I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this country,
NOW, just as exists in 36 industrialized countries who have better
health care outcomes than we do, for half the price. If you believe, as
I do, that our current system leaves each and every one of us vulnerable
to bankruptcy due to a health care crisis, including those who are happy
with their private insurance, then please, please, please, call and
write your legislators EVERY DAY until we get a moral and equitable
health care system in this country.
Remember, much more than half of the bankruptcies in this country are
due primarily to a health care crisis. More than half of those people
were already insured! One slip on the table saw, you can't work any
more, thus you can't work, you lose your job, you can't pay the COBRA
insurance payments (mine are in excess of $1000/month), and bingo, you
are bankrupt. Without health care for your stump.
On Jul 7, 8:46=A0pm, krw <[email protected]> wrote:
<snip>
> In what case is asperin more effective?
Aspirin prevents heart attacks while Vioxx causes them?
On Tue, 07 Jul 2009 20:40:14 -0500, Douglas Johnson
<[email protected]> wrote:
>krw <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>On Tue, 07 Jul 2009 11:16:48 GMT, Han <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>>If aspirin can do the same thing as Vioxx (kill the pain) then I would
>>>like the rule that cost plays a role. Not the only role, for sure, but
>>>that is where the if comes in.
>>
>>Do you really believe Vioxx and aspirin are equivalent?
>
>He didn't say one way or the other.
He did.
>But of course they are not equivalent. In
>many cases aspirin is safer and more effective. -- Doug
In what case is asperin more effective?
On Jul 7, 5:52=A0am, "HeyBub" <[email protected]> wrote:
> Luigi Zanasi wrote:
>
> > Our nasty socialist uncaring health care system offered knee
> > replacement surgery to my 88-year old mother-in-law. She turned it
> > down as she felt she was too old for that.
>
> > Luigi
> > Just doing his bit to counter some of the lies about Canada's health
> > care system.
>
> You mom should have gotten on the list, even though she was probably corr=
ect
> in assuming she wouldn't live long enough to bubble to the top. Stranger
> things have happened.
>
> I understand that abortions are free in Canada, but there's an eleven-mon=
th
> waiting list.
>
> Is that so?
On abortions, it's actually only 10 months, but only in the Catholic
hospitals. :-)
My mother-in-law is not planning to die within the next 2-3 months
(waiting time for knee surgery where she lives).
Luigi
"DGDevin" wrote:
> Just him? I'd have thought umpteen million voters had something
> similar in mind.
Yep, that's why he got elected.
> IMO the mutts in Congress are going to mess up enough of what Obama
> wants to do that it will be at best half-assed reform, the Dems take
> campaign contributions from the same lobbyists as the Repubs.
IMHO, Obama is going to have to start leading the effort to get what
is needed.
But then again, who am I to question his methods?
> It's also been reported that Elvis is still alive and well. That's
> a dubious number.
As Dirksen said, "a million here, a million there, etc".
Any way you cut it, it's impressive.
> They've earned it. They care *only* for their profits, and the
> suffering of people who can't afford what the industry wants to
> charge is just too damn bad.
You want an argument, change the subject.
> Yeah, the govt. is going to screw up some of this, but it can't go
> on like it has, one in six Americans with no health coverage is
> intolerable.
Agreed, but I'm sensing that Congress is beginning to realize the
futility of opposing what Obama wants, at least for now.
Lew
On Tue, 07 Jul 2009 05:17:30 GMT, "Lew Hodgett"
<[email protected]> wrote:
>"krw" wrote:
>
>> I knew you wouldn't understand the whole concept.
>
>You are correct, the idea that a government bureaucrat makes medical
>decisions is a concept is a concept I neither accept nor understand.
Get used to it.
DGDevin wrote:
> HeyBub wrote:
>
>> I don't. I am indifferent in the extreme to the thoughts, attitudes,
>> institutions, and preferences of other nations.
>>
>> I do have a position, however, on those who would hold up other
>> nations as exemplars worthy of emulation.
>
> Ah yes, the NIH Syndrome. We don't care how good somebody else's
> idea/system/machine is, if it's Not Invented Here, then we don't want
> it. Brilliant.
I think you've wrapped your mind around the concept. It's evolution, you
see.
For generations, those of the old country who possessed initative,
self-reliance, bravery, and the desire to risk for greater rewards, came
here. They left behind the cowards, the nay-sayers, the fearful and the
fretful. We new-worlders - and here I include Canadians - are the cream of
the crop. Those left behind are, in the main, the dregs. Each group
developed systems, governments, and institutions according to their
inclinations.
That's why what seemingly works in Germany is abhorrent here.
Come to think on it, it might NOT be evolution. Maybe Divine Intervention?
"Han" wrote:
> I do understand the concept and its tendency to break down.
> Insurance
> company clerks make those types of decisions all the time. Now, hey
> have
> a profit motive instilled in them, where supposedly the government
> clerk
> only needs to weed out fraud.
Precisely.
For profit insurance companies have grunts on the payroll whose total
job is to find ways to weasel out of meeting their contractual
obligations to their customers.
That's a private not a governmental happening.
Lew
jo4hn wrote:
>>
>> Greed is intrinsically good. An ancient great worthy once said:
>> "Were it not for the evil inclination (greed), no man would build a
>> home, marry, or father a child."
>>
>> 'Course he didn't work for a drug company, but the concept's the
>> same.
> "Greed is good."
>
> Gordon Gekko: "The richest one percent of this country owns half our
> country's wealth, five trillion dollars. One third of that comes from
> hard work, two thirds comes from inheritance, interest on interest
> accumulating to widows and idiot sons and what I do, stock and real
> estate speculation.
Here are the top wealthiest people in the U.S. What 2/3rds inherited their
wealth?
William Gates III (Founder of Microsoft)
Warren Buffett (Investments)
Lawrence Ellison (Founder of Oracle)
Jim Walton (Inherited)
S Robson Walton (Inherited)
Alice Walton (Inherited)
Christy Walton & Family (Inherited)
Michael Bloomberg (Founder Bloomberg)
Charles Koch (Inherited small company)
David Koch (Inherited small company)
Michael Dell (Founder, Dell Computers)
Paul Allen (Founder, Microsoft)
Sergey Brin (Russian immigrant, founder Google)
Larry Page (Founder, Google)
Sheldon Adelson (Created Comdex)
Steven Ballmer (Founder, Microsoft)
Abigail Johnson (President, Fidelity Investments)
Jack Taylor & Family (Founder, Enterprise Rent-A-Car)
Anne Cox Chambers (Inherited Cox Entertainment)
Donald Bren (Real estate developer)
http://www.forbes.com/2008/09/16/forbes-400-billionaires-lists-400list08_cx_mn_0917richamericans_land.html
By my count, seven of the top twenty got their start via inheritance. That's
about ONE-third, not two-thirds.
On 6/30/2009 7:12 PM scritch spake thus:
> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this country,
> NOW, just as exists in 36 industrialized countries who have better
> health care outcomes than we do, for half the price.
I'll keep this short too. I agree *absolutely*.
Will make more detailed arguments later.
--
Found--the gene that causes belief in genetic determinism
"HeyBub" <[email protected]> writes:
>Tim W wrote:
>> <[email protected]> wrote in message
>> news:[email protected]...
>>> On Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:12:41 -0700, scritch <[email protected]>
>>> wrote:
>> [...]
>>>
>>> Oh, like some of the european countries where healthcare is "free"
>>> and everyone pays 80% income tax?
>>
>> There is no such country
>>
>>> And you may have NO choice of provider
>>
>> There is no country where private health care is outlawed
>
>"Private insurance for medically necessary hospital and physician services
>is illegal in only 6 of the 10 [Canadian] provinces."
>http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/content/full/164/6/825
Read the damn article. It doesn't say what you're implying. If you
want to pay a doctor out of your own pocket for services, you can.
From TFA:
"Before describing the constraints on direct billing and extra-billing, we want to clarify the
concept of opting out. A Canadian physician may, at any time, choose to give up his or her
rights to bill the public plan and take up practice in the private sector.
Although there are differences in terminology (e.g., "non-participation," "non-enrolment,"
"practising outside the Act," "not subject to the agreement"), every provincial plan
permits physicians to opt out."
In Manitoba, Nova Scotia and Ontario the financial incentive to do so is significantly
dulled because opted-out physicians cannot bill more than they would receive if they
were working within the public plan.
In every other province, opted-out physicians can set their fees at any level.
However, as the status disincentive row in Table 1 shows, all of the remaining 7
provinces except Newfoundland and Prince Edward Island have in place measures that
prohibit the public purse from subsidizing the private sector. In other words, patients
of opted-out physicians are not entitled to any public funds to subsidize the cost of
buying their services privately.
>
>Most African countries do not permit private medical practice.
A Citation is required for this statement.
scott
On 7/1/2009 9:44 AM Larry Blanchard spake thus:
> On Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:12:41 -0700, scritch wrote:
>
>> Remember, much more than half of the bankruptcies in this country are
>> due primarily to a health care crisis.
>
> That in itself is enough reason for single-payer. And despite the claims
> of the right, that does not necessarily mean single provider.
In fact, it has *NEVER* meant single-provider. That's a myth
perpertrated by those rabid right-wingers you referred to. (HeyBub, you
there?) It has always been proposed that a single payer (the gov't) will
pay for services from a multitude of providers. The provider can be
anything from a private physician to a clinic to a hospital to some kind
of medical co-op that hasn't even been dreamt up yet.
OK, chew on this for a minute: A single-payer system *should* be
embraced *especially* by conservatives (speaking of true fiscal
conservatives here), for two reasons:
1. Conservatives are always bitching and moaning about bureaucracy this
and bureaucracy that. Well, guess what? Under the current "system" (in
quotes because, basically, there ain't no system), bureaucracy is
rampant and needlessly large. Think about it: each insurer or other
medical payer has its own redundant administrative operation--basically
a gigantic bureaucracy, replicated hundreds of times over.
A single-payer system would overnight eliminate much of this bloat.
There would be one administrative entity to take care of paying medical
bills.
(I can already hear the Rushies saying "yeah, well it's only gubmint
burocracys that are bad! private industry don't count!", which, of
course, is bullshit and can simply be ignored.)
2. It would *immediately* reduce the costs of doing business in the US,
because employers would no longer be responsible for covering their
employees' medical expenses through insurance. Instant boost for business!
Of course, don't let the fact that *every other* industrialized
democracy in the world today has such a system in place sway you either
... (more American Exceptionalism at work here)
--
Found--the gene that causes belief in genetic determinism
On Tue, 07 Jul 2009 11:16:48 GMT, Han <[email protected]> wrote:
>Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote in
>news:[email protected]:
>
>> Han wrote:
>>
>>> Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote in
>>> news:[email protected]:
>>>
>>>> Ed wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> "scritch" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>>>>> news:[email protected]...
>>>>>> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this
>>>>>> country,
>>>>>
>>>>> That is a very scary thought. Some reform may be in order, but not
>>>>> that.
>>>>
>>>> Yeah, it's worked out SO well for Great Britain and many other of
>>>> those
>>>> countries the OP touted are either on the same verge of bankruptcy
>>>> in their systems, taxing the snot out their citizens, or (more
>>>> frighteningly) rationing care and planning on more rationing.
>>>>
>>>> The One has already alluded to age-based means tests when he was
>>>> asked
>>>> about how one woman's mother with a tremendous love of life and
>>>> great spirit at 100 was given a pacemaker to help keep her quality
>>>> of life. The One made the absolutely cold (not cool, but *cold*)
>>>> statement, "Uh, well, umm, I think "spirit" is a pretty subjective
>>>> thing and we won't be able to do that under my plan"
>>>>
>>>> Cold, calculating, and scary. Many of you rec.ww denizens are
>>>> reaching ages that are going to fall into the "not of value to
>>>> society" category.
