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There's No Such Thing as Free Health Care
The costly truth about Canada's health care system
President Obama says government will make health care cheaper and better. But there's no free lunch.
In England, health care is "free"—as long as you don't mind waiting. People wait so long for dentist appointments that some pull their own teeth. At any one time, half a million people are waiting to get into a British hospital. A British paper reports that one hospital tried to save money by not changing bedsheets. Instead of washing sheets, the staff was encouraged to just turn them over.
Obama insists he is not "trying to bring about government-run healthcare."
"But government management does the same thing," says Sally Pipes of the Pacific Research Institute. "To reduce costs they'll have to ration—deny—care."
"People line up for care, some of them die. That's what happens," says Canadian doctor David Gratzer, author of The Cure. He liked Canada's government health care until he started treating patients.
"The more time I spent in the Canadian system, the more I came across people waiting for radiation therapy, waiting for the knee replacement so they could finally walk up to the second floor of their house." "You want to see your neurologist because of your stress headache? No problem! Just wait six months. You want an MRI? No problem! Free as the air! Just wait six months."
Polls show most Canadians like their free health care, but most people aren't sick when the poll-taker calls. Canadian doctors told us the system is cracking. One complained that he can't get heart-attack victims into the ICU.
In America, people wait in emergency rooms, too, but it's much worse in Canada. If you're sick enough to be admitted, the average wait is 23 hours.
"We can't send these patients to other hospitals. Dr. Eric Letovsky told us. "Every other emergency department in the country is just as packed as we are."
More than a million and a half Canadians say they can't find a family doctor. Some towns hold lotteries to determine who gets a doctor. In Norwood, Ontario, 20/20 videotaped a town clerk pulling the names of the lucky winners out of a lottery box. The losers must wait to see a doctor.
Shirley Healy, like many sick Canadians, came to America for surgery. Her doctor in British Columbia told her she had only a few weeks to live because a blocked artery kept her from digesting food. Yet Canadian officials called her surgery "elective."
"The only thing elective about this surgery was I elected to live," she said.
It's true that America's partly profit-driven, partly bureaucratic system is expensive, and sometimes wasteful, but the pursuit of profit reduces waste and costs and gives the world the improvements in medicine that ease pain and save lives.
"[America] is the country of medical innovation. This is where people come when they need treatment," Dr. Gratzer says.
"Literally we're surrounded by medical miracles. Death by cardiovascular disease has dropped by two-thirds in the last 50 years. You've got to pay a price for that type of advancement."
Canada and England don't pay the price because they freeload off American innovation. If America adopted their systems, we could worry less about paying for health care, but we'd get 2009-level care—forever. Government monopolies don't innovate. Profit seekers do.
We saw this in Canada, where we did find one area of medicine that offers easy access to cutting-edge technology—CT scan, endoscopy, thoracoscopy, laparoscopy, etc. It was open 24/7. Patients didn't have to wait.
But you have to bark or meow to get that kind of treatment. Animal care is the one area of medicine that hasn't been taken over by the government. Dogs can get a CT scan in one day. For people, the waiting list is a month.
John Stossel is co-anchor of ABC News' 20/20 and the author of Myth, Lies, and Downright Stupidity.
COPYRIGHT 2009 BY JFS PRODUCTIONS, INC.
DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
Hugh Akston|7.2.09 @ 12:19PM|#
As a public service, I will preempt the healthcare trolls that
swamp this blog every time a story about the absurdity of a
government health system is posted:
"But you guys, in the current system, some people can't even AFFORD
to get substandard care!"
We now return you to your regularly scheduled comment thread.
Tomcat1066|7.2.09 @ 12:19PM|#
But...but...but...Obama promised that we could keep our private insurance. He's good for that promise, right?
|7.2.09 @ 12:26PM|#
But what is the cost of DOING NOTHING?!?
Shouldn't this become a drinking phrase? I certainly feel the need
to get shitfaced drunk when I hear read it.
For the retarded, allowing economic freedom isn't "doing nothing".
It is actually allowing human liberty to work. While certainly
hated by the wanna-be tyrants, it actually works much better.
The cost of "doing nothing" is actually miniscule when compared to
the government "doing something wrong. What is so
difficult to understand about "the government doesn't fix
shit"?
Rich|7.2.09 @ 12:28PM|#
The President: "It's about providing patients and doctors with
the information they need to make the best medical
decisions."
What about providing them the legality to implement those
decisions? Many educated people self-treat to the best of their
ability, that is, until the law *requires* them to see a physician.
Guess we're not ready for *that* much change.
proud libitard|7.2.09 @ 12:38PM|#
ya know, I'm really sick of these fuckers who don't have health
insurance. Fuck them!
My plan? Kill the sick who don't have health insurance. Much
cheaper and probably more humane than that stupid, piece of shit
Canadian system.
|7.2.09 @ 12:38PM|#
Urm,
My sister (in Canada) had cancer and had prompt surgery (1 week),
(immediate) radiation treatment and chemo and is cancer free. I'm
not sure what this talk about waiting is about. A fair number of
her friends have had similar experiences. I've never heard of
anyone having to wait for cancer treatment. Of course waiting one
day seems like a long time when you have a disease but ...... if
there were less than 1 week turn around I would say that the system
was underutilized. A lot of people sitting around twiddling their
thumbs.
I've heard a lot from Americans talk about waiting for medical
treatment in Canada. My family has had a fair amount of experience
with the medical system in Canada and have never had a "6 months"
wait for anything. The max that someone had to wait was 2 months
for specialist appointment, once.
Funny, but it is always a 6 month wait in these stories.
Hey, I wish the US well with whatever you decide as far as health
care goes but don't do what Americans always seem to do and talk
shit about things you know nothing about.
I love Big Bro|7.2.09 @ 12:39PM|#
"until the law *requires* them to see a physician"
Are you for or against mandatory proctological exams?
George Miller|7.2.09 @ 12:42PM|#
Not that I'm trying to defend this charade, but you understand
that healthcare is not a government monopoly in the UK? I had to
wait behind a desk for about 6 minutes as a girl spoke over the
phone while others wandered around meaninglessly just to collect my
prescription slip and then wait another 20 minutes for tablets that
allow me to live a reasonably normal life, but if I get sick of the
six minute wait I can always opt for private health care; it is
available in the UK. It's also worth noting that the long wait for
my medication is at the privately run Lloyds pharmacy.
And to Mr. django above: what part of the US do you live in? I'll
search Google for "cheap Yankee and redneck stereotypes" and get
back to you.
DADIODADDY|7.2.09 @ 12:44PM|#
qingl78
Lived & worked in Ontarion for a year and a half. joined the
health system...waited constantly even for a primary care initial
visit...may work part of the time as in your case, but still sucks
as a way to get care to people
nicno|7.2.09 @ 12:47PM|#
Just went to the DMV on Tuesday to get a small matter resolved.
Took five hours of my day and it still isn't resolved - had to come
home and spend another three hours on the phone with various gov't
agencies explaining the problem over and over and over and over.
About half of the invitations I sent out two weeks ago for a 4th
party were lost by the USPS - but ask the USPS about it and you'll
hear crickets. We just found out that 40% of the kids at my son's
school are on free breakfast and lunch programs yet more than 80%
of the kids at the school have cell phones. Our city has spent
TWICE as much on a "necessary" road construction project than was
allocated. Need I go on?
Don't worry, though, the gov't is going to get it all right with
health care. All we have to do is BELIEVE!!!!!
|7.2.09 @ 12:50PM|#
One in nine Canadian physicians work in the United
States.
During the past 30 years, about 19,000 physicians trained in Canada have crossed the border into the United States and depleted the Canadian supply of physicians in the process, says the study, which was conducted by the AAFP's Robert Graham Center, the department of pediatrics at New York University and the department of family medicine at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario. According to "The Canadian Contribution to the U.S. Physician Workforce," in 2006, 8,162 Canadian-educated physicians were providing direct patient care in the United States. That figure accounts for about one in nine Canadian-trained physicians, which is equivalent to having two average-sized Canadian medical schools dedicated entirely to producing physicians for the United States.
I guess the system up there is just too awesome for them to be able
to stand it.
noelle|7.2.09 @ 12:54PM|#
My OBGYN is Canadian. I asked him at my last visit if he ever thought about returning to his homeland to practice. His response (after he stopped laughing): "I'd rather pay $500,000 in malpractice insurance here."
|7.2.09 @ 12:57PM|#
My sister (in Canada) had cancer and had prompt surgery (1
week), (immediate) radiation treatment and chemo and is cancer
free.
And I don't know anybody who voted for Nixon.
|7.2.09 @ 12:58PM|#
As I heard the provincial health minister for Ontario say in an interview, in reality there is a two-tier healthcare system in Canada. There's the primary care Canadian system, and then there's the U.S. when you need a real specialist.
WWJGD|7.2.09 @ 1:06PM|#
I, for one, am in support of mandatory proctological exams. Government shoves things in our ass figuratively enough times, why not actually?
|7.2.09 @ 1:12PM|#
qingl78 | July 2, 2009, 12:38pm | #
Nothing like anonymous anecdotes posted to the comments section of
a blog to refute factual data.
I love Big Bro|7.2.09 @ 1:23PM|#
I'm in favor of all things mandated.
True freedom is achieved when one is no longer able to think.
Anonymous Crank|7.2.09 @ 1:23PM|#
Several years ago, I was working in and around a major trauma
center (I'm and I/T guy, not a Doc), and got to know an English
intern very well. There was a horrendous automobile accident on a
nearby freeway, and on of the most severly injured victims was
brought in by LifeFlight helicopter. The girl was so badly messed
up they didn't seem to realize she was female until they had her
stripped and in the E.R. IIRC, she was in for about 9 hours of
surgery, and had a massive team working on her. Long story short,
over coffee, the English Doc told me he was astounded at the
efforts to save her life. He told me, "In Britain, that girl would
have died. There just isn't that level of resources for such an
effort."
BTW: She DID live. Lost and eye and part of a leg, I think. Yeah,
yeah.. "Plural of anecdote," and all.
|7.2.09 @ 1:26PM|#
I have previously posted this elsewhere, but I waited 6 months
for surgery to save my eyesight from glaucoma, and I was a "high
risk" patient. The delay cost me seventy percent of the vision in
my right eye.
I also waited 18 months for hernia surgery, during which time I had
to wear a very uncomfortable truss in order to prevent it from
strangulating.
So I'm not a happy Canadian in that respect.
StPat|7.2.09 @ 1:40PM|#
Healthcare isn't a right. I don't know what is worse, not being able to afford healthcare on your own or the pipe dream that the government has a plan for you get the healthcare you 'need'.
Jaydub|7.2.09 @ 1:45PM|#
Every time I hear this propaganda it makes my blood boil.
ANYONE can find someone who fell through the cracks in ANY system.
Selectively hoisting them up on the sacrificial altar of
impartiality is not journalism.
I have lived under the Canadian, German, and US medical
systems.
Only one country's medical system shit all over my credit record
because a transcription error between the emergency department and
surgery. My fault of course, I should have known better. Emergency
room visit stateside? Wait 7 hours with a 103 fever, pass out, wake
up later, and spend the next five years sorting it out.
Great.
Lost your job, COBRA crapped out, wife pregnant? Too fucking bad,
welcome to America.
At least my hospital visits in Canada would not be found out about
when applying for a credit card.
Both of my parents died from cancer, in Canada. Only one time did
my mom wait for an MRI.
And for the last time, Canada does not have a NATIONAL system. Each
province runs their own. Stupid, badly managed province (say,
Ontario), bad system. Good province, say Alberta, they can't build
hospital wings to 2 year old hospitals fast enough to house all the
extra MRI and other machines the medical plan ordered, what do they
have, like three MRI machines at the hospital in Red Deer? That's
like one for every 3,000 people that live there.
qingl78|7.2.09 @ 1:47PM|#
Tulpa,
Do you want my sister and her friends' names? Would that
help.
Last I checked, as far as statistical data goes there isn't that
much to choose between most 1st world nations as far as life
expectancy, cancer survivor rates, etc. so I'm not sure what your
point about statistics is. Do you know something that I don't
know?
Again. I'm not telling Americans what to do, enjoy your health
system. It seems to work for you. I like the Canadian one just
fine.
Aresen,
I'm not sure about you but where do you live, out in the boonies? I
know people who have had both glaucoma and hernia surgery within a
couple of months and your story sounds like a kind of 6 sigma
event.
I guess you can cherry-pick any story to tell any story you want
but I come back to the fact that there really isn't that much
difference between most industrial countries for general health of
population.
Other Matt|7.2.09 @ 1:52PM|#
Every time I hear this propaganda it makes my blood
boil.
Ok, so I assume you are against it.....
Selectively hoisting them up on the sacrificial altar of
impartiality is not journalism.
Yeah, yeah, got it....
Lost your job, COBRA crapped out, wife pregnant? Too fucking
bad, welcome to America.
But, you said you didn't like propaganda?
At least my hospital visits in Canada would not be found out
about when applying for a credit card.
Ok, so it appears your argument for healthcare centers on credit
reporting? If you want to go after THAT, then you have my full
backing, guilty till proven innocent fuckwad approach they have,
but credit doesn't equal healthcare.
Each province runs their own. Stupid, badly managed province
(say, Ontario), bad system. Good province, say Alberta, they can't
build hospital wings to 2 year old hospitals fast enough
A fine statement that can be applied to insurance companies, HMOs,
etc, in the USA also.
I think you might want to clean up your own propaganda before you
go after someone else's.
Jordan|7.2.09 @ 1:52PM|#
Good province, say Alberta, they can't build hospital wings to 2 year old hospitals fast enough to house all the extra MRI and other machines the medical plan ordered, what do they have, like three MRI machines at the hospital in Red Deer? That's like one for every 3,000 people that live there.
Good for
them:
The United States spends more on technology than Canada. In a 2004 study on medical imaging in Canada,[77] it was found that Canada had 4.6 MRI scanners per million population while the U.S. had 19.5 per million.
Other Matt|7.2.09 @ 1:53PM|#
I guess you can cherry-pick any story to tell any story you want
but I come back to the fact that there really isn't that much
difference between most industrial countries for general health of
population.
Then why is it so damn urgent to "do" something?
JB|7.2.09 @ 1:54PM|#
Fuck Obama that socialist fuck.
That dickless bitch can move to Canada. The sooner, the better.
what just happened|7.2.09 @ 2:01PM|#
Yes, although likely impossible to get entirely accurate, I
would like to see the economics of innovation in the health market
between all offending parties here.
Those positive externalities might not be quite picked up in "the
other" side's assessment.
zoltan|7.2.09 @ 2:08PM|#
Lost your job, COBRA crapped out, wife pregnant? Too fucking
bad, welcome to America.
Hey ain't it too fuckin' bad when you can't get other people to pay
for your bad life decisions and misfortunes?
Paul|7.2.09 @ 2:15PM|#
I'm not sure what this talk about waiting is
about.
Uhm, the Canadians
and their government are talking about wait times.
"Despite government promises and the billions of dollars funnelled into the Canadian health-care system, the average patient waited more than 18 weeks in 2007 between seeing their family doctor and receiving the surgery or treatment they required," said Nadeem Esmail, director of Health System Performance Studies at the Fraser Institute and co-author of the 17th annual edition of Waiting Your Turn: Hospital Waiting Lists in Canada.
qingl78|7.2.09 @ 2:19PM|#
Ok, got to take off but...
Like I've said before. I wish the US well with whatever it decides
about Healthcare, including doing nothing.
I just wish that BOTH SIDES would keep Canada out of your
discussion, because you invariably fuck up anything you say about
it. You guys think that you know so much about Canada but most of
you barely know your own national anthem much less anything about
Canada.
You take some woman who "has a blocked artery that prevents her
from digesting". (is that like a lung problem that prevents you
from crapping?) as though this is representative and then give a
lecture on using anecdotal information "to refute statistical
truth" (which wasn't provided).
I keep on coming back to wishing you well on what you decide but
don't lecture other countries on how they suck.
Maybe because I've only had experience with BC and Alberta and
California healthcare in the 1st world, I've never really seen
shitty healthcare (except Brasil, Mexico, etc.) and I can't really
tell the difference between them and that colours my impression of
this debate.
Like I said, there isn't much to choose statistically between
France, Germany, UK, Canada, Australia, US, etc. and your system
appears to work for you so I say more power to you. Just keep
Canada out of it.
|7.2.09 @ 2:23PM|#
It all comes down to do you believe the government is actually
capable of solving a problem. Tell me; how's the War on Poverty and
the War on Drugs working out for you? How's Obama's pledge of
ending the Washington culture of corruption working out for you?
How's the stimulus working out for you?
Oh Yes - Please let's put more under the Federal governments
control.
Paul|7.2.09 @ 2:23PM|#
Again. I'm not telling Americans what to do, enjoy your
health system. It seems to work for you. I like the Canadian one
just fine.
What a coinkidink, the Canadians with immediate life-threatening
injuries really like our
system just fine, too.
British Columbia has sent four patients with spine injuries to Washington State hospitals for care from May to September, 2007, though the recruitment of more staff and opening of new beds have helped alleviate the problem. Saskatchewan has sent patients to neighbouring provinces - such as Alberta, which is working at maximum capacity - for specialized neurosurgical services.
And what this story doesn't report, but I know to be a fact is that
a lot of infants needing neonatal care are sent to U.S. Hospitals.
Often, the toughest cases. And... AND, if that weren't enough, the
Canadian government doesn't provide or arrange for transportation
back to Canada for the infants or their families. Entire families
are literally being dumped in American cities with no place to stay
and no transportation options back. Their accomodations and
transportation gets paid for by someone... I wonder who that might
be... So yes, we're paying for your healthcare system, too.
Average American|7.2.09 @ 2:24PM|#
I'm not qualified to make an informed decision. That's why we have a president and a congress. They will do right by us Americans. Yes they will.
Xeones|7.2.09 @ 2:25PM|#
I just wish that BOTH SIDES would keep Canada out of your
discussion, because you invariably fuck up anything you say about
it. You guys think that you know so much about Canada but most of
you barely know your own national anthem much less anything about
Canada.
It appears we have a pot/kettle situation here when it comes to
national stereotypes, eh?
and that colours my impression of this
debate.
Learn to spell "colors," ya hoser.
Obey the Fist|7.2.09 @ 2:29PM|#
I live in the US. I had a back problem and needed to see a
doctor for the first time in about 5 years. I had to wait 6 weeks
to get in because the one doctor I could find who was taking new
patients was full until then.
