The cost of war

Thr these.
http://bcn.boulder.co.us/health/healthwatch/canada.html
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/He...Canada_KP.html




"Dude" wrote in message
...
Sandy,

The following externalities prevent our insurance system from working in
the
case of healthca

1. Forced coverage - you cannot buy insurance to cover what you want.
Regulations force coverage and non coverage based on state politics

2. Medicare is hard to compete with. Competing with the government is
just
silly, and most businesses don't want to try it.

3. Subsidy of employer based coverage through the tax code. This is the
big one, and most important one here. You cannot get health insurance
because you cannot buy a cradle to grave policy. Your employment
situation
forces you into groups based on job stays and inevitably forces changes in
policy throughout your life. Instead, you go from dependent of your
parents employment group or groups, to possibly a student group, to then a
number of employment groups, and then are put in the medicare group. At
each change serious government involvement and inefficiency prevent your
making any choices of importance, taking the market out of the situation,
and driving up costs in ridiculous ways.

So, you could, if you had paid into a policy for your entire life, have
built up enough reserve for at least one stint of heroic medicine to
extend
your life. This could easily be done for the amount that most workers pay
into the system now. Also, if you paid more directly, and were more
financially involved in price quality decisions for your care your health
cost would be much reduced. Instead, you likely have ZERO involvement
even
though you are the best person to police it on the scene.

4. State licensing. The licensing system is overly burdensome, driving up
costs

5. Tort. Defensive medicine is used because you cannot be allowed as a
patient to make decisions based on reasonable outcome expectancies. Also,
because you have no financial involvement, you just get ALL the tests.
Failure to give a test should not be automatic negligence if its not
called
for the presented systems, unfortunately, juries expect doctors to be
perfect.

6. Reverse price competition. Instead of competing on price and value,
the
present system is a strange maze of over and under payment negotiated
without any of the real customers being involved in the negotiation at
all.

7. Inability to refuse care. Emergency rooms cannot turn you away for
any
reason at all. While inability to pay is likely a good restriction, how
about we tell you that you are not eligible due to lack of need - GOODBYE.
Or, when you pester the ER all the time, and never pay, we send you away
for
consistent REFUSAL to pay.

8. Cost shifting of socialist systems from countries with government
healthcare to the US. These systems will begin to fail the day the US
forces the pharmaceutical companies into the same situation they force our
doctors into. Namely, you must charge the US government covered patients
the lowest price you charge anyone, or we throw you in jail. Now,
progress
in healthcare will virtually cease.

Sorry Sandy, I am not out in any field on this. I am just unwilling to
look
at the present system and accept it. It sucks. Really, the system we
have
is outside the stadium and it started with job based health insurance.
Socialist healthcare will not improve the system in the US for anyone
except
the working poor and stupid. 80% of us will suffer.

Your question assumes that someone would have no insurance until after
they
found they had cancer. Of course, no one will sell it to you then. That
would be stupid, and wouldn't work. But wait, that's what we have now.
Once you spend ALL your money, then you get Uncle Sugar to pay. Thus
rewarding lack of financial responsibility.

Lastly, your link does not support your statement, and is hardly
conclusive
at all. No findings were made on quality of care. Also, healthcare is
definitely NOT the largest contributor life expectancy. Sanitation, life
style, diet, and climate would all beat out health care. Your doctor can
add a year or two on average. Better living and genes can add decades.




"Sandy" wrote in message
...

"Dude" wrote in message
...
.

Just how does one save up for radical cancer therapy after you
retire
and
don't have company health insurance. No insurance company is going
to
insure you and if you do find insurance you can say goodbye to your
nest
egg
that you have been saving for all your life. Oh yeah, you get to
sell
your
house and give it to a doctor. What a great way to grow old. Just
when
you've finished working all your life, and through the luck of the
draw,
you
get to lose everything you own to the health industry. But, at
least
you
have your life, such that it is, living in a rental at a trailer
park.



One can buy his own insurance. The fact that you cannot get a decent
policy
is largely due to government interference in insurance.

Dude, you're a little out in right field on this one. What do you think
insurance is going to cost you after you have retired and had a bout
with
cancer? Either way it's going to cost you your house and everything you
have worked for all your life. This is where countries with socialized
medicine have it over the US. People live longer and pay less for
medical
care than in the US. Have a read.



http://news.sympatico.msn.ca/Health/...btitle=&abc=ab

"Sandy" wrote in message
...
Thr these.
http://bcn.boulder.co.us/health/healthwatch/canada.html
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/He...Canada_KP.html




Don't need to, rading your links I see that one is from the people's
republic of boulder while "third world traveler" has agenda just dripping
off of it.

Lets agree to disagree.

