The best healthcare in America is government run

[MadDog]

So now, you're admitting that Canada fixes the prices rather than negotiating. Of course that means you lied the first time. So what else have you lied about (or fabricated) today?

 

[DiveCon]

So now, you're admitting that Canada fixes the prices rather than negotiating. Of course that means you lied the first time. So what else have you lied about (or fabricated) today?

not only do they "fix" the price, they also subsidize it with tax dollars(Canadian $ of course)

 

[MadDog]

You're wrong, but then you work for them.

No, I worked in pharma. Past tense.

The pharmaceutical industry forbade bargaining for prescription drug prices as part of Medicare D. They now pay the per pill price for millions of pills. Other countries do have bargaining power.

Please tell more how a company can forbid anything in a government program.

On January 1, 2006, the federal government began providing insurance coverage for Medicare recipients' prescription drug expenditures through a new program known as Medicare Part D. Rather than setting pharmaceutical prices itself, the government contracted with private insurance plans to provide this coverage. Enrollment in Part D was voluntary, with each Medicare recipient allowed to choose from one of the private insurers with a contract to offer coverage in her geographic region. This paper evaluates the effect of this program on the price and utilization of pharmaceutical treatments. Theoretically, it is ambiguous whether the expansion in insurance coverage would increase or reduce pharmaceutical prices. Insurance-induced reductions in demand elasticities would predict an increase in pharmaceutical firms' optimal prices. However, Part D plans could potentially negotiate price discounts through their ability to influence the market share of specific treatments. Using data on product-specific prices and quantities sold in each year in the U.S., our findings indicate that Part D substantially lowered the average price and increased the total utilization of prescription drugs by Medicare recipients. Our results further suggest that the magnitude of these average effects varies across drugs as predicted by economic theory.

nber.org/papers/w13917


In a capitalist economy, high risk should come with high reward and low risk should come with low reward. That's how things work.

And where do you suppose those profits go? Either dividends to shareholders (which are low in the pharma industry) or they are re-invested, primarily for R&D and manufacturing facilities. Where do you think the money is going?

And if you don't think the pharma industry is high risk, just look at all the companies that are no longer around. Only 1 in 10,000 compounds ever makes it to the market place. Of those, it takes about $1.2 billion in R&D cost. And only 20 - 25% ever make back the cost of R&D.

So what would happen if you completely eliminated those profits and made all phama companies not-for-profit? You'd reduce US annual health care spending by 2.6%. Oh, and by the way, you'd reduce R&D spending to $0.

 

[Jon]

Are you EVER right about ANYTHING?

For the sixth year in a row, VA hospitals last year scored higher than private facilities on the University of Michigan's American Customer Satisfaction Index, based on patient surveys on the quality of care received. The VA scored 83 out of 100; private institutions, 71. Males 65 years and older receiving VA care had about a 40% lower risk of death than those enrolled in Medicare Advantage, whose care is provided through private health plans or HMOs, according to a study published in the April edition of Medical Care. Harvard University just gave the VA its Innovations in American Government Award for the agency's work in computerizing patient records.

You're comparing the VA to Medicare Advantage. Not the VA to all private health care, shit-for-brains.

You are the one with shit for brains.

"Medicare Advantage, whose care is provided through private health plans or HMOs"

Nice try, though.

Are you ever right about anything?

I'm sorry, where did I indicate that Medicare Advantage was not private? My statement is that your comparison is the VA to Medicare Advantage, NOT the VA to ALL private health care. God, you are stupid.

To answer your question, "Should the rich get the best health care?" The answer is, "People should get what they are willing and able to pay for."

 

[MadDog]

To answer the question, "Should the rich get the best health care?" My answer is that the government should not dictate what health care I can get and which I can't.


So what is Canada's approach, well in Quebec they acutally threatened to shut down a hospital because it was going to allow patients to use supplemental insurance to get care not included in the provinces plan. In other words, all care was reduced to the lowest common denominator.

 

[Bern80]

That was hysterical.

But the issue is not government run healthcare. This issue is a single payer system. A single payer system is what we need, but people in America are too stupid for that. We see a lot of this ignorance on display in this threat.

