skullaria wrote:
I so wish we had national healthcare. It is outrageous the profit that is made on the life and death of human beings. Regardless, the insurance agencies now approve or disprove your treatment - and even with GOOD insurance - there is NO CAP on out of pocket expenses anymore- at least on our expensive bc/bs policy. I have a chronic, disabling illness. My insurance company over requires so many different doctors visits that my copays can run over 200 a month easily - then they don't want to cover my medications - I can only get covered on OLD medicines - at 35 dollars a month per prescription.
You just don't KNOW how bad this insurance stuff has got until you really get sick.
It makes me so sad - recently I did my best to take care of a friend who got her finger tip cut off with a lawnmower- who DID NOT go to the hospital because of no insurance and no real money to speak of.

During this time I found out that very few of my friends HAD insurance - they either couldn't afford it or couldn't get it - Nice very educated folks with familes. SAD

I was in and out of the hospital with migraines getting MRIs and CAT scans and lumbar punctures and such and the bills have amounted to $5K or so on that I have to pay under my policy. But the worst part is this: the ER doctor will bill like $300, for example. And Blue Cross will negotiate that down to $50. If I had no insurance, I'd owe the complete $300. They consistently knock the bills down to 20% of the original bill.

I can't imagine having to pay that personally.

skullaria wrote:
I so wish we had national healthcare. It is outrageous the profit that is made on the life and death of human beings. Regardless, the insurance agencies now approve or disprove your treatment - and even with GOOD insurance - there is NO CAP on out of pocket expenses anymore- at least on our expensive bc/bs policy. I have a chronic, disabling illness. My insurance company over requires so many different doctors visits that my copays can run over 200 a month easily - then they don't want to cover my medications - I can only get covered on OLD medicines - at 35 dollars a month per prescription.
You just don't KNOW how bad this insurance stuff has got until you really get sick.
It makes me so sad - recently I did my best to take care of a friend who got her finger tip cut off with a lawnmower- who DID NOT go to the hospital because of no insurance and no real money to speak of.

During this time I found out that very few of my friends HAD insurance - they either couldn't afford it or couldn't get it - Nice very educated folks with familes. SAD

in my country ok you might have a 5 or 6 hour wait in ER but if you cut the end of your finger off you get treated
a friend of mine is Polish, Poland joined the EU so she can legally come to England get a job and live here, she cut open the forefinger of her right hand down to the bone the length of her finger, she got free medical care including an operation under general anaesthetic and because she's Polish the NHS bills the Polish healthcare system. Ola never pays a medical bill for this other than maybe some outpatient presciptions which are charged at a flat fee per drug regardless of the actual cost of the medication to the NHS (the current charge is $10.60 per presciption so I pay that for my approx 3 months supply of 100 1mg tablets of Stelazine taken daily). Free operation, free stay in hospital, free physiotherepy
according to here in 2002 in Britain we spent 7.7% of our GDP on Healthcare and the US spent 14.6%
we have free healthcare at the point of delivery no questions asked
we are also a free country and you can take out insurance and go private if you choose, few do
i know people who earn $30,000 a year
i know people who earn $100,000+ a year
none of them use private healthcare
in England we all bitch about the NHS but it is proven electoral death to hint at privatising it or to give the opposition room to suggest they might think about privatising it

adam wrote:
in my country ok you might have a 5 or 6 hour wait in ER but if you cut the end of your finger off you get treated

Same deal here. They triage people base on the severity of the problem they have. If you aren't dying, you are waiting.

I'm not sure a national healthcare system would fit well with American culture, but I think universal coverage ought to exist. There are many ways to architect it.

The problem here is that many people don't care if others live or die as long as their taxes don't go up. They rationalize that it couldn't be them.