America's border flooded by foreigners seeking better medical care

Discussion in 'The Green Room' started by Liet, May 27, 2009.

  1. Caedus

    Caedus Fresh Meat Formerly Deceased Member

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    It's quite intellectually dishonest to think that a decade old survey of Canadians who cross the border for care and a sob story of a million "California medical border hoppers" (no matter how much bleeding hearts want to insist otherwise illegals aren't Americans) who, in addition to being affluent enough to make frequent trips to Mexico, do so because of "cultural and linguistic barriers" constitutes an empirical anything. :borg:
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  2. steve2^4

    steve2^4 Aged Meat

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    I'm not sure what "non profit" is...

    My wife works for a non-profit hospital and they're building cardio towers that are empty and sending home nurses because of a low census.

    Also the major cost of administering insurance claims is due to multiple payers, different protocols etc.
  3. garamet

    garamet "The whole world is watching."

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    Or a consumer base that doesn't know the history of health insurance in the U.S. and doesn't realize how it's been corrupted.
  4. Uncle Albert

    Uncle Albert Part beard. Part machine.

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    I believe I said something about "educating themselves." My point stands. You aren't owed an uncorrupted system. It exists because we make it profitable, and the fact that it will be difficult and painful to reverse this trend without circumventing consent is no excuse to go interfering in private transactions of any kind.
  5. steve2^4

    steve2^4 Aged Meat

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    Under the Canadian system (single payer) hospitals are given a budget by the provincial govt and they submit no claims. Doctors are paid according to their patient base. The few claims they have to process are for Americans that wander across the border requiring hospitalization.

    I'll try to find a link.

    edit:

    link
  6. Ward

    Ward A Stepford Husband

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    Don't have to. My wife and I have already had that conversation with out doc. We had to face the insurance battles - not him. He just wanted his money because, ultimately, it was our responsibility. We got the insurance company to change.

    So, no dice with me.
    I'm not getting why you call it baby and bathwater but... The healthcare system in this country started out without any government involvement. People planned for their health needs knowing that they'd get sick eventually and realizing that life is, ultimately, a terminal disease.

    Great, we agree that turning over healthcare to the government is bad. Let's not give up trying to fix the problems and just wash our hands of the whole thing. Giving up is the surest way to continue to get screwed by a system that really doesn't care.
  7. Jenee

    Jenee Driver 8

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  8. Chris

    Chris Cosmic Horror

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    Oh yes it is.
  9. Ward

    Ward A Stepford Husband

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    And it's precisely that kind of funding that leads to not having advanced equipment to cover emergency needs. Horror stories that, according to the original post don't happen that often, really do happen for just that reason.
  10. Uncle Albert

    Uncle Albert Part beard. Part machine.

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    :doh:

    Where do their profits come from? People who have no choice in the matter?

    Deny them your business. Gather investors and start your own insurance company. Do not just sit on your fucking ass and demand that a solution present itself effortlessly. Until you try that, you're getting exactly what you deserve.
    :bang:

    What motivation is there for providing this service if nobody profits, and where does the money come from? Remember that you are responsible for your self and your health care.
  11. Uncle Albert

    Uncle Albert Part beard. Part machine.

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    Why? Because our culture is rearing generations of parasites who think they are owed a comfortable living where all of their needs are satisfied with no downside for them ?
  12. Ward

    Ward A Stepford Husband

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    There's nothing wrong with doing both. Lots and lots of people set up businesses to help people AND make themselves a nice profit. Sure, let's make sure no one's killing anyone in pursuit of a profit but let's not throw out what pushes innovation in pursuit of some mythical concept of fairness.
  13. Jenee

    Jenee Driver 8

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    So, my 'choice' is either pay 3 times as much for healthcare, or allow the system to continue the way it is.

    And doctors continue to get fucked.

    What motivation is there for providing any service from a non-profit organization?

    This is where government steps in and says, if you want to help someone when the chips are down, fine, set up your company. But, if you want to profit from someone's misery, get the fuck outta town.