I don't know what you guys are comparing other countries' wait
times to. It's pretty bad here, it seems to me.
|7.2.09 @ 2:31PM|#
Who - exactly - said Canadian health care is free? It's not. Nobody says it is. That's a lovely straw man argument, there, REASON magazine.
|7.2.09 @ 2:46PM|#
They really should shut sown these comment sites. Hey Ray Butlers - way to add to the discussion. Hey Obey the Fist - thanks for the nice story, tell it again.
The Angry Optimist|7.2.09 @ 2:46PM|#
Ray Butlers, you are about as worthless as a sack of hammers. You'll hear everyone talk about how "free" health care is when it is government-controlled. Please spare me the parsimonious bullshit. If you don't have anything to contribute, please fuck off.
|7.2.09 @ 2:50PM|#
qing178
I live in Victoria.
It's the f*****g capital of British Columbia, so I would not call
it "the boonies", at least as far as Canada is concerned.
If I couldn't get prompt care here, where the f**k am I going to
get it?
BTW, the hernia surgeon used to do the procedure in his office
within 2 weeks of diagnosis on Saturdays at a cost of $1,200. Then
the Chretien government threatened to pull funding out of any
province that didn't ban such practices. So, not only did I wait 18
months, but the Canadian Taxpayer wound up footing a bill from Vic
General for $3,500, being their chargeout for day surgery.
(Actually, even at 18 months, I was lucky. A new surgeon happened
to join the practice of the original surgeon and had to start
filling his allotted OR times. If I hadn't been willing to change
surgeons, the stats are that I would have waited another year.)
|7.2.09 @ 2:51PM|#
Who - exactly - said Canadian health care is free? It's not.
Nobody says it is. That's a lovely straw man argument, there,
REASON magazine.
Ray is absolutely right. We should be saying that Canadian health
care is "free." That's better.
Paul|7.2.09 @ 2:54PM|#
No regular on this board calls Canadian Healthcare Free. We consider it quite expensive.
Sean W. Malone|7.2.09 @ 2:58PM|#
"to refute statistical truth" (which wasn't
provided)
Statistical proof WAS provided for much of what
Stossel said... You just didn't bother to check the links:
Try this one (from the article itself) -
Wait Time Alliance (of Canada) June 2009 Report Card
Also - incidentally I was just in a discussion the other day where
a Spanish guy repeatedly called his country's health care "free".
Ray Butler being a douchebag troll aside, it's not a strawman.
|7.2.09 @ 3:14PM|#
Things you learn on Hit and Run.
Canada has socialized medicine. (If you have no clue what the word
socialized means)
|7.2.09 @ 3:25PM|#
As a Canadian I question our healthcare system all the time. I
have a mother, a mother in-law and a couple of friends who have
been let down by our system in the last couple of years
alone.
That being said this article could use some serious work. The "23
hour average wait" stat is especially uninformed. In Winnipeg,
where I am from, we recently had a death in an Emergency room that
took place after the patient waited over 30 hours for help. As sad
as it is, that is the only case I have heard of where wait times
where so atrocious.
|7.2.09 @ 3:30PM|#
What's that saying again? Oh, right: "If it looks too good to be
true, it probably is."
I am also reminded of the saying "There is no such thing as a free
lunch." Well, just imagine that medical procedure is a sandwich and
your prescription is a bag of chips.
|7.2.09 @ 3:32PM|#
FrBunny,
Are you calling me a liar?
Huh? I'm assuming the Nixon reference went right over your
canucklehead. No worries; I probably wouldn't get your cultural
references to Rick Moranis either.
squarooticus|7.2.09 @ 3:34PM|#
The Euth Centers will be a welcome option.
Futurama got it right in the first episode: we need suicide booths.
Badly.
squarooticus|7.2.09 @ 3:35PM|#
Pulling their own teeth in England? That explains so much.
How often do you brush your teeth?
Three times a day, sir!
Ralph... why must you turn my office into a house of lies!?
I don't brush! I do-on't brush! Wah!
Let's have a look at the Big Book of British Smiles...
|7.2.09 @ 3:36PM|#
My sister (in Canada) had cancer and had prompt surgery (1
week), (immediate) radiation treatment and chemo and is cancer
free.
And I don't know anybody who voted for Nixon.
FrBunny, for the win!
|7.2.09 @ 3:38PM|#
People complain about the high cost of American health care but
you get what you pay for. We don't cut costs to the extent they do
in countries with socialized medicine. Brett Skinner of the
Canadian think tank, Fraser Institute found that "while Americans
spend 55% more than Canadians for health care as a percentage of
their national economy, the US has 327% more MRI units and 183%
more CT scanners per capita than Canada. Doctors in the US perform
twice as many inpatient surgical procedures than Canadian doctors.
There are 14% more physicians and 19% more nurses in the US per
capita than in Canada." The study also found that the average
waiting between the time patients first saw their family physician
and the time they actually got treated is now 18.3 weeks. In 1993
it was 9.3 weeks. Only 44% of new drugs approved by the Canadian
government in 2004 were covered by the government insurance program
in October 2007. To get them, you had to wait for a year on
average. There was a total of 1.7 million Canadians that couldn't
access a family physician in 2007. Four years ago, the average
waiting time for nonurgent cardiac surgery in Manitoba was 19 days,
now it's 77.
Regarding the claim that medical care is about the same in all 1st
world countries, 41% of colon cancer cases in Canada prove fatal
vs. 34% in the US. The US leads the world in treating cancer. The
survival rate after 5 years in the US for breast cancer is 83.9%,
for women in Britain, it's 69.7%. The survival rate for prostrate
cancer in the US is 91.9%, but only 73.7% in France and only 51.1%
in Britain. Americans are 35% more likely to survive colon cancer
than Brits. Much of this success in the US is due to cancer
screening of which the US leads the world.
More than one million Brits are currently waiting for hospital
admission. Another 200,000 are waiting to get on a waiting list.
Each year, 100,000 operations are cancelled.
Swedish patients in need of heart surgery are often forced to wait
as long as 25 weeks
|7.2.09 @ 3:45PM|#
Remember everyone, when a pinkbot calls for socialized medicine,
treat him like the misanthropic little shit that he is.
-jcr
Rich|7.2.09 @ 3:57PM|#
> Are you for or against mandatory proctological exams?
OK, all this discussion has changed my mind.
It depends on the asshole. ;-)
|7.2.09 @ 4:15PM|#
How about this... we get Canada and all other countries to stop
using ANY medicine, procedure or device that was invented by
American healthcare system. You know, that horrible system that
needs to be fixed.
Take away EVERYTHING that this bad American wasteful invested.
Everything.
Then, ... then we'll see how great Canadian or English healthcare
is.
That would be a sight to see.
----
p.s.
"I guess the system up there is just too awesome for them to be
able to stand it."
Best line of the day. Thx.
|7.2.09 @ 4:16PM|#
"The US leads the world in treating cancer. The survival rate
after 5 years in the US for breast cancer is 83.9%, for women in
Britain, it's 69.7%."
You also have to factor in that a LOT of cancer patients around the
world also come HERE for their treatment. Our system is not only
better, but also treats more people.
robc|7.2.09 @ 4:23PM|#
Lost your job, COBRA crapped out, wife pregnant? Too
fucking bad Pay cash, no problem
FTFY
|7.2.09 @ 4:30PM|#
He told me, "In Britain, that girl would have died. There just isn't that level of resources for such an effort."
That's why I wonder about the Michael Moore story in Sicko
about the guy who cut of the tips of two of his fingers with a
power saw. Apparently he paid $12K to get one reattached but
couldn't raise the $65K to get the other one done.
First of all, it strikes me that the fact that it cast over five
times as much to reattach the second finger indicates it was likely
a really difficult procedure compared to the other (possibly way
more damage?).
I don't know for sure, but I kinda suspect that if he had gone to
an NHS hospital in Britain they would have said, "we're sorry, but
we can't reattach your fingers."
I fully admit I could be wrong.
robc|7.2.09 @ 4:35PM|#
The son of a college prof of mine cut off a number of his
fingers in a kibbutz in Israel. They were reattached at Jewish
hospital in Louisville, KY.
This occurred late 80s/early 90s. AFAIK, if you cut off an
appendage ANYWHERE in the world, ask to be flown to Louisville and
go to Jewish. They were and probably still are the leaders in
reattaching things (probably due to the high local rate of "Hey
yall, watch this" moments).
robc|7.2.09 @ 4:41PM|#
It may only be hands. If you cut off a leg, you might want to go somewhere else.
|7.2.09 @ 4:58PM|#
robc
I know a guy who had his hand cut off at the wrist in a
construiction accident in the eighties. They reattached it at the
Mayo Clinic (I think) in Jacksonville. To get the whole thing
functional took several operations over about a year and a
half.
Now losing a hand is a serious impairment. I can see where someone
could say it is "life threatening" in the sense that one's
lifestyle, employment and general enjoyment of life are affected in
a negative way.
I can see where attempting to reattach a limb like that would
probably be done under a public system.
I just really think MM picked a piss poor example. Of course, no
one can challenge him and prove that the NHS would not have done
the reattachment surgery.
But that's pretty much MM's MO.
|7.2.09 @ 5:13PM|#
I find it interesting that the only government run healthcare
system they EVER talk about is Canada? You can guarantee if someone
is writing an article about something they are against they are
going to use the worse data possible. If we are going to compare
"socialized" health care, what about the other countries they never
mention? We are Americans though, if there is a way to fuck
something up, we will do it. Won't even take us long. Essentially
we are a bunch of sheep that have stopped thinking, just nodding at
whatever the TV is telling us. It is easier not to think.
"It's true that America's partly profit-driven, partly bureaucratic
system is expensive, and sometimes wasteful"
PARTLY? I guess you really don' know about the profit driven part
if you have good medical insurance through ABC or whatever news
organization you work for.
StPat|7.2.09 @ 5:59PM|#
They were and probably still are the leaders in reattaching
things (probably due to the high local rate of "Hey yall, watch
this" moments).
I do not believe that is region specific. Generally, garages across
America are a place of tomfoolery with intermittent successful task
completion. Fingers get in the way of innovation.
Lauren|7.2.09 @ 6:00PM|#
Isn't it possible that the American statistics on waiting are skewed because (according to a Commonwealth Fund study,) 25% of Americans skip going to the doctor at all because they can't afford it, as compared to 4% of Canadians?
Lauren|7.2.09 @ 6:02PM|#
I guess I should expect a magazine with a title like "REASON" to consider possible distortions in statistics though...
Lauren|7.2.09 @ 6:02PM|#
Correction: Judging by REASONS content, I "should NOT expect a magazine..."
|7.2.09 @ 6:06PM|#
And for the last time, Canada does not have a NATIONAL system. Each province runs their own.
It is a national system to the extent that it is a federal
mandate that every province and territory must have a medicare
plan.
The provinces must follow the federal mandates (universal coverage
of certain practices and procedures, no private alternatives, no
copays or deductables etc). They have little flexibility and few
options, and certainly not the option to not participate.
The only options they have in essence are to spend more of their
own money over and above the federal grants and to provide wider
coverage than the federal minimum.
It is more than likely that better management in any province over
others is pure luck and just as likely to change with the next
election.
|7.2.09 @ 6:18PM|#
I'm an American currently living in Canada. No serious health
problems myself but I know people who use the medical system a lot,
and like anything else, experiences vary. I'm of the school that a
private system or a public system can be decent; my philosophical
preferences for one don't blind me to the realization that, in
practice, the philosophically more objectionable system might work
better in at least some cases.
I note also, with the existence of medicare/medicaid and VA medical
treatment, the health-care system in the U.S. is NOT private, it is
a hybrid, with some of the worst aspects of both systems (I think a
more purely private, OR a more purely public, health care system
would be a lot better than the current U.S. mishmash).
Arguing by anecdote is ridiculous. There are Canadians denied
treatment by provincial government health plans or with long waits
or who face malpractice. Just like there are Americans who are
denied treatment (or denied the best treatment) by private insurers
or medicare/medicaid etc. Individual examples are not reasonable
indictments of entire systems.
As for Canadian-trained doctors moving to the U.S., there's a
motivation called, "I can earn more money in the U.S.". That's the
same reason why many foreign-trained doctors from other countries
or foreign-trained nurses or foreign-trained lawyers may choose to
go to the U.S. (at least until the current economic problems, a
number of major NY law firms did recruiting at some Canadian law
schools, they offered significantly more money). The desire to earn
more money does not necessarily mean that the medical system is
better.
There are some medical conditions where, if I got sick, I would
rather be in the U.S. if I had good insurance. There are others
where, especially if it was VA medical "care" or medicare/medicaid
or "bad" private insurance, I'd rather be in Canada. Individual
anecdotes or examples about specific conditions aren't terribly
helpful to understanding, nor are they terribly persuasive.
Lauren|7.2.09 @ 6:23PM|#
It's also sadly not surprising to see that no one put the "brain
drain" problem of physicians leaving Canada together with the wait
time problem -
though, I'm happy someone finally pointed out that we refuse to
compare America with the many excellent examples of socialized
medicine.
zoltan|7.2.09 @ 6:26PM|#
25% of Americans skip going to the doctor at all because
they can't afford it
[Citation needed] I find it difficult to believe that a quarter of
Americans can't afford a $15-$50 copay.
Jordan|7.2.09 @ 6:37PM|#
It's also sadly not surprising to see that no one put the "brain drain" problem of physicians leaving Canada together with the wait time problem -
Um, so what's your point? Either way, the long wait times are a
result of the system. Most of us would consider a healthcare system
that drives away doctors not to be something to emulate.
Lauren|7.2.09 @ 6:42PM|#
What, zoltan, your Googling abilities are malfunctioning?
http://www.commonwealthfund.org/Content/Publications/In-the-Literature/2007/Nov/Toward-Higher-Performance-Health-Systems--Adults-Health-Care-Experiences-in-Seven-Countries--2007.aspx
Jordan, my point is that doctors might not be "driven away" by a
bad system so much as wanting to make money in a US system - it's
called "brain drain" and it happens all over the world -
intellectuals leaving their country to go to America instead of
staying and helping improve the country. Long waits are a result of
a system, as well as not going to see a doctor at all, like in the
US.
Jordan|7.2.09 @ 6:47PM|#
Jordan, my point is that doctors might not be "driven away" by a bad system so much as wanting to make money in a US system - it's called "brain drain" and it happens all over the world - intellectuals leaving their country to go to America instead of staying and helping improve the country.
Oookay. So once there's nowhere else to run to, you think they'll
just resign themselves to this? How many people do you think are
going to be willing to put up with 8-12 years of higher education,
crushing debt, and 80-100 hour workweeks for almost nothing in
return (especially after malpractice insurance is included)?
Lauren|7.2.09 @ 6:52PM|#
Jordan - the dream of America is not fulfilled in its reality, as you've just pointed out. But, Doctors in this country do great - they make lots of money. Why wouldn't they want to come here?
Jordan|7.2.09 @ 7:05PM|#
Jordan - the dream of America is not fulfilled in its reality, as you've just pointed out. But, Doctors in this country do great - they make lots of money. Why wouldn't they want to come here?
Yeah, that's kind of why they are coming here. Of course, once
socialized medicine takes over that won't be the case anymore,
(which was the entire point of my previous comment...). Let's take
a look at how the
Massachusetts public healthcare plan has turned out:
Small businesses with more than 10 employees were required to provide health insurance or pay an extra fee to subsidize uninsured low-income residents, yet the overall costs of the program increased more than $400 million - 85 percent higher than original projections. To make up the difference, payments to health care providers were slashed, so many doctors and dentists in Massachusetts began refusing to take on new patients. In the state with the highest physician/patient ratio in the nation, some people now have to wait more than a year for a simple physical exam.
So, just one year of existence the program was $400 million
overbudget, wait times had skyrocketed, and the cost of care had
increased by 56%. Yeah, I'm sure the federal government can do
better. You know, the same government that claimed Medicare would
pay for itself and proceeded to rack up unfunded liabilities
greater than the economic output of the entire world.
Lauren|7.2.09 @ 7:29PM|#
You're doing what many people do, which is confuse correlation with causation - did the Massachusetts plan *cause* rising health costs? I think, probably not, as that is uniform throughout the country. Wait times skyrocketed, probably because many people tried to use the system - which is probably because they couldn't afford the private system. My "probably"s are much better than your uncited "skyrocketed"s and such. So, since we already pay twice the rest of the world for such shitty coverage, why do Medicare costs bother you? I'm having trouble understanding this - a study I cited on another thread showed that based on our GDP, we should be paying 40% less than what we do pay. This relation between GDP and health-cost is in comparison to the rest of the world, of course - but who said comparisons were good in the first place, right?
Jordan|7.2.09 @ 7:47PM|#
Wait times skyrocketed, probably because many people tried to use the system - which is probably because they couldn't afford the private system.
No. Once again: "To make up the difference, payments to health care
providers were slashed, so many doctors and dentists in
Massachusetts began refusing to take on new patients."
So, since we already pay twice the rest of the world for such shitty coverage, why do Medicare costs bother you?
What kind of logic is this? It's like saying since I'm already
$20,000 in debt, I shouldn't worry about putting a Ferrari on my
credit card.
I'm having trouble understanding this - a study I cited on another thread showed that based on our GDP, we should be paying 40% less than what we do pay.
Thanks in large part to the fact that the government already picks
up 50% of the tab. We're seeing the same effect with college
tuition. Eliminate all insurance mandates, repeal medical licensing
laws, remove employer-provided health insurance tax credits, and
allow insurance companies to offer coverage across state lines so
that for once we actually have a free market in health care and
watch prices fall (ask yourself why veterinary medicine is so much
cheaper and service so much quicker). Offer public insurance to
those who are refused private coverage.
mark|7.2.09 @ 8:34PM|#
Canada is a "special case". Three out of four Canadians live
within 200 miles of the American border. Their entire economy is
based on skimming the cream off the top of the American economy.
Look at this chart. Most of the top income countries, with the
exception of the US, are small or lightly populated countries which
have economies based on being trading centers with larger
economies. Most are culturally homogeneous. Canada is a bad example
to compare our health system to. Just because they can afford a
single-payer system does not mean the US will come close to
affording it. And the resulting loss of innovation and efficiency
may lead to negative consequences around the world. Seriously, if
Canadians knew what was in store for them if the U.S. lost its free
market in health care, they would be very afraid.
France is a more comparable country and they are now facing very
hard choices with their health system. I wouldn't want to be in
their position.
B|7.2.09 @ 8:56PM|#
Damn I miss joe and his hilarious fucking claims that the Cuban health care system is better than that of the United States. You can always count on some Single Payer asshole to shoot himself in the foot by claiming a communist hellhole has super duper awesome medical care. And in Cuba, it is practically free. I say practically, because the only cost was all of their civil liberties and basic freedoms.
jacob|7.2.09 @ 9:09PM|#
"You take some woman who "has a blocked artery that prevents her
from digesting". (is that like a lung problem that prevents you
from crapping?)"