Just how does one save up for radical cancer therapy after you retire and
don't have company health insurance. No insurance company is going to
insure you and if you do find insurance you can say goodbye to your nest
egg
that you have been saving for all your life. Oh yeah, you get to sell
your
house and give it to a doctor. What a great way to grow old. Just when
you've finished working all your life, and through the luck of the draw,
you
get to lose everything you own to the health industry. But, at least you
have your life, such that it is, living in a rental at a trailer park.



One can buy his own insurance. The fact that you cannot get a decent policy
is largely due to government interference in insurance.


You are at least partly right. The bigger issue though is government
interference in the entire healthcare industry.


Bob Reed
www.kisbuild.r-a-reed-assoc.com (KIS Builders Site)
KIS Cruiser in progress...Slow but steady progress....

"Ladies and Gentlemen, take my advice,
pull down your pants and Slide on the Ice!"
(M.A.S.H. Sidney Freedman)

"RobertR237" wrote in message
...


Just how does one save up for radical cancer therapy after you retire
and
don't have company health insurance. No insurance company is going to
insure you and if you do find insurance you can say goodbye to your
nest
egg
that you have been saving for all your life. Oh yeah, you get to sell
your
house and give it to a doctor. What a great way to grow old. Just
when
you've finished working all your life, and through the luck of the
draw,
you
get to lose everything you own to the health industry. But, at least
you
have your life, such that it is, living in a rental at a trailer park.



One can buy his own insurance. The fact that you cannot get a decent
policy
is largely due to government interference in insurance.


You are at least partly right. The bigger issue though is government
interference in the entire healthcare industry.


Yep. Perhaps laissez faire is not the end all solution due to the percieved
cost of death, but lack of any market force is killing the whole thing.




Bob Reed
www.kisbuild.r-a-reed-assoc.com (KIS Builders Site)
KIS Cruiser in progress...Slow but steady progress....

"Ladies and Gentlemen, take my advice,
pull down your pants and Slide on the Ice!"
(M.A.S.H. Sidney Freedman)

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 05:18:07 -0700, "Sandy" wrote:

Just how does one save up for radical cancer therapy after you retire and
don't have company health insurance. No insurance company is going to
insure you and if you do find insurance you can say goodbye to your nest egg
that you have been saving for all your life. Oh yeah, you get to sell your
house and give it to a doctor. What a great way to grow old. Just when
you've finished working all your life, and through the luck of the draw, you
get to lose everything you own to the health industry. But, at least you
have your life, such that it is, living in a rental at a trailer park.

**** happens. If I may be so bold, I would suggest that if you are
still alive to bitch about it on the internet, that the evil US health
industy earned every penny of your life savings.

================================================== ==
Del Rawlins--
Unofficial Bearhawk FAQ website:
http://www.rawlinsbrothers.org/bhfaq/
Remove _kills_spammers_ to reply

Just how does one save up for radical cancer therapy after you retire and
don't have company health insurance. No insurance company is going to
insure you and if you do find insurance you can say goodbye to your nest egg
that you have been saving for all your life. Oh yeah, you get to sell your
house and give it to a doctor. What a great way to grow old. Just when
you've finished working all your life, and through the luck of the draw, you
get to lose everything you own to the health industry. But, at least you
have your life, such that it is, living in a rental at a trailer park.

**** happens. If I may be so bold, I would suggest that if you are
still alive to bitch about it on the internet, that the evil US health
industy earned every penny of your life savings.

================================================= ===
Del Rawlins--
Unofficial Bearhawk FAQ website:
http://www.rawlinsbrothers.org/bhfaq/
Remove _kills_spammers_ to reply


One thing that most people don't consider regarding the cost of healthcare is
that very little of the money we spend on healthcare acutally goes into the
process of healthcare. When we make those monthly payments on our health
insurance, much of that money is acutally spent on the administrative cost of
the insurance system, not on healthcare. A percentage goes to the agent who
wrote the policy, a percentage goes to pay for those lavish Insurance Company
offices and all the personnel who fill them, a percentage goes to the profits
of the insurance company, an percentage goes to the outragious salaries of the
executives of the insurance companies, and finally, if anything is left, a
percentage goes to the healthcare industry.

Then the percentages for distribution are further diluted by government
regulations that overburden the healthcare industry. More codes to makeup for
the non-collectables that range for the insurance companies refusal to pay to
indigents who must be treated for free. The list goe on and on.


Bob Reed
www.kisbuild.r-a-reed-assoc.com (KIS Builders Site)
KIS Cruiser in progress...Slow but steady progress....

"Ladies and Gentlemen, take my advice,
pull down your pants and Slide on the Ice!"
(M.A.S.H. Sidney Freedman)