What's your opinion on the lack of health care ?

I was reading some of the questions in the medical section and found it very sad that so many people find it hard to get proper dental and health care. Speaking for the UK and US, supposedly advanced nations, what in your opinion is going on? Also, people from other countries, what are the facilities like in your country?

What's your opinion on the lack of health care ?
I think health care needs to stop being treated like a business, and start treating people regardless of what is in their wallet.
Reply:peope with money having private treatment are budging the nhs patients further down the list.
Reply:I have recently just come out of hospital and i think the service in there was good. Everyone was kind and polite and made my stay as comfetable as possible.
Reply:NHS dental hospital is free to all.


The students learn while sticking a drill in your mouth.
Reply:im from australia and now live in the states. Australias health care is so much better than the US. I dont have to pay to go to the emergency room or see a doctor in australia its under medicare. One night in the Emergency room in the States cost me $2000. Lucky i had travel insurance.
Reply:I think it's really sad as well. I am employed full time, and my small business employer does not offer benefits. When I have applied for private coverage I have been declined due to a preexisting condition. Even if I could afford the insurance (which I can't) I get turned down because of a chronic skin condition. So basically unless I can pay out of pocket or get on with a clinical trial, my conditions go untreated because I am too expensive for insurance companies to take on. I think it's a disgrace that they reap huge profits at the expense of other people and their health.
Reply:Hi,i live in the North east %26amp; have not (touch wood )come across


any problems.I feel sorry for the people that are suffering %26amp; hope some thing is done %26amp; quick.
Reply:What is going on in the US is NOT being reported. The pols and media parrot the "UHC" line as a "solution" when it does not work.


Hillarycare exists--in Taxachusetts--care of Romney. Results for those 6.5 million?


"Massachusetts announced that spending on its health care plan would increase by $400 million in 2008, a cost expected to be borne largely by taxpayers."


http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/200...


Last modified: January 29. 2008 5:03AM


Article discusses how CA couldn't even get it off the ground as UHC is horridly expensive, far beyond any government's ability to estimate or handle.





The ACTUAL problems are these:


When 75% of the people who declare bankruptcy over medical bills ARE INSURED, then insurance is CLEARLY not the answer.


"Aldrich’s situation is "asinine" but increasingly common, said Dr. Deborah Thorne of Ohio University. Thorne, co-author of a widely quoted 2005 study that found medical bills contributed to nearly half of the 1.5 million personal bankruptcies filed in the U.S. each year, said that ratio has likely worsened since the data was gathered.


...


Like Aldrich, Thorne said, three-quarters of the individuals in the study who declared bankruptcy because of health problems were insured. "


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20201807/





Linda Peeno, MD testified that SHE had often denied treatment JUST to save the insurance company money http://www.thenationalcoalition.org/DrPe...





Furthermore:


"the vast majority of health insurance policies are through for-profit stock companies. They are in the process of “shedding lives” as some term it when “undesirable” customers are lost through various means, including raising premiums and co-pays and decreasing benefits (Britt, “Health insurers getting bigger cut of medical dollars,” 15 October 2004, investors.com). That same Investors Business Daily article from 2004 noted the example of Anthem, another insurance company. They said the top five executives (not just the CEO) received an average of an 817 percent increase in compensation between 2000 and 2003. The CEO, for example, had his compensation go from $2.5 million to $25 million during that time period. About $21 million of that was in stock payouts, the article noted.





A 2006 article, “U.S. Health Insurance: More Market Domination, More CEO Compensation”


(hcrenewal.blogspot.com) notes that in 56 percent of 294 metropolitan areas one insurer “controls more than half the business in health maintenance organization and preferred provider networks underwriting." In addition to having the most enrollees, they also are the biggest purchasers of health care and set the price and coverage terms. “’The results is double-digit premium increases from 2001 and 2004—peaking with a 13.9 percent jump in 2003—soaring well above inflation and wages increases.’" Where is all that money going? The article quotes a Wall Street Journal article looking at the compensation of the CEO of UnitedHealth Group. His salary and bonus is $8 million annually. He has benefits such as the use of a private jet. He has stock-option fortunes worth $1.6 billion."


--Save America, Save the World by Cassandra Nathan pp. 127-128





"Insurance Companies Robbing Patients


Robbing patients to pay CEOs leads to unprecedented medical insurance corporation greed.


Thursday, January 3, 2008 8:52 AM


By: Michael Arnold Glueck %26amp; Robert J. Cihak, The Medicine Men"


http://www.newsmax.com/medicine_men/medi...





Forcing insurance on people without reforming the RAMPANT abuses is insane.





We need to enforce CONTRACT law: they need to pay all legit claims.


We need to enforce ANTITRUST law: they drive up costs when they control the market in more than half of the major markets.


We need PRICE TRANSPARENCY: this is the ONLY field in which people have NO clue what they will owe until the damage is done and you can't "restock" an angiogram, now can you? The power players--provider, insurer, etc. all know to the PENNY what the costs are or will be and what they will be paid, ONLY the customer is left in the dark. If he is the victim of being denied a legit claim, no one helps him. Rare to be able to launch a lawsuit--remember these are folks with medical issues--usually can't afford a lawyer, don't have the energy for the BS, and are afraid of antagonizing the "health care providers."





We also need more doctors, need to reduce their student loan obligations, etc.





Want a comprehensive solution? Read the book Save America, Save the World by Cassandra Nathan. You can see the basic outline of a plan that would provide ALL the potential benefits of UHC with NONE of the downsides because the focus is on personal responsibility and the insurance kicks in (after a physical with follow up, and possibly an ER visit) ONLY if legit medical care becomes a true financial BURDEN so whiners or those who try to misuse the system pay for themselves and the genuinely ill get the care they need with no fear of bankruptcy.


Check it out:


http://www.booklocker.com/books/3068.htm...


Read the PDF, not the blurb, for the bulk of the plan. Book is searchable on Amazon.com
Reply:I think it stinks, because there are many sick people who will need health care, but that is just me. It doesn't have to be free, but at least cheep and affordable to all.
Reply:Here is France I had full cover as an expat, well until January this year when the French decided that Brits were not entitled if you retired early, (i'm 64) however, they relented and now I am entitled to it except the local health authority refuses and said Paris can say what it likes we are not giving it you even if it means being dismissed from their posts and heavily fined. some EEC treaty
Reply:I don't think there is a lack of Health care, now the cost of it is so outrageous that I think this is what the trouble is that keeps people from acquiring the medical attention they need.
Reply:In Canada everyone accepted to see a doctor, a hospital stay and operations and cancer treatments etc. We do not segregate. I had no idea that thousands of Americans die needlessly from lack of healthcare due to lack of insurance. Time and time again I have read about people being turned away from lack of money and insurance. Thousands die needlessly. Even with insurance you are told which doctors fall under the plan and if he is a quack oh well sorry. And their is a ceiling of how much some insurance companies will play and that can take a good chunk of money as well. I feel sorry for Americans without proper insurance for you need to have quite a nest egg should you fall ill. I am proud to be here in Canada with medicare and pray that the American government can also assure every American the same right. Each and every person in America needs to say enough. We do not want to die needlessly.