>>>
>>> This is indeed scary. It is also scary that (on average) an
>>> exceedingly high percentage of one's lifetime healthcare costs are
>>> expended in the last year of life. And that a lot of those costs do
>>> hardly anything to prolong life, let alone quality life.
>>>
>>> I do know how difficult choices that need to be made are, believe me.
>>> But what of chemotherapy to prolong life with a few months,
>>> considering the agony that at least some go through with the
>>> treatment?
>>>
>>> As I said, difficult choices. Be sure you have them written out in
>>> the appropriate form, so your doctors and loved ones know what your
>>> real wishes are.
>>>
>>
>> If The One gets his way, I (or anyone else for that matter) won't
>> have to
>> do that, the government will be making those choices for us. And no,
>> that's not hyperbole -- take a critical look at the things that
>> Daschle was promoting as far as evaluating "cost-effectiveness" of
>> treatment, the comments The One made as related above, the fact that
>> the only real way to bring medical costs down is to ration
>> availability of care.
>
>If aspirin can do the same thing as Vioxx (kill the pain) then I would
>like the rule that cost plays a role. Not the only role, for sure, but
>that is where the if comes in.
Do you really believe Vioxx and aspirin are equivalent?
"HeyBub" <[email protected]> wrote:
>The current method of pay-to-play has, as a consequence, a built-in
>incentive to work, save, invest, be productive, and plan for contingencies.
>Only by pursuing these goals can one stand a good chance of choice in health
>care. It's social survival of the fittest. The dissolute and the slackers
>die off more quickly.
If we really wanted to get serious about Darwinism, we'd eliminate health care
entirely. -- Doug
"scritch" wrote:
> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this
> country, NOW, just as exists in 36 industrialized countries who have
> better health care outcomes than we do, for half the price. If you
> believe, as I do, that our current system leaves each and every one
> of us vulnerable to bankruptcy due to a health care crisis,
> including those who are happy with their private insurance, then
> please, please, please, call and write your legislators EVERY DAY
> until we get a moral and equitable health care system in this
> country.
>
> Remember, much more than half of the bankruptcies in this country
> are due primarily to a health care crisis. More than half of those
> people were already insured! One slip on the table saw, you can't
> work any more, thus you can't work, you lose your job, you can't pay
> the COBRA insurance payments (mine are in excess of $1000/month),
> and bingo, you are bankrupt. Without health care for your stump.
You want an argument, change the subject.
It will be interesting to observe the process as it happens this
summer and maybe into the fall.
Before it is over, Obama will have to twist a few arms, but he can do
that.
Lew
"HeyBub" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> > country's wealth, five trillion dollars. One third of that comes from
> > hard work, two thirds comes from inheritance, interest on interest
>
http://www.forbes.com/2008/09/16/forbes-400-billionaires-lists-400list08_cx_mn_0917richamericans_land.html
>
> By my count, seven of the top twenty got their start via inheritance.
That's
> about ONE-third, not two-thirds.
Perhaps you can't count high enough? Try working out the average for all of
them instead of just 20. Nevertheless, what possible difference does it
make?
"CW" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> No. They outlawed the sale of tablesaws with arbors long enough to mount a
> dado blade.
So, how far does that law extend? Can a Brit ship in a dado comparable
tablesaw from another country? Can the motor in one of their table saws be
changed out for a motor with an arbour long enough for a dado blade.
In other words, what possibilities exist for getting around the attack on
dados?
On Thu, 2 Jul 2009 14:55:22 -0700, "DGDevin" <[email protected]> wrote:
>Charlie Self wrote:
>
>> To put it politely, that is a sin, one aided and abetted by phalanxes
>> of adminstrators, overcharging hospitals and surgeons and insurance
>> companies, with the last listed being among the major problems...and
>> problem causers.
>
>The insurance companies are a huge part of the problem, their administrative
>overhead absorbs twice as much money as in Canada and something like eight
>times as much as compared to Taiwan. Their attempts to only insure healthy
>people and cut loose anyone who gets sick if they can get away with it is
>revolting. That recent case in Calif. where an insurance company cut off a
>woman right in the middle of cancer treatment was sickening, the
>arbitrator's ruling of nine million bucks hopefully got the bastards'
>attention. Press coverage of that and similar cases revealed that insurance
>companies have employees whose only job is finding reasons to cancel
>coverage of customers who have made claims, they pay bonuses for doing so.
>So you pay your premiums for years, then you get sick and make a claim, and
>they cancel your policy on the grounds that when you first signed up umpteen
>years ago you under-reported your weight (though that is not in any way
>related to your illness). If it was within my power that would be flat-out
>illegal.
>
>> I use VA health care and am grateful for it. It's far from perfect--
>> hey, what the hell: it IS government run, after all--but it is
>> coherent, consideraly cheaper than civilian care (try 15% or so), and
>> in the past few years, they have tried mightily to cure the long term
>> ills that had built up from its being generally ignored.
>
>And the VA negotiates lower drugs prices with the pharmaceutical companies,
>something Congress in its wisdom refused to allow Medicare to do under the
>previous administration. Now that the drug companies see which way the wind
>is blowing they've suddenly discovered that maybe they can cut Medicare some
>slack, to the tune of eighty billion dollars. Ain't it amazing what these
>companies are suddenly able to do when they realize they've pushed their
>greed too far?
Greed beyond imagination.
On Thu, 02 Jul 2009 22:14:11 GMT, "Lew Hodgett" <[email protected]> wrote:
Change, what hallucinating grass are you smoking now?
All Polititions are liars and crooks.
>The change is upon us.
>
>Obama wants it.
>
>Obama is going to get it.
>
>It is reported that Obama has a re-election "war chest" in excess of
>$2 billion.
>
>An organization that can acquire that kind of campaign fund, is simply
>going to get the job done.
>
>The medical status quo folks are clueless how to handle what is headed
>their way.
>
>Lew
>
On Thu, 2 Jul 2009 22:05:31 -0500, "HeyBub" <[email protected]> wrote:
>Greed is intrinsically good. An ancient great worthy once said: "Were it not
>for the evil inclination (greed), no man would build a home, marry, or
>father a child."
>
>'Course he didn't work for a drug company, but the concept's the same.
Maybe it did not work for drug companies, I can accept that!
But, how about politicians (Democrats/Republicans), Banks, Insurances,
Hospitals, Lawyers etc.
>
"Douglas Johnson" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> If we really wanted to get serious about Darwinism, we'd eliminate health
care
> entirely.
If you *Really* wanted to get serious about Darwinism, you'd eliminate all
social programs, works programs, government and anything else that brings
people together. The only industry would be club making.
But then, what would we do for beer?
<[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> On Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:12:41 -0700, scritch <[email protected]>
> wrote:
[...]
>
> Oh, like some of the european countries where healthcare is "free" and
> everyone pays 80% income tax?
There is no such country
>And you may have NO choice of provider
There is no country where private health care is outlawed
>
> Please check ALL the conditions before picking out just the ones you
> think are good.
ROFL
>
> Did you know that a German driver's license can cost $1500 to $2500?
No, but I don't believe it.
Tim W
Mark & Juanita wrote:
<SNIP>
>
> Further, once the government takes over, this gives a tremendous foothold
> in not just rationing health care, but using the fact that taxpayers are
> paying for it as an excuse to regulate every portion of one's life. Again,
> not hyperbole -- it's being done in Great Britain. Overweight? No hip
> replacement for you. Smoke? Forget about treatment for heart disease, you
> brought it upon yourself.
>
> Think about the ramifications -- woodworking is a semi-dangerous hobby, it
> would not be far-fetched to see the government banning various hobbies
> because of the "burden" on the public health care system.
>
Question - Didn't the Brits outlaw dado blades on home table saws?
Glen
Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>Douglas Johnson wrote:
>
>> Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> Yeah, it's worked out SO well for Great Britain and many other of those
>>>countries the OP touted are either on the same verge of bankruptcy in
>>>their systems, taxing the snot out their citizens, or (more frighteningly)
>>>rationing care and planning on more rationing.
>>
>> The question is not whether the US system needs rationing. It already has
>> it. We ration it by who you happen to work for (corporate insurance), by
>> age (Medicare), by poverty (Medicaid), and by wealth (private pay or
>> individual
>> insurance). Those that aren't in one of the privileged groups are out of
>> luck.
>>
>
> Just to dispel this notion -- this is not true. My wife had two elderly
>unmarried aunts who were never well off, to be blunt, they were poor their
>entire lives. When one was diagnosed with cancer, the state of Kansas paid
>not only for her treatment, but also for trips to and from the doctors.
>When her sister needed long-term care, she spent several years in a nursing
>home. The state got their home and anything left in savings after they
>passed away, but this was reasonable considering the care they received.
>Care is available to those who need it.
This sounds like it's Medicaid, which is a state run, federally funded welfare
program. Like any such program, there is are a bunch of requirements, but the
central one is poverty, or near poverty. If you have too many assets or too
much income, you are out of luck. You also have to be old, disabled, on
welfare, or a low income family with children -- at least in Texas. It is NOT
available to everyone who needs it.
I included Medicaid in the list of privileged groups. It is a little odd to
think of poor people as privileged, but when it comes to health care, they are.
> IMO, the system we have now is by far superior to as system run by the
>government. I don't want the same kind of people who run TSA, the Post
>Office, the Motor Vehicle Department, or the IRS deciding the kind, amount,
>or any other element of the kind of medical care I should receive.
Unless you are completely private pay, you do have such people making those
decisions. They just work for the insurance company instead of the government.
I think that is a distinction without a difference.
I'm heading towards Medicare at a rapid rate and will have government
bureaucrats making those decisions for me. Keep your fingers crossed.
-- Doug
On Jul 1, 9:13=A0pm, "DGDevin" <[email protected]> wrote:
> Ed wrote:
> > "scritch" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> >news:[email protected]...
> >> I'll keep this short. =A0We need single-payer health care in this
> >> country,
>
> > That is a very scary thought. Some reform may be in order, but not
> > that.
>
> "Some" reform? =A0Fifty-million with no insurance, millions more
> under-insured, a tenth of health insurance premiums shifted by the health
> care industry to cover their costs treating uninsured patients, U.S. heal=
th
> insurance companies spending at least double on administration as in othe=
r
> industrialized countries, health care costs consistently outstripping
> inflation, companies moving overseas to duck the costs of employee health
> coverage, hospitals closing emergency rooms to stop losing money treating
> uninsured patients, people living in fear of bankruptcy from serious
> illness.... =A0"May" be in order? =A0Just how bad do things have to get b=
efore
> we decide substantial reform is certainly in order? =A0I don't pretend to=
know
> what the solution is, and my instinct is the govt. can always make things
> worse. =A0But I sure as hell can see that American health care today is b=
roken
> and needs more than a little tinkering around the edges.
Any reason applied is painful. U.S. health care is 37th among
industrialized nations in effectiveness and first or nearly first in
cost.
To put it politely, that is a sin, one aided and abetted by phalanxes
of adminstrators, overcharging hospitals and surgeons and insurance
companies, with the last listed being among the major problems...and
problem causers.
I use VA health care and am grateful for it. It's far from perfect--
hey, what the hell: it IS government run, after all--but it is
coherent, consideraly cheaper than civilian care (try 15% or so), and
in the past few years, they have tried mightily to cure the long term
ills that had built up from its being generally ignored.