No.
Arteries are what supply the smooth muscle in your gut, which
creates peristalsis so you can digest.
Lauren|7.2.09 @ 9:14PM|#
"To make up the difference, payments to health care providers
were slashed, so many doctors and dentists in Massachusetts began
refusing to take on new patients."
- This does not *necessarily* mean that you can blame the public
plan for the rising costs - since you like the word "again," I will
repeat, again, that if your idea were true not only would we see a
significantly higher cost of health care in Massachusetts (care to
provide the data?), we would also see other countries with BOTH
public and private options exhibiting the same economic struggles
that you claim will happen to us - wait, in every other of the 30
OECD countries, not one exhibits these claims. So much for
evidence.
|7.2.09 @ 10:58PM|#
When I lived in Canada (Alberta, mid-90s) a small town in
British Columbia raised its own money to buy an MRI. When they
raised the money, the Feds came in and said "no no, that would be
unfair, you shouldn't be more privileged just because you raised
the money" and took it away.
At that time, there was a thriving MRI business in Sweetgrass,
Montana, just minutes over the Alberta/Montana border servicing
Canadians who needed MRIs.
I could go on with similar stories, but it's quite simple--to save
money on Health Care, you deny people services. That's it. Of
course, old people are the easiest targets, and thus they are
denied services more often than younger people. So, Gov't
Healthcare will be fantastic--just don't get old, or don't get VERY
old and you'll be just fine.
As far as the US system goes, There are 1300 insurance providers in
the US currently--does anyone think they're all not doing whatever
they can to minimize costs and maximize profit??? And a government
system unconcerned with profit will drive most of them out of
business, and the cost will rise astronomically when every sniffle
results in a doctor's appointment.
The whole argument is absurd. But, in the Age of Entitlement and
Envy, this is what the people want, and this is what they will
get.
Good Luck America.
Abner MacGillicuddy|7.2.09 @ 11:30PM|#
See, quite often people who get sick die. Now some of this is
due to the fact that nothing anyone can do can help them and
sometimes it's due to the fact that what they need to help them is
simply not available due to the fact that due to scarcity there is
not enough of anything to make sure that everything everyone needs
is available to help them.
This is of course sad, and of course, especially sad if it's
happening to you or someone that you love.
So you see sometimes people die even though they could be
cured.
Now some people think it's more just that some bureaucrat decides
who lives and dies and others think that those who can afford it
should get the treatments they can pay for and those that can't
have to rely on the voluntary charity of others.
But either way, some people are going to die because scarcity
determines that there is never enough to furnish everything that
everyone needs.
Mike|7.3.09 @ 12:13AM|#
I am going to Canada with a veterinarian and a hand full of
doctors. I'll set up a "veterinary" clinic and let my group of real
doctors practice on humans under free market style.
Im gonna get fuckin rich!
|7.3.09 @ 1:20AM|#
Whether or not it is more effective, any government plan is against the letter and spirit of our Constitution. End of story.
johnny john john|7.3.09 @ 1:38AM|#
"Damn I miss joe and his hilarious fucking claims that the Cuban
health care system is better than that of the United States. You
can always count on some Single Payer asshole to shoot himself in
the foot by claiming a communist hellhole has super duper awesome
medical care."
You can tell that a debate is devolving when people stop sticking
to rational arguments and start up with the personal attacks.
Let's read the name of the website we're posting on, shall we?
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 1:42AM|#
Lauren... this is all also just basic economics.
Please spare me the idiocy of health care being a good that doesn't
obey the laws of economics. It does. Everything does.
If you impose price & wage controls, you get shortages and
unemployment. Doesn't matter the industry... We used to have 26
companies making flu vaccine, as government involvement has
increased and they have taken over the majority of pay, we've gone
down to 2.
This isn't just an issue of confusing causation and correlation,
the causation part is extremely clear - if you are looking at the
health care system with a functioning knowledge of economic
principles.
For whatever reason people have a hard time recognizing that - I'm
not really sure what that's about... I have a feeling it's the
nagging desire of people to believe that medicine in the US is
expensive for oversimplified reasons like "greed" and because they
have a magic-based conception of the alternative as being all-good
and "free".
The results in MA are exactly what I (and most of us
around here) would have expected them to be. There's no special
crystal ball we have here, it's just a bit of logic stemming from
the premises that incentives matter and that people are autonomous
and primarily self-motivated.
As for your issue about other countries, country to country is
really hard to compare on this issue because every one
sets up different incentive structures and operates their systems
differently. A government system doesn't *necessarily* have to set
price or wage controls, and they may or may not allow more or less
competition, they may limit access to the government part more or
less... Etc. So your burden of evidence, without delving really
specifically case to case is rather thin. If you're interested at
all in the history of US Health care, you might start here:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1094/is_n2_v28/ai_13834930/
johnny john john|7.3.09 @ 1:58AM|#
http://www.npr.org/news/specials/healthcare/healthcare_profiles.html
http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/RL34175_20070917.pdf
In summary, USA spends more money than any other developed country
but has shorter lifespans, fewer doctor visits, higher prices for
health care commodities, higher mortality rates, ETC.
In short, US healthcare sucks! Socialized medicine works BETTER
(statistially) for most other developed countries!
Read and weep, libertarians. Whatever socialized medicines'
shortcomings, it's a fuckload better than what we got right
now.
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 3:47AM|#
John... Umm.... you really don't like very deep thinking,
huh?
Aside from the fact that mortality rates have little to nothing to
do with the health care system and a hell of a lot more to do with
the population and other factors such as diet, climate, exercise,
race, and a dozen other factors - and that those metrics are
meaningless as an aggregate. E.g. Infant mortality rates are higher
in the US because we actually are able to have thousands of
premature babies born that no other country even attempts to keep
alive - but ya know, within the first year a lot of those premature
babies die - that skews our number up. Also skewing some other
countries' numbers down is simple differences in methodology. Many
nations don't count babies which die within the first few hours of
birth as having ever been born. We do.
Ok, so inconsistent methodology and ridiculous data aside, which
proves next to nothing "statistically", you also don't address a
lot of the basic stuff like the fact that the US is responsible for
the vast majority of all new developments in the medical
industry.
We create more life-saving procedures, drugs and technologies than
anywhere else and the rest of the world gets to free-ride off those
innovations.
Further, when we have a single-payer government system accounting
for some 60% of medical care in the US, I think you're missing the
parts that went wrong.
But hey - if it's cool with you that you don't even understand the
metrics you're using as "proof", that's fine.
|7.3.09 @ 5:21AM|#
My understanding (I could be wrong on this) is that Canada's
healthcare system is an exception, not the norm, around the world.
Governments are involved in healthcare in varying degrees, but not
to the point they pay for the whole thing.
I'm told by cousins and friends who live in Asia that their
healthcare can be dysfunctional in it's own way, although general
care is cheaper compared to the United States. Incompetent doctors
can be a problem.
On another note - Reasontv (which I don't always agree with) isn't
wrong about getting healthcare for around 100 dollars. My dad got
one for an year, although it's restricted to 5,6 nearby hospitals
and he has to pay a fee when he visit a doctor.
johnny john john|7.3.09 @ 6:02AM|#
Sean W. Malone: Please prove that the rest of the world is "free
riding off our inventions". That's just a hypothesis I really
haven't heard anyone prove. From how I think things work, the rest
of the world pays good money for our technology.
The most important metric addressed in the links I provided,
http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/RL34175_20070917.pdf, here, is that
America pays around 60% more (as a percentage of GDP) for similar
or shittier care. It also claims that administrative overheard is
also much higher in the USA. This statistic is a slap in the face
for people who believe our freer market system is more efficient
than socialized medicine. Clearly, our system is not more
efficient.
Please read that link, I think its a pretty unbiased analysis of
our healthcare system. The bottom line is that our health care
system is both expensive, does not offer full coverage, and is not
noticeably superior to other developed countries' systems.
johnny john john|7.3.09 @ 6:10AM|#
oh and let me add:
Sean W. Malone: A lot of your other arguments are clearly addressed
in the paper.
Infant mortality: the paper did a comparison with countries that
performed similar statistic upkeeping as the USA and we were still
outperformed.
Diet, climate, exercise, etc: That is a valid point, which the
paper does address. However, they compare 20+ countries all with
different climates an cultures and we still end up as the most
expensive. I admit that our culture may have a significant impact
on our health, but it still doesn't completely explain our
incredibly inefficient system.
http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/RL34175_20070917.pdf
I'm sure glad I found a paper that brought some numbers into the
debate instead of talking points.
Barak A. Pearlmutter|7.3.09 @ 9:07AM|#
Numbers like this:
> 41% of colon cancer cases in Canada prove
> fatal vs. 34% in the US ... survival rate
> after 5 years in the US for breast cancer
> is 83.9%, for women in Britain, it's 69.7%.
> The survival rate for prostrate cancer
> in the US is 91.9%, but only 73.7% in
> France and only 51.1% in Britain. Americans
> are 35% more likely to survive colon cancer than
> Brits.
are almost always comparing apples to oranges. When screening
programs are expanded, more patents with "the condition" are found.
Consider someone whose prostate cancer is noticed four years
earlier than it would have been with less screening, and who dies
another two years after that. With less screening, this counts as
"two year survival", with more as "six year survival." Same
patient, same death. But the effect can be even more skewed:
screening may catch someone who has a condition which, untreated,
either grows so slowly as to never result in fatality (something
unrelated kills them first) or even reverses itself.
So you cannot just compare simple percentages like that. You need
to correct for the above statistical artifacts. When you do, you
find that early screening sometimes really doesn't help so much, in
fact sometimes it increases the death rate (because chemo,
radiation, surgery are not risk free); and that differences in
treatment regime do not always favour the US. (E.g., beta blockers
after heart attacks turn out to increase the death rate. Oops!)
Lauren|7.3.09 @ 9:33AM|#
"I have a feeling it's the nagging desire of people to believe
that medicine in the US is expensive for oversimplified reasons
like "greed" and because they have a magic-based conception of the
alternative as being all-good and "free"."
- Well, Sean, I'm not sure of all of the reasons why we have such
expensive medicine, but I know that A: It has something to do with
the structure of our health system. B: We have FAR more expensive
medicine than anyone else in the world. C: For that high price, we
have the lowest quality care of any developed country, and the
least amount of access to it.
"The results in MA are exactly what I (and most of us around here)
would have expected them to be."
- Funny, because the results of health care quality in South
America, where I lived, and Europe, where most of these statistics
above these posts are from, are exactly what I (and most sensible,
reasoning people) would have expected them to be - better than the
United States.
"As for your issue about other countries, country to country is
really hard to compare on this issue because every one sets up
different incentive structures and operates their systems
differently. A government system doesn't *necessarily* have to set
price or wage controls, and they may or may not allow more or less
competition, they may limit access to the government part more or
less"
- The link John posted to that NPR health care profile was
wonderfully informative on this subject, not that there aren't
other great sources out there. Just incase you missed it, it really
is worth comparing some other countries with us - funny, because,
when you do, the other countries with a more similar health system
to us happen to spend the most on health care as well - interesting
how that works... but then again, I'm just using real-world
examples here, I don't think a magazine like REASON would be
interested in something like examples... theories, and
Massachusetts, are just as good - right, libertarians?
|7.3.09 @ 9:51AM|#
23 hours? That seems a bit exaggerated... the longest I've ever had to wait was about 4 or 5, and that has only happened a couple times.
Josh|7.3.09 @ 9:55AM|#
Canada is such a horrible place to live because of their
healthcare?
I'll just leave this here:
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2009/07/01/health-canadian-aids-hiv-vaccine-kang.html
footandmouth|7.3.09 @ 10:08AM|#
http://www.fark.com/cgi/comments.pl?IDLink=4486886
A discussion of this article on Fark
|7.3.09 @ 10:25AM|#
What a poorly written, and researched article. John Stossel, I will now abandon ABC and any other news outlet you contribute to.
|7.3.09 @ 10:29AM|#
Hrm. I am Canadian.
I have never waited 23 hours in an emergency room. I did go in
once, needing stitches for a very not serious cut on my finger... I
was told the wait would be about 6 hours, but I got into "triage"
within 45 mins. They bandaged it, I went home.
My 6 month pregnant sister went in with a cut needing stitches..
and got in right away. Same with when she brings in her kids.
My mother died of cancer. Did she die because we had to wait for
treatment or diagnosis? No. That was all fast, we had every
treatment, including some new ones... it was just a type of cancer
people don't really survive.
And hey, my family didn't owe hundreds of thousands of dollars
after about two years of that hell.
Gotta be worth something
Bret|7.3.09 @ 10:34AM|#
i was in england last fall and had to go to the ER. I expected to spend most of my day there, being that there are plenty of articles like this floating around spreading falsehoods. I was literally in and out in about 15-20 minutes tops. and the cost, as a US citizen for an ER visit in another country - $0. I recently had to go to the ER in the US. Mind you, I have health insurance, and the visit still managed to cost me $250 when it was all said and done. I don't know where these people get their facts and figures but in my personal experience, socialized medicine sure beats any of the privatization we currently have. the health care industry has proven time and time again they are unable to regulate themselves and do the right thing so maybe it is time for the government, even with all it's flaws, to step in...
|7.3.09 @ 10:41AM|#
Whatever!!! that is all I have to say. I am not sure about the people that did any research on this, or even the doctor they interviewed, but my experience and that of my family has been far from that. My wife was diagnosed with breast cancer on December 14th, by January 8th she was already starting her chemotherapy. The biggest cause of waiting room delays is the amount of morons that visit emergency rooms with the sniffles or a twisted ankle.
|7.3.09 @ 10:42AM|#
If you believe that your neighbor is responsible for your life,
of course "national" or "single payer" health insurance makes
complete sense. When you are a child, you don't take personal
responsibility for your actions, regardless of how old of a child
you are.
There is real self-denial and/or ignorance in the issue of profit.
It doesn't matter in what field you work. If someone can come to
your door and demand that you work for them, or demand that you pay
for something for them, or have the government do it for them,
they would be making a fucking profit!! The only
difference is between earning it and
stealing it.
From each according to his ability and to each according to his
need has the blood of a hundred million people on it hands,
but if it makes it possible for you to rent a couple extra videos
this week, who gives a shit?
|7.3.09 @ 10:46AM|#
I call bullshit. I've been to emerg (in Ontario and Nova Scotia) all too frequently over the past three years, for myself and waiting with others and I've never waited more than 3.5 hours. That's a long time... but for non-serious illness/injury (i.e. bladder infection). and not 23 hours.
|7.3.09 @ 10:48AM|#
As a Canadian reading this article, this may be the funniest
thing I've read in a while.
I've been sick here. My family has been sick here. My friends have
been sick here.
Didn't cost any of us a penny. We're all happy with the treatment
we got and healthy now.
Sorry folks, but this guy is so far wrong he can't even see right
from where he's standing.
|7.3.09 @ 10:58AM|#
As for the authors comments about Canadian's 'riding off american innovation'. Well how about you americans stop useing Bone Marror compatability tests, useing Electron Microscopes, Heart Pacemakers, or Insulin for anyone who is diabetic. These are all innovations in the medical field invented by Canadaians.
Sigh|7.3.09 @ 11:06AM|#
Waah Americans get better treatment, waah socialized medicine is
an idiotic system, waah screw the poor let them die!
Everytime I hear something almost amusing like this just makes my
head spin that some people can be so idiotic. If the Canadian
system didn't work, we would change it. If the Britain system
didn't work, they would change it. The only country thats currently
changing it is...hmm the States? That MUST be because its working
so well right?
Choke on this next time you compare the two healthcare systems:
http://www.yesmagazine.org/article.asp?ID=1503
Every system has its flaws, this blogger is just can't seem to
realize that.
j-biz|7.3.09 @ 11:07AM|#
all those American innovations being used "for free" are they?
well, as a Canadian we'll take penicillin back then...
FYI the discussion on FARK is much more intelligent than what's
going on over here at "Reason".
|7.3.09 @ 11:14AM|#
Probably the most biased article on health care that I've
seen.
As a Canadian who has had two parents recently treated with Cancer;
plus two grandparents who are frequently hospitalized, please take
my word for it that the Canadian system is nowhere near as
dysfunctional as this article implies. Also please remember that
you can't decide policy based on isolated incidents - you need to
find the general trend.
I hope to find tangible facts in coming articles, supported by
statistics, or unbiased findings.
When my U.S. former employer "Agere" was recently cutting health
benefits for U.S. employees, the president announced in an all
employees meeting that:
1) the U.S. spends twice as much (as a proportion of GDP) on health
care as the U.K., and about 40% more when compared with
Canada.
2) the U.S. has half as many hospital beds per unit of population
as the U.K., and a similar amount to Canada.
3) that private health care in the U.S. constituted "an unfair tax
upon business, and a distinct competitive disadvantage". This was
ascribed to the employer's obligation to provide health insurance
as a benefit.
|7.3.09 @ 11:16AM|#
Canada has a lower incident and mortality rate for all cancers combined. This article has more info, but this Stossel piece is just typical fear-mongering, and doesn't mention the uninsured.
|7.3.09 @ 11:19AM|#
The fact remains that Canadians are eventually able to get the
medical treatment they need.
Americans have to wait until they're in the upper middle class,
which for a growing majority of US citizens just never happens.
|7.3.09 @ 11:33AM|#
This is the WORST researched article I've ever read, shame on
you John Stossel! You call yourself a journalist?!?!
My grandmother just spent 8 days in the hospital for a respiratory
infection. She was given the best care imaginable; recieved ever
test needed and was released once her condition improved to a point
that it could be managed by her GP. I can't imagine being sick and
without medical insurance or on some half-baked HMO in the U.S. My
grandparents would be broke now if they lived in the U.S.
There are problems with our system but you can't tell me with a
straight face that the U.S. system is any better.
Just look at the treatments for austic children in any U.S. state
versus in the province of Alberta. Tell me that an average American
family would be able to pay for that kind of treatment out of their
own pockets. Psht!
|7.3.09 @ 11:40AM|#
Is reason suddenly getting a lot of health care industry
support?
It seems to have gone from promoting liberty to manufacturing noise
to hide the fact Americans pay far more 17% GDP vs 10% for far less
as measured objectively by life expectancy.
Actual Canadians laugh at the suckers who think this sort of
nonsense is true and it is some kind of maple syrup magic that
allows us to live longer and better for far less money.