The rest of the world is smarter than we are on this issue.

Which would be a monoply. Explain to us all why a monopoly would be good way to provide health care.

How does a union get a better deal for its members?

Collective bargaining! Why are drugs cheaper in Canada? Because the government negotiates for everyone with the drug companies. In America the drug companies have the patients by the balls.

Likewise, which is a more efficient system, paying admin, marketing, and profit for 150 different insurance companies or paying admin alone with no marketing or profit for one insurance company that we all own together.

These cost efficiencies are why all the other Western democracies pay HAlf per capita what we pay for healthcare.

So if single payer is your goal. If monopolies are okay (noticed you didn't say the weren't) why does the single payer need to be the government? Why not just have all the insurance companies have congressional hearings and vote on one of them to be the nations health care insurer?

You can say the same thing over and over again about cost. COST IS NOT THE FUCKING PROBLEM YOU IDIOT. If the government runs you'll still need to pay admin costs, that won't go away no matter who does it. And as another poster pointed out if you want the U.S. to continue to provide drugs they will need money for R&D to do so (something drug companies do with the profits you revile so much). Cost doesn't make a lick of difference if your health costs are zero if you still can't get treatment or drugs when you need it. At some point you will need to recognize that. You're so fucking narrow minded to think all the health care issues are gonna be solved if we just make it cost less for the individual.

 

[elvis]

Which would be a monoply. Explain to us all why a monopoly would be good way to provide health care.

How does a union get a better deal for its members?

Collective bargaining! Why are drugs cheaper in Canada? Because the government negotiates for everyone with the drug companies. In America the drug companies have the patients by the balls.

Likewise, which is a more efficient system, paying admin, marketing, and profit for 150 different insurance companies or paying admin alone with no marketing or profit for one insurance company that we all own together.

These cost efficiencies are why all the other Western democracies pay HAlf per capita what we pay for healthcare.

So if single payer is your goal. If monopolies are okay (noticed you didn't say the weren't) why does the single payer need to be the government? Why not just have all the insurance companies have congressional hearings and vote on one of them to be the nations health care insurer?

You can say the same thing over and over again about cost. COST IS NOT THE FUCKING PROBLEM YOU IDIOT. It doesn't make a lick of difference your health costs are zerom if you still can't get it when you need it. At some point you will need to recognize that.

he never will recognize it. he's a shitstain.

 

[DiveCon]

How does a union get a better deal for its members?

Collective bargaining! Why are drugs cheaper in Canada? Because the government negotiates for everyone with the drug companies. In America the drug companies have the patients by the balls.

Likewise, which is a more efficient system, paying admin, marketing, and profit for 150 different insurance companies or paying admin alone with no marketing or profit for one insurance company that we all own together.

These cost efficiencies are why all the other Western democracies pay HAlf per capita what we pay for healthcare.

So if single payer is your goal. If monopolies are okay (noticed you didn't say the weren't) why does the single payer need to be the government? Why not just have all the insurance companies have congressional hearings and vote on one of them to be the nations health care insurer?

You can say the same thing over and over again about cost. COST IS NOT THE FUCKING PROBLEM YOU IDIOT. It doesn't make a lick of difference your health costs are zerom if you still can't get it when you need it. At some point you will need to recognize that.

he never will recognize it. he's a shitstain.

he's being given a run for that title by derek the moron

 

[Oddball]

So if single payer is your goal. If monopolies are okay (noticed you didn't say the weren't) why does the single payer need to be the government? Why not just have all the insurance companies have congressional hearings and vote on one of them to be the nations health care insurer?

You can say the same thing over and over again about cost. COST IS NOT THE FUCKING PROBLEM YOU IDIOT. If the government runs you'll still need to pay admin costs, that won't go away no matter who does it. And as another poster pointed out if you want the U.S. to continue to provide drugs they will need money for R&D to do so (something drug companies do with the profits you revile so much). Cost doesn't make a lick of difference if your health costs are zero if you still can't get treatment or drugs when you need it. At some point you will need to recognize that. You're so fucking narrow minded to think all the health care issues are gonna be solved if we just make it cost less for the individual.

It's like a Martian talking to a fungo, man.