My biggest objection is that VA cannot bill Medicare part B when I
need hospitalization. I'm paying, IIRC, $96 a month for something that
will only be used accidentally. The statement that one government
department cannot pay another is, first, bullshit, and second,
asinine, since that money is withheld from my SS each month, thus is
my money, not government funds. I wouldn't mind at all paying VA the
same amount monthly.
I wish to hell I could get similar care for my wife--and she is on
Medicare, too.
HeyBub wrote:
>>> I don't. I am indifferent in the extreme to the thoughts, attitudes,
>>> institutions, and preferences of other nations.
>>>
>>> I do have a position, however, on those who would hold up other
>>> nations as exemplars worthy of emulation.
>>
>> Ah yes, the NIH Syndrome. We don't care how good somebody else's
>> idea/system/machine is, if it's Not Invented Here, then we don't want
>> it. Brilliant.
>
> I think you've wrapped your mind around the concept. It's evolution,
> you see.
>
> For generations, those of the old country who possessed initative,
> self-reliance, bravery, and the desire to risk for greater rewards,
> came here.
Oh, really? You might read up on why many early colonists came to the new
world; hundreds of thousands of them were convicts, indentured servants,
political prisoners and other undesirables expelled from their homelands.
For all intents and purposes many of the early European colonists were
slaves and could be bought and sold and generally treated in the same
fashion as slaves from Africa. They died like flies in the Caribbean and
thus weren't very effective at working the sugar plantations; they did
somewhat better in a climate more similar to their native lands. It's also
odd how right to the present day immigrants have been widely considered
losers, undesirable, low-class. America has a long history of treating
immigrants with suspicion and even hostility, just ask the Irish, or the
Chinese, or the Japanese, or Jews, or Mexicans, or....
> They left behind the cowards, the nay-sayers, the fearful
> and the fretful. We new-worlders - and here I include Canadians - are
> the cream of the crop. Those left behind are, in the main, the dregs.
> Each group developed systems, governments, and institutions according
> to their inclinations.
Ah yes, eugenics, the pseudoscience beloved of the Master Race.
> That's why what seemingly works in Germany is abhorrent here.
>
> Come to think on it, it might NOT be evolution. Maybe Divine
> Intervention?
I remember many years ago talking to a gentleman who had been a tanker in
WWII. He related how most of the Sherman tanks he and his comrades rode
were armed with a pipsqueak 75mm gun (based on a First World War French
field gun) that was nearly useless against the German heavy tanks they
faced. But to their amazement the British had some Shermans (with the
typically British name Firefly) armed with a British gun called a 17lber.
It was every bit as good as what the German Panther tanks were armed with
and could shoot holes in enemy armored vehicles at great distances.
Needless to say it was a source of some bitterness to them that the Brits
had come up with a better gun than the mighty American industrial machine
while most of their tanks had crappy little guns.
Which brings us back to the NIH Syndrome--if it ain't American, how could it
possibly be any good?
Lew Hodgett wrote:
> The change is upon us.
>
> Obama wants it.
>
> Obama is going to get it.
Just him? I'd have thought umpteen million voters had something similar in
mind. IMO the mutts in Congress are going to mess up enough of what Obama
wants to do that it will be at best half-assed reform, the Dems take
campaign contributions from the same lobbyists as the Repubs.
> It is reported that Obama has a re-election "war chest" in excess of
> $2 billion.
It's also been reported that Elvis is still alive and well. That's a
dubious number.
> An organization that can acquire that kind of campaign fund, is simply
> going to get the job done.
>
> The medical status quo folks are clueless how to handle what is headed
> their way.
>
> Lew
They've earned it. They care *only* for their profits, and the suffering of
people who can't afford what the industry wants to charge is just too damn
bad. Yeah, the govt. is going to screw up some of this, but it can't go on
like it has, one in six Americans with no health coverage is intolerable.
HeyBub wrote:
> I don't. I am indifferent in the extreme to the thoughts, attitudes,
> institutions, and preferences of other nations.
>
> I do have a position, however, on those who would hold up other
> nations as exemplars worthy of emulation.
Ah yes, the NIH Syndrome. We don't care how good somebody else's
idea/system/machine is, if it's Not Invented Here, then we don't want it.
Brilliant.
WD wrote:
>>
>> And the VA negotiates lower drugs prices with the pharmaceutical
>> companies, something Congress in its wisdom refused to allow
>> Medicare to do under the previous administration. Now that the drug
>> companies see which way the wind is blowing they've suddenly
>> discovered that maybe they can cut Medicare some slack, to the tune
>> of eighty billion dollars. Ain't it amazing what these companies
>> are suddenly able to do when they realize they've pushed their greed
>> too far?
>
> Greed beyond imagination.
Greed is intrinsically good. An ancient great worthy once said: "Were it not
for the evil inclination (greed), no man would build a home, marry, or
father a child."
'Course he didn't work for a drug company, but the concept's the same.
Douglas Johnson wrote:
> Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>
... snip
>
>
>> IMO, the system we have now is by far superior to as system run by the
>>government. I don't want the same kind of people who run TSA, the Post
>>Office, the Motor Vehicle Department, or the IRS deciding the kind,
>>amount, or any other element of the kind of medical care I should receive.
>
> Unless you are completely private pay, you do have such people making
> those
> decisions. They just work for the insurance company instead of the
> government. I think that is a distinction without a difference.
>
While this is somewhat true, there is a huge difference and distinction --
there are competing insurance companies that have to keep the majority of
their clients satisfied or they lose business to other insurance companies.
They are also subject to lawsuits and redress for grievances through the
legal system. When the government takes over, no such mechanisms exist
unless one is independently wealthy and can go private pay (if that will
even be legal).
Further, once the government takes over, this gives a tremendous foothold
in not just rationing health care, but using the fact that taxpayers are
paying for it as an excuse to regulate every portion of one's life. Again,
not hyperbole -- it's being done in Great Britain. Overweight? No hip
replacement for you. Smoke? Forget about treatment for heart disease, you
brought it upon yourself.
Think about the ramifications -- woodworking is a semi-dangerous hobby, it
would not be far-fetched to see the government banning various hobbies
because of the "burden" on the public health care system.
> I'm heading towards Medicare at a rapid rate and will have government
> bureaucrats making those decisions for me. Keep your fingers crossed.
>
> -- Doug
--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough
J. Clarke wrote:
> Han wrote:
>> "Lew Hodgett" <[email protected]> wrote in
>> news:KTA4m.2714$9l4.1840 @nwrddc01.gnilink.net:
>>
>>> "krw" wrote:
>>>
>>>> I knew you wouldn't understand the whole concept.
>>> You are correct, the idea that a government bureaucrat makes medical
>>> decisions is a concept is a concept I neither accept nor understand.
>>>
>>> Lew
>> I do understand the concept and its tendency to break down. Insurance
>> company clerks make those types of decisions all the time. Now, hey
>> have a profit motive instilled in them, where supposedly the
>> government clerk only needs to weed out fraud.
>
> The trouble is that the insurance company clerk has the government clerk
> watching him. But who watches the government clerk?
As voters, we do. But we've been doing a really piss-poor job of it.
"Brian Henderson" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> DGDevin wrote:
>
> Actually, it's worse than that. Insurance companies, and this includes
> government programs like MediCare and MediCal, will only pay 10% of the
> cost of a procedure. If someone needs an MRI and it costs $200 to
> perform, the hospital absorbs 80% of the cost and insurance picks up 20%.
> Hospitals learned that if they wanted to get reimbursed, they had to raise
> the price of the procedure to $2000, that way they got the $200 that it
> actually cost. This hurts the uninsured because legally, the hospital
> cannot charge different rates, therefore the uninsured are paying $2000
> for a $200 procedure that shouldn't cost that much, if not for the screwed
> up way the insurance industry works.
Right on brother!
I've also found that hospital emergency rooms give a 50% discount for cash
payment at the time of treatment. What does that tell you?
Luigi Zanasi wrote:
> On Jul 5, 10:14 pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Yeah, it's worked out SO well for Great Britain and many other of those
>> countries the OP touted are either on the same verge of bankruptcy in their
>> systems, taxing the snot out their citizens, or (more frighteningly)
>> rationing care and planning on more rationing.
>
> Medical care has to be rationed like any non-free good, there is not
> enough for everyone to get everything they want. The choice is
> rationing based on ability to pay (US system), or medical necessity
> (Canadian system).
>
>> Cold, calculating, and scary. Many of you rec.ww denizens are reaching
>> ages that are going to fall into the "not of value to society" category.
>
> Our nasty socialist uncaring health care system offered knee
> replacement surgery to my 88-year old mother-in-law. She turned it
> down as she felt she was too old for that.
>
> Luigi
> Just doing his bit to counter some of the lies about Canada's health
> care system.
My mother just had a repair of a knee replacement done over 15 years
ago, she is 84. For what it is worth, she has replacement hips and
knees on both legs, all free.
--
Froz...
Scott Lurndal wrote:
>>>
>>> There is no country where private health care is outlawed
>>
>> "Private insurance for medically necessary hospital and physician
>> services is illegal in only 6 of the 10 [Canadian] provinces."
>> http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/content/full/164/6/825
>
> Read the damn article. It doesn't say what you're implying. If you
> want to pay a doctor out of your own pocket for services, you can.
>
> From TFA:
>
> "Before describing the constraints on direct billing and
> extra-billing, we want to clarify the concept of opting out. A
> Canadian physician may, at any time, choose to give up his or her
> rights to bill the public plan and take up practice in the private
> sector.
>
True. But, as the article states, private medical insurance is not allowed.
Further, private physicians do not have privileges a government-run
hospitals. This limits physicians to things like dermatology, ophthalmology,
or primary care. Anything beyond that has to be cycled into the government
system.
HeyBub wrote:
> True. But, as the article states, private medical insurance is not allowed.
> Further, private physicians do not have privileges a government-run
> hospitals. This limits physicians to things like dermatology, ophthalmology,
> or primary care. Anything beyond that has to be cycled into the government
> system.
Not necessarily...if they thought there was money in it someone could
open a private hospital.
Chris
Tim W wrote:
> <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> On Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:12:41 -0700, scritch <[email protected]>
>> wrote:
> [...]
>>
>> Oh, like some of the european countries where healthcare is "free"
>> and everyone pays 80% income tax?
>
> There is no such country
>
>> And you may have NO choice of provider
>
> There is no country where private health care is outlawed
"Private insurance for medically necessary hospital and physician services
is illegal in only 6 of the 10 [Canadian] provinces."
http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/content/full/164/6/825
Most African countries do not permit private medical practice.
>>
>> Please check ALL the conditions before picking out just the ones you
>> think are good.
>
> ROFL
>>
>> Did you know that a German driver's license can cost $1500 to $2500?
>
> No, but I don't believe it.
>
" it will cost approximately 1500 bucks...maybe less also..."
"I did mine about 2 years ago in Frankfurt. The whole thing cost about
?2,000."
"An Australian friend of mine got his German license 6 years ago and only
paid around ? 500..."
http://www.toytowngermany.com/lofi/index.php/t42662.html
"Many schools have set up simplified courses for experienced drivers, which
will cost you about ?200 as opposed to the over ?1,000 that a beginner would
have to pay."
http://www.howtogermany.com/pages/driving.html
"This is understandable when you realize that a German driver's license
costs about $1500-2000, after a minimum of 25-45 hours of professional
instruction plus 12 hours of theory, and such a license is good for life."
http://www.german-way.com/driving.html
and more...