Erin|7.3.09 @ 11:44AM|#
I'm a Canadian citizen and this is bullshit. Average waiting times are nowhere NEAR 23 hours. I was diagnosed with pneumonia and the moment I was diagnosed I was admitted, I didn't have to go home and wait 23 hours in order to receive care. We may have waiting times in Canada that are a little longer than American, but "worse comes first" not who has the most money to pay the best doctors.
|7.3.09 @ 11:52AM|#
You can always tell when an article about healthcare is written by someone who opposes a public option because it will always focus on the English and Canadian systems. Those countries do have long waits for public care. What about France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Denmark, Norway...heck, even Venezuela. Those countries have publicly financed healthcare systems that work, cost less and don't have long waits. Why should the US remain a third-world country? Anyway, thanks for the propaganda, and I look forward to an increase in the level of misinformation as we get closer to dragging ourselves out of the nineteenth century.
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 11:53AM|#
OK guys... The free-rider thing is about the easiest damn thing
in the world to prove, so here ya go, starting with Greg
(10:58am):
It doesn't matter what nationality the inventors were from, but
what country they traveled to to do the work, as it happens, you're
simply wrong about the inventions you list.
1. "The first physician to perform a successful
human bone marrow transplant was Robert A. Good at the University
of Minnesota in 1968."
2. "The first electron microscope prototype was
built in 1931 by the German engineers Ernst Ruska and Max
Knoll.[1]
...
"Reinhold Rudenberg, the scientific director of Siemens, had
patented the electron microscope in 1931, stimulated by family
illness to make the poliomyelitis virus particle visible."
3. The pacemaker was developed simultaneously by
doctors in the US, the UK, Australia, and of course there was John
Hopps of Canada as well...
4."Nicolae Paulescu, a professor of physiology at
the University of Medicine and Pharmacy in Bucharest, was the first
one to isolate insulin, which he called at that time pancrein, and
published in 1921 the work that he had carried out in
Bucharest."
The history of most both insulin and the pacemaker are very complex
and it's pretty damned disingenuous to say that either was invented
by a Canadian - AND since insulin was created by the
1920s, and pacemakers by 1950, and Canada didn't have
anything approaching "Universal Care" by then, it doesn't
even remotely count as an example of where socialized medicine has
created something useful. Try again.
AND BESIDES..... Of course there are going to be
innovations coming out of other countries, there are doctors all
over the world and no one is claiming that American's have a
monopoly of all inventions. Of course we
don't. However...
To Johnny John John:
This Ma href="http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba649">article which is
definitely worth looking at, discusses the findings of Victor R.
Fuchs and Harold C. Sox, Jr.'s Physicians'
Views Of The Relative Importance Of Thirty Medical
Innovations:
Of the 30 top medical innovations as ranked by physicians,
the US was involved in nearly all of them and is either credited or
co-credited.
1. MRI/CT - United States & UK
2. ACE Inhibitors - United States
3. Balloon Angioplasty - Switzerland
4. Statins - United States & Japan
5. Mammography - "indeterminate"
6. Coronary by-pass surgery - United States
7. PPI & H2 Receptor Antagonists (Anti-Ulcer drugs) - Sweden & United States
8. Anti-depressants - United States
9. Cataract Extraction/Lens Surgery - United States
10. Hip & Knee Replacements - UK, Japan and... again, United States
Most medical technology, like everything has a lot to do with a lot
of research being done simultaneously by people all around the
world, but there is a reason why even as hampered as our
system is, we still have a bigger hand in innovation than anyone
else.
The reasons that health care in the US is more expensive has a lot
to do with R&D costs, it has a lot to do with specific
insurance costs being born by a third party - which has, over time
pushed people to thinking that the "cost" is unimportant as someone
else (usually Government or employer) is footing the bill, and of
course there are many issues with the high cost of FDA approval
(which this magazine has covered in the past - and is up to around
$1 Billion per drug) and AMA/Congressional restrictions on the
number of doctors trained & licensed in the US, which basically
makes doctors a glorified, high-priced union, keeping competition
out and supply of service providers low.
The issues are again, extremely complex. I linked to this before
here, but if you want a good overview of the American system (which
you all should since you are under the woeful delusion
that it's somehow a private one now), read
Health Care in the 20th-C: A history of government interference and
protection
Finally - Lauren: The mere fact that you'd reference South American
medical care as even comparable to the United States' means I
cannot take you remotely seriously. Sorry.
|7.3.09 @ 11:58AM|#
You do realize that socialized medicine and government run
health insurance are two completely different things, right?
By 'You' I mean anyone who thinks the current proposal is anything
like socialized medicine in any way whatsoever.
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 12:04PM|#
Sorry one tag-fail:
10 Surprising Facts about
American Health Care
Also - going back to my first point for one second... The
inventions listed in support of the Canadian system that were
actually invented largely by Canadians were ALL invented prior to
their system becoming "Universal" in the 1950s/60s
Electron Microscope by 1931
Insulin by 1920
Pacemaker by the late 40s/early 50s based on ideas that began in
the late 19th Century
C'mon...
And the last thing is - as bogged down as we get in this debate of
supposedly utilitarian figures and statistics that show this or
that system working "better". What's lost in all this is that
everyone is forgetting about the niggling little detail of
socialized medicine BEING GODDAMNED
SLAVERY!
Medical tech doesn't just produce itself ya know - Doctors &
scientists spend their lives training and working on these
products, and then to serve the needs of "the people" their time
and the fruits of their labor will just be confiscated? And yeah,
sure it's "free"... Because you lucky assholes have a few rich
people to soak for it all the time.
One way or another, what all this is about fundamentally is whether
or not you dickless jerks have the right to steal from
some people or enslave others for your own
specific benefit.
Regardless of whatever government says, you don't have that right,
so the rest of this is ultimately moot. And at some point, those
you are enslaving and robbing will come to realize it explicitly or
implicitly and then you're going to have a real problem when they
stop allowing themselves to be extorted.
|7.3.09 @ 12:16PM|#
For an article named 'the costly truth about Canada's free health care system' it sure is short on truth. While there are difficulties with Canadian health-care they stem from the government decision to under-fund the system not from the system itself. If Canada spent what the system required all problems would be resolved ... and it would still cost less than the US "system".
|7.3.09 @ 12:35PM|#
Nice propaganda. None of the things stated in this article are
true in general. They've cherry picked some examples from a small
town and worst-case scenarios, or have plain made them up.
I've never spent more than 4 hours in a waiting room, I've always
had prompt emergency scans.
Not to say there's not challenges, there certainly are, but
considering we live longer here, in better health. Something to
chew on.
Oh, and my total tax burden here in Alberta is less than most of
the USA, and I don't have to paying ridiculous health premiums nor
worry about being denied coverage or going into major debt should I
become ill.
Seems like a winner to me.
Lauren|7.3.09 @ 12:39PM|#
Sean, the real important point you highlight, which drives your
principles and therefore your stance on this issue, is your idea of
"slavery" by the government if you have to (gasp) pay more taxes.
Perhaps you'd like to cut out from this system and try your luck
elsewhere, because here's how it works in this country: you trade
government services, like public schools, the military, roads, etc,
for money, because you are a citizen who utilizes these things and
agrees to their importance by means of your paying taxes. Rousseau
called it a "social contract," which obviously not many people at
Reason know much about. Your very act of being a citizen means that
you can protest legislation all you want, but if a bill passes that
legalizes the process of a public plan, well, there's democracy at
work, kid, not slavery.
And, not only did I reference South America, I happen to have
gotten the best medical treatment of my life there - not because it
was free, but because it was convenient, quick and efficient - and
at a public hospital no less! I saw a doctor (spoke fluent english)
three times in an hour, in between two X-rays - and I got two
prescriptions afterwards, which cost me no more than 5$ US. All
within one hour. Even when I was younger and could afford the best
insurance and health care in our state, I never experienced that
kind of treatment. Interesting.
Lauren|7.3.09 @ 12:40PM|#
By the way, it is refreshing to get some feedback from Canadians about this article and it's truths, or lack thereof.
|7.3.09 @ 12:44PM|#
Read the "article".
Read the "comments".
Anyone who believes Stossel and who believes as you put it in your
comments deserves the health care system you have.
The facts of the matter are on public record, contained in World
Health reports, UN reports, etc. Look for them, not for some hack
who uses fear and selective, out of context facts to put the fear
into the sheep.
We Canadians are taxed (in Total) less than you USA-ians, we spend
less per capita on health care, we live longer, with better
outcomes.
We have more lovers, more TV's per capita than you do. We eat
better than you do, we live longer than you do. Our homes are
larger (contain more rooms than) yours.
We have vastly superior health care.
Now everyone of those statements can be backed up by published
study or report, some of them from USA-ian studies even.
The drivel in the article and in the comments is just opinion and
not very well informed opinion.
|7.3.09 @ 12:44PM|#
People in England have to wait? OMG, that is so cruel. Why, they
should have the American way and be told immediately that their
health insurance doesn't cover whatever they'd be waiting for in
England.
Some Englishmen are pulling their own teeth? Oh yeah, name three.
(Englishmen, not teeth)
I'm curious, why are people in Canada and England having to wait?
Are there not enough doctors to handle the load? Are the people
wanting to see a doctor really in need of a doctor, or are they
hypochondriacs like most American's who have been taught by their
TVs that they need to rush and see their doctor if they cough more
than twice a day? What's the difference between waiting to see a
doctor and not being able to afford the doctor at all? Why is it
assumed that changing the system that we have won't work, but we
already know the system we have is broken? Why didn't the article
point out that Americans spend up to 100 times more than Europeans
for the same exact drug? This article is propaganda BS emoted by
the Health Care Industry and has no truth to it, for all the
bombast and BS put out by the HC industry thru TV shows and
articles such as this, your American health care is broken, and
getting worse.
|7.3.09 @ 12:53PM|#
Well... I suppose that if we were to simply deny care to 10 or
20 percent of the population as the for-profit model does then we
could eliminate waiting...
I'm not sure that's such a good idea.
We can hardly deny that many wonderful innovations have come and
continue to come from the USA. Keep up the good work!
It is I think disingenuous or at least very poorly informed to say
that Canada does not produce medical innovations.
How about the artificial hearts? how about the nuclear reactors
producing the isotopes that are used across this continent to
diagnose cancers?
Then there's the AIDS vaccine which is going into phase 1 trials...
or if you want to go back a few years, how about insulin?
|7.3.09 @ 1:00PM|#
For those whose Google-fu is lacking.
Human Development Index (2008), UN "Human Development Indices, a
Statistical Update, 2008"
Statistics Canada, "Survey of Financial Security", 2008.
US Federal Reserve, ""Recent Changes in US Family Finances". (Q4
data adjusted using OECD PPP rate)
Financial net worth data from Haver Analytics (original sourcing
from Statistics Canada, US Federal Reserve, UK Office for National
Statistics)
House size from Euromonitor.
Our (Canadian) life expectancy is 81.25 years. The US is 78.11.
That is from the CIA Factbook.
Our healthy life expectancy is 73 years, US is 70. (World Health
Organization's World Health Statistics 2009)
And, according to Durex, who did a survey, we also beat you by a
large margin in the amount of time we engage in foreplay and
intercourse. By two minutes. But just ask your women...those two
minutes are critical, eh?
|7.3.09 @ 1:00PM|#
I'm Canadian. Is our health system perfect? No. Is it
cheap...yes. I'm in my early 30's and in good health. I have never
had serious health issues, but family members have. While I'm sure
there are well documented cases where people had to wait
weeks/months for tests or treatment, most don't.
A family friend had an aneurysm detected, and got an MRI within in
days. In contrast to Stossel's report, CT, MRI's and all sorts of
other tests are operated around the clock.
The way I look at it, I'm healthy (and so is my family) and my
quality of life is great. The reason: health care. I've never
thought twice about seeing my doctor if I'm ill. If I was sick I
wouldn't blink an eye to get treatment or surgery. And then I don't
have to worry about going into massive debt for that.
Did you know 60% of U.S. bankruptcies are medically related? Is
that fair? And while Stossel says one woman's "elective" surgery
wasn't covered by the government-- is that so different from all
the HMO's that screw people over?
The New York Times had an interesting observation from an American
living and working in Canada. She had a minor stroke, was
immediately helped by a hospital in BC, and received therapy and
the likes when she was recovering. The cost: Nada.
The same woman went to Southern California to visit family and
fainted. While there were no serious medical issues for that, it
still cost her over $8K. And she wasn't even admited. She also says
if she had to return to the US she would be unable to afford health
care, because her premiums would be too high.
But, for those of you against universal health care, enjoy your for
profit, money gouging system where they famously charge you $9
bucks for aspirin.
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 1:06PM|#
"Rousseau called it a "social contract," which obviously not
many people at Reason know much about."
Lauren, the people over here know far more about the idea
of social contract than you seem to realize. In fact, the very
notion that you have that we actually *HAVE* a social contract is
laughable at best.
You are in the process of arguing for something that conscripts our
children & grandchildren to massive debt and tax burdens for
the foreseeable future.
Further, the idea that you don't recognize the concept of tyranny
of the majority means you need to spend sometime actually thinking
about philosophy and learn your civics a bit better. First off, we
are not, and shouldn't be a "democracy", we are a
representative republic, and we have - or are supposed to have -
*guaranteed rights*
Those rights are immutable, self-evident (as Jefferson put it) and
are not subject to the whims of the majority. As for the higher
taxes point, currently, I'm in a tax bracket that would assuredly
mean I pay no higher taxes - it has nothing what-so-ever to do with
my personal situation. But taxes are theft, one way or
another - because you ostensibly get something in return from the
thief doesn't make it any more or less voluntary since I didn't ask
for their services and don't appreciate having guns backing their
desire to take money. And that, frankly, is why your canard of the
"social contract" is bullshit.
I was born here, and unlike what Thomas Jefferson often discussed
and proposed, the laws of this nation don't all disappear each
generation so that a true social contract can emerge voluntarily.
The right of people to determine their own government is long gone
in the US and virtually everywhere else around the world.
And regardless, your logic works vastly better in
reverse!!
If you think South American health care is so great, GO MOVE THERE!
There is no where on the planet that freedom-loving individuals can
really point to as a safe haven anymore. And there are a thousand
places where you can go to live under some soma-induced torpor and
get "free" stuff from your government at the expense of productive
individuals.
There's a gigantic disconnect with most people posting here.
1. There is NO SUCH THING AS A FREE LUNCH.
Health Care ain't free guys, not here, not in Canada, not in New
Zealand, not in Ecuador. Resources are finite, not everyone is
capable or has the desire to become doctors so supplies and talent
are extremely limited. And absurdly, instead of supporting a
productive system where we get increases in supply and
productivity, you leach from other sectors of the economy that
are still productive in order to afford increasingly
expensive health care. That's ridiculous.
2. Price-signaling, Suppy & Demand laws and other economic
principles don't disappear just cause the good being discussed is
"medicine"
3. Price controls don't work, they cause shortages. Wage controls
don't work, they cause unemployment.
and
4. When you run out of people to tax, then the only thing left is
outright theft of remaining supplies or outright slavery. At some
point, you will have bled the producers so much that they will die
off (view Venezuela for a fun current example), and then you will
be faced with this choice: Force doctors to work for free, or start
stealing supplies from anyone and everyone still producing.
That's the end of the line for your ideas Lauren. I hope you
understand that. It saddens me that anyone would think that that
was an ok direction to take, but history and rational logic
dictates that that's the direction you're headed.
Lauren|7.3.09 @ 1:11PM|#
"Bankruptcies due to medical bills increased by nearly 50
percent in a six-year period, from 46 percent in 2001 to 62 percent
in 2007, and most of those who filed for bankruptcy were
middle-class, well-educated homeowners, according to a report that
will be published in the August issue of The American Journal of
Medicine."
Another fascinating point that you don't hear much about on REASON.
Here's where that quote came from:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/06/05/bankruptcy.medical.bills/index.html?eref=rss_mostpopular
|7.3.09 @ 1:14PM|#
Canada's life expectancy is two yrs ahead of U.S, for 2008. Canada has had gov't paid health care for at least 10 yrs. Why isn't Canada's expectancy down?
|7.3.09 @ 1:15PM|#
It really doesn't help ones argument if it's bolstered by inaccurate propaganda. But it is all simply a distraction. What is being repeatedly missed in this discussion is that the US government has no authority to do what they propose to do.
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 1:16PM|#
To those of you who have no understanding of libertarianism I
give you this quote:
"Libertarianism is the radical notion that you don't own
other people."
Doctors aren't my slaves, rich people don't exist to be hosts for
parasites. You guys are playing with 50,000 year old fire and it's
burned humanity an innumerable amount of times.
For rather important reading material, anyone who thinks this shit
is a good idea needs to first fully understand what they're
doing:
Philosophy of
Liberty (produced by ISIL)
and... Economics in One
Lesson
From the introduction:
"In this lies the whole difference between good economics and bad. The bad economist sees only what immediately strikes the eye; the good economist also looks beyond. The bad economist sees only the direct consequences of a proposed course; the good economist looks also at the longer and indirect consequences. The bad economist sees only what the effect of a given policy has been or will be on one particular group; the good economist inquires also what the effect of the policy will be on all groups."
While you all blather on about the "seen", you are missing the
countless crimes which are going unseen and are falling into some
of the most egregious economic fallacies that have plagued mankind.
It's already a problem now, and it's only going to get much, much,
much worse. And when the havok has been wreaked on humanity - I
hope you all realize that it was your doing, and not ours
(libertarians).
|7.3.09 @ 1:19PM|#
Wow, what a horrible article. My MRI took about 20 minutes to
get into. My mother just had nerve tests done after her personal
doctor referred her. She had an appointment setup before she got
home from the office. It took less than 2 days to get into the
appointment. Before you write put something like this up, and it
gets farked, please do some actual research. Don't just talk to
some lunatic doctor who doesn't actually know how the system works.
He clearly doesn't, and neither do you.
3 months.... wow.... really not that bright.
Lauren|7.3.09 @ 1:20PM|#
Ideas don't have lines, my friend, and they do not end - in
fact, it is best, I think, to question our beliefs, ideas, values,
assumptions, and so on, rather than letting them come to "the end
of the line."
"The right of the people to determine their own government is long
gone in the US and virtually everywhere else around the
world."
- This sounds borderline conspiratorial, or paranoiac. If you
really believe this, you must be one of those people who sits in a
bomb-shelter basement, watching FOX news and waiting for the
secession of the south or something like that. I mean, if you
*really* think that you've lost the ability to protest, run for
office, or even just speak out about an issue and have it be
addressed by legislation; if you really think you've lost the
ability to do any of this then you, my friend, are the one not
meeting with reality.
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 1:29PM|#
Right... because anyone who thinks that government has run amok
in the US.