 

[Darkwind]

1. Personal insult

Should only the rich receive the best healthcare?

Should you continue to allow Old Rocks to make you gag on his cock?

1. Personal insult

Should only the rich receive the best healthcare?

Strawman.

The rich are not the only ones who recdieve the best healthcare.

You continue to confuse insurance with the quality of services given.

Why are you so envious of the rich? This is America. If you want to have the best healthcare, go out and get rich and buy some.

 

[Oddball]

Strawman.

The rich are not the only ones who recdieve the best healthcare.

You continue to confuse insurance with the quality of services given.

Why are you so envious of the rich? This is America. If you want to have the best healthcare, go out and get rich and buy some.

Logic has already been tried.....Doesn't work on binary "thinkers" (for lack odf a better term).

 

[Darkwind]

Strawman.

The rich are not the only ones who recdieve the best healthcare.

You continue to confuse insurance with the quality of services given.

Why are you so envious of the rich? This is America. If you want to have the best healthcare, go out and get rich and buy some.

Logic has already been tried.....Doesn't work on binary "thinkers" (for lack odf a better term).

Yeah, I know.

I was just kind of curious. I mean, is the MD after My doctors name somehow different then the MD after a rich mans doctors name?

 

[garyd]

I've gone the VA Route in two different states. The first time I had a golf ball sized cyst removed from my right for arm by a guy who barely spoke english and who had apprently never heard of anesthesia that or they were out that day.

Oh and as for those in that systen thinking it's great, I've yet to hear a drowning man bitch about the quality or condition of the rope while he was still clinging to it in the midst of the sea. Oh and most of those guys are career soldiers. They think standing in line for hours is a normal part of life.

My last trip to my private physician I was in and out in 45 minutes. I've never been in and out of the VA in less than two hours and three to four is more usual.

When I was going to get my Kidneys x-rayed by the VA they wanted me to have an enema. The stuff they gave me to do the Job was clearly marked in bold "If you have or think you might have kidney disease do not use this product". So is this how Obama care plans on lowering costs? They're going to kill half the people that come through the door by giving them stuff they shouldn't have?

 

[Darkwind]

I've gone the VA Route in two different states. The first time I had a golf ball sized cyst removed from my right for arm by a guy who barely spoke english and who had apprently never heard of anesthesia that or they were out that day.

Oh and as for those in that systen thinking it's great, I've yet to hear a drowning man bitch about the quality or condition of the rope while he was still clinging to it in the midst of the sea. Oh and most of those guys are career soldiers. They think standing in line for hours is a normal part of life.

My last trip to my private physician I was in and out in 45 minutes. I've never been in and out of the VA in less than two hours and three to four is more usual.

When I was going to get my Kidneys x-rayed by the VA they wanted me to have an enema. The stuff they gave me to do the Job was clearly marked in bold "If you have or think you might have kidney disease do not use this product". So is this how Obama care plans on lowering costs? They're going to kill half the people that come through the door by giving them stuff they shouldn't have?

Very true. Great line about the rope...

 

[Skull Pilot]

More lies from the right.

A single payer healthcare system is the most efficient and the most fair. That is why every other industrialized nation has a single payer system, and they pay HALF per capita what we pay for healthcare, and get as good or better results. Those are the facts.

For profit healthcare is morally wrong. Pure and simple.

OK Let's make this clear.

Chris states that every other industrialized nation with some type of government run single payer system gets equal or better results than the current US system.

Five Year Survival Rates, Selected Countries and Cancers

View attachment 7859


Source: Arduino Verdecchia et al., “Recent Cancer Survival in Europe: A 2000-02 Period Analysis of EUROCARE-4 Data,” Lancet Oncology 8 (September 2007): 784-96.

So Chris tell us again how quality and results of foreign government run health care is equal to or better than our current system.

Interesting that you don't provide an actual link to that study, but something off a GOP website.

Of course that study also includes Eastern European countries like Slovenia, Poland, etc.. who don't have the wealth of say France or Sweden, so you aren't really comparing apples to apples or oranges to oranges.

Also one of the big reasons for the survival rates in the U.S. is that almost everyone over 65 has government sponsored healthcare, Medicare, so you may be proving my point!

the source is there. Look up the journal and get it.