HeyBub wrote:
>> "Before describing the constraints on direct billing and
>> extra-billing, we want to clarify the concept of opting out. A
>> Canadian physician may, at any time, choose to give up his or her
>> rights to bill the public plan and take up practice in the private
>> sector.
>>
>
> True. But, as the article states, private medical insurance is not
> allowed.
That's not so, private insurance exists in Canada but it can only pay for
things not covered by the govt. insurance plans, e.g. private rooms, some
rehab and so on, plus total coverage for people waiting to qualify for
govt.-run insurance, e.g. recent immigrants. The 2005 ruling by the Supreme
Court of Canada that prohibiting patients from going outside the govt.-run
systems is unconstitutional while there are widespread life-threatening
delays in diagnosis and treatment in the govt.-run systems is also worth
noting--it makes the whole "not allowed" thing kind of doubtful.
> Further, private physicians do not have privileges a
> government-run hospitals. This limits physicians to things like
> dermatology, ophthalmology, or primary care. Anything beyond that has
> to be cycled into the government system.
Most hospitals in Canada are not "government-run," they are operated by
non-profit charitable entities (although I'm sure they manage to absorb
plenty of money without calling it profit).
Douglas Johnson wrote:
>
> Which finally brings me around to the real point. The question is
> not whether to ration health care, but how. Who gets what care and
> who decides? This is ugly. There will be winners and losers. Both
> sides are going to fight like hell. But rationing is the core issue.
> Anything else is smoke.
You make a good point. Inasmuch as some form of rationing is required, we
need to look at the other effects of whatever scheme is being considered.
The current method of pay-to-play has, as a consequence, a built-in
incentive to work, save, invest, be productive, and plan for contingencies.
Only by pursuing these goals can one stand a good chance of choice in health
care. It's social survival of the fittest. The dissolute and the slackers
die off more quickly.
"DGDevin" wrote:
> The insurance companies are a huge part of the problem,..........
<snip>
The change is upon us.
Obama wants it.
Obama is going to get it.
It is reported that Obama has a re-election "war chest" in excess of
$2 billion.
An organization that can acquire that kind of campaign fund, is simply
going to get the job done.
The medical status quo folks are clueless how to handle what is headed
their way.
Lew
"Glen" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Question - Didn't the Brits outlaw dado blades on home table saws?
>
No. They outlawed the sale of tablesaws with arbors long enough to mount a
dado blade.
Douglas Johnson wrote:
> Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Yeah, it's worked out SO well for Great Britain and many other of those
>>countries the OP touted are either on the same verge of bankruptcy in
>>their systems, taxing the snot out their citizens, or (more frighteningly)
>>rationing care and planning on more rationing.
>
> The question is not whether the US system needs rationing. It already has
> it. We ration it by who you happen to work for (corporate insurance), by
> age (Medicare), by poverty (Medicaid), and by wealth (private pay or
> individual
> insurance). Those that aren't in one of the privileged groups are out of
> luck.
>
Just to dispel this notion -- this is not true. My wife had two elderly
unmarried aunts who were never well off, to be blunt, they were poor their
entire lives. When one was diagnosed with cancer, the state of Kansas paid
not only for her treatment, but also for trips to and from the doctors.
When her sister needed long-term care, she spent several years in a nursing
home. The state got their home and anything left in savings after they
passed away, but this was reasonable considering the care they received.
Care is available to those who need it.
> Of course we need to ration health care. We need to ration any commodity
> where
> the demand exceeds the supply. In a pure capitalist system this is done
> by
> price. What we have now in health care is nothing close to a pure
> capitalist system nor do I necessarily think it should be.
>
> Which finally brings me around to the real point. The question is not
> whether
> to ration health care, but how. Who gets what care and who decides? This
> is
> ugly. There will be winners and losers. Both sides are going to fight
> like
> hell. But rationing is the core issue. Anything else is smoke.
>
> OK, I know there are inefficiencies that can be squeezed out. But that
> isn't
> going to get everyone all the health care they want. It won't even get
> everyone all the health care they need.
>
> -- Doug
IMO, the system we have now is by far superior to as system run by the
government. I don't want the same kind of people who run TSA, the Post
Office, the Motor Vehicle Department, or the IRS deciding the kind, amount,
or any other element of the kind of medical care I should receive.
--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough
scritch wrote:
> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this
> country, NOW, just as exists in 36 industrialized countries who have
> better health care outcomes than we do, for half the price. If you
> believe, as I do, that our current system leaves each and every one
> of us vulnerable to bankruptcy due to a health care crisis, including
> those who are happy with their private insurance, then please,
> please, please, call and write your legislators EVERY DAY until we
> get a moral and equitable health care system in this country.
>
We already HAVE single-payer systems. Medicare, Medicaid, and the VA
hospitals. And there are those who want the REST of the health-care delivery
system to emulate them.
Sigh.
"HeyBub" <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:
> jo4hn wrote:
>>>
>>> Greed is intrinsically good. An ancient great worthy once said:
>>> "Were it not for the evil inclination (greed), no man would build a
>>> home, marry, or father a child."
>>>
>>> 'Course he didn't work for a drug company, but the concept's the
>>> same.
>> "Greed is good."
>>
>> Gordon Gekko: "The richest one percent of this country owns half our
>> country's wealth, five trillion dollars. One third of that comes from
>> hard work, two thirds comes from inheritance, interest on interest
>> accumulating to widows and idiot sons and what I do, stock and real
>> estate speculation.
>
> Here are the top wealthiest people in the U.S. What 2/3rds inherited
> their wealth?
>
> William Gates III (Founder of Microsoft)
> Warren Buffett (Investments)
> Lawrence Ellison (Founder of Oracle)
> Jim Walton (Inherited)
> S Robson Walton (Inherited)
> Alice Walton (Inherited)
> Christy Walton & Family (Inherited)
> Michael Bloomberg (Founder Bloomberg)
> Charles Koch (Inherited small company)
> David Koch (Inherited small company)
> Michael Dell (Founder, Dell Computers)
> Paul Allen (Founder, Microsoft)
> Sergey Brin (Russian immigrant, founder Google)
> Larry Page (Founder, Google)
> Sheldon Adelson (Created Comdex)
> Steven Ballmer (Founder, Microsoft)
> Abigail Johnson (President, Fidelity Investments)
> Jack Taylor & Family (Founder, Enterprise Rent-A-Car)
> Anne Cox Chambers (Inherited Cox Entertainment)
> Donald Bren (Real estate developer)
> http://www.forbes.com/2008/09/16/forbes-400-billionaires-lists-
400list0
> 8_cx_mn_0917richamericans_land.html
>
> By my count, seven of the top twenty got their start via inheritance.
> That's about ONE-third, not two-thirds.
Simply put, statistics lie, or, rather, one can easily interpret
statistics so that lies result, as you just did. You simply took the
top 20 richest people as being representative of the top 1 % of the tax
payers.
Another example: Vioxx. It increased the chances of death by at least
a factor 2, with a highly significant probability of causality. From 1
in 10,000 to 2 in 10,000. (Rough numbers, I am too lazy to get the real
ones). No one has as yet satisfactorily explained the mechanism by
which Vioxx caused excess deaths, although plausible theories exist.
This is the basis on which Vioxx was taken off the market. The real
crooks were the company, who (yes it is people who did this) hid
results, and the marketers who pushed a drug with limited good potential
onto many, many more who should have taken something real cheap like
aspirin, tylenol, whatever other NSAID for their pain, or a narcotic if
the pain was really too bad. And greedy consumers who said let the
insurance company pay. --
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid
Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:
> Ed wrote:
>
>>
>> "scritch" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>> news:[email protected]...
>>> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this
>>> country,
>>
>> That is a very scary thought. Some reform may be in order, but not
>> that.
>
> Yeah, it's worked out SO well for Great Britain and many other of
> those
> countries the OP touted are either on the same verge of bankruptcy in
> their systems, taxing the snot out their citizens, or (more
> frighteningly) rationing care and planning on more rationing.
>
> The One has already alluded to age-based means tests when he was
> asked
> about how one woman's mother with a tremendous love of life and great
> spirit at 100 was given a pacemaker to help keep her quality of life.
> The One made the absolutely cold (not cool, but *cold*) statement,
> "Uh, well, umm, I think "spirit" is a pretty subjective thing and we
> won't be able to do that under my plan"
>
> Cold, calculating, and scary. Many of you rec.ww denizens are
> reaching ages that are going to fall into the "not of value to
> society" category.
This is indeed scary. It is also scary that (on average) an exceedingly
high percentage of one's lifetime healthcare costs are expended in the
last year of life. And that a lot of those costs do hardly anything to
prolong life, let alone quality life.
I do know how difficult choices that need to be made are, believe me.
But what of chemotherapy to prolong life with a few months, considering
the agony that at least some go through with the treatment?
As I said, difficult choices. Be sure you have them written out in the
appropriate form, so your doctors and loved ones know what your real
wishes are.
--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid
"Lew Hodgett" <[email protected]> wrote in news:KTA4m.2714$9l4.1840
@nwrddc01.gnilink.net:
> "krw" wrote:
>
>> I knew you wouldn't understand the whole concept.
>
> You are correct, the idea that a government bureaucrat makes medical
> decisions is a concept is a concept I neither accept nor understand.
>
> Lew
I do understand the concept and its tendency to break down. Insurance
company clerks make those types of decisions all the time. Now, hey have
a profit motive instilled in them, where supposedly the government clerk
only needs to weed out fraud.
--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid
Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:
> Han wrote:
>
>> Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote in
>> news:[email protected]:
>>
>>> Ed wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>> "scritch" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>>>> news:[email protected]...
>>>>> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this
>>>>> country,
>>>>
>>>> That is a very scary thought. Some reform may be in order, but not
>>>> that.
>>>
>>> Yeah, it's worked out SO well for Great Britain and many other of
>>> those
>>> countries the OP touted are either on the same verge of bankruptcy
>>> in their systems, taxing the snot out their citizens, or (more
>>> frighteningly) rationing care and planning on more rationing.
>>>
>>> The One has already alluded to age-based means tests when he was
>>> asked
>>> about how one woman's mother with a tremendous love of life and
>>> great spirit at 100 was given a pacemaker to help keep her quality
>>> of life. The One made the absolutely cold (not cool, but *cold*)
>>> statement, "Uh, well, umm, I think "spirit" is a pretty subjective
>>> thing and we won't be able to do that under my plan"
>>>
>>> Cold, calculating, and scary. Many of you rec.ww denizens are
>>> reaching ages that are going to fall into the "not of value to
>>> society" category.
>>
>> This is indeed scary. It is also scary that (on average) an
>> exceedingly high percentage of one's lifetime healthcare costs are
>> expended in the last year of life. And that a lot of those costs do
>> hardly anything to prolong life, let alone quality life.
>>
>> I do know how difficult choices that need to be made are, believe me.
>> But what of chemotherapy to prolong life with a few months,
>> considering the agony that at least some go through with the
>> treatment?
>>
>> As I said, difficult choices. Be sure you have them written out in
>> the appropriate form, so your doctors and loved ones know what your
>> real wishes are.
>>
>
> If The One gets his way, I (or anyone else for that matter) won't
> have to
> do that, the government will be making those choices for us. And no,
> that's not hyperbole -- take a critical look at the things that
> Daschle was promoting as far as evaluating "cost-effectiveness" of
> treatment, the comments The One made as related above, the fact that
> the only real way to bring medical costs down is to ration
> availability of care.