Anyone who might, for example, think that representatives bailing
out private banks when the vast majority of the public opposed the
action, or continuing a trillion dollar war in Iraq when some 80%
thinks we shouldn't, and that this might mean that people aren't
being very well represented by their government MUST live
in a bunker watching Fox.
Thanks for the retarded straw man. Perhaps you've confused me for a
Republican.
My POINT, however, was that we have no such thing as a social
contract, because that requires the public to actually decide and
agree on it. There was no consent, thus there is no contract. It's
that simple. If I came up to you with a contract signed by your
grandfather that you were to be my personal valet for the rest of
your life, would you view that as valid?
I'm guessing no.
Why? Because you didn't agree. The social contract theory
is great, if there actually is one. There isn't... so for our
purposes here, it's a bullshit distraction at best and a depressing
modern commentary at worst.
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 1:30PM|#
Should read: Right... because anyone who thinks that government has run amok in the US is a conspiratorial Fox News fan.
Lauren|7.3.09 @ 1:38PM|#
You know, I happen to agree with you on a lot of points about
the big bad ol govt - they fuck up, a lot, and I am very, very much
against the wars, our arms dealings, and so on. But, I also still
retain the confidence (or, from your p.o.v., the illusion) that I
can still have an affect on the direction of this country, this
government, and our culture. It just sounds way too conspiratorial
to assume that the song-and-dance of Congress, the courts,
elections, international relations, all of this is just a big lie,
and they just *let* us think the government is still answerable to
the people.
So, I'm curious, since you are so free and all, do you just obey
the laws you agree with? Do you not consider it "obeying" but
rather "agreeing" maybe? Or is there a better term for libertarians
who might get arrested for smoking pot or something? I mean, where
do you draw the line between your freedom and the power of society
to detain you if you do something this country considers illegal?
Maybe you don't think there is a line, and no government can tell
you what to do, and on and on. I mean, is that true of your
beliefs?
|7.3.09 @ 1:40PM|#
Most people who read reason are probably free market
believers.
The American health system has worse outcomes for far more money
than other systems.
Maybe it just isn't a free market.
Maybe the domination by large players has given it the
characteristics of a cartel.
Medicine and health insurance are vastly complicated.
Whether or not you actually need, or will be covered for, a given
treatment, is unknown due to the chance element of need and the
probability an insurance company will do everything they can to
cheat you and/or drop coverage when you are vulnerable.
Maybe there is an inherent lack of transparency that cause what
should be a free market to fail so badly.
Maybe Government intervention in the form of licensing
professionals and approving medicines etc is to blame and a half
free system combines the worst of all worlds.
Maybe the tax code tying health care to employment is a problem
because it limits choice in such an obvious way.
I don't know the answers but I do know the question: Why is
American health care so expensive for such a poor result?
Rather than repeating free market platitudes and homilies,that I
suspect most of us agree with, why don't we examine why the
evidence says they don't apply?
Lauren|7.3.09 @ 1:43PM|#
A truly free market is an ideal that can no longer be accomplished, because there are government regulations that benefit the public in the case of health - I am not opposed to strict licensing laws, and loosening them could increase the number of malpractices. I am not opposed to strict FDA regulations - if these are not strict we can see dangerous and/or useless drugs out on the market and people buying them before the bad effects are realized.
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 2:01PM|#
The joke is Lauren, this stuff won't benefit the
public.
This is maybe the cosmic humor played on libertarians, but we
are strong supporters of free markets often primarily
because very few of us believe that businesses are to be trusted.
And nobody should be trusted with the power to rule over other men,
and certainly not to the extent that they now do. The case for
freedom is actually really simple and it works equally well from
both sides of your potential view of humanity.
1. If you think people are suspect and not to be trusted, then why
in the world would you give a tiny handful of them the power to
make decisions for a whole population?
2. If people are capable of making their own decisions effectively,
then no government is particularly necessary. Voltaire's "Candide"
makes this point far better than I...
In either case, there are inherent limits to human knowledge that
make it flat out impossible for any top-down solution to be "best"
for most people when every individual has individual values and
needs and no one person can simultaneously know what they all are -
much less plan for them effectively.
That said, and as counter-intuitive as this may seem, you notice
how Wal-Mart is already on board with mandates for employer
provided health care?
Shouldn't you ask yourself why??
Did Wal-Mart suddenly turn into a benevolent company that just
wants what's good for the American worker? No... of course not. But
due to their already massive size, they will have no problem
complying with the new rules - whereas their competition most
assuredly will struggle and many of the smaller competitors will go
out of business as a result. So while you are happily swallowing
the feel-good rhetoric of politicians about how this stuff reins in
businesses and is good for American workers (higher labor costs,
incidentally, have never been a "good thing" for American
production - and won't be as long as companies are free to move out
of the country as they have been for 3 decades) - the truth is, the
biggest multi-national companies are the ones who will laugh their
way to the bank on these deals.
I don't think it's a conspiracy, I think it's a natural consequence
of bad ideas and a mediocre system, but I do find it ironic the
number of people who consistently support the very policies that
result in the ever tightening grip of corporations & government
against the people. Especially since mostly those same people blame
massive corporations for all our problems.
Lauren, there are many studies that have shown the FDA's "strict"
regulations cost far more lives than they save - assuming that Drug
X exists for 8 years before it's approved, and it is perfectly safe
and for example, had been shown to be effective after 2 years of
clinical study, when the FDA finally approves it that's 6 years
worth of lives that could have been saved that now aren't. Further,
due to the testing requirements, it pushes the cost of creating and
developing drugs into a realm where ONLY gigantic monsters
like Pfizer (or Wal-Mart) can afford the risk.
As I noted earlier, due to the regulations and costs, we've gone
from 26 manufactures of flu vaccine down to 2... I'm not sure we
can take another loss.
|7.3.09 @ 2:04PM|#
An ex-boss of mine needed hip replacement. It took 16 months of
run-around; first, to discover the pins in his leg (30 years of one
leg too short will do in the hip); then to schedule the surgery to
remove those pins first; then to go back to the bottom of the list
for the hip. OTOH, my grandfather-in-law fell and had his shattered
hip replaced the same day at age 80. In Canada if you need
smething, you will get it; if it can be put off, it will be a while
- but not horribly long.
My wife needed gall-bladder surgery; first, there was a 3 month
delay to get ultrasound; can't schedule surgery for that
excruciating pain until the diagnosis is confirmed. yelling got
past that. Then, "we don't have an anesthetist, cll us to get on
the list in 3 months when we have one" (Not, we'll statr a list so
we're ready when they arrive). A doctor got her in another city's
hospital, and she had her surgery within 2 months. A month after
surgery, our hospital called to ask her about scheduling the
surgery.
The system is not great, but nobody has a $50,000 bill at the end
of things, and nobody gets denied normal treatment, and nobody
worries about losing coverage if they switch or lose jobs. It's
like an HMO without the hassle.
It's a comedy of errors because the people running the system (not
the doctors) have no incentive to make it work; so they do what
looks good. Get rid of the line-ups? Sorry, you can't join the line
until diagnosis is confirmed.
The American system works great if you can afford the thousands and
thousands real health care costs, or if you are one of those
prominent socialized medicine critics who can affor to pay almost
any surgery out of pocket. For the average guy who has to choose
between groceries and his children's health - Canada is pretty
good.
|7.3.09 @ 2:13PM|#
John Stossel is a lying fear-monger. Always has been. He also
doesn't have to worry about health care in the U.S. as it stands
because he's richer than most people. Articles like this will only
further serve to push the rich-white-male agenda here in Canada for
a more U.S. based health-care system, which would be an ENORMOUS
step backwards for my country.
So thanks a heap, you know-nothing loudmouth.
|7.3.09 @ 2:23PM|#
The problem with free-market health care? It's like gasoline -
it costs the same no matter who you are. You pay the same for a
gallon whether you're a Hummer or a moped.
The only way to save on health-care is to not use it, or not be
allowed to use it. So, most Americans save by either not going to
the doctor, or not being allowed by their HMO. I suppose that's not
too bad if you're in the first triage (survive anyway), or even in
the third triage (gonna die anyway). For them, it's some discomfort
with a finite end.
For those who need the care to survice, the middle triage, the rich
do well, the poor suffer, and the middle class struggle. I suppose
if health care doesn't fit in any of the categories life, liberty,
or the pursuit of happiness... then this is OK. If you believe that
some aspects of life should not be reduced to free market terms,
then socialized medicine makes sense.
Yes, we pay much higher taxes in Canada, but if you added in US
health care premiums, it probably works out to the same rate as
middle class Americans. The difference -there's no denied claims or
extra bills, no pre-existing conditions.
Lauren|7.3.09 @ 2:23PM|#
"1. If you think people are suspect and not to be trusted, then
why in the world would you give a tiny handful of them the power to
make decisions for a whole population?
2. If people are capable of making their own decisions effectively,
then no government is particularly necessary. Voltaire's "Candide"
makes this point far better than I..."
- This is very interesting. Do we, as a country, *want* people to
be capable of making their own decisions? Our set-up of government
seems to indicate it - while we don't have a direct democracy in
the literal sense (effectively canceling your fears of the populist
"tyranny of the masses"), we do have mandatory public education,
k-12. Why would we do that? It seemed that the founders of this
system considered an educated public to be of value to the nation.
I wonder why? Maybe so they were able to make informed decisions
for themselves.
The decisions we are talking about here require more focus. There
are smaller, community decisions, for instance, which affect only a
community, city or region, and which are decided and carried out at
that level of local government. Then there are state decisions,
which health care falls under. Then, of course, federal ones. So we
are not talking about the same kinds of decisions, and therefore
these levels of decisions require different levels of capability -
a fisherman in my region has full capability to give his input on a
decision being made here concerning fishing legislation, but he is
not able to make a decision that concerns North Korea's nuclear
threat. Hence, my city council invites him to the discussion, and
the president does not. So we can't group decisions together.
Now, the power of our nation lies in it's design, which I don't
have to describe to you if you already mistrust it. But our
founders really did do quite an amazing job, utilizing the free
market system in economics, and leaving government as flexible as
possible and as open to change as possible, in order to adapt well
to circumstances they couldn't imagine. I do have a great mistrust
of government, but for these reasons, I still think it is
susceptible to influence and change from citizens - whereas, the
only way we can influence corporations is *through* the judicial
branch of the government - lawsuits. So, do you just place your
trust in some aspects of government, not others? Or do you scorn
even the local city council and the court rooms that end up leading
to strict regulations on chemical plants?
I was aware, by the way, of the Wal-Mart thing - and it makes sense
in a way, they seem to want to jump on the bandwagon and get some
credit benefits for it. But, the issue of employer coverage is
difficult, and I don't know where to stand on that. In some
respects, like a free-market advocate, I like choices more than
anything else: I want to choose whether or not I want my employer's
coverage - maybe I don't, maybe I want to shop around and find a
better insurer in my state. Maybe I want to save money and use the
public plan for a few years, then when I'm more stable
economically, I can find a good private plan. Maybe I want some
more damn choices besides the only one, buying insurance from a
private company, which I literally can not afford (no job, just
like millions of others), and going without health insurance
SUCKS.
Joe Fulgham|7.3.09 @ 2:29PM|#
I'm Canadian and this article is pure propaganda. The 23 hour
average wait time is from presentation to an in-patient bed. That
means a room of your own. In the meantime you're being treated.
Your use of that is TOTALLY misleading.
The longest I've waited is 40 minutes. If you have a condition
requiring immediate attention, you get it. Those of us showing up
with a bad flu have to wait for a bit.
Yes, elective surgery has a waiting list. That's what happens when
you have the same amount of doctors but everyone has access to
them. The alternative in the US is that only those with private
health care (that decides they will cover their elective surgery!)
gets it done at all, so there's less wait.
My wife recently had surgery for an annoying (though not
life-threatening) condition, and it took about a month to get it.
At the end, there was no $25,000 bill for it which there would have
been in the US.
Yes, finding a family doctor is difficult. Most doctors prefer to
run clinics so they don't work 14 hours days. This isn't a symptom
of our health care system, but of the realities of the medical
profession.
I've looked for "Shirley Healy" online but have found no mention of
her aside from other articles quoting this one (or this one quoting
those, I'm not going to read them all -- they all use the exact
same phrasing). I'm calling BS on that until we get a source. No
Canadian doctor would call surgery for a life-threatening condition
"elective". I suspect that if she even exists there was a perfectly
fine non-surgical solution to her problem that she refused and
decided to pay for the elective solution. Sources, please.
Your claim we "leech off of US innovation" is pure bunk. In fact,
the CT Scan was invented in England! There is still a place for
profit (and therefor your profit-driven innovation) with
government-run health care. Doctors are still being paid, equipment
is still purchased, medicine is still required.
In fact, Canada is a world leader in medical research -
http://www.canadianmedicinenews.com/2007/11/canadas-greatest-medical-research.html
For a more balanced view, check out this article:
http://www.denverpost.com/recommended/ci_12523427
|7.3.09 @ 2:34PM|#
"Is reason suddenly getting a lot of health care industry
support?"
Ease up on the ad hominem attacks, pilgrim.
I've lived and worked in both Canada and the U.S. and I found the
health care systems, which I used a lot btw, were roughly a wash
for me. Canada has way better primary care, but in the U.S. my
insurer covered seeing a shrink!!! I paid about the same amount in
both California and Alberta in terms of premiums, etc.
Ironically, I have more choice up here in terms of what doctor I
want to see. I can see any doctor who's taking on patients, and
there are also clinics open every day for non-life threatening
things. Also, I had to go to an emergency room recently and had to
wait a few hours for a non-life threatening issue.
In California, I could only see doctors that were with my specific
insurer. I could go on and on about pros and cons of each system...
they're both pretty good. Of course once I got laid off the U.S.
definitely was a LOT worse, since I had to pay the full premiums
myself under COBRA...
I also lived and worked in Vietnam for a couple years or so and the
health care system there SUCKED. I don't buy what people are
selling when they insist that communist countries have superior
health care. They obviously have never lived in a communist
country, and are what Lenin called, "useful idiots."
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 2:53PM|#
Medical decisions seem like the most local of all possible
decisions.
Anyway, I actually have to seriously go do some things today, but I
also wanted to take this back to the beginning anyway... Which is
that ultimately, discussions of Canada, the UK, Sweden and wherever
else you might want to point are moot.
This is the US. The system we have here will not necessarily
resemble the ones adopted by other nations (which again, is why an
across the board comparison is kind of silly). What are the
individual incentives going to be like and what will be the checks
against abuse, fraud, overconsumption, under-payment (causing
shortages), bad price-signaling, etc.?
I don't know for sure but Obama has talked a lot about
Massachusetts as a model for their "universal" coverage... I'm
working on a larger piece about this topic, as I've said, as are
others, and my man at the PoliticalMath blog had
something to say about that just today: Obama Health
Reform
In either case, you're deluding yourselves if you think that a
government run system is remotely sustainable. The cracks are
clearly forming in systems around the world, and the last 30 years
of Medicaid and HMOs (which were created by the HMO
Act of 1973 in case you're unaware of the fact that government
invented that gem and not "the market") should have proven
beyond a doubt that it's not, especially the way the USA is likely
to implement something like this.
The thing is, I actually feel really sorry for a lot of the people
who so desperately want "free" Health Care. Most of it comes out of
real legitimate need and personal tragedy. A friend has a
"pre-existing condition" which is causing her own nightmare with
the insurance system now... But her support of universal health
care is mostly based on poor logic, bad economic thinking and
almost total ignorance of the history of American health
care...
That ignorance, I think is unfortunately shared by most people
posting here.
I get the fear and the feeling that anything would be
better than a system where some sick people just aren't covered,
but sound economic reasoning says + some knowledge of US history
(imo) definitively shows that some things can get a lot worse.
blake|7.3.09 @ 3:06PM|#
DM:"The problem with free-market health care? It's like gasoline
- it costs the same no matter who you are. You pay the same for a
gallon whether you're a Hummer or a moped."
Thats a bad thing?
Anyway, I know everyone likes debating the ideal system, but
shouldn't we also be arguing over the best feasible option?
I'd like to hear other's thoughts on a public/private two-tiered
system, ala England.
The two-tiered system keeps our american ed system from completely
failing, so perhaps it will do the same for health care.
BTW, I am not as knowledgeable about public vs. private health
care, I work/have worked in public and private middle school/high
school, and I can tell you the public system is a true abomination.
It truly demonstrates what happens when you pretend that govt
options can ignore the realities of the market that manifest
themselves in every other human transaction.
I don't see how healthcare can be better in this regard, but again,
I am no expert.
|7.3.09 @ 3:16PM|#
"I'd like to hear other's thoughts on a public/private
two-tiered system, ala England."
England and Canada are pretty much single-payer systems, while
France, Germany and Switzerland are two-tiered. The top ranked
health care systems in the world? France, Germany and
Switzerland.
Systems like England and Canada rank a lot lower than those three
countries, but both still rank higher than the U.S. system
overall.
The New Republic a while back ran a series of discussions on health
care in different countries. You may want to go to their site and
do a search.
|7.3.09 @ 3:21PM|#
Now that article isn't very true.
I'm in Canada. I broke my hand and waited in emergency at 11pm for
about 3 hours. A few months later, I went to emerg with chest pains
and was hooked up to several machines within a minute.
My Dad needed a triple bypass, but needed to lose some weight. He
scheduled it for 4 months down the road. It turned out to have
complications and he spent over 4 months in cardiac ICU. Do you
know what that must have cost?
My step mother needed a new knee. Yes, she waited for several
months, but it's her knee! She was fine until the operation. I knew
someone who couldn't walk or wait, so they got bumped up and only
waited a few weeks.
MRI's are a wait, true, but it also depends on the urgency. I had
an ongoing problem with a sporadic nerve pinch and waited a few
months. I lived! My fatherinlaw had a brain tumour and got an MRI
the next day. So please, let's get real here.
My system isn't free. I pay taxes for it. As a Canadian, the top
rate is about 48 percent, I'm in the 28 percent bracket. However, I
have no monthly insurance premiums. Maybe I net more than the
average American.
Are you going to find Canadians that want to complain? Sure. Will
you find doctors willing to complain? Of course. I will tell you,
everyone is covered, and everyone shares that burden. If you are
critical, you go to the front of the line. If you can wait, you do.
It's called being civilized.
Maybe Mr. Stossel wants a system to treats rich people faster than
poor? I would be ashamed to be a part of that kind of society.
