Blaize

http://www.41nbc.com/news/national-n...il-health-care

Guy walks into a bank, hands them a note demanding $1, then sits in the lobby waiting for the police to arrive. He did it because he has a couple of slipped discs, and various other medical problems and the US doesn't give a **** about their own. This is the sort of thing we should be ******* ashamed of. He is playing the system and I am sure a few of you will start yelling about it, but the real travesty is that he has to. The entire civilized world has governments that exist to protect the citizenry, except the USA. There the govt is there to protect business. Healthcare is a business, and national health care is nowhere near as profitable as a private system.

So **** poor people.

buffon01

iTrader: (9)

You done did it now... here come

Scrappy Jack

iTrader: (2)

I'll ignore most of the (willfully?) ignorant trolling rant in the OP and talk about the article linked.

The article says nothing about what other options he explored or whether he attempted to utilize any of the numerous state and Federal welfare options for the indigent that do exist in this country. It also says nothing about how he got in to his current financial situation, or the specifics of it.

It does seem to say that he believes he will have enough money coming in from Social Security to pay for beachfront living, though.


There are lots of things wrong with American health care but there are more things right with it. It needs a revamp, not a complete takeover.

hustler

iTrader: (6)

Coming from a man who pays $240/month for awesome healthcare, and a father who's slowly dying on the state's dime...I bet he and my father wish the had a healthcare policy.

turotufas

iTrader: (7)

I heard it was $1,000,000.

shuiend

iTrader: (24)

There have been a lot of blog posts circulated around about this. Apparently people have done some snooping and it was found it he has a few local options that would have provided him with free health care. He was not signed up for any of them.

hustler

iTrader: (6)

The real tragedy is the lack of work-ethic to utilize the available healthcare. Wow, almost like a patterns that's destroying America. Hopefully Geitner can raise my taxes and the ultra-rich $250k households to pay for this lack of work ethic.

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

Americans pay the exact same amount of Canadians for health care. Canadians pay for it through taxes, Americans have the choice to purchase it or not.

I'd go into this further, but i have SC2 to play. and its my birthday.


not a bad system if this is an extreme case and happens quite un-often.

18psi

iTrader: (76)

HBD Brainey

Scrappy Jack

iTrader: (2)

So... I just figured out total cost of my employer-provided health insurance (employer + employee portions). In Germany (a nation often lauded as a compromise between the British and US systems), I believe I would have to pay something like 15% of my AGI towards the public insurance fund. I currently pay less than 7%.

I'm not saying that is right or wrong, just a data point. I had not calculated that previously. I wonder how many Americans are even aware what portion of their health insurance they pay or what amount (on an absolute basis) their employers do.

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

taxes as percent of GDP is 35% in Canada. it's 25% in USA. factor in private healthcare costs and it's 35%...

sixshooter

iTrader: (12)

Lazy **** could work 30hrs a week at the Waffle House and be eligible for really good health insurance. As a company, they have fantastic healthcare benefits. Many of the rough looking folks that work there stay for so many years for the health benefits for themselves and their children. And yes, they have a dental plan...

phillyb

iTrader: (8)

relevant

Scrappy Jack

iTrader: (2)

As bad as it is, I have to think that a Medicaid bed is better than a prison bed.

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

US Healthcare trivia:

1. Tiny little France and Germany have more competition among health insurers than the U.S. does right now. Amazingly, both of these socialist countries have less state regulation of health insurance than we do, and you can buy health insurance across regional lines -- unlike in the U.S., where a federal law allows states to ban interstate commerce in health insurance.
   
2. U.S. health insurance companies are often imperious, unresponsive consumer hellholes because they're a partial monopoly, protected from competition by government regulation. In some states, one big insurer will control 80 percent of the market. (Guess which party these big insurance companies favor? Big companies love big government.)
   
3. Not only is Medicare bankrupt, but it is extremely limited in whom and what it covers. If Medicare were a private insurer, it would be illegal in many states for failing to cover hearing aids, podiatry, acupuncture, chiropractic care, marriage counseling, aromatherapy and gender reassignment surgery.
   