And the same journal was used as a source for a Washington Times story

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/feb/18/pardon-the-interruption/

and if you don't like the EU average, just concentrate on the Norway and England numbers and tell me how that care is better than care in the US

 

[Skull Pilot]

And that Washington times piece is very interesting.

ATLAS: Pardon the interruption - Washington Times

As politicians, economists, popular media and an ever increasing list of others convincingly proclaim cures for the ills of American health care, we Americans are subjected to a stream of opinion deriding as utterly miserable our health-care system compared to the rest of the developed world.

Much of this chatter resonates with the public; many assume the arguments are sound and the expertise of the presenters profound because the calls for change are so ubiquitous and the topic so complex.

In their haste to address such serious challenges as escalating costs and the uninsured, many economists, government officials, insurers and academics alike are beating the drum for a far larger role for government in health care.

In this interlude between health czar nominees, and before we legislate government as the solution and final arbiter of medical care, it may be a good time to consider a few unheralded facts about America's health-care system. For instance, did you know:

(1) Americans have better survival rates from both common and rare cancers than Europeans? (Sources: Lancet Oncology, 7, No. 2 ( February 2006): 132-40; Verdecchia et al., "Recent Cancer Survival in Europe : A 2000-02 Period Analysis of EUROCARE-4 Data," Lancet Oncology, No. 8 (2007): 784-96.)

(2) Americans have significantly better survival rates from cancer than Canadians? (Sources: United States Cancer Statistics, National Program of Cancer Registries, Centers for Disease Control; Canadian Cancer Society/National Cancer Institute of Canada; also June O'Neill and Dave M. O'Neill, "Health Status, Health Care and Inequality: Canada vs. the U.S.," National Bureau of Economic Research, NBER Working Paper 13429, September 2007. Available at Health Status, Health Care and Inequality: Canada vs. the U.S..)

(3) Americans have better access to treatment for chronic diseases than Canadians? (Source: O'Neill and O'Neill, "Health Status, Health Care and Inequality: Canada vs. the U.S.")

(4) Americans have better access to preventive screening for major cancers than Canadians? (Source: O'Neill and O'Neill, "Health Status, Health Care and Inequality: Canada vs. the U.S.," Table 8.)

(5) A marker for inequality of access and quality of health systems, the "health-income gradient" (i.e., that higher incomes achieve better health and lower incomes mean worse health) for adults 16 to 64 years old reveals a more severe disparity in Canada than in the United States? (Source: O'Neill and O'Neill, "Health Status, Health Care and Inequality: Canada vs. the U.S.")

(6) In the United Kingdom and Canada, patients wait far longer than Americans (about twice as long, sometimes even more than a year) to see a specialist, have elective surgery like hip replacements or cataracts, or get radiation treatment for cancer? (Sources: "Waiting Your Turn, (17th edition) Hospital Waiting Lists In Canada"; Critical Issues Bulletin 2007; N. Esmail, Michael A. Walker MA, and M. Bank, Studies in Health Care Policy, August 2008; N. Esmail and D. Wrona "Medical Technology in Canada," Fraser Institute; Sharon Willcox et al., "Measuring and Reducing Waiting Times: A Cross-National Comparison Of Strategies," Health Affairs 26, No. 4 (July/August 2007): 1078-87; O'Neill and O'Neill, "Health Status, Health Care and Inequality: Canada vs. the U.S.," M.V. Williams et al., "Radiotherapy Dose Fractionation, Access and Waiting Times in the Countries of the U.K.. in 2005," Royal College of Radiologists, Clinical Oncology 19, No. 5 (June 2007, 273-286).

(7) Sixty percent of Western Europeans say their health systems need "urgent" reform? (Source: H. Disney et al., "Impatient for Change: European Attitudes to Health-Care Reform;" The Stockholm Network, 2004.)

(8) More than 70 percent of Germans, Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders and U.K. adults (all countries in the survey except the Netherlands, with "only" 58 percent) say their health systems needs either "fundamental change" or "complete rebuilding"? (Source: C. Schoen, R. Osborn, M. M. Doty, M. Bishop, J. Peugh, and N. Murukutla, "Toward Higher-Performance Health Systems: Adults' Health Care Experiences In Seven Countries, 2007," Health Affairs 26, No. 6 (2007): w717-w734.)