    I've worked for an insurance company. Trust me, they aren't there to help people. In fact, they hire more people to find reasons not to pay out than they hire to actually process claims.
  14. Chris

    Chris Cosmic Horror

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    No, because a society has the right to determine what rules they set forth within their society.
  15. Uncle Albert

    Uncle Albert Part beard. Part machine.

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    You don't know until you try, but if it does shake out that way, that's life. You're not owed pleasant solutions. If it's important enough, you'll suffer and sacrifice for it, if not, you'll take what you're offered.


    Good question! :techman:

    Except you're not just asking for that, because the only result would be an end to the entire private health care industry. If you don't want anyone profiting from the inherent "misery" in all of this, you're either suggesting that people suffer unaided, no matter how able they are to pay, or you're asking the government to fund your health care with other peoples' money.

    :garamet:

    No business is. Not directly, anyway. It's there to make money, and there's nothing wrong with that. The fact that people need health care doesn't make this a special subject, any more than hunger as a biological fact makes it somehow "wrong" to charge money for food.
  16. garamet

    garamet "The whole world is watching."

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    And run by nonprofit organizations. Which made all the difference in the world.

    Yep, and in the 1960s, a kid with leukemia could measure life expectancy in weeks.

    Damn progress for making it possible - and commensurately more expensive - to put that kid into remission so they could live a normal lifespan.

    The majority of Americans have never given up, because they've never been engaged in the battle to begin with. They're only waking up now because their employer has stopped paying their premiums, or they've gotten that nasty letter from the insurer saying they're only covering a third of the costs of that life-saving surgery they had last month, or they've got a second or third mortgage on the house to pay for the kid's dialysis.

    The insurers have run amok for decades. It's a little difficult to stop the avalanche halfway down the hill.
  17. Uncle Albert

    Uncle Albert Part beard. Part machine.

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    That's it?

    That's your excuse for interfering in private transactions and imposing on peoples' freedom to do business as they choose? Sure, great. Let's dictate everything by the irrational whims of the entitled majority. What could possibly go wrong?
    :tbbs:
  18. The Original Faceman

    The Original Faceman Lasagna Artist

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    What good is choice if you can't afford the options?
  19. ehrie

    ehrie 1000 threads against me

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    I'd love to see a market solution to our health care woes, but it's an inescapable fact that western europe, Canada, Japan and Taiwan all spend far far less on health care than we do and have more healthy populations to show for it. All the while nobody going bankrupt because of medical bills.
  20. Uncle Albert

    Uncle Albert Part beard. Part machine.

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    It would be nice if those were the only considerations, and a lot of people obviously wish very badly they were, but that is not the case. You can make all manner of practical, pragmatic improvements to a society by indenturing the productive individual to the needy collective, but that doesn't make it right.
  21. steve2^4

    steve2^4 Aged Meat

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    the amount of money spent by these governments per capita is less than is spent here.

    How is universal health insurance, if it lowers our government's spending and improves health, a bad thing?
  22. ehrie

    ehrie 1000 threads against me

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    And I perfectly understand that line of thinking, it's in the back of my head too. To me I just wonder at one point does a persons right to have and spread an easily controllable disease, but doesn't because he can't afford it end and my right to not get sick begin? I mean I'm already paying extra because Betty Lou in Flint, MI had to declare bankruptcy because her husband contracted Lung Cancer. I'm also paying because in thousands of similar situation people litigate the crap out of their doctors when their insurance runs out because it's either that or bankruptcy. We already have socialized medicine, the current system is just so backwards and reactive instead of proactive, because that's where all the easy money is.
  23. garamet

    garamet "The whole world is watching."

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    Very nicely put, and if the issue were brought to the American public in these terms, instead of the scare tactics paid for by the insurers and their pet Congresscritters, the existing structure wouldn't have deteriorated to the point where it's very likely unsalvagable.
  24. Ancalagon

    Ancalagon Scalawag Administrator Formerly Important

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    You would have a point if a person's health decisions only effected them.