Me|7.3.09 @ 3:23PM|#
I live in a small Ontario town and don't get sick too often, but I've never waited more than an hour at my local hospital, even for minor problems like an ear infection. It is true that some Canadians go to the States for specialized treatment, but that has less to do with the wait times in our hospitals and more to do with the fact that our best specialists can't help but be lured to hospitals in the States, by the promise of the big paycheck. There are still plenty of excellent doctors in Canada who feel they are paid well (they are), but more often than not, greed becomes a factor. I'm sure when someone in the US offers you millions more than you make up here, it's hard to turn down, even if you're in one of the best paid professions in Canada. But that may also explain why lower-middle class Americans are turned away at US hospitals. They can't afford to help pay the enormous salaries that Doctors are demanding along with the ridiculous markups that for-profit hospitals place on everything from food to hospital beds. I'll never be denied good health care in Canada based on my financial situation and that is more than can be said for the current US system. From an outsider looking in, the attitude in the US seems to be that if your rich, you're welcome, but if not, you don't deserve healthcare.
|7.3.09 @ 3:32PM|#
"In America, people wait in emergency rooms, too, but it's much
worse in Canada. If you're sick enough to be admitted, the average
wait is 23 hours."
I call BS!! Making up statistics is dishonest. Show your source -
and a legitimate one, not one you pulled out of the air. . .
|7.3.09 @ 3:45PM|#
"Canada and England don't pay the price because they freeload
off American innovation."
Amazing. Who provided the world with penicillin, and especially
insulin?
Canada.
Who provided the world with a culture that has permeated, and
necessitated the increasing need for insulin?
USA
This entire excrement-throwing article is highlighting some
extremely important issues.
In Canada, cancer patients are treated immediately, with a great
deal of home-grown technology. They are diagnosed, treated, and
sent home to friends and family.
Total cost: $0.00
In the USA you always have the option to die because you can't
afford medical treatment unless you're under some kind of
plan.
Congrats!
If you could take even a fraction of the money that you spend
invading sovereign nations halfway around the world, you could have
universal healthcare.
What are your priorities, anyway?
|7.3.09 @ 3:52PM|#
we do have mandatory public education, k-12. Why would we do that?
I don't know, you tell me. Give me a single good reason why
children should be incarcerated like prisoners in public
institutions, that more and more resemble prisons, for twelve years
of their lives. I certainly doesn't have anything to do with making
them into "an educated public to be of value to the nation". Since
the more "we" spend on public education the more we seem to get an
ignorant public, why do you think spending more on health care will
produce a healthier one.
It seemed that the founders of this system considered an educated public to be of value to the nation.
For real, the current cockup called "public education has
absolutely nothing to do with anything the founders wanted.
Seriously, girl, you need to shut your self-absorbed, self-centered
yap for a while and read all the threads on this blog (ie not just
the ones talking about the problems of having other people pay your
medical bills) and see what the denizens of the den of iniquity
really believe.
Of course if you did, your head might assplode.
|7.3.09 @ 3:56PM|#
Amazing. Who provided the world with penicillin, and especially insulin?
As mentioned elsewhere insulin was developed in the 1920s over
thirty-five years before Canada's first universal health
plan.
And penicillin was not one of Canada's gifts to the world.
johnny john john|7.3.09 @ 4:04PM|#
http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba649
http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba649
http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba649
http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba649
Seriously if the numbers in this paper aren't lying, the US medical
system is definitely the shittier exception in comparison to other
developed countries.
IF you study this paper, its conclusions are clear: The USA spends
more for less than any other developed country.
The paper is 60 pages long and a lot more thorough than some of the
half baked reasoning I've been reading in the posts.
Open your mind to the mere possibility that socialized medicine can
work, at least in other countries. They have yet to succumb to
apocalypse. You know, there are many schools of thoughts to how to
structure society, among them libertarianism. But it is foolish to
rigidly stick to a single belief structure, and expect everyone
else to believe in that belief too. It's analogous to demanding
that everyone else believe in your religion.
johnny john john|7.3.09 @ 4:05PM|#
Whoops posted the wrong linke
http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/RL34175_20070917.pdf
|7.3.09 @ 4:07PM|#
Postscript,
You are being driven by Big Pharma, and Big Medico to reject the
concept of universal health care, because it would (potentially,
though I doubt it) reduce their profit margins.
As we all know, a universal system versus user or insurance
plan-pay would continue to pump vast amounts of money into these
industries - and they are industries. There is no doubt about
it.
I'm afraid that the American government is either too afraid of
pissing off these huge structures, or too many senators/congressmen
have massive investments and other interests in these
corporations.
Okay. Let's say that you decide (maybe in the next century) that
universal health care is a priority for the Amercan public. Are the
Big Pharma, and Big Medico companies going to fold their tents and
go ... umm ... somewhere else?
NO!
Robert Smith|7.3.09 @ 4:25PM|#
I have lived in 4 different provinces in canada over the last 35 years and I can assure the average wait time in our hospitals is more like 2-3 hours not 23. Our health care system is fantastic. After reading this incredible inaccurate article I feel that its quite possibly its author is either getting paid to write these inaccuracies as truth or is just an idiot
|7.3.09 @ 5:11PM|#
In 2004, in a Nationwide Contest, Canadians voted Tommy Douglas,
the Father of Canadian Healthcare.....Canada's Greatest
Canadian.
'nuff said.
Cheers
WC
Yaniv|7.3.09 @ 5:29PM|#
This article ridiculous, just two weeks ago i asked for an MRI because i have headaches and was not at all an urgent matter yet i went in for my appointment last Friday. I live in Canada and i never heard of anyone having to wait 6 months, or not having a family doctor.
|7.3.09 @ 6:34PM|#
Right ... because none of this EVER happens in America.
Instead of waiting for long periods of time to see the dentist,
a 12 year-old Maryland boy died, because he
couldn't see a dentist AT ALL.
Instead of cutting costs by flipping sheets and pillows, Blue Cross gives doctors incentives to RESTRICT
TREATMENT.
Instead of having a lack of doctors ... oh wait, we have that problem too.
You see, I too can provide a whole host of anecdotal evidence that
doesn't prove anything.
Perhaps some reading is in order.
I realize that libertarians have a philosophical opposition to
government-run anything, but what you're essentially saying is, "I
would rather have other human beings go without medical treatment
than pay higher taxes." Nevermind the fact that your insurance
costs are higher, because hospitals are having to charge more to
treat the uninsured free of cost.
What's sad is that you're trying to convince everyone that Canadian
and British health care is so abhorrent, that it's worth letting
people go without health care to avoid. Deep down in your heart of
hearts, you know that isn't true. Have some compassion.
Thomas|7.3.09 @ 7:30PM|#
I must say that most of this article is complete BS. I live in
Canada(Ontario) and I have NEVER, EVER waited 23 hours in an
emergency room.
Sure an hour or two wait, but nothing like what this article
represents.
blake|7.3.09 @ 7:36PM|#
a number of you are making good arguments for the possible
advantages of canadian or western european models of healthcare
over the american one. but its kinda silly to say that the us has a
free market health care system. its a cartel system. opec is not a
free market, neither is us healthcare.
you're essentially saying is, "I would rather have other human
beings go without medical treatment than pay higher taxes."
some people might think that, but you are a fool if you think that
is the crux of the libertarian position. serious libertarian
problems with "govt run anything" stems from the fact that govt
cant predict what people need or want. the best way to do that is
to let market forces determine incentives. its pretty simple. if
there were a govt program that could accurate divine market forces,
and incentivize innovation, i would be all for it.
im not sure what the best healthcare system would be, but
encouraging the consumers of healthcare to ignore costs,
encouraging the providers of healthcare to not compete for
customers, and having the payer of healthcare determine prices
seems like a straightforward disaster to me.
Kreel Sarloo|7.3.09 @ 7:53PM|#
From:
Kevin Smith | July 3, 2009, 6:34pm | #
Right ... because none of this EVER happens in America.
Instead of waiting for long periods of time to see the dentist, a
12 year-old Maryland boy died, because he couldn't see a dentist AT
ALL.
"A routine, $80 tooth extraction might have saved him."
Oh, yeah, right, the poor people were so fucking poor they couldn't
raise eighty motherfucking semollions to get their kids tooth
pulled.
I wonder what kind of shit the family had just spend four eagles on
in the last few months.
I'm calling a motherfucking bullshit, because as sad a case as this
is this is exactly the kind of thing that happens all over the
world in countries with generous welfare systems because racial and
ethnic minorities don't know how to game the system.
|7.3.09 @ 8:14PM|#
Blake,
I'm not saying that it's the crux of libertarian thinking. What I'm
saying is that libertarians are using their philosophical
objection to government involvement in the market to justify their
denial of government run health care to people who
desperately want it ... because it comes down to the
cost.
Sure, government-run health care would naturally be more
inefficient than private care. But no one will force you to give up
your health care, so your private insurance can go on
being as efficient as it always is.
But we're not talking about you. We're talking about people who
have nothing at all. It makes no sense whatsoever to say
that you don't want someone else to waste their money. But
it does make sense to say that you don't want the government to
waste your money. I get that.
So what it comes down to, is, again, that people don't want to pay
higher taxes, so others can get health care.
If it's not, then maybe we should set up a fund, so people can
donate money, and the fund can be spent on buying the uninsured
private insurance? Somehow, I don't see that happening.
|7.3.09 @ 8:21PM|#
Kreel,
My point exactly. Stossel's use of one case of a British
man pulling his own teeth offers as much proof of a failed British
system as a boy dying from an untreated abscess does of a failed
U.S. system.
I agree that "this is exactly the kind of thing that happens all
over the world" but I disagree with your premises.
David Small|7.3.09 @ 9:15PM|#
Sean Malone, thanks fighting the good fight. Unfortunately, too many equate needs with rights.
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 10:06PM|#
Thanks David...
I just popped in for a minute, but seriously, how come the same
arguments keep coming back when I clearly refuted them
earlier?
The medical innovations that Canada has contributed to the world -
the big ones that have been listed, like insulin, were all BEFORE
the imposition of their national system. Further, insulin - as I
already noted, was a highly international project. So, you
don't get to claim them as credits to "socialized medicine". And
thus, as yet, there has still been nothing even remotely resembling
a rebuttal to the free-rider problem or the lack of significant
innovation coming out of the socialized nations - especially
without some American influence.
End of story.
Anyway, I do need to address one other thing though.
The "libertarian" position isn't about the costs. It's
about the morality of forcing other people to pay
for your health and your life.
Everyone, please think through this chain. Earned money represents
value of your labor or investments. In essence, it represents the
life and time of another human being. Taking that money from them
by force is what we call theft, regardless if the state
"legitimizes" it and calls it taxation. But don't think of the
theft in monetary terms think about it in terms of the hours that
person spent working productively.
EG: If you make $20/hr, and you work 40 hrs a week, then you've
made $41,600 for the year - now, suppose someone takes 40% of that.
Now, suddenly you've only made $24,960 for the year, right? Well
the problem is - for many of you - there's a serious disconnect
between realizing that money and "working/productive hours" is a
synonymous measurement. This means you didn't simply take nearly
half of someone else's "money", you took nearly half their
time as well. This means that they spent a little
over 31 WEEKS, working to support someone else - not
voluntarily, but on threat of punishment and ultimately physical
force.
If this were a more transparent abuse (i.e. if instead of a yearly
IRS bill, there was simply a master with a whip at your back 40% of
the time), you would rightly recognize it as slavery. It's
obfuscated by the veneer of legitimacy provided by government and
their various edifices... So you think that it's legitimate.
Fundamentally it's not.
That is the essence of the libertarian opposition.
Most of us accept that we live in society as it is, and that
some government is necessary for the overall protection of
liberties - police, courts, national defense, etc. - and I won't
bore you with the various well-thought-out ideas of paying for
those services voluntarily rather than through coercion, but the
point is to minimize, not maximize the amount of slavery
we impose on other people.
You people need to be far less cavalier about demanding that
other people toil and earn a productive living to fund
your lives.
It is the height of narcissism and solipsistic evil. And because
the slave-master is wearing a suit and no one complains too much,
you wind up thinking it's ok. It isn't.
NOW... THAT was the "libertarian" moral point. Again, it
is:
"The radical notion that you don't own other
people."
That is quite apart from the sufficiently robust economic problems
with the idea.
The economic point I've already expressed dozens of times. The fact
is any government-run system is based on fundamentally unsound
economics and really really bad math. If you can't
recognize that, then I encourage you to think harder. If not, then
I can help try to explain... I am happy to do so - but to be quite
honest, it really doesn't matter.
We're already bankrupt and no matter what wishful, magical thinking
exists to support "universal health care", we simply cannot afford
it.
At any rate, one should note that slavery economics are a net drag
on society - which is where the moral and the practical meet. But
it's a combination of both things that make up the full
oppositional arguments.
Sean W. Malone|7.3.09 @ 10:16PM|#
And PS.
Kevin Smith:
You are distressingly naive if you believe that the private system
isn't affected by a single payer public system. What do you think
would happen, as an analogy, if you were on a baseball team and the
opposing team's coach was also the umpire, had the ability to
redefine the rules of the game at any point and if he so desired,
forcibly remove your bats & gloves... We know who's going to
win, but is it just, is it good, and was the winner the "best"
player? Probably not.
ANNNND Spud:
Big Phrama and Big Medico are going to SUPPORT these bills
ultimately, because they will be the ones who's competition is
destroyed by it.
I made this point earlier if you'd read it - but it's a joke you're
playing on yourself if you think that the big companies wouldn't
benefit the most from a government-run system. The winners
of that battle will have 0 competition, a legal monopoly on supply
and a virtually unlimited funding source. The sooner you learn that
big corporations LOVE big government, the sooner
you will drop the delusion of sticking it to asshole CEOs with this
stuff. Unless you have a dozen lobbyists, $10,000,000 laying around
for political donations and went to Harvard Law with the
politicians writing the new laws, my guess is you're gonna get
fucked and they're going to come out wayyyy, wayyy ahead.
All you're doing is screwing the smaller companies who might have
been cost reducing/quality raising competitors.
Genius.
johnny john john|7.3.09 @ 10:48PM|#
Sean Malone: How can you ignore the evidence of every other
fucking country in the world??? Their systems work, and they're not
overrun by monopoly and 0 competition. You are deluding yourself
that a socialized system will not work. It works, and 20 other
countries prove it!!
We ALL admit that socialized medicine will have problems that we
don't have now. But looking at the other countries, we can see that
socialized medicine can solve many other problems. Beyond that,
gov't needs to perform a ton of fat cutting operations on
healthcare. The current system is a money drain and needs to be
fixed.
Stop presuming that the only thing government can do is increase
waste. It doesn't always happen that way.
|7.4.09 @ 12:19AM|#
I am a Canadian living in the US. My family (living in Western Canada) sadly, has been riddled with cancers, serious athsma, heart disease, you name it. NOT ONCE have they had to wait for any of their care (beyond what is considered normal here in California, anyway). They have received top notch healthcare in all cases. Better yet, not once did the family have to worry about how they were going to pay for it all or whether or not they were going to be denied by insurance companies. Here in the US there seems to be a deep rooted fear that, despite having good insurance, all it takes is one serious illness to push a hardworking family over the edge into poverty. How can Americans really consider themselves free if they are so scared about something so elemental all the time? I don't get it, but then again I guess I have never had to because I come from a place where health care is considered a right, not a privilege... Wishing my US friends a healthy and happy 4th!
Sean W. Malone|7.4.09 @ 12:37AM|#
johnny:
France, Sweden, the UK, and Canada ALL are facing
seriously hard choices - already.
France's PM got skewered recently for even suggesting that
they were going to have to reduce health care services because they
can't afford it.
I'm not the one ignoring evidence.
I'm also not blind enough to think that government accounting of
this stuff is remotely on the up and up. AND... I'm certainly not
short-sighted enough to only see things as they are
today.
I've already made the case that innovation tanks - and it does.
I've made the case here and elsewhere that through regulation,
supply restrictions, price & wage controls, these systems
pressure many companies out of business, leading to shortages and
rationing - and they do/have. And much more importantly, there is
the irrefutable and disturbing point that the very nature of it
conscripts and enslaves people, regardless of how "humane" it
appears on the surface.
Frankly Johnny, your "evidence" is barely there, and you're
omitting a TON of mitigating factors - you assume that they're all
financially solvent when really none are. You assume that there is
private competition that is as robust and as high quality as
possible, when that is inherently not the case. You assume that
government's accounting of these things isn't completely fictitious
- which, if you look at "intergovernmental borrowing" in the US,
you'd know that the accounting practices of the US Federal
government put Enron's to shame - and we remain one of the "better"
ones in that department around the world.
AND... You've still ignored the free-rider problem which I think is
pretty goddamn incontrovertible.
When other countries benefit so much from the US' massive
spending on health care, and they produce very little in the way of
world-class hospitals or innovative technological developments,
destroying the engine of production here might make you think
twice. For better or worse, they still need us in that
department.
So... Let me summarize:
1. Most of metrics that cover how much "better" other nations'
systems are compared to the US are bullshit.
2. Other nations free ride off the US in a dozen different ways
regarding health care (but also of course, regarding their
economies and their military protection as well) - and if you kill
the "golden goose" (which is what you're talking about it,
whether you believe it or not), then we'll be fucked and so will
they.
3. The writing is already on the wall for the other socialized
systems - Remember, it took 70 years for the USSR to eat itself
alive entirely and that was a massive, incredibly wealthy empire to
start off with, and in the process people spent hours and hours a
day waiting in lines for everything from bread to clothing to
medicine, and most of the time they just starved. For that matter,
North Korea and Cuba are both still kicking despite starving
populations and 50 years of complete stagnation. It will take some
time...
HOWEVER
4. The US is already, as I said, bankrupt. So regardless
of what fancy plan you want to adopt, we absolutely cannot afford
it. I wrote this the other day, but perhaps it's worth noting here
as well:
"Just throwing this out there: The federal budget is now $3,550,000,000,000... For a little perspective. If you spent $100 million *a DAY*, it would take you 97 YEARS to spend it all. Alternatively... That's roughly $11,833,333 per PERSON living in the United States, for one year. What would you do with ~$12 million dollars a year? Think you could afford roads & schools and even armed security guards?"
You need to learn how big our debt and deficits really are before you go proposing tacking on another trillion. Think I'm cruel if you wish, but cost does matter, and we've fleeced the rich enough in this country already that many, if not most are fleeing the country - if not personally, then with their businesses and investment capital.
OHHHHH oh oh oh.... AND...
5. Something we haven't even talked about much - the metrics on the "uninsured" that get thrown about in the media are complete bullshit too! The real number of honest-to-goodness uninsured with no ability to afford it and no eligibility for existing programs or medicare is incredibly small - I believe around 5% or less.