If aspirin can do the same thing as Vioxx (kill the pain) then I would
like the rule that cost plays a role. Not the only role, for sure, but
that is where the if comes in.
--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid
Brian Henderson <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:
> J. Clarke wrote:
>> Han wrote:
>>> "Lew Hodgett" <[email protected]> wrote in
>>> news:KTA4m.2714$9l4.1840 @nwrddc01.gnilink.net:
>>>
>>>> "krw" wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> I knew you wouldn't understand the whole concept.
>>>> You are correct, the idea that a government bureaucrat makes
>>>> medical decisions is a concept is a concept I neither accept nor
>>>> understand.
>>>>
>>>> Lew
>>> I do understand the concept and its tendency to break down.
>>> Insurance company clerks make those types of decisions all the time.
>>> Now, hey have a profit motive instilled in them, where supposedly
>>> the government clerk only needs to weed out fraud.
>>
>> The trouble is that the insurance company clerk has the government
>> clerk watching him. But who watches the government clerk?
>
> As voters, we do. But we've been doing a really piss-poor job of it.
I really think that due to a poorly understood provision (separation of
powers) you always have recourse through the courts. Whether a
principle is worth the expense is another thing. And I am afraid it is
your money that is used first. That is the case whether the insurance
agent is an insurance company clerk, or a government clerk.
--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid
Luigi Zanasi <[email protected]> wrote in news:0aa8e355-a682-4cec-
[email protected]:
> On Jul 7, 8:46 pm, krw <[email protected]> wrote:
> <snip>
>> In what case is asperin more effective?
>
> Aspirin prevents heart attacks while Vioxx causes them?
That indeed seems to be the case. Exactly why is not quite sure yet.
Other NSAIDs may act in either way or not <Grin>.
This is the current explanation. Not everyone may believe all of it.
The protein involved in this all is called cyclo-oxygenase. There are 2
different forms of it. COX-1 and COX-2. Both convert arachidonic acid
(AA, an n-3 or omega-3 fatty acid, which should be rather plentiful in
your cell membranes) into a compound called PGH2 (prostaglandin
endoperoxide). Depending on the tissue this occurs in (or near), this
is converted then into several different compounds - prostaglandins,
thromboxane, and prostacyclin. Thromboxane promotes thrombosis and
other things, prostacyclin counteracts the tendency to thrombosis.
PGH2, thomboxane and prostacyclin are inactivated in vivo in seconds (
aminute or 2 maximum). Therefore, in order to "work", they have to be
formed over and over again (generally speaking).
COX-1 is really plentiful in blood platelets. Platelets do not
(generally) make new proteins, what they are born with is what they
carry. Aspirin reacts with an amino acid of COX near where the active
site is, where AA is converted. The reaction effectively, very rapidly
and irreversibly kills the enzyme activity. Since platelets live for
about 10 days, a fairly low amount of aspirin once a day should keep
platelets from making thromboxane from AA (via PGH2), and thereby
prevent thrombosis.
COX-2 is more prevalent in inflammatory cells, but also in the cells
lining the blood vessel that are an important part of the "machinery"
that keeps blood fluid.
It was believed that perhaps the bad gastrointestinal effects of aspirin
on at least some people could be avoided by targeting the inflammatory
COX-2, with a drug that is specific for COX2. Vioxx was the second such
drug. Their development was a great success story, at first. It is
still being debated through what unintended consequences the inhibition
of COX2, especially by Vioxx, resulted in it (Vioxx) "causing" an excess
morbidity and mortality.
Sorry for the long lecture. It is a scientific subject of interest to
me. I take a full aspirin tablet (325 mg) each day, because the baby
aspirin doesn't seem to work sufficiently on my platelets, despite a
huge body of research saying that 81 mg should suffice.
--
Best regards
Han
email address is invalid
Lowell Holmes wrote:
> "Brian Henderson" <[email protected]> wrote in
> message news:[email protected]...
>> DGDevin wrote:
>>
>> Actually, it's worse than that. Insurance companies, and this
>> includes government programs like MediCare and MediCal, will only
>> pay 10% of the cost of a procedure. If someone needs an MRI and it
>> costs $200 to perform, the hospital absorbs 80% of the cost and
>> insurance picks up 20%. Hospitals learned that if they wanted to get
>> reimbursed, they had to raise the price of the procedure to $2000,
>> that way they got the $200 that it actually cost. This hurts the
>> uninsured because legally, the hospital cannot charge different
>> rates, therefore the uninsured are paying $2000 for a $200 procedure
>> that shouldn't cost that much, if not for the screwed up way the
>> insurance industry works.
>
> Right on brother!
>
> I've also found that hospital emergency rooms give a 50% discount for
> cash payment at the time of treatment. What does that tell you?
It tells you they're making money. We hear a lot of complaining about the
uninsured using up the valuable resources of emergency rooms. If this is a
problem, why don't the hospitals open clinics next door to the emergency
rooms for snot-dripping infants, broken toes, and non-critical care?
I once worked in a hospital's computer room, located under the Life Flight
helicopter's nest. The air ambulance was forever coming and going. One of
the administrators told me: "We lose $5,000 every time the helicopter takes
off -- but we make it up in the emergency room." (This was back when $5,000
was a lot of money.)
Ed wrote:
> "scritch" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this
>> country,
>
> That is a very scary thought. Some reform may be in order, but not
> that.
"Some" reform? Fifty-million with no insurance, millions more
under-insured, a tenth of health insurance premiums shifted by the health
care industry to cover their costs treating uninsured patients, U.S. health
insurance companies spending at least double on administration as in other
industrialized countries, health care costs consistently outstripping
inflation, companies moving overseas to duck the costs of employee health
coverage, hospitals closing emergency rooms to stop losing money treating
uninsured patients, people living in fear of bankruptcy from serious
illness.... "May" be in order? Just how bad do things have to get before
we decide substantial reform is certainly in order? I don't pretend to know
what the solution is, and my instinct is the govt. can always make things
worse. But I sure as hell can see that American health care today is broken
and needs more than a little tinkering around the edges.
Ed wrote:
>
> "scritch" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this country,
>
> That is a very scary thought. Some reform may be in order, but not that.
Yeah, it's worked out SO well for Great Britain and many other of those
countries the OP touted are either on the same verge of bankruptcy in their
systems, taxing the snot out their citizens, or (more frighteningly)
rationing care and planning on more rationing.
The One has already alluded to age-based means tests when he was asked
about how one woman's mother with a tremendous love of life and great
spirit at 100 was given a pacemaker to help keep her quality of life. The
One made the absolutely cold (not cool, but *cold*) statement, "Uh, well,
umm, I think "spirit" is a pretty subjective thing and we won't be able to
do that under my plan"
Cold, calculating, and scary. Many of you rec.ww denizens are reaching
ages that are going to fall into the "not of value to society" category.
--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough
On Jul 5, 10:14=A0pm, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
> =A0 Yeah, it's worked out SO well for Great Britain and many other of tho=
se
> countries the OP touted are either on the same verge of bankruptcy in the=
ir
> systems, taxing the snot out their citizens, or (more frighteningly)
> rationing care and planning on more rationing. =A0
Medical care has to be rationed like any non-free good, there is not
enough for everyone to get everything they want. The choice is
rationing based on ability to pay (US system), or medical necessity
(Canadian system).
> =A0 Cold, calculating, and scary. =A0Many of you rec.ww denizens are reac=
hing
> ages that are going to fall into the "not of value to society" category.
Our nasty socialist uncaring health care system offered knee
replacement surgery to my 88-year old mother-in-law. She turned it
down as she felt she was too old for that.
Luigi
Just doing his bit to counter some of the lies about Canada's health
care system.
On Tue, 07 Jul 2009 03:22:01 GMT, "Lew Hodgett"
<[email protected]> wrote:
>"krw" wrote:
>
>
>> I know. It's called "liberty". You should try it.
>
>Interesting. You smoke "liberty"?
I knew you wouldn't understand the whole concept.
HeyBub wrote:
> jo4hn wrote:
>>> Greed is intrinsically good. An ancient great worthy once said:
>>> "Were it not for the evil inclination (greed), no man would build a
>>> home, marry, or father a child."
>>>
>>> 'Course he didn't work for a drug company, but the concept's the
>>> same.
>> "Greed is good."
>>
>> Gordon Gekko: "The richest one percent of this country owns half our
>> country's wealth, five trillion dollars. One third of that comes from
>> hard work, two thirds comes from inheritance, interest on interest
>> accumulating to widows and idiot sons and what I do, stock and real
>> estate speculation.
>
> Here are the top wealthiest people in the U.S. What 2/3rds inherited their
> wealth?
>
[snip]
Just in case anyone out there does not know who Gordon Gekko is, he is a
FICTIONAL character. Here is an excerpt from Wikipedia:
Gordon Gekko is a fictional character from the 1987 film Wall Street by
director Oliver Stone. Gekko was portrayed by actor-producer Michael
Douglas, in a performance that won him an Oscar for Best Actor. Gekko
will return in Wall Street 2 which is currently in pre-production.
Co-written by Stone and screenwriter Stanley Weiser, Gekko is claimed to
be based loosely on arbitrageur Ivan Boesky, who gave a speech on greed
at the University of California, Berkeley in 1986, and real-life
activist investor / corporate raider Carl Icahn. According to Edward R.
Pressman, producer of the film, "Originally, there was no one individual
who Gekko was modelled on," he adds. "But Gekko was partly Milken", who
was the "Junk Bond King" of the 1980s, and indicted on 98 counts of
racketeering and fraud in 1989.[1]
In 2002 Gordon Gekko was named one of the Fifteen Richest Fictional
Characters according to Forbes who attributed him with 650 million
dollars. In 2003, the AFI named him number 24 of the top 50 movie
villains of all time.
mahalo,
jo4hn
krw <[email protected]> wrote:
>On Tue, 07 Jul 2009 11:16:48 GMT, Han <[email protected]> wrote:
>>If aspirin can do the same thing as Vioxx (kill the pain) then I would
>>like the rule that cost plays a role. Not the only role, for sure, but
>>that is where the if comes in.
>
>Do you really believe Vioxx and aspirin are equivalent?
He didn't say one way or the other. But of course they are not equivalent. In
many cases aspirin is safer and more effective. -- Doug
On Tue, 07 Jul 2009 02:16:58 GMT, "Lew Hodgett"
<[email protected]> wrote:
>
>"krw" wrote:
>
>> What good does that do when the government bureaucrat tells you that
>> your life isn't worth anything.
>
>I don't know what you're smoking, but it is g-O-O-d stuff.
I know. It's called "liberty". You should try it.
Charlie Self wrote:
> To put it politely, that is a sin, one aided and abetted by phalanxes
> of adminstrators, overcharging hospitals and surgeons and insurance
> companies, with the last listed being among the major problems...and
> problem causers.
The insurance companies are a huge part of the problem, their administrative
overhead absorbs twice as much money as in Canada and something like eight
times as much as compared to Taiwan. Their attempts to only insure healthy
people and cut loose anyone who gets sick if they can get away with it is
revolting. That recent case in Calif. where an insurance company cut off a
woman right in the middle of cancer treatment was sickening, the
arbitrator's ruling of nine million bucks hopefully got the bastards'
attention. Press coverage of that and similar cases revealed that insurance
companies have employees whose only job is finding reasons to cancel
coverage of customers who have made claims, they pay bonuses for doing so.
So you pay your premiums for years, then you get sick and make a claim, and
they cancel your policy on the grounds that when you first signed up umpteen
years ago you under-reported your weight (though that is not in any way
related to your illness). If it was within my power that would be flat-out
illegal.
