plenty of people running around saying "if only we got rid of regulation X it would be cheaper" ... unfortunately they cannot demonstrate the truth of their statements with hard numbers.

That is the sort of hard work that politicians seem unwilling to undertake.

 

[Care4all]

did i hear a parrot or two?

I wonder if they have any of their own solutions? Or do they just mock and repeat what they are told?

j/k

But come on guys and gals!!! Where is your critical thinking and where are your ideas on how to fix our looming health care problems???

care

 

[Fraulein Hilda]

Stop subsidizing group health insurance with tax breaks.

 

[Oddball]

Declare medical insurance sales a free field of interstate commerce, with which no state may interfere.

 

[Fraulein Hilda]

The drones' tunnel vision is that "someone" has to do "something" and that "someone" is only government.

 

[Care4all]

The drones' tunnel vision is that "someone" has to do "something" and that "someone" is only government.

well, you are not government, what have you done or can you do about it?

what has the private sector done about it the last 10 years other than raise the cost of it by double digits each year?

where are these NON GVT ENTITIES that you speak of that can fix it? why are they sitting on their hands?

care

 

[Oddball]

well, you are not government, what have you done or can you do about it?

what has the private sector done about it the last 10 years other than raise the cost of it by double digits each year?

What is the cost of Medicare/Medicaid versus what it was projected to cost back in '65??...G'head and adjust it for inflation.

Show your math.

where are these NON GVT ENTITIES that you speak of that can fix it? why are they sitting on their hands?

The non gubmint entities are only playing by the rules and regs foisted upon them by gubmint....Like the state laws that prevent individuals from shopping out of state for cafeteria-style coverage.

 

[Fraulein Hilda]

See, I know how you people operate. I know how this movie ends. You are a drone who thinks government has to do it or it won't get done.

Market forces have had nothing to do with the direction of health care costs in the past 10 years.

Except Lasik. Has it gotten cheaper or more expensive?

 

[Oddball]

Market forces have had nothing to do with the direction of health care costs in the past 10 years.

Except Lasik. Has it gotten cheaper or more expensive?

Don't forget plastic surgery and hair transplants.

 

[Fraulein Hilda]

All the procedures nobody expects somebody else to pay for.

 

[Care4all]

See, I know how you people operate. I know how this movie ends. You are a drone who thinks government has to do it or it won't get done.

Market forces have had nothing to do with the direction of health care costs in the past 10 years.

Except Lasik. Has it gotten cheaper or more expensive?

so what do you suggest are the measures that need to be taken to truly address the outrageous amounts of money we spend on healthcare and why do you think your measures will really work?

i am not set on any one solution or one means to address our problems...but i know, with every ounce of intelligence God gave me, that we do have major problems that have to be addressed and can;t be ignored.



care

 

[Fraulein Hilda]

See, I know how you people operate. I know how this movie ends. You are a drone who thinks government has to do it or it won't get done.

Market forces have had nothing to do with the direction of health care costs in the past 10 years.

Except Lasik. Has it gotten cheaper or more expensive?

so what do you suggest are the messures that need to be taken to truly address the outrageous amounts of money we spend on healthcare and why do you think your messures will trally work?

i am not set on any one solution or one means to address our problems...but i know, with every ounce of intelligence God gave me, that we do have major problems that have to be addressed and can;t be ignored.



care

Do you really know how market forces work? Tell me everything you understand about that in 25 words or less.

 

[Oddball]

so what do you suggest are the messures that need to be taken to truly address the outrageous amounts of money we spend on healthcare and why do you think your messures will trally work?

i am not set on any one solution or one means to address our problems...but i know, with every ounce of intelligence God gave me, that we do have major problems that have to be addressed and can;t be ignored.

care

"Outrageous amounts of money" by whose definition??

If the competitive pricing and subsequently falling costs of cash-and-carry procedures like Lasik, plastic surgery, and hair transplants aren't proof enough of how returning medical services to a truly free market model will work, what evidence would you accept??

 

[Fraulein Hilda]

Is $100,000 an outrageous amount of money for a house or $1,000,000? Is $4/gallon for gas outrageous? How about $3/gallon?

If I sold tacos out of a cart at care4all's place of employment for $25 each because the owner of her company negotiated that, so that others could eat lunch for free, would care4all be smart enough to go down the block and see if she could get a taco cheaper?

 

[Oddball]

If I sold tacos out of a cart at care4all's place of employment for $25 each because the owner of her company negotiated that, so that others could eat lunch for free, would care4all be smart enough to go down the block and see if she could get a taco cheaper?

If you were being paid $25.00 from a third party for $3.00 tacos, which were in turn delivered to someone else, what would stop you from serving tacos that only cost you $2.00 and pocketing the difference??