Conclusion: Destroy the country's finances further, push producers and the wealthy out of the country, punish hard work and innovation, stifle competition, conscript people into what amounts to a palatable form of indentured servitude and in return get what?? 20 years, AT BEST, of coverage for a very small population of people who've fallen through the cracks, before the whole thing comes apart at the seams? Again... Genius.
|7.4.09 @ 1:32AM|#
Prayer is free so I pray to Obama. I don't pray for Obama, I
pray TO Obama. I pray that he keeps the world ice cold, that he
keeps a Chevy in every pot and that all the little children, who
are our future, get free health insurance and welfare dentistry. I
pray that soon Obama will give all the hungry children free food
and gym memberships -- free cigarettes too -- if they join the
Union. I pray that teachers get big raises and that more than 10%
of Detroit's public school students graduate from the free GED
school. I also pray for a middle class tax cut even though I'm rich
because I will soon be middle class.
I pray for lots of stuff. Prayer changes things.
|7.4.09 @ 2:03AM|#
Sean,
If it's about the morality of forcing people to
pay for the life and health of someone else, I choose life and
health every time. I cannot ever accept the premise that one
person's health is worth more than another, simply because that
person earns more money. It's a highly utilitarian view of the
world and simply unrealistic. But that's just me.
If it were about the morality of it, why haven't
you started a health care fund for the uninsured, paid out of your
pocket and those of like-minded libertarians who don't want to
force others to pay for it? I'm guessing it's because you
feel like you're already paying too much for the lives of others.
That's your right.
But I do have to take issue with some of your statement. You said,
"Taking that money from them by force is what we call theft,
regardless if the state 'legitimizes' it and calls it taxation."
But then you qualified it by saying that there actually are
legitimate government expenses such as national defense, police,
etc. So which is it? Is it theft, or are there legitimate expenses?
If you open the door to one expense, then our disagreement is not
about the principle, but the degree. And if it's about degree, then
it's about cost, disguised as the morality of
instituting each new increment.
The general libertarian principle, as I understand it, is that the
government should do no more than protect property. All else is
government intrusion on the free market.
So I take it that you believe that the government should not
promote the creation of wealth? You might be thinking, the
government couldn't possibly do that since it's so inefficient and
couldn't possibly understand the needs, wants and desires of
everyone. All I would say is look at public schools. Sure, private
schools exist, just as they existed in medieval Europe. But haven't
we all benefited by having an educated population? How many people
that went to public universities, who might not have received that
education otherwise, have positively impacted your life? Is it
moral to pay for public education? Well, I guess that's for every
individual to decide. But to dismiss the taxation for it out of
hand as slavery, well, that seems rigidly ideological and
a bit much. Slaves don't receive rewards for their labor.
Government expenditures, in this case, are those rewards, however
indirect they may be.
And I never said that the public system doesn't affect the private
system, so I strongly disagree with your characterization of me as
"distressingly naive."
But, you do bring up another interesting point. To go off your
analogy (and perhaps extend it well beyond its usefulness), I would
say that the government isn't changing the rules of the game, but
rather adding another team to the league. If the private teams play
well, they can charge more for their tickets. Sure, the government
team hands out tickets paid for by everyone, but they're a crappy
team. If an individual decides that they'd rather get a free ticket
and see a crappy team than pay more to see a good team, isn't that
their choice? Isn't it an acknowledgment that the government team
provides a better value for their entertainment dollar? Isn't it an
acknowledgment that the government is better for some
people? Why deny them that choice?
Maybe it's because you don't feel it's right to make everyone pay
to subsidize the government team's seats, but that, again, is a
matter of degree, which is a matter of philosophy not facts. Sure,
you may feel that the public good provided by government health
care is not good enough to justify forcing others (and yourself) to
pay more in taxes. I disagree. That's my opinion, and that's my
right.
But to get back to the point of my original post, Stossel didn't
prove anything. He threw out a bunch of anecdotal evidence, which,
is no evidence at all.
|7.4.09 @ 3:48AM|#
Sean,
When it comes to the social contract, perhaps you should take some
of your own advice and leave, as you suggested Lauren do when she
questioned your obviously brilliant mind.
The social contract still applies today, even if it you did not
explicitly agree to it, because the contract is not between you and
the government (that was Hobbes' theory as put forth in the
Leviathan), but rather between you and the other citizens of this
nation. You tacitly agreed to participate when you accepted
education, roads, police, libraries, etc. but did not leave. If,
the people determine that the system is just and within the bounds
set forth in the constitution, the contract goes on. If, on the
other hand, we decide that the system has become unjust, we are
well within our rights to form a new government, per social
contract theory.
So let's use your example of the valet, but make it consistent with
Rousseau's actual theory. Lauren's grandfather makes a
contract with Grampy Malone so that each of their families pays $2
a month into a fund to provide valet services for each family (they
get a better deal if they both use it). Then, both families
continue to use the service, even after both grandparents have
died. Are the remaining family members on the hook for that $2 a
month? Of course they are. If they don't want to pay it, then they
can dissolve the contract.
Now, let's extrapolate that to a town. The townsfolk and Lauren's
grandfather get together and decide that they want to form a
government. At the outset, they all agree that they will abide by
the decisions of the group when it comes to the formation of the
contract (constitution). So, the group forms a government and all
is well. For many years, the people believe that the system is
just, and the government is operating within its boundaries.
As a new generation comes of age, they have a choice: continue
receiving benefits from the other members of the group in exchange
for providing benefits or leave. They stay and tacitly agree to be
policed for failing to uphold their end of the bargain. And so on,
and so on.
For our purposes, I'm going to assume that your family came to the
town after the formation of the government. So, it's many
generations later, and Grampy Malone comes to the town of his own
free will. He is in fact, explicitly agreeing to the contract that
is already in place.
But, two generations later, Sean the Wise comes of age and is faced
with the same dilemma as previous generations. He feels that the
system is unjust and that the government is overstepping the
constitution. He brings his concerns to the people, and they are
all amazed. A majority of the people agree to dissolve the
government and start over. This new and just place is called
Sean-Is-Brilliant-Land, and everyone is happy.
But, of course, that didn't happen. Sean brought his case to the
people and they disagreed with him. They said, pay up or leave.
Sean, realizing that as flawed as he felt the system was, it was
better than anything else. So he stayed and paid into the system.
That's not slavery, that's being on the wrong side of the majority,
as tyrannical as it may be. But at least they gave Sean the option
of leaving.
Maybe the townsfolk are all just too stupid to see the light.
Perhpas Sean the Wise should just leave everyone to their
stupidity, and the enlightened ones will bask in the radiance of
Sean's wealth of knowledge in Sean-Is-Brilliant-Land.
But then again, it's more fun to call someone a "douchebag troll,"
dismiss others as missing a "functioning knowledge of economic
principles," assert that others "don't like very deep thinking" or
"don't even understand the metrics," insist that those that
disagree with you are "assholes" and "dickless jerks," and assume
that others need "to spend some time actually thinking about
philosophy and learn [their] civics a bit better" or are
"distressingly naive" on a message board than to accept the fact
that others disagree with you about the morality
of something.
Sure, you may believe that a public option is slavery. Others
don't. Whatever the outcome, we'll all have to accept it and a)
move on, b) leave the country, or c) dissolve the government and
form a new constitution. Maybe a public option isn't the best for
you or others like you who have wonderful insurance, but surely you
can see how it would be the best for others. And if, we the
people decide that we will pay higher taxes to help out
our fellow citizens, then we all must, your philosophical
objections aside.
johnny john john|7.4.09 @ 4:10AM|#
You definately didn't read the article I linked. No shit, all
metrics don't tell the complete story about a healthcare system.
However, the article uses around 20 to 30 different comparisons of
US healthcare to other countries. It's extremely thourough and
telling.
USA healthcare is more expensive, and by several of their measures,
not at all superior to other countries. I'm not gonna reprint the
entire 50 page article here; you can go read it if you really want
to know about it. It's clear you haven't read it from the arguments
you've been using.
No where do I claim that other countries have no problems with
their systems. OF course there will be problems. But the numbers do
not lie. Our system is just too expensive. It's time to drastically
change it.
David Small|7.4.09 @ 7:29AM|#
To all who love socialized medicine, why did Berlusconi come to the US for his heart surgery in 2006? And why did Belinda Stronach (a Canadian MP and staunch defender of Canada's public health care system) come to California for her breast care treatment in 2007? According to public care's defenders there is little to no waiting for treatment under such systems. So it would beg the question, why would your leaders come to the US for treatment?
Reality Check|7.4.09 @ 10:27AM|#
Just a preface.
How can anyone take John Stossel seriously? I mean he got beat up
by a WWF wrestler when he was purporting to do an in depth
investigation into whether wrestling was 'real' or not.
John your reporting certainly hasn't improved with this
piece.
I'm a Canadian and had the misfortune to be ill and injured on
several occasions during my brief three and change decades here on
planet earth.
I have never waited anywhere close to 23 hours for anything in a
waiting room, in fact I'd say the longest I have ever in my life
waited whether it was living in rural Alberta or major cities like
Ottawa and Toronto is around 3 and a half hours and that's when it
was just broken bones. Sure there are long wait times on occasion,
it's generally when a nurse has improperly triaged or failed to
re-assess an incoming patient.
I have had many relatives undergo cancer treatment and they're all
still here and none of us have the crippling debt that the US
system entails and neither does Canada despite its health care
system being administered by each province have anywhere NEAR the
colossal level of bureaucracy that the US system of
insurance/hmo/private medicine stumbles along with.
John, maybe you need to go back to the wrestling beat.
Sean W. Malone|7.4.09 @ 12:20PM|#
"When it comes to the social contract, perhaps you should
take some of your own advice and leave, as you suggested Lauren do
when she questioned your obviously brilliant mind."
TO WHERE!?
There are HUNDREDS of countries on this planet that have adopted
various forms of collectivist bullshit. There are, as have been
aptly pointed out OVER AND OVER, an endless supply of nations that
have socialized health care, and a host of other issues. If you
don't like to be offended you can move to Canada today and appeal
to their lovely "human rights commissions" on "hate speech".
If you don't care very much about liberty you can go ANYWHERE YOU
WANT.
Where the FUCK am I going to go?? America is hardly the land of the
free anymore, but compared to Europe or Canada, or Asia or the
Middle East?
You act like there's just some other place I can pick up and move
to, and there isn't. If there was, I'd probably already be working
out a way to do so. If I could just look around the world and find
a country that has something similar to the US constitution that's
actually not being used as toilet paper by the government, I would
happily just go there. That place doesn't exist and America, as
corporatist as it is, and as many freedoms are gone or are
vanishing, is still better on that scale than anywhere else... And
hell, I'd like ot think its salvageable.
Anyway, your twist on my valet example fails in it's premise sir,
the grandfather has no right to make any contract for me
what-so-ever. That was what I was pointing out. The social
contract idea is a valid idea, provided that each individual can
opt out. No one can opt out, so in reality, it's a very weak
concept.
At any rate, I like how you try to pretend that I'm using ad
homs when I've linked to sources, and consistently argued the
point. That some people are douchebag trolls and not thinking
enough is a separate issue.
And YES johnny john john, it IS time to
change our system. But unless you learn the history of our system,
the incentives that are in play now and how they got there, then
you're going to miss the point and change it for the worse. No one
here is arguing that the status quo is as good as it should be. But
you guys keep recommending pushing farther down the road that got
us where we are already. It's madness... Government already pays
for some 60% of health care in this country and, while costs have
skyrocketed and quality and innovation has declined as government
involvement has increased, you all want to increase it some
more??
That's just insane. And while I get that no one likes history very
much, right now is the right time to start paying attention to
it.
"And if, we the people decide that we will pay higher taxes to
help out our fellow citizens, then we all must..."
...I hope you realize that this is exactly the kind of
statement that I'm referring to when I say tyranny of the majority.
If "we the people" decide that 10% of the population is going to be
enslaved, then "we all must go along with it". If "we the people"
decide that the bill of rights isn't worth shit, then we
all must lose our liberties (already happened). If "we the
people" decide that it's cool to aggressively attack a foreign
country, then we all must pay for it.
But so much of the time, it isn't "all" of us who pay for these
things. The costs of socialized medicine aren't being born by
everyone are they? No... A sizable chunk of the US barely pays any
taxes at all, but they won't have to pay for anyone else. It's not
"society" that bears the cost when somebody decides that "we the
people" need a new mini-mall built over the top of some guy's home
and the "people" claim eminent domain and level the guy's place
over his objections.
We live in a republic, you asshole. A republic that is
supposed to be accompanied by guaranteed liberties. So
YES... My moral objections do trump your bullshit
authoritarianism. There are certain things that, according to our
own constitution, "We the people" are not allowed to do against
others. If you want to change the constitution, then do it... But
right now, you're shitting all over it and pretending that it's all
good cause it's what a majority wants. Well that's EXACTLY what the
constitution is designed to limit.
I have three quotes for you:
"A Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled to against every government, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference."
"A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine."
"A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government."
Know who said all that? Thomas Jefferson.
Does that seem like the direction you're pushing? Not so much. So
frankly, that you think it's even remotely valid for you to invoke
the words, "we the people" just pisses me off. These schemes of
conscription and taxation are the complete opposite of what the
writers were talking about.
So happy Independence Day everybody.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."
The slow shift of our government away from its original idea - all
for light and transient causes - and without any attempt at an
honest revision of the Constitution itself, pushes us towards the
tyranny this nation was founded to escape.
|7.4.09 @ 2:04PM|#
This article is as misleading as the anti-vaccine campaign. All
health care in Canada is run by the provinces, which means that
there is a great difference from place to place how patients are
treated.
In Alberta, where I live, it is a system fast becoming a version of
the profit and insurance run mess that is in the US. Services are
routinely cut, hospitals are threatened with closure and around
250,000 people in Calgary (population over 1 million) have no
family doctor. Wait times in ERs are usually over 12 hours and if
you want a CT scan of other "exotic" test, the wait can be over 1
year.
In Manitoba, on the other hand, a friend who moved there this year
has found a family doctor, did not have to wait more than one week
for a CAT scan and the price for parking was 42 cents at the
hospital.
Everything depends on the provincial governments, not the federal
government which has washed its hands of the entire affair to play
nursemaid to big corporations. That is the main reason this article
is irrelevant and misleading.
Lauren|7.4.09 @ 4:06PM|#
The libertarian flag-waving is great and all, but thank god for
public education so that the "majority rule" is smart enough to
know that libertarianism is not what we want - hence 3/4 of the
country want public health care.
Is the mob always right? No. 99 Senators voted in the Patriot Act,
which STILL has yet to "sunset" away. Is the majority always
followed? No, or else it would have taken a shorter amount of time
for civil liberty rights to pass in Congress.
With any great change to the structure of our society, there will
be the outliers, in this case libertarians, and other far-right
thinkers, who will adamantly oppose change in favor of the status
quo, usually in which they are doing well. So I expect these kinds
of struggles with the universal health care debate to go on for a
while, with some pretty red-faced opposition and ideological
flag-waving, but reality will sink in soon, and the country will
continue to chug on as it should.
And, by the way Sean, if we are so great and innovative and the
rest of the world relies on us, it doesn't make much sense to say
afterwards that our country's government has been hijacked by
majority rule and that it is destroying us. You are directly
contradicting yourself - our markets are not entirely free, and
instead of restricting the potentials of free trade, gov't policy
restricts the potentials of corruption and monopoly.
And while innovation is great, we can't expect innovation from a
small percentage of our population - we want people to have basic
education and good health so that our Einsteins and other geniuses
can rise to the top using their productivity in mind and body,
instead of wasting that productivity on getting an education and
taking care of medical bills. Hence, government steps in to level
the playing field - and if you're rich, yea, that means you get
brought back to the median a little bit. A country with a big
middle class is better than a country with a blossoming poor class
and shriveling rich class with a high concentration of wealth.
|7.4.09 @ 5:42PM|#
Sean,
"At any rate, I like how you try to pretend that I'm using ad
homs when I've linked to sources, and consistently argued the
point. ... you asshole."
I never said you didn't link to sources, but you did resort to
ad hominem attacks. The two are completely unrelated. Just
because you did one, doesn't mean you can't do the other. For
example, I could say, "Here are some appropriate links to the
discussion we're having, you sanctimonious prick." But I wouldn't
do that, because I'd like to have an amicable discussion about the
theories of government.
You're conflating social contract theory with the Constitution of
the United States. Social contract theory is an agreement to come
together and form a government, based on the majority opinion,
regardless of the ultimate form the government takes--not an
agreement to form a republic. If a majority of people in Britian
believe that they should have a constitutional monarchy, it is
their right until they choose to abolish the government and form
another. If a majority of people in Germany decide that they want
to form a federal republic, it is their right until they choose to
abolish the government and form another. Get it?
A majority of the delegates ot the Philadelphia Convention decided
that a republic was an appropriate form of government for the
United States. That republic shall remain in place until the people
of the United States choose to abolish it and form another. To use
the words of Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence
that you provided:
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
What's ironic about all the quotations you provided is that Thomas
Jefferson, as the newly appointed minister to France, had no hand
in drafting the framework for the Republic that you insist I am
"shitting all over" and "pretending that it's all good cause it's
what a majority wants." In fact, he opposed the formation of an
executive branch but ultimately became the third President of the
United States, because the majority of the people
instituted it as part of their chosen form of
government.
I understand that you believe the government is overstepping those
bounds set forth in the Constitution. However, it is then your
duty, as Jefferson said and you pointed out, "to abolish it, and to
institute new Government." If a majority disagree that the
government is overstepping those bounds, then it is their right to
keep the current government in place.
I still believe that the valet example is valid, because you do
have the option of opting out by leaving. The grandfather is not
making a contract for you. The grandfather is making a
contract that you have the choice of participating in or
not.
I'm sorry if you disagree with the decision that the town is
making, but you've run a cost-benefit analysis and concluded that
it is better to be a slave (in your terms) here than be a slave
anywhere else. It is your right to believe that you are a slave,
but you do not have the right to refuse to uphold your end of the
bargain, because you disagree with a decision that the group
made.
I have done a similar analysis. I believe that the war in Iraq was
unconstitutional. Does that mean I can quit paying my taxes? No,
because I have the power to choose my representatives who can then
hold the government to the constitution. If they don't, then I can
advocate that we reform the government. If the majority decides
that we should not, then I must accept it or leave.
This is the essence of social contract theory. I'm sorry we don't
all have our own pieces of land, so we can form our own
governments. In fact the prospect of 6 billion
governments is well outside the bounds of plausible.
"I hope you realize that this is exactly the kind of statement
that I'm referring to when I say tyranny of the majority. If "we
the people" decide that 10% of the population is going to be
enslaved, then "we all must go along with it". If "we the people"
decide that the bill of rights isn't worth shit, then we all must
lose our liberties (already happened). If "we the people" decide
that it's cool to aggressively attack a foreign country, then we
all must pay for it.