> I use VA health care and am grateful for it. It's far from perfect--
> hey, what the hell: it IS government run, after all--but it is
> coherent, consideraly cheaper than civilian care (try 15% or so), and
> in the past few years, they have tried mightily to cure the long term
> ills that had built up from its being generally ignored.
And the VA negotiates lower drugs prices with the pharmaceutical companies,
something Congress in its wisdom refused to allow Medicare to do under the
previous administration. Now that the drug companies see which way the wind
is blowing they've suddenly discovered that maybe they can cut Medicare some
slack, to the tune of eighty billion dollars. Ain't it amazing what these
companies are suddenly able to do when they realize they've pushed their
greed too far?
Han wrote:
> Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote in
> news:[email protected]:
>
>> Ed wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> "scritch" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>>> news:[email protected]...
>>>> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this
>>>> country,
>>>
>>> That is a very scary thought. Some reform may be in order, but not
>>> that.
>>
>> Yeah, it's worked out SO well for Great Britain and many other of
>> those
>> countries the OP touted are either on the same verge of bankruptcy in
>> their systems, taxing the snot out their citizens, or (more
>> frighteningly) rationing care and planning on more rationing.
>>
>> The One has already alluded to age-based means tests when he was
>> asked
>> about how one woman's mother with a tremendous love of life and great
>> spirit at 100 was given a pacemaker to help keep her quality of life.
>> The One made the absolutely cold (not cool, but *cold*) statement,
>> "Uh, well, umm, I think "spirit" is a pretty subjective thing and we
>> won't be able to do that under my plan"
>>
>> Cold, calculating, and scary. Many of you rec.ww denizens are
>> reaching ages that are going to fall into the "not of value to
>> society" category.
>
> This is indeed scary. It is also scary that (on average) an exceedingly
> high percentage of one's lifetime healthcare costs are expended in the
> last year of life. And that a lot of those costs do hardly anything to
> prolong life, let alone quality life.
>
> I do know how difficult choices that need to be made are, believe me.
> But what of chemotherapy to prolong life with a few months, considering
> the agony that at least some go through with the treatment?
>
> As I said, difficult choices. Be sure you have them written out in the
> appropriate form, so your doctors and loved ones know what your real
> wishes are.
>
If The One gets his way, I (or anyone else for that matter) won't have to
do that, the government will be making those choices for us. And no,
that's not hyperbole -- take a critical look at the things that Daschle was
promoting as far as evaluating "cost-effectiveness" of treatment, the
comments The One made as related above, the fact that the only real way to
bring medical costs down is to ration availability of care.
--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough
Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
> Yeah, it's worked out SO well for Great Britain and many other of those
>countries the OP touted are either on the same verge of bankruptcy in their
>systems, taxing the snot out their citizens, or (more frighteningly)
>rationing care and planning on more rationing.
The question is not whether the US system needs rationing. It already has it.
We ration it by who you happen to work for (corporate insurance), by age
(Medicare), by poverty (Medicaid), and by wealth (private pay or individual
insurance). Those that aren't in one of the privileged groups are out of luck.
Of course we need to ration health care. We need to ration any commodity where
the demand exceeds the supply. In a pure capitalist system this is done by
price. What we have now in health care is nothing close to a pure capitalist
system nor do I necessarily think it should be.
Which finally brings me around to the real point. The question is not whether
to ration health care, but how. Who gets what care and who decides? This is
ugly. There will be winners and losers. Both sides are going to fight like
hell. But rationing is the core issue. Anything else is smoke.
OK, I know there are inefficiencies that can be squeezed out. But that isn't
going to get everyone all the health care they want. It won't even get everyone
all the health care they need.
-- Doug
HeyBub wrote:
> Greed is intrinsically good. An ancient great worthy once said: "Were
> it not for the evil inclination (greed), no man would build a home,
> marry, or father a child."
>
> 'Course he didn't work for a drug company, but the concept's the same.
The rest of the story being that they set free the lion of fire, but first
blinded it in one eye. That's the part that some folks forget, that
self-interest cannot be allowed unchecked freedom, it must be restrained by
law or we might as well be living in a jungle.
Or as another wise person once said, "No man chooses evil because it is
evil; he only mistakes it for happiness." And a lot of people think greed
is the way to happiness, they sure do. Bernie Madoff will probably be
reflecting on that for some years to come.
scritch wrote:
> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this
> country, NOW, just as exists in 36 industrialized countries who have
> better health care outcomes than we do, for half the price. If you
> believe, as I do, that our current system leaves each and every one
> of us vulnerable to bankruptcy due to a health care crisis, including
> those who are happy with their private insurance, then please,
> please, please, call and write your legislators EVERY DAY until we
> get a moral and equitable health care system in this country.
>
> Remember, much more than half of the bankruptcies in this country are
> due primarily to a health care crisis. More than half of those people
> were already insured! One slip on the table saw, you can't work any
> more, thus you can't work, you lose your job, you can't pay the COBRA
> insurance payments (mine are in excess of $1000/month), and bingo, you
> are bankrupt. Without health care for your stump.
We need to collectively build a cross and nail to it everyone who makes
off-topic posts to rec.woodworking concerning the desirability of this or
that or the other political action.
<plonk>
scritch wrote:
> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this country, NOW
Thanks to you all for your (mostly) reasonable arguments. It seems
that, unlike most OT political/economic discussions here on rec that the
vast majority of us are in agreement.
Now, President Obama stated this week that single-payer is "off the
table". Clearly he believes that it either can't get done because a)
the Congress and Senate are too bought-off to pass it, or b) he is too
bought-off to pass it. We can't rely on him to push this himself.
What I am doing is writing my legislators EVERY DAY, and including
senators from other states who are standing in the way of the American
people, who have wanted this type of health care reform for more than
fifty years. I urge you also to write your legislators if you agree
with me.
If you would like my list of legislators that I am writing to, send me a
message to [email protected]. I will respond with a private message.
Han wrote:
> "Lew Hodgett" <[email protected]> wrote in
> news:KTA4m.2714$9l4.1840 @nwrddc01.gnilink.net:
>
>> "krw" wrote:
>>
>>> I knew you wouldn't understand the whole concept.
>>
>> You are correct, the idea that a government bureaucrat makes medical
>> decisions is a concept is a concept I neither accept nor understand.
>>
>> Lew
>
> I do understand the concept and its tendency to break down. Insurance
> company clerks make those types of decisions all the time. Now, hey
> have a profit motive instilled in them, where supposedly the
> government clerk only needs to weed out fraud.
The trouble is that the insurance company clerk has the government clerk
watching him. But who watches the government clerk?
On Mon, 06 Jul 2009 10:50:13 GMT, Han <[email protected]> wrote:
>Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote in
>news:[email protected]:
>
>> Ed wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> "scritch" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>>> news:[email protected]...
>>>> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this
>>>> country,
>>>
>>> That is a very scary thought. Some reform may be in order, but not
>>> that.
>>
>> Yeah, it's worked out SO well for Great Britain and many other of
>> those
>> countries the OP touted are either on the same verge of bankruptcy in
>> their systems, taxing the snot out their citizens, or (more
>> frighteningly) rationing care and planning on more rationing.
>>
>> The One has already alluded to age-based means tests when he was
>> asked
>> about how one woman's mother with a tremendous love of life and great
>> spirit at 100 was given a pacemaker to help keep her quality of life.
>> The One made the absolutely cold (not cool, but *cold*) statement,
>> "Uh, well, umm, I think "spirit" is a pretty subjective thing and we
>> won't be able to do that under my plan"
>>
>> Cold, calculating, and scary. Many of you rec.ww denizens are
>> reaching ages that are going to fall into the "not of value to
>> society" category.
>
>This is indeed scary. It is also scary that (on average) an exceedingly
>high percentage of one's lifetime healthcare costs are expended in the
>last year of life. And that a lot of those costs do hardly anything to
>prolong life, let alone quality life.
>
>I do know how difficult choices that need to be made are, believe me.
>But what of chemotherapy to prolong life with a few months, considering
>the agony that at least some go through with the treatment?
As scary as all of this is, having Nancy Pelosi make these decisions
is *really* scary.
>As I said, difficult choices. Be sure you have them written out in the
>appropriate form, so your doctors and loved ones know what your real
>wishes are.
What good does that do when the government bureaucrat tells you that
your life isn't worth anything.
Chris Friesen wrote:
> HeyBub wrote:
>
>> True. But, as the article states, private medical insurance is not
>> allowed. Further, private physicians do not have privileges a
>> government-run hospitals. This limits physicians to things like
>> dermatology, ophthalmology, or primary care. Anything beyond that
>> has to be cycled into the government system.
>
> Not necessarily...if they thought there was money in it someone could
> open a private hospital.
>
They have, but they're all in the U.S.
"scritch" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this country,
That is a very scary thought. Some reform may be in order, but not that.
On Jul 8, 12:54=A0pm, jo4hn <[email protected]> wrote:
> krw wrote:
> > On Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:42:27 GMT, "Lew Hodgett"
> > <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >> "krw" wrote:
>
> >>> Get used to it.
> >> Back to smoking the good stuff?
>
> > Unfortunately, no. =A0We're both going to be smoking "hope and change",
> > whether we like it or not.
>
> I have the solution for you. =A0Get yourself a nice blanket, soak it in
> warm salt water, assume the fetal position in a dark warm closet, wrap
> the blanket around you, and chant: "there is no hope and nothing will
> ever change". =A0It's gonna be OK.
No, you have that wrong. There's only hope that Obama 'll leave you
with change.
krw wrote:
> On Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:42:27 GMT, "Lew Hodgett"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> "krw" wrote:
>>
>>> Get used to it.
>> Back to smoking the good stuff?
>>
> Unfortunately, no. We're both going to be smoking "hope and change",
> whether we like it or not.
>
I have the solution for you. Get yourself a nice blanket, soak it in
warm salt water, assume the fetal position in a dark warm closet, wrap
the blanket around you, and chant: "there is no hope and nothing will
ever change". It's gonna be OK.
erk,
j4
<[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
On Jul 8, 12:54 pm, jo4hn <[email protected]> wrote:
> krw wrote:
> > On Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:42:27 GMT, "Lew Hodgett"
> > <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >> "krw" wrote:
>
> >>> Get used to it.
> >> Back to smoking the good stuff?
>
> > Unfortunately, no. We're both going to be smoking "hope and change",
> > whether we like it or not.
>
> I have the solution for you. Get yourself a nice blanket, soak it in
> warm salt water, assume the fetal position in a dark warm closet, wrap
> the blanket around you, and chant: "there is no hope and nothing will
> ever change". It's gonna be OK.
No, you have that wrong. There's only hope that Obama 'll leave you
with change.
<end of original postings>
Sorry to have not read the earlier posts on this topic, but just came across
a very interesting article in the New Yorker:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/06/01/090601fa_fact_gawande
Kerry
jo4hn wrote:
> krw wrote:
>> On Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:42:27 GMT, "Lew Hodgett"
>> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> "krw" wrote:
>>>
>>>> Get used to it.
>>> Back to smoking the good stuff?
>>>
>> Unfortunately, no. We're both going to be smoking "hope and change",
>> whether we like it or not.
>>
> I have the solution for you. Get yourself a nice blanket, soak it in
> warm salt water, assume the fetal position in a dark warm closet, wrap
> the blanket around you, and chant: "there is no hope and nothing will
> ever change". It's gonna be OK.