   Moreover, Medicare payments aren't enough to pay the true cost of those medical services it does cover. With Medicare undercutting payments to hospitals and doctors for patients 65 and older, what keeps the American medical system afloat are private individuals who are not covered by Medicare paying full freight (and then some). That's why you end up with a $10 aspirin on your hospital bill.
   
4. The only reason you can't keep -- or often obtain -- health insurance if you move or lose your job now is because of ... government intrusion into the free market.
   
   You will notice that if you move or lose your job, you can obtain car and home insurance, hairdressers, baby sitters, dog walkers, computer technicians, cars, houses, food and every other product and service not heavily regulated by the government.
   
   Federal tax incentives have created a world in which the vast majority of people get health insurance through their employers. Then to really screw ordinary Americans, the tax code actually punishes people who don't get their health insurance through an employer by denying individuals the tax deduction for health insurance that their employers get.
   
   Meanwhile, state governments must approve the insurers allowed to operate in their states, while mandating a list of services -- i.e. every "medical" service with a powerful lobby -- which is why Joe and Ruth Zelinsky, both 88, of Paterson, N.J., are both covered in case either one of them ever needs a boob job.
   
5. In 2004, 42.6 percent of all babies born at taxpayer expense in California were born to illegal aliens, according to a state report on Medi-Cal-funded deliveries. In hospitals close to the Mexican border, the figure is closer to 80 percent.
   
   Hospitals across the country are going bankrupt because the federal government forces them to provide free services to illegals. This situation appears to have angered some segment of the population, in particular, American citizens who pay taxes to support the hospitals, but then are forced to spend hours writhing in pain in hospital waiting rooms.
   
6. Although the United States has a higher incidence of heart disease, cancer and diabetes compared to Europe -- because of lifestyle choices and genetics -- it also has better survival rates across the board for all these medical problems.
   
   A European study found that, compared to 18 European countries, the U.S. had strikingly higher five-year survival rates in all 12 cancers studied, except for one: stomach cancer. Even there, the survival rates were close -- and the difference was attributed to the location of the cancer in the stomach.
   
   For all types of cancers, European men have only a 47.3 percent five-year survival rate, compared to 66.3 percent survival rate for American men. The greatest disparity was in prostate cancer, which American men are 28 percent more likely to survive than European men.
   
   European women are only 55.8 percent likely to live five years after contracting any kind of cancer, compared to 62.9 percent for American women.
   
   In five cancers -- breast, prostate, thyroid, testicular and skin melanoma -- American survival rates are higher than 90 percent. Europeans hit a 90 percent survival rate for only one of those -- testicular cancer.
   
   Most disturbingly, many cancers in Europe are discovered only upon the victim's death -- twice as many as in the U.S. Consequently, the European study simply excluded cancers that were first noted on the death certificate, so as not to give the U.S. too great an advantage.
7. On that note, American women are most likely to have received a Pap smear or a mammogram in the past two years
8. America has the most advanced equipment per capita, highest paid doctors, most advanced research.
9. If you get injured in malpractice, you can sue like crazy.

here's one interesting quote from it: "For instance, in France, people with long-term diseases get 100% coverage (similar to, say, Medicare for patients with end-stage kidney diseases). The government proposed trimming coverage not directly related to a patient's primary illness -- a sore throat for someone with diabetes, for example. The proposal created such public outcry that French Health Minister Roselyne Bachelot later said the 100% coverage rule was "set in stone."

buffon01

iTrader: (9)

What about healthcare and medicare/medicaid fraud? I too often see individuals with bullshit injuries that attend these pain management facilities and said facilities charge about $2k per week for 30 minute daily massage therapy.

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

yep. hurts the system. Wouldn't happen if healthcare was truely in a free market.

JasonC SBB

B..b.b.b...bb..bbut, the free market is evil! Evil capitalist pigs are driven by profit! The gov't must keep them in line!

Braineack

iTrader: (62)

yep.

Like this:

chicksdigmiatas

iTrader: (11)

Coming from a guy whos country banned guns then had it ravaged by ******** because the citizens could not defend themselves. More government equals better clearly. Brainey put some awesome facts on the table which are true. Where has socialized medicine saved anyone? My father-in-law is an anethisist at a hospital in a small town in TN. He constantly gives certain surgeries to canadians that fly a small assed hospital in East TN that have to pay for it out of their pockets because the government is to cheap and won't give them what they need.