Gunner's Status

Sometimes people use what is available, even though in principle they would rather it not exist. Doesn't men they are (or are not) a bad person.

Damn, now I'm forced to defend Runner... First it was the French, now this. I guess Republicans really are uniters!

Dan

Our public health system deals with it nicely - your first heart attack, you get whatever it takes to get you well - if you still smoke, and have a 2nd one, you get put in a general ward and you take your chances without major surgery and expense. Also, no liver transplants for drug addicts/alcoholics, no lung transplants for smokers.

Now, I would have thought such a system would appeal to Gunner - its called "freedom of choice" and "accepting responsibility for your own actions".....

And we do have private health insurance as well - mind you, its been distorted by the previous conservative gov. subsidizing it by billions of dollars (sorta like your banks) - it enables you to "jump the waiting list" for elective surgery, ie non life threatening illness.

But if your in a bad car crash. or a major heart attack, or need neurosurgery, most people prefer to use the public hospital system as its got the gear and the expertise...

Andrew VK3BFAA.

BTW - our beer is better than yours too.....

They are bad if they continue to condemn those who are forced to use the same resources that they use themselves. It's kind of like standing in the free cheese line while complaining about all those people in front of you who don't deserve the free cheese.

Funny that never happens anywhere it has been tried...

Look at Medicare, and compare it with insurance. Medicare wins hands down in all categories except the very top tier (read VERY expensive) insurance plan. Add the extra (private) plans pushed by the insurance industry, and Medicare ceases to look quite so good. For most purposes, VA care was also pretty darned good, considering its clientèle, until the GOP started cutting corners to save money on veterans to spend on other useless programs.

Perfect? Hardly. Faults are known, and could be handled. Any decently designed plan would be better than the current one with private insurance, which itself is unaffordable to so many.

Dan

And yet, try as you might, you really cannot come up with a good case for not having it (with real facts and figures).

Dan

So far, no one in this group has done so.

Why did you bring it up? Because Runner has wished such on many, many other people? Do you dislike irony?

Dan

DD:

I'll show you mine, if you show me yours, eh. LOL

NOW you are just being pathetically stupid.

Be a man, and quit raising our medical costs.

Dan

Apparently that's not universal. Gummer had his first event years ago, didn't change his ways, yet still got another even more expensive round of care recently. You'd think he'd be mortified and grateful, but instead he's going to sue! Paging Jerry Springer!

Wayne

I agree that socialized medicine would be cheaper than what we now have. That is not my argument.

My position is on two levels.

First, I do not like coercion at any level. Forcing me to pay for socialized medicine, which I have no control over, no choice in, is simply unacceptable.

Secondly, I see socialized medicine as an end-run on cost containment. When prostrate surgery costs a house, a broken leg costs half a year's income, and a doctor's appointment two days income then the system itself is broken.

Spreading that cost out to everyone to mitigate individual cost only masks a monopoly fleeding America.

I'd be a little less resistant to the coercion if medicine and pharmaceuticals weren't outrageously priced.

Amazing that a hospital is forced to provide medical care to someone who either cannot pay or chooses not to pay, and then is subject to a lawsuit from that nonpaying "client"!

Oh, the one where my 2nd X wife shot me in the chest, hell it was just a little 25 cal didn't make much of a hole until the damn DRs got done. Had tubes out my side for many weeks & it was hell pulling the radiator out of my 64 vette (327/365hp) with the damn tubes getting in the way.

You'll be paying for Gunner's surgery, plus the cost of defending his lawsuit, if he finds an ambulance chaser willing to take a stab at it. Hospitals must provide emergency care regardless of ability to pay. You're absolutely right that costs will have to be brought under control, which will be easiest to do under a single-payer system. That would be bad news for the insurance companies and medical professionals robbing us blind, and that's why they fight against it tooth and nail. I don't believe, BTW, that everyone has a right to health care, it's just not practical the way we are running the system currently. There is also no reason why a universal system could not have deductibles to discourage excessive visits.

Glad to hear you made it.

No, I won't. I've expatriated. At least until either of two conditions arise, a revolution or a mass rejection of politics and a reboot of the Constitution and Bill of Rights.

Gunners triple/quad bypass here costs about $5,500 usd for everything.

That is my objection to either the current U.S. situation or the proposed single-payer plan. Both simply socialize irrational costs.

I believe that everyone should have _access_ to health care. As it stands citizens of the U.S. cannot see a reasonably priced doctor without joining a healh insurance plan. Urgent care doctors are about $100/5 minutes and provide no on going care, drugs are outrageously priced, monopolized, hospitals are insanely priced.

No one should be penalized for primary care just because they haven't paid the medical mafia for protection. If Blue Cross or Kaiser charges $18/5 minutes then everyone should have similar treatment.

If someone wants to ride their motorcycle wihtout a helmet or health insurance then society should pick up the tab for shoveling his brains into a bucket then charge his estate. Which raises another issue.

People with cradle-to-grave, unlimited insurance have a different outlook on life and services. They feel immortal, invincible, and are greater risk takers. People without insurance are more cautious, on the average, and careful of not only diet, exercise, health maintenance but also risky behavior.

National Health is a good idea but there are too many flaws in every system offered so far.

Dave:

Well, you've probably got me beat. I have a couple of scars on either side of my head from rolling a car seven times when I was 21, but you can't see them under the hair. Never had my tonsils out, or appendix either for that matter.

This is just an addition for what has the makings of turning into the longest thread of all time in here. What have we got, something like

140 posts on the just the first day? It already seems to have enough contention to let it persist for weeks, if not MONTHS! LOL

Fran probably has the both of you beat. LOL How is she doing Bob?

Like a train wreck or car accident, people just have to watch. I'll bet none of you can match the scars a 155mm flechette round leaves behind and you wouldn't want to.

-- JC

Soon, Gunner may be thanking President Obama and the Democratic Congress, for providing him with universal health coverage.

i

Don't hold you breath waiting for Gunner to be grateful for that.

JC