>
> erk,
> j4
Well, at least as a woodworker, you will have some of the required tools
to take care of yourself as you wait for even the simplest procedures:
<http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1135582/Man-pulls-13-teeth-pliers-NHS-dentist.html>
... and just for grins, by the numbers:
<http://hotair.com/archives/2009/07/07/state-run-health-care-by-the-numbers/>
0: The number of unrehearsed, unscripted questions asked of President Obama
during his âTown Hallâ on health care reform.
13: The number of teeth that British veteran Ian Boynton pulled out himself
with pliers âbecause he couldnât find an NHS (National Health Service)
dentist⦠[he] could not afford to go private for treatment so instead took
the drastic action to remove 13 of his teeth that were giving him severe
pain.â
14: The percentage of all patients in Britain who wait more than one (1)
year to receive treatment after a referral by a general practitioner. Half
of all National Health Care patients in Britain wait between 18 and 52
weeks for treatment.
37: The âhealth care rankingâ assigned to the U.S. by the World Health
Organization among the worldâs countries. This oft-quoted number is used to
justify an overhaul of the U.S. health care system and lists countries like
Italy (2), Andorra (4), Malta (5), Singapore (6), Oman (8), Portugal (12),
Greece (14), the United Kingdom (18), Ireland (19), Columbia (22), Cyprus
(24), Saudi Arabia (26), the UAE (27), Morocco (29), Canada (30), Chile
(33), the Dominican Republic (35) and Costa Rica (36) ahead of the U.S.
Considering that no U.S. citizens travel to these countries when
experiencing a life-threatening situation, itâs worth questioning the
methods by which the WHO arrived at these rankings. Their criteria included
subjective and political assessments such as âFairness in financial
contributionâ. Suffice it to say that the WHOâs rankings are clearly
fraudulent and are designed to influence U.S. policy.
60: Average cancer survival rate (all types) for patients in the United
States. Canadaâs survival rate is significantly lower at 55%, while
Europeâs is a dismal 48%.
81: Average percentage of those who survive a diagnosis of prostate cancer
in the United States versus 43% in Britain under their National Health
Service.
90: Number of days, on average, each Canadian patient must wait for an MRI
under the Canadian government-run health care system.
750: The estimated number of people waiting in line (in the pouring rain) at
Britainâs Bury Office attempting to register for dental care.
2050: By this year, âSocial Security, Medicare and Medicaid (health care for
the poor) will consume nearly the entire federal budget.â And by 2082,
Medicare spending alone will consume the entire federal budget. This
trajectory is, quite obviously, unsustainable for our children and our
grandchildren. Congress is bequeathing our descendents a bankrupt health
care system â for just the third of the medical system that the government
already runs!
10,000: Number of Canadian breast cancer patients to file a class action
lawsuit against Quebecâs hospitals because, on average, they were forced to
wait 60 days to begin post-operative radiation treatments.
280,392: The number of jobs that employers would shed if government levied
an employer mandate, requiring them to insure all employees. A 2007 study
by Katherine Baicker of Harvard University and Helen Levy of the University
of Michigan (âEmployer Health Insurance Mandates and the Risk of
Unemploymentâ) found that â0.2 percent of all full-time workers and 1.4
percent of uninsured full-time workers would lose their jobs if a health
insurance mandate were written into law. Workers who would lose their jobs
are disproportionately likely to be high school dropouts, minority, and
female.â
443,849: The number of British patients of the National Healthcare Service
(NHS) who waited four or more weeks for inpatient admittance into a
hospital (Excel file) in May of 2009 (more than 75% of all patients).
1,500,000: The number of Canadians who do not have â and cannot find â a
general practitioner/primary care physician due to shortages in medical
staff: âIn 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 âelective.â â¦âThe only thing elective about
this surgery was I elected to live,â she said.â
12,000,000: number of illegal immigrants who would qualify for free health
care and â in all likelihood â additional health care rights for relatives
under the Democratsâ universal health care plan, according to a reported
statement by the office of Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) and spokespeople for
the racial separatist group La Raza.
$311,000,000 ($311 million): The amount of additional funding requested last
month by the Obama administration simply to combat Medicare fraud. Medicare
fraud is estimated at $60 billion annually.
$3,600,000,000 ($3.6 billion): The amount of added malpractice insurance
costs to the current health care system instigated by an out-of-control
trial lawyer lobby that donates heavily to Democrat causes.
$10,000,000,000 ($10 billion): The estimated amount of Medicaid fraud, based
upon FBI estimates. Criminal practices include billing for nonexistent,
overstated, or unnecessary services, kickbacks to patients, inflated costs,
etc.
$60,000,000,000 ($60 billion): The estimated annual amount of Medicare
fraud, due to widespread criminal operations that victimize taxpayers and
specialize in dead doctors, fake patients, non-existent treatments and the
like.
$107,000,000,000,000 ($107 trillion): The estimated shortfall of the
Medicare and Social Security programs, which are utterly and completely
bankrupt; they can be legitimately called an âenormous version of Bernard
Madoffâs Ponzi schemeâ.
Canada and England donât pay as high a price for their health care because
they freeload on American innovation. If we utilized their systems,
Americans might worry less about paying for health care, but weâd get
2009-level care and long lines. Those are the immutable laws of supply and
demand. Government monopolies donât innovate. Only the free market
innovates.
Furthermore, government bureaucrats already raped the Social Security Trust
Fund â there is no trust fund. They raped the Medicare Trust Fund â thereâs
nothing left. They raped the Highway Trust Fund â itâs empty. I could go
down a long list of things the government said it would do, but hasnât
done. Because the big government statists are liars. They even moved these
massive expenditures âoff the booksâ to conceal the damage theyâve done.
And now the Democrat Party, the union bosses and the trial lawyers are
launching the most massive attack on the American people in the history of
government.
They promise health care for everyone, but they will not â and they canât
possibly â deliver it. The numbers donât lie.
--
If you're going to be dumb, you better be tough
On Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:42:27 GMT, "Lew Hodgett"
<[email protected]> wrote:
>"krw" wrote:
>
>> Get used to it.
>
>Back to smoking the good stuff?
>
Unfortunately, no. We're both going to be smoking "hope and change",
whether we like it or not.
"Douglas Johnson" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>>Previously I have been adamantly opposed to the inheritance tax since it
>>was
>>a tax on assets that had already been taxed. I don't care if it affected
>>only Bill Gates, I still considered it immoral.
>
> Interestingly, both Bill Gates and Warren Buffet favor the inheritance
> tax.
>
> -- Doug
While I personally oppose the tax, I'm leaving nothing much to family. They
are all doing OK but it is a good opportunity to help a couple of charities.
"HeyBub" <[email protected]> wrote:
>Okay, I went through the all 400.
>
>According to Forbes, 17 reached the Top-400 list via inheritance. That's
>about 5%.
From: http://www.ml.com/index.asp?id=7695_7696_8149_63464_67896_67897.
"HNWI" means High Net Worth Individuals, a fancy word for rich.
"The Report found that while business ownership or the sale of a business is the
primary source of wealth (37 percent) for the majority of the world's HNWIs,
income ranks second at 24 percent as the source of wealth, and inheritance rates
third at 18 percent"
"HNWI" means High Net Worth Individuals, a fancy word for rich.
>It may be more, because in researching this subject I ran across the amazing
>statement that "the inheritance tax is a voluntary tax."
>
>Previously I have been adamantly opposed to the inheritance tax since it was
>a tax on assets that had already been taxed. I don't care if it affected
>only Bill Gates, I still considered it immoral.
Interestingly, both Bill Gates and Warren Buffet favor the inheritance tax.
-- Doug
On Tue, 07 Jul 2009 19:31:11 GMT, "Lew Hodgett"
<[email protected]> wrote:
>"Han" wrote:
>
>> I do understand the concept and its tendency to break down.
>> Insurance
>> company clerks make those types of decisions all the time. Now, hey
>> have
>> a profit motive instilled in them, where supposedly the government
>> clerk
>> only needs to weed out fraud.
>
>Precisely.
>
>For profit insurance companies have grunts on the payroll whose total
>job is to find ways to weasel out of meeting their contractual
>obligations to their customers.
Government has grunts on the payroll whose total job is to justify
their job. They have no customers.
>That's a private not a governmental happening.
...and that's the good part.
Luigi Zanasi wrote:
>>
> Our nasty socialist uncaring health care system offered knee
> replacement surgery to my 88-year old mother-in-law. She turned it
> down as she felt she was too old for that.
>
> Luigi
> Just doing his bit to counter some of the lies about Canada's health
> care system.
You mom should have gotten on the list, even though she was probably correct
in assuming she wouldn't live long enough to bubble to the top. Stranger
things have happened.
I understand that abortions are free in Canada, but there's an eleven-month
waiting list.
Is that so?
On Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:12:41 -0700, scritch <[email protected]>
wrote:
>I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this country,
>NOW, just as exists in 36 industrialized countries who have better
>health care outcomes than we do, for half the price. If you believe, as
>I do, that our current system leaves each and every one of us vulnerable
>to bankruptcy due to a health care crisis, including those who are happy
>with their private insurance, then please, please, please, call and
>write your legislators EVERY DAY until we get a moral and equitable
>health care system in this country.
>
>Remember, much more than half of the bankruptcies in this country are
>due primarily to a health care crisis. More than half of those people
>were already insured! One slip on the table saw, you can't work any
>more, thus you can't work, you lose your job, you can't pay the COBRA
>insurance payments (mine are in excess of $1000/month), and bingo, you
>are bankrupt. Without health care for your stump.
>
Oh, like some of the european countries where healthcare is "free" and
everyone pays 80% income tax? And you may have NO choice of provider
(any MD or hospital is considered as good as any other MD or
hospital).
No thanks.
Please check ALL the conditions before picking out just the ones you
think are good.
Did you know that a German driver's license can cost $1500 to $2500?
John
On Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:12:41 -0700, scritch wrote:
> I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this country,
> NOW, just as exists in 36 industrialized countries who have better
> health care outcomes than we do, for half the price.
>
Agreed, but you've just fed raw meat to the rabid right of this group :-).
> Remember, much more than half of the bankruptcies in this country are
> due primarily to a health care crisis.
That in itself is enough reason for single-payer. And despite the claims
of the right, that does not necessarily mean single provider.
Something which I believe and seldom comes up in these discussions, it
that it is morally wrong to get rich from the sufferings of others.
Somewhat akin to the parasites that bought up the life insurance policies
of AIDs patients at half price.
Now that I've tossed in a few more steaks, I'll duck :-).
--
Intelligence is an experiment that failed - G. B. Shaw
On Wed, 01 Jul 2009 09:50:56 -0500, HeyBub wrote:
> We already HAVE single-payer systems. Medicare, Medicaid, and the VA
> hospitals. And there are those who want the REST of the health-care
> delivery system to emulate them.
I'm on Medicare (plus a supplement) and I think it works great. My wife
is not old enough yet and since I was self employed I pay full cost for
her insurance. Twice the cost of Medicare plus supplement for only
catastrophic coverage.
--
Intelligence is an experiment that failed - G. B. Shaw
DGDevin wrote:
> The insurance companies are a huge part of the problem, their administrative
> overhead absorbs twice as much money as in Canada and something like eight
> times as much as compared to Taiwan. Their attempts to only insure healthy
> people and cut loose anyone who gets sick if they can get away with it is
> revolting. That recent case in Calif. where an insurance company cut off a
> woman right in the middle of cancer treatment was sickening, the
> arbitrator's ruling of nine million bucks hopefully got the bastards'
> attention. Press coverage of that and similar cases revealed that insurance
> companies have employees whose only job is finding reasons to cancel
> coverage of customers who have made claims, they pay bonuses for doing so.