    Unfortunately that is not the case. Due to the anti-vaccination jihadists, Whooping Cough, one thought almost eradicated, 1K cases in 1976, is a a growing problem, with 26K cases in 2004.

    Kid's that aren't vaccinated are TWENTY THREE TIMES more likely to catch it (and thus be able to pass it on). Fortunately none have died (wonder how many millions that cost the system?), but unfortunately they were then carers who passed it on to infants (can't be vaccinated under 2 yo) and others who for medical reasons couldn't be vaccinated. These groups have seen deaths. So millions spent, and hundreds dead, all b/c some fundies and other wackos don't want to vaccinate.

    What's your solution to that? Keep infants in bubbles until they are two?

    Full story:
    http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104523437
  25. Uncle Albert

    Uncle Albert Part beard. Part machine.

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    I reject the "fund health care" vs "accept epidemics" dichotomy. Nothing prevents us from exiling sick people who can't pay for treatment and neutering people who show no reasonable ability to fund childhood vaccinations.

    I'm only half kidding with that. :bergman: My point is that there are always less compassionate options. It's not limited to "support them one way or another."
  26. Ancalagon

    Ancalagon Scalawag Administrator Formerly Important

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    It's pretty obvious to most people that current system isn't workable. It's gotten to the point now (and public opinion shows this) that we either fix it now, or it'll be fixed for us.

    I'm no expert, but ideas that I think are workable or at least worthy of debate:


    1) Remove the various state regulations on practice in the medical field. Have one set standard, allowing free movement of labor.

    2) Remove the barriers to entry in the medical field. Why should only doctors and other tightly controlled professions be able to prescribe medicine? In the Army an 18D can prescribe shit and they've only had 2 a half years training out of HS (Not all of which is medical, 18D is Special Forces Medical Sergeant, a large chunk of that time is the bad ass SF shit/languages) Why is it so hard to have a hospital birth with a midwife instead of a doctor? Or even have it outside the hospital? Hell why even make it so hard to be a Doctor? Make Alabama jokes all you like, but I know people who the family Vet is the first person they go see about a problem, most things he can give you a prescription for right then and there.

    3) Uniform billing process/forms for all insurance companies.

    4) Insurance companies must pay full price for any service. None of this only paying 1/2 so the Doctor charges double to get his money. If they don't like what the Doctor charges tell him you are dropping him from coverage.

    5) One large market for insurance companies. All them to grow and compete, instead of have 50 little fiefdoms where one company can take over and exclude others from entry.

    6) The German and Swiss Insurance plans.

    7) Major Tort Reform. Mal Practice Insurance is ridiculous these days.
    Last edited: Jun 1, 2009
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  27. Ancalagon

    Ancalagon Scalawag Administrator Formerly Important

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    And Shep is free to reject Evolution and Big Bang all he wants.

    Reality is reality, as evidenced by the example I posted.
  28. garamet

    garamet "The whole world is watching."

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    :yes: :yes: :yes:
  29. K.

    K. Sober

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    So mandatory health care infringes on your freedoms, but being kicked out of your country or being neutered doesn't? :wtf:
  30. K.

    K. Sober

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    The two good parts of the German health system, i.e. those that work, IMO:

    (1) Everybody has to either prove they earn enough to pay for necessary health care privately, or have insurance.

    (2) The state organizes (!= pays for) ONE insurance company that sets rates by income rather than medical situation, including zero rates for those without income, ensuring affordable health insurance for everyone. But all private deals that cover basic health care sufficiently suit the reuirements of (1) as well.

    In theory, it might seem as if the state-controlled insurer would be unable to compete. In reality, it has operated at a surplus for many decades and would still be doing so even under current conditions if the government hadn't gotten greedy in the 90s and taken that surplus, and then some, to pay for unrelated costs of Germany's reunification. The reason for the success of this insurer is simple (IMO): It turns out that much more people than you might think actually enjoy stable rates independently of changing medical status, and are prepared to carry those less lucky for a while as long as this gives them the same safety net. But in any case, it's their choice.