Panda Bear MD on Single Payer
He writes so well, it almost makes me want to quit blogging.
But I won't. I'll just bow to his excellence.
The truth hurts socialist liberals more than a junkyard dog biting their scrotum.
Bravo.
Labels: links to greatness
posted by scalpel at 8:10 AM
13 Comments:
Great article. So well said, and so frighteningly true. Thanks for sharing this. I've had to expand my list of new best friends by one.
A horrible day in nursing school, c. 2002: The day the professor led a chant in our healthcare policy class...
Who wants universal coverage?
MEEE!
When do you want it?
NOWWW!
The girl from Canada walked out of the lecture in protest, having lived through the socialist system (where her grandpa went to Detroit for heart surgery, for example), and so did I. Half of the class was silent and bewildered, the other remaining half participated in the chant.
People here think 'universal health care' would be the same as our current system with no ill effects like lost jobs from increased taxes shortage of EVERYTHING from increased demand. We are so used to the best that we can't fathom anything else.
I think we need to look at some form of universal health care.
I've read that one major flaw in the universal health care system concerns the waiting time you have to go through before you can obtain care. The insurance companies are already creating this by throwing up roadblocks to deny access to health care. Consumers must jump through many hoops to get what they need, and each hoop comes with a copayment. I have health care insurance, but I can't afford the copays, so you might as well say I don't have any insurance at all. Our system is a shame. The doctors aren't paid what they are worth, and the patients are getting the shaft. Universal health care may not be perfect, but for many people, it's a better option than what we have now. I think a lot of people will start looking at universal health care differently as they get older, and are denied insurance coverage based on their age and pre-existing medical conditions.
MJ
We do have universal health care for people as they get older, it's called Medicare.
And I have never seen anybody, ever, turned away from any hospital where I have ever worked for any reason whatsoever except that medically, they did not need to be admitted.
The idea that the uninsured have no access to medical care is a myth for, although this was not the stated intent of EMTALA, the practical effect is that anybody can present to any hospital, from the Mayo Clinic to Tangipahoa Parish General Hospital, for any reason and they will receive exactly the same treatment any other patient regardless of their ability or their intent to pay.
They don't even have to be citizens or legal residents, either.
I once had the last honest poor man in the state as a patient. He sincerely did not want a heart cath because he could not pay for it. I couldn't help laughing, and, after I apologized profusely explained that if he actually payed for his medical care, he would be one of the first uninsured patients who ever did and they would probably wouldn't know what to do with his check.
Panda Bear:
It's true that patients coming into a ER can't be turned away, but access to care is slowly being taken away from the poor and middle class. Sure, there are programs that will pay for care, but there are fewer doctors that are willing to take patients covered under these programs because the payment they receive doesn't cover the cost of services.
You are missing my point about the issue of private health
insurance. Insurance comapanies are "cherry picking" patients, and weeding out the older patients with preexisting conditions so they can save money. I'm seeing this with my own health insurance at work. This year, my employer is "asking" employees to give sample of blood for "screening." Next year, giving blood is going to be a requirement. The cost of insurance is going to based on our test results. I forsee a time when employees will not be able to buy insurance based on developing health conditions. I also believe as baby boomers start swamping the health care system, Medicare will collapse and private companies will throw up more roadblocks in an order to save money. So much for our Golden Years.
Um, Mother Jones....my co-pays are $15 for an office visit and $11 for prescriptions, not including diabetic testing stuff, which is free. Maybe you guys need a union there or you need to upgrade to the better plan. No one asks about pre-existing conditions. The cost for my family plan is about $240/month.
Universal health care, as was previously mentioned, does exist in the ER. There are always sliding-fee clinics for the uninsured and whatnot if you live in a big city. I tell people about those Minute Clinics that are in grocery stores for things like earaches, sore throats, pink eye, and UTIs (most of what young, uninsured people present to the ER for anyway). I used those when I was uninsured....costs $30 for the NP visit and tests.
Medicare will collapse and private companies will throw up more roadblocks in an order to save money.
So the solution to Medicare collapsing is adding more government services/exponential tax increases? I don't get your logic. If it doesn't work now...we need MORE of it?
Well, guys, it’s obvious that we are going to have to agree to disagree on this one because we apparently aren’t in the same boat. My middle class boat is sinking. Nurse Kelly, I really wish we did have some sort of collective bargaining unit representing our interests at the hospital. My husband and I spend hundreds of dollars each month on health care expenses (copays for medications and doctor visits to the doctor) and I’m afraid that we will not have access to health insurance within the next couple of years due to our age and pre-existing health conditions. I advise everyone not to get old. And in regards to my comment about Medicare: I’m saying things need to be restructured before the system crashes. I’m not suggesting that we add onto a system that is ready to implode. We need to take a whole new look at things because, from my viewpoint, things aren’t looking good.
MJ
As we all get older, our healthcare usually costs hundreds (or in some cases thousands) of dollars per month. Some of us cost much more than we are putting into the system. There is no getting around that. The older we get, the more services we utilize and the more expensive it becomes. If you are not wanting to spend those hundreds of dollars, then who the heck do you expect to pay for your healthcare? And why should they?
Getting old may be frustrating, expensive, and scary, but it's better than the alternative.
I like the HSA concept, btw. It covers the major medical issues, protects against a catastrophic illness/injury, and allows most people to save enough over the course of their healthy young lives to better prepare them for their higher expenditures in their less healthy old lives.
Hi Scapel:
I see the pros and cons of HSA. The up side: tax breaks sound good and you don't have to deal with pinhead insurance companies that don't care if you live or die, as long as it doesn't cut into their profit margin. The downside: I don't know how people with little money will save for their health care needs when they can't afford the basics such as food and shelter. HSA may be the wave of the future-the concept is promising-but some of the bugs still need to be worked out.
I am willing to pay for my health care, but there may come a time when I'm no longer able to do so. And yes, that's scary.
MJ
Patients may not be denied health care at the emergency room area. If you go there and you are having a stroke or heart attack you will get the million dollar work up. But, if one had the means to pay for health care up to that point, meaning, dr. visits and medications, they may not need that million dollar work-up and treatment.
Seems to me that covering a few BP meds a month would be alot cheaper, on taxpayers, than paying for years of care for a stroke victim. Your ERs do not hand out monthly prescriptions for BP or heart meds. I know of NO ERs that would allow a person to come there, each month, just to get their maintenance medications.
Cathy, believe it or not, there is probably no correlation between access to health care (by access I mean having insurance) and health. If all it takes is a few BP meds and a doctor visit now and then, people who are interested in their health will pay the relatively inexpensive cost of a yearly doctor visit and a few cheap meds. People who are not, won't and having insurance, free or otherwise, is in no way the same as leading a healthy life or caring about health.
Most of the incredibly sick patients I see, usually sick as a result of lifestyle choices (smoking, eating, not exercising)have had some of the best access to primary care in the world through the ruinously expensive health benefits typical of GM, Ford, and the other big auto manufacturers (a lesson in itself in the perils of Single Payer) and it seems to have made no difference in the trajectory of their bad health.
See my point? If all it takes is a few cheap meds, why shouldn't people pay for them out of pocket?
In other words, what you're proposing is a type of blackmail: "Pay for my cheap medications now leaving me more money to upgrade my cellphone every six months or I'll get really sick later on and cost you a ton of money."
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