> So you pay your premiums for years, then you get sick and make a claim, and
> they cancel your policy on the grounds that when you first signed up umpteen
> years ago you under-reported your weight (though that is not in any way
> related to your illness). If it was within my power that would be flat-out
> illegal.
Actually, it's worse than that. Insurance companies, and this includes
government programs like MediCare and MediCal, will only pay 10% of the
cost of a procedure. If someone needs an MRI and it costs $200 to
perform, the hospital absorbs 80% of the cost and insurance picks up
20%. Hospitals learned that if they wanted to get reimbursed, they had
to raise the price of the procedure to $2000, that way they got the $200
that it actually cost. This hurts the uninsured because legally, the
hospital cannot charge different rates, therefore the uninsured are
paying $2000 for a $200 procedure that shouldn't cost that much, if not
for the screwed up way the insurance industry works.
HeyBub wrote:
> WD wrote:
>>> And the VA negotiates lower drugs prices with the pharmaceutical
>>> companies, something Congress in its wisdom refused to allow
>>> Medicare to do under the previous administration. Now that the drug
>>> companies see which way the wind is blowing they've suddenly
>>> discovered that maybe they can cut Medicare some slack, to the tune
>>> of eighty billion dollars. Ain't it amazing what these companies
>>> are suddenly able to do when they realize they've pushed their greed
>>> too far?
>> Greed beyond imagination.
>
> Greed is intrinsically good. An ancient great worthy once said: "Were it not
> for the evil inclination (greed), no man would build a home, marry, or
> father a child."
>
> 'Course he didn't work for a drug company, but the concept's the same.
>
>
"Greed is good."
Gordon Gekko: "The richest one percent of this country owns half our
country's wealth, five trillion dollars. One third of that comes from
hard work, two thirds comes from inheritance, interest on interest
accumulating to widows and idiot sons and what I do, stock and real
estate speculation. It's bullshit. You got ninety percent of the
American public out there with little or no net worth. I create nothing.
I own. We make the rules, pal. The news, war, peace, famine, upheaval,
the price per paper clip. We pick that rabbit out of the hat while
everybody sits out there wondering how the hell we did it. Now you're
not naive enough to think we're living in a democracy, are you buddy?
It's the free market. And you're a part of it. You've got that killer
instinct. Stick around pal, I've still got a lot to teach you."
On Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:12:41 -0700, scritch <[email protected]>
wrote:
>I'll keep this short. We need single-payer health care in this country,
>NOW, just as exists in 36 industrialized countries who have better
>health care outcomes than we do, for half the price. If you believe, as
>I do, that our current system leaves each and every one of us vulnerable
>to bankruptcy due to a health care crisis, including those who are happy
>with their private insurance, then please, please, please, call and
>write your legislators EVERY DAY until we get a moral and equitable
>health care system in this country.
>
>Remember, much more than half of the bankruptcies in this country are
>due primarily to a health care crisis. More than half of those people
>were already insured! One slip on the table saw, you can't work any
>more, thus you can't work, you lose your job, you can't pay the COBRA
>insurance payments (mine are in excess of $1000/month), and bingo, you
>are bankrupt. Without health care for your stump.
>
I am uninsured, but do not want the government to insure me nor force
me to pay to be insured. I plan to wait until I'm 65 to become
insured by Medicare or find a job where I can get on a group plan.
But, it would be nice if it were illegal for an insurance company to
deny anyone insurance or to deny a claim due to cancer or other
serious illness. I wish the government would stop spending our tax
money, get out of our face, start making better laws and drop the
stupid ones.
Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
>When the government takes over [snip]
> Further, once the government takes over, [snip]
>
> Think about the ramifications -- woodworking is a semi-dangerous hobby, it
>would not be far-fetched to see the government banning various hobbies
>because of the "burden" on the public health care system.
With respect, Mark, I think it is very far fetched. First, the government is
not close to taking over. The most aggressive serious proposal towards that is
a government run health insurance program in competition with the private
insurers. That is getting a lot of push back on the grounds that it would drive
out the private insurers. Whether it would or not depends on the details, and
we are a long way from details.
Second, there is already a large, government health care program (Medicare)
where the government has not made a single move in 40 years towards banning any
activity for recipients. Smokers are under a lot of pressure, but that is not
just the government and there is no ban, nor does anyone I know think it would
work.
What you suggest is certainly not impossible, but we are a long way from here to
there.
-- Doug
David Nebenzahl wrote:
>
> In fact, it has *NEVER* meant single-provider. That's a myth
> perpertrated by those rabid right-wingers you referred to. (HeyBub,
> you there?) It has always been proposed that a single payer (the
> gov't) will pay for services from a multitude of providers. The
> provider can be anything from a private physician to a clinic to a
> hospital to some kind of medical co-op that hasn't even been dreamt
> up yet.
I have never said anything even remotely concerned with single-provider
(other than holding up the VA hospital system as a possible result of
government intervention in the health-care system). As an aside, I think the
VA hospital system should be abolished and veterans treated by local doctors
at local hospitals with the government footing the bill.
>
> OK, chew on this for a minute: A single-payer system *should* be
> embraced *especially* by conservatives (speaking of true fiscal
> conservatives here), for two reasons:
>
> 1. Conservatives are always bitching and moaning about bureaucracy
> this and bureaucracy that. Well, guess what? Under the current
> "system" (in quotes because, basically, there ain't no system),
> bureaucracy is rampant and needlessly large. Think about it: each insurer
> or other
> medical payer has its own redundant administrative
> operation--basically a gigantic bureaucracy, replicated hundreds of times
> over.
>
> A single-payer system would overnight eliminate much of this bloat.
> There would be one administrative entity to take care of paying
> medical bills.
The existing bureacracy - and there's a lot of it - IS the government's
fault. Just today this issue was raised on a news program with an executive
from the American Medical Association. He said streamlining HAS been tried,
but EVERY time doctors, hospitals, and insurance carriers sit down in a room
to develop standards, the federal anti-trust people have a conniption fit
and bust up the committees, claiming collusion, conspiracy to restrain
trade, and all sorts of nefarious motives. He said lawsuits and the threats
of lawsuits have taken place at least six times in the last fifteen years.
It may be that the only way the process can be streamlined is to let the
government take over the whole thing. The government can't sue itself for
restraint-of-trade practices.
But it's a race: Walmart is rolling-out a medical records and billing system
to its in-house clinics with plans to open it up to all practitioners and
providers. The question becomes who is going to win the race to simplify and
streamline the operations: Walmart or the government.
My money's on Walmart.
>
> 2. It would *immediately* reduce the costs of doing business in the
> US, because employers would no longer be responsible for covering
> their employees' medical expenses through insurance. Instant boost
> for business!
Uh, somebody's got to pay for it. And if employers drop employee medical
coverage, that puts paid to the president's oath that you can keep your same
doctor and same plan.
>
>
> Of course, don't let the fact that *every other* industrialized
> democracy in the world today has such a system in place sway you
> either ... (more American Exceptionalism at work here)
I don't. I am indifferent in the extreme to the thoughts, attitudes,
institutions, and preferences of other nations.
I do have a position, however, on those who would hold up other nations as
exemplars worthy of emulation.
"HeyBub" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Tim W wrote:
>> <[email protected]> wrote in message
>> news:[email protected]...
>>> On Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:12:41 -0700, scritch <[email protected]>
>>> wrote:
>> [...]
>>>
>>> Oh, like some of the european countries where healthcare is "free"
>>> and everyone pays 80% income tax?
>>
>> There is no such country
>>
>>> And you may have NO choice of provider
>>
>> There is no country where private health care is outlawed
>
> "Private insurance for medically necessary hospital and physician services
> is illegal in only 6 of the 10 [Canadian] provinces."
> http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/content/full/164/6/825
>
> Most African countries do not permit private medical practice.
>
Oh, Africa. Right.
Tim W
Han wrote:
> "HeyBub" <[email protected]> wrote in
> news:[email protected]:
>
>> jo4hn wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Greed is intrinsically good. An ancient great worthy once said:
>>>> "Were it not for the evil inclination (greed), no man would build a
>>>> home, marry, or father a child."
>>>>
>>>> 'Course he didn't work for a drug company, but the concept's the
>>>> same.
>>> "Greed is good."
>>>
>>> Gordon Gekko: "The richest one percent of this country owns half our
>>> country's wealth, five trillion dollars. One third of that comes
>>> from hard work, two thirds comes from inheritance, interest on
>>> interest accumulating to widows and idiot sons and what I do, stock
>>> and real estate speculation.
>>
>> Here are the top wealthiest people in the U.S. What 2/3rds inherited
>> their wealth?
>>
>> William Gates III (Founder of Microsoft)
>> Warren Buffett (Investments)
>> Lawrence Ellison (Founder of Oracle)
>> Jim Walton (Inherited)
>> S Robson Walton (Inherited)
>> Alice Walton (Inherited)
>> Christy Walton & Family (Inherited)
>> Michael Bloomberg (Founder Bloomberg)
>> Charles Koch (Inherited small company)
>> David Koch (Inherited small company)
>> Michael Dell (Founder, Dell Computers)
>> Paul Allen (Founder, Microsoft)
>> Sergey Brin (Russian immigrant, founder Google)
>> Larry Page (Founder, Google)
>> Sheldon Adelson (Created Comdex)
>> Steven Ballmer (Founder, Microsoft)
>> Abigail Johnson (President, Fidelity Investments)
>> Jack Taylor & Family (Founder, Enterprise Rent-A-Car)
>> Anne Cox Chambers (Inherited Cox Entertainment)
>> Donald Bren (Real estate developer)
>> http://www.forbes.com/2008/09/16/forbes-400-billionaires-lists-
>> 400list0 8_cx_mn_0917richamericans_land.html
>>
>> By my count, seven of the top twenty got their start via inheritance.
>> That's about ONE-third, not two-thirds.
>
> Simply put, statistics lie, or, rather, one can easily interpret
> statistics so that lies result, as you just did. You simply took the
> top 20 richest people as being representative of the top 1 % of the
> tax payers.
Okay, I went through the all 400.
According to Forbes, 17 reached the Top-400 list via inheritance. That's
about 5%.
It may be more, because in researching this subject I ran across the amazing
statement that "the inheritance tax is a voluntary tax."
Previously I have been adamantly opposed to the inheritance tax since it was
a tax on assets that had already been taxed. I don't care if it affected
only Bill Gates, I still considered it immoral.
Then I hit the above statement and its explanation. Suitable pre-death
planning can completely eliminate the inheritance and its accompanying tax.
Therefore...
Members of the Forbes 400 list may be the beneficiaries of inheritance by
another name (trusts, stocks, gifts, blah-blah-blah).
"Glen" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Mark & Juanita wrote:
>
> <SNIP>
>
>>
>> Further, once the government takes over, this gives a tremendous
>> foothold
>> in not just rationing health care, but using the fact that taxpayers are
>> paying for it as an excuse to regulate every portion of one's life.
>> Again,
>> not hyperbole -- it's being done in Great Britain. Overweight? No hip
>> replacement for you. Smoke? Forget about treatment for heart disease,
>> you
>> brought it upon yourself.
>>
>> Think about the ramifications -- woodworking is a semi-dangerous hobby,
>> it
>> would not be far-fetched to see the government banning various hobbies
>> because of the "burden" on the public health care system.
>>
> Question - Didn't the Brits outlaw dado blades on home table saws?
>
> Glen
Can they still own table saws? They need a weeks training before getting
permission to buy a chain saw.