(9) Although much maligned by economists and targeted by policymakers, an overwhelming majority of America's leading physicians themselves recently listed the computerized tomography (CT) scan and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) as the most important medical innovations in improving patient care in the previous decade? (Source: V. R. Fuchs and H. C. Sox Jr., "Physicians' Views of the Relative Importance of 30 Medical Innovations," Health Affairs 20, No. 5 (2001): 30-42.)

(10) By any measure, the vast majority of all the innovation in health care in the world comes out of the U.S. health-care system? (Sources: "The U.S. Health Care System as an Engine of Innovation," in the 2008 Economic Report of the President, Chapter 4, Economic Research from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, Federal Reserve Archival Service for Economic Research; T. Cowen, New York Times, Oct. 5, 2006; Coburn et al., Heritage Lecture No. 1030, April 2007; T. Boehm, Journal of Medical Marketing 5, No. 2 (2005): 158-66; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, July 2002.)

Let's be careful about what we believe when we listen to all those health-care "experts" in Washington.

There are plenty of sources in that article for you Chris

So when you can tell me how every other industrialized country's health care is better than ours as you claim it is, get back to me.

Oh and don't forget to post all your sources.

 

[editec]

I've gone the VA Route in two different states. The first time I had a golf ball sized cyst removed from my right for arm by a guy who barely spoke english and who had apprently never heard of anesthesia that or they were out that day.

Oh and as for those in that systen thinking it's great, I've yet to hear a drowning man bitch about the quality or condition of the rope while he was still clinging to it in the midst of the sea. Oh and most of those guys are career soldiers. They think standing in line for hours is a normal part of life.

My last trip to my private physician I was in and out in 45 minutes. I've never been in and out of the VA in less than two hours and three to four is more usual.

When I was going to get my Kidneys x-rayed by the VA they wanted me to have an enema. The stuff they gave me to do the Job was clearly marked in bold "If you have or think you might have kidney disease do not use this product". So is this how Obama care plans on lowering costs? They're going to kill half the people that come through the door by giving them stuff they shouldn't have?

I think your story is bullshit.

Seriously I think you're making it up.

You had surgery without anesthesia?

I think that's a boldfaced lie.

 

[Jon]

I've gone the VA Route in two different states. The first time I had a golf ball sized cyst removed from my right for arm by a guy who barely spoke english and who had apprently never heard of anesthesia that or they were out that day.

Oh and as for those in that systen thinking it's great, I've yet to hear a drowning man bitch about the quality or condition of the rope while he was still clinging to it in the midst of the sea. Oh and most of those guys are career soldiers. They think standing in line for hours is a normal part of life.

My last trip to my private physician I was in and out in 45 minutes. I've never been in and out of the VA in less than two hours and three to four is more usual.

When I was going to get my Kidneys x-rayed by the VA they wanted me to have an enema. The stuff they gave me to do the Job was clearly marked in bold "If you have or think you might have kidney disease do not use this product". So is this how Obama care plans on lowering costs? They're going to kill half the people that come through the door by giving them stuff they shouldn't have?

I think your story is bullshit.

Seriously I think you're making it up.

You had surgery without anesthesia?

I think that's a boldfaced lie.

Removing a cyst is not considered major surgery. I had a sebaceous cyst removed on my inner thigh without anesthesia, local or otherwise. It's an outpatient procedure performed in a doctor's office, usually.

 

[AllieBaba]

My mom worked in a VA hospital for 10 years. She said the majority of doctors were shit.

Tell my clients that their healthcare, which doesn't provide dental, which requires long waits between visits, even for acute problems, is better than my blue cross/blue shield and dental plan.

They'd probably spit in your face.

 

[DiveCon]

My mom worked in a VA hospital for 10 years. She said the majority of doctors were shit.

Tell my clients that their healthcare, which doesn't provide dental, which requires long waits between visits, even for acute problems, is better than my blue cross/blue shield and dental plan.

They'd probably spit in your face.

BCBS is one of the best