You are exactly correct. In fact, we did enslave ten percent of the
population, and it was even written into the Constitution!
We the people decided to ammend it based on the
powers we granted ourselves when a majority of the delegates wrote
it into the Constitution and a super-majority of the states
ratified it. This is especially ironic when you consider, Mr. "all
men are created equal" owned slaves and impregnated at least one of
them. And yes, if we the people decide that the
"bill of rights isn't worth shit," then we must either abolish the
government, leave or abide.
|7.4.09 @ 7:40PM|#
While I can't address the statistics used in the article, as
they aren't backed up, I can give you my personal experiences from
living in Canada from birth to now (almost 30 years).
I've had two family doctors. Never a problem seeing them. My
current doctor has been mine for 20 years, it's never an issue to
see her (emergency same/next day, apointment in a week or so),
although she does get rushed around flu season.
Hospitals? Here are my family's experiences:
Broken arm, xrays 30 min after arrival, cast and out the door with
meds and followup apointment 60 min after that. I basically waited
for about 5 minutes the whole visit.
Pneumonia. Arrived delerious with my parents at about 1 am. On IV
treatment about 20 minutes later. Feeling almost perfect the next
day, followups scheduled for 1-3-7 days.
My dad had a triple aortic aneurism repair and triple bypass
performed over two years. Both times the waiting was less than two
weeks from identification of the problems (which came up in
regularly scheduled scans and tests of a man his age). He got three
days of ICU care, and almost two weeks (combined) in room
aftercare. Cost of this treatment (because we checked) in the us
would have been roughly 350 thousand dollars without insurance
(good luck getting that, as an older overweight smoker - now ex
smoker). His treatment from beginning to end was top notch. The
nurses and doctors were great, and followup has been superb.
My mum had a flag raised at a routine feminine checkup a few years
ago, a week later she had been through a battery of tests including
body scans. Three weeks later they performed surgery to remove the
growths on her ovaries, happy ending to that one too.
Even on busy weekends, I've NEVER waited for more than 5 hours in
emergency, when I was a moderately ill person compared to the
overflowing mess of emergency visitors (and that was when I was
there for antibiotics for a fever during a holiday weekend when
doctors/clinics were closed)
Neither myself nor my family have ever encountered the problems I
sometimes see written about our 'public' (not free, it's paid for
by our taxes) system. It has always worked for us in the manner in
which it should.
I do have a personal story from the US though:
My aunt in NY recently had a brain tumor diagnosed and removed. She
had great insurance, and scans were quicker than here (within 4
hours tests were being run), but when her insurance company got the
second round of bills for transport, surgery, and followup chemo
(over 100k), they dropped her policy. She ended up paying hundreds
of thousands out of pocket to get fast treatment, and will likely
get that back from the insurance company, but she shouldn't have to
go through that, and I'm glad for my system where such situations
aren't the norm.
|7.4.09 @ 7:46PM|#
One country vigorously comes together to defend the right to
bear arms and kill one another; the other country vigorously comes
together to keep one and all's health paramount.
Both positions have issues and problems.
But all in all, I'd rather have my problems, eh?
Sean W. Malone|7.5.09 @ 12:19AM|#
The interesting thing that you gloss over Kevin, is that our
Bill of Rights is still on the books!
No one abolished it, no one repealed the first 10 amendments, no
one openly changed the Constitution.... Yet it has been destroyed
all the same.
That was my main point for referencing all of that. It was changed
for light and transient causes - but not legitimately at all, it's
just been steadily ignored. Perhaps you forget the other part of
Jefferson's statement:
"and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."
I am not so disposed.
Anyway, you have the sequence of events backward
sir. I am not the one wanting to "abolish" our government, you
(metaphorically of course) are the one who has already abolished
it, and you did so without any direct assault what-so-ever. I want
our government to abide by the Constitution. That's it! In
doing so, I believe this nation would be far more prosperous, more
free, more innovative and robust, we would return to being the envy
of the world and reduce our antagonistic relationship to other
nations and we would be stronger as a result. (And, keeping with
the theme of the article... there would be far fewer people
slipping through the cracks.)
We are, imo, soon approaching the time where the train of abuses
and usurpations will wind up with absolute despotism, and instead
of turning back towards liberty now when we have
the opportunity to do so peacefully, the only ultimate result will
be violent revolution. I'm honestly surprised that more people
aren't concerned about this.
Frankly, I would much prefer a shift in attitude back towards the
values of liberty, and a gradual repeal of the massive government
power grabs we've seen over the last 80 years to poverty, despotism
and civil war.
The worst part is, the majority has clearly
already decided that the Bill of Rights
isn't worth shit and yet you act like it's me who is the
"radical". It's laughable to suggest that I'm the one
who's breaking the social contract...
Ask yourself how many of the first 10 amendments are still
applicable. By my count, only 1 (III), and only because it's
socially irrelevant.
But honestly, I'm tired of discussing this issue. As I've said
before, the majority - as it does - will win. However, I completely
reject your idea that I should be the one to just pack up
and leave when A. there is no other place to go, and B. it's the
government that broke the social contract, not me. As such, I also
reject the idea that it is my duty to simply acquiesce to
majority rule when the laws the majority wants to enact are both
immoral and unconstitutional. If you want to change the
constitution, fine - actually do it. But I'm under no
obligation to people who demand illegal activities from me.
Honestly - If you're familiar with the idea of the Laffer Curve, I
think we're already past the hump, and I think we've been past it
for quite a while (thus Obama cracking down on foreign "tax
shelters"). At some point, you can whine and cajole and blame the
rich and say they need to do their "fair share" (which is the most
ironic conception of "fairness" I've ever heard of), and you can
try to force them to stay in the US by making it costlier to leave
(i.e. imposing exit taxes as we have), you can make it illegal for
them to move businesses overseas, or invest in foreign stocks - but
you won't succeed. And you shouldn't.
At any rate, I will remain here until I can afford to leave or
until things get to a point that is completely unbearable. In the
meantime, I will continue to fight tooth-and-nail for freedom...
When I'm 75, I will look back and remain proud of myself,
regardless of what happens. Though I hope you re-think your
positions, I have a feeling you may look back one day and wonder
"what went wrong?"
I leave you all with this:
"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have ... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."
|7.5.09 @ 12:30AM|#
What perplexes me is the amount of people pushing for 'free'
healthcare because it is a basic human right. While I agree that
all people have a right to be taken care of when they are sick, I
don't think it's any more of a right than food, shelter, etc. But
nobody in any country expects to get those things for free, so why
health care?
Physicians and other health care professionals make a lot of money,
but the average U.S. physician spends 8 years (college + medical
school) in post high school academia, plus 3-5 years training for a
low salary before they are even allowed to begin practicing on
their own. Plus, the average doctor graduates medical school with
150,000+ dollars in student loan debt.
So if and when the U.S. goes to a 'socialized' system, where
physicians will probably earn a salary comparable to a waste
management worker, you are going to see both a massive shortage of
new doctors and a marked decrease in the quality (lack of
competitive applicants) in those new physicians.
Bottom line, the health care may be cheaper (or 'free'), but by
that time, will you even want it?
Just some food for thought.
R.I.P. Steve McNair.
|7.5.09 @ 12:53AM|#
In my opinion, the biggest problem with health care in the U.S.
is the disconnect between the patient and the physician that has
been brought about by big insurance. In years past, patients were
billed by their physician for services, and patients paid for these
services. Insurance was mainly for very advanced or very expensive
procedures and medications.
The way things have become, most people use their insurance for
something as trivial as a routine physical. The only way the
insurance companies can make a profit is to reimburse as few things
as possible and as little money as possible. The only way for the
physician to make a profit is to bill the insurance company for
more than the services actually cost with the expectation that they
will not be fully reimbursed.
This creates the unfortunate situation of putting the patient
between a physician who is trying to get rightfully paid for the
service he or she provides, and the insurance company whose purpose
is to pay as little money as possible. The permeation of big
insurance into all levels of healthcare has created a sort of
lose-lose situation.
I know quite a few people who work out what is referred to as a
'self-pay' setup with their primary care physician, and
additionally, only go to the doctor when absolutely necessary.
There are very inexpensive insurance plans out there that can cover
only high-dollar procedures, sort of a worst-case-scenario plan. As
long as the care required is relatively simple, these people choose
to pay for healthcare directly out of their own pocket. As an added
benefit, the physician usually cuts these people a significant deal
on the cost, since they don't have to worry about being
short-changed by the insurance company.
There are a number of ways that the American system of healthcare
can improve, but they will take the concerted effort of the general
public and physicians. The government cannot fix these problems,
and it's not their job.
Colonel_Angus|7.5.09 @ 1:39AM|#
Government has already fucked up the health system enough with
regulation in every aspect- insurance companies, employers, drug
companies, doctors, hospitals, and now apparently every individual.
This is the kind of market manipulation that has raised costs in
the first place, it is no where near a free market system. Any
socialist health policy implemented in this country will be among
the worst performing and most expensive. Fuck this outdated thread
and all the progressive scuzbags in it. Why are there so many pinko
fuckheads posting on here lately anyway?
Tommy Douglas is a piece of shit.
Colonel_Angus|7.5.09 @ 1:48AM|#
"The way things have become, most people use their insurance for
something as trivial as a routine physical."
This sort of thing is partly a result of government mandates
dictating what the insurance companies must cover in their
policies. Without such mandates, it would be easier for consumers
to shop around for policies that more closely fit their needs.
Another thing is tax breaks to employers providing insurance,
distorting the market to give insurance companies a more captive
market share and making it easier for them to raise costs. Just to
give some examples of what kinds of regulation I am talking
about.
|7.5.09 @ 2:01AM|#
Sean,
I think we've finally found something we can agree upon. I
absolutely support your right to fight anything you feel to be
unjust or illegitimate. Just as I have the right to support
anything I feel to be just and legitimate.
You are absolutely correct that the people have glossed over the
amendments when it is expedient. It is then our responsibility to
fight that, and I will be standing next to you when they do.
But again, as the quotation you provided from the Declaration
states,
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
|7.5.09 @ 2:09AM|#
Sorry, the last part got cut off.
As I've said, if the people decide to live under a system that is
abusive, that is their right. But, when "a long train of abuses and
usurpations ... reduce them under absolute despotism," we will
"throw off such Government."
What I don't understand though, is how a public option qualifies as
an abuse. Article I Section 8 of the Constitution clearly
states:
The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States
Regardless of how misguided a public option may be in your opinion,
if the people decide to promote the "general welfare" through a
public option and "lay and collect taxes" to pay for it, what's
unconstitutional about that?
And if we disregard the fact that the contract is between you and
your fellow citizens, not the government as you've incorrectly
asserted on several occasions, how is the government "breaking" the
contract with you by following the rules we have set forth?
|7.5.09 @ 12:03PM|#
That article is just not true and is obviously written for the big Pharma and the insurance companies. I live in Canada and our medical service has some problems , but I still get treatment and I dont have to worry about being bankrupt by large medical bills. You have millions of people in USA who cannot afford health insurance. People in England do not pull their own teeth, that is a downright lie. My neighbour just got both her knee caps replaced at not cost to her and she did not wait for treatment either.
johnny john john|7.5.09 @ 9:26PM|#
"Fuck this outdated thread and all the progressive scuzbags in
it. Why are there so many pinko fuckheads posting on here lately
anyway?"
I usually check the reason blog because it has interesting, up to
date news on the drug war and civil rights topics. However, posts
about the US health care issue are driven by purely
libertarian/conservative ideology, rather than something
libertarians and liberals all agree on, civil rights.
And calling us "pinko fuckheads" isn't really helping your
libertarian cause. You are turning more people off to
libertarianism than gaining allies with that kind of useless name
calling.
|7.6.09 @ 12:13PM|#
Here's another story about how no medical innovations would
happen without a profit driven system...oh wait.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2009/07/01/health-canadian-aids-hiv-vaccine-kang.html
|7.6.09 @ 1:38PM|#
The General Welfare asks "Am I necessary and proper?"
The answer is probably "yes." You may also be justified and
ancient, and you roam across the land.
|7.6.09 @ 3:59PM|#
As a newcomer here, I am a little dismayed by the number of
potty-mouthed postings, especially on a site called
"reason.com."
It seems that they mainly emanate from "libertarians," who have not
yet had to mortgage their houses to pay for trivial medical
treatment for themselves or other family members.
One thing that I don't understand is this:
How come so few people get the idea of "shared risk?"
This is the basis of all insurance. In fact, it's the only reason
that the concept of insurance was developed in the first
place.
Car insurance. If I manage to get through an entire year without an
accident or moving violation, I know that my premiums are being
applied toward settling matters of other individuals who had less
luck than me.
The number of nasty things that can happen with automobiles is as
varied as the number of people with driving licenses. Just having
your parking brake let go on a graded driveway can cause enormous
damage when a car hits the street, and God knows what else.
I know that my tax dollars are being applied to my province's
medical system. If I manage to not have a heart attack this year,
someone else will. And I'll be helping to fund the treatment and
survival of that person.
I'm baffled by some of the "Constitutional" arguments against
universal health care.
It's strange to see a nation that maintains the "right to bear
arms" and will spend $1000 on some handgun, or whatever.
At the same time, others are expected to pony up hundreds of
thousands of dollars for cancer treatment, especially when it
doesn't have the desired result (like, survival).
Curiouser and curiouser ...
|7.6.09 @ 4:25PM|#
As an ordinary 58 yr old Cdn male, I can testify that this article is basically a pile of half-truths and misinformation. I have never had to wait for any test or appointments, I get great service from my family doctor, and even the most overcrowded hospital around here will admit you to emergency within an hour or so unless there is some sort of disaster in progress. The physician shortage has more to do with retiring doctors and not enough medical school admissions than how we fund our system. I truly feel sorry for Americans and their overpriced medicine for profit system.
Douglas Gray|7.7.09 @ 12:06AM|#
John Stossel's article was not well researched, as he over
generalizes. As one poster mentioned, some Provinces have great
medical care with no wait; other are really awful. The physican he
quoted was in bad place.
It is also not true that all the innovation comes from the U.S.
President Reagan got German cancer treatment, as some of their
innovations are better than ours. Other wealthy Americans have gone
to Germany as well.
This is a typical REASON piece. To promote libertarianism and free
markets, the authors over generalize and make statements that are
not wholly accurate.
|7.7.09 @ 12:34PM|#
Myths, lies, and downright stupidity, should be the title of
this piece of crap.
As a Canadian with extensive personal experience of the Canadian
health system as a patient, and one who does not have to rely on
dubious anecdotes, I can tell you that this article gives a
completely false and misleading picture. Sure, you might have to
wait for a particular treatment but so what? If immediate treatment
is necessary you get it; if not, you don't. The judgment call is a
medical one, not one based on your willingness to come up with the
cash. If everyone who wants an MRI could get one on demand, there
would be hundreds of MRI machines lying around idle waiting for
someone to come in the door. That is ridiculous waste and no small
factor in America's inefficient and costly system. Rationing health
care is necessary and universal. It exists to the fullest and most
immoral degree in the US where access to care is rationed by ones
ability to pay, and to pay a premium for instant access. The
Canadian system has its problems, all systems do including the one
in the US which leaves tens of millions uninsured and astronomical
costs for everyone else, but it is not broken. Coverage is
universal, and readily available to those who need it. I know: the
author of this article doesn't.
engineer|7.7.09 @ 2:01PM|#
"How come so few people get the idea of 'shared risk?'"
We get the idea of shared risk (which is why most of us have
insurance). What we don't like is forced subsidies of other
people's risks. And I've noticed an unusual number of hereto unseen
posters claiming to be from Canada and therefore knowing how
wonderful it all is.I smell a rat, and it tends toward Michael
Moore-style tactics.
engineer|7.7.09 @ 2:11PM|#
And Canada hardly enjoys an advantage in preventive care.
Canadians receive mammograms, pap smears, prostate-antigen tests,
and colonoscopies at lower rates than Americans,and as a result
have a 25% higher mortality rate for breast cancer, an 18% higher
mortality for prostate cancer, and a 13% higher mortalitiy for
colon cancer.
Canada's system is cheaper because it uses its monopsony power to
pay doctors and drug companies less.
Finally, in areas where Canadians compare favorably to Americans
(like heart-disease research), the cause is more easily
attributable to lifestyle (lower rates of obesity, more exercise,
healthier diet) than to the healthcare system.
|7.7.09 @ 2:50PM|#
Okay, "engineer," you simply take the idea of shared risk out
from the constrictions of a subset of the working population, and
apply it to the overall working population. Suddenly - more people
- more dollars - less strain on the individual.
It's not even math - it's simple arithmetic.
|7.8.09 @ 12:57PM|#
Wow, I am simply amazed at the character of a "journalist" that
would well bullshit his way through an article because he is
personally offended by the concept that the government has a place
in the day to day workings of a just society. As a canadian who has
been to the most overworked hospitals in the canadian system
(English hospitals in quebec) the longest I have had to wait is
four hours to have a sprain examined. The quickest was immediate
care for a possible concussion.
For someone who seems to have a deep concern about profit you don't
seem to mind paying triple the canadian medical bill for a lower
average per capita level of care.
|7.8.09 @ 1:21PM|#
23 hr wait in Canada? Where the hell do you get your information from? Someone who stubbed their toe? Come on..maybe I would take this article seriously if it wasn't filled with stupid exagerated comments like that.
|7.8.09 @ 4:42PM|#
Pure Hogwash Stossel. Wow I finally found a website run by corporate fascists. I will be coming here often to see what greed can do to people.
|7.8.09 @ 9:47PM|#
I'm a Canadian, and my experiences with our health care system are NOT what you describe.
Dear Johnny Strudel|7.12.09 @ 9:00PM|#
Hey John here's some real in depth analysis
"The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of
moral crisis, maintain a neutrality."
http://www.boingboing.net/2009/07/12/high-ranking-insuran.html
Leave a Comment
More Articles by John Stossel
- Worse Than Taxes, John Stossel, November 19, 2009
- The U.S. House of Presumptuous Meddlers, John Stossel, November 12, 2009
- The Double Standard About Bias in Journalism, John Stossel, November 5, 2009
Related Articles (Canada, Health Care)
- Who Decides If Breast Tests Are Best?, Ronald Bailey, November 24, 2009
- Mandating Disaster, Shikha Dalmia, November 20, 2009
- My Body, Their Choice, Peter Suderman, November 18, 2009
- Kiss Your Freedoms Goodbye If Health Care Passes, Andrew Napolitano, November 16, 2009
- The U.S. House of Presumptuous Meddlers, John Stossel, November 12, 2009
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Los Angeles, CA 90034
(310) 391-2245