Don’t like Government Health Care? You’ve Already Got It!

Sojourner6
Sorry for the loss of your brother. Organ donation, although it helps the unfortunate extentd their lives a bit longer, is a gold mine to the medical profession. Organ donors nor thier heirs do not share in the wind fall for doctors and hospitals for thier selfless act. They are expected to donate and would be deemed mercinary if they spoke up. The medical industry needs to be formed by reining in, an example is; an overnight stay in a semi private costing thousands of dollars, and crating a pile of cash or insurance for them to draw from only adds to the problem of gouging the victim which is nicely put as "high costs" which they tell us is due to high insurance costs.. The government knows what is going on and wants their piece of the action. So now we have the " Health Care Reform Bill" to lower cost, right? Why would one donate their organs to perpetuate the continued practice of gouging the public unless it is family. If we donate the organs how about the doctors and hospitals donating too, or at least compensating the donors. Stop cooperating with a corrupt system.

I think the nature of health care militates against a free market solution to this problem. It's almost impossible for the consumer to make an informed buying decision without becoming a doctor himself. It's different from buying most consumer items.

For example, let's say I discover that I'm passing blood in my urine. My doctor recommends various tests. Do I second guess him and say, no, that's too expensive? There's only one hospital where I live: how do I shop around for cheaper tests? And how do I know if all the tests are equal? Maybe one doesn't test for a certain element to save money, but I don't know how important that is, because I'm not a doctor. I have to rely on my doctor for expertise, and the stakes are a lot higher than, say, buying a new car. Realistically, are you going to shop around for a heart surgeon based on price, or are you going to go with the best reputation, or your cardiologist's recommendation.

But still, I think a huge part of the problem is just having the insurance companies get in the middle of every dollar spent on health care. They do nothing, they add no value: they're parasites. They've inserted themselves deeper and deeper into the process, exerting more and more control over it and contributing to the spiraling of health care costs.

Additionally, Medicare currently acts as a massive subsidy to insurance companies by taking the oldest, neediest patients off their roles. Can you imagine what insurance would cost if everybody's 70 year old parents had to buy insurance? How many could afford it? What kind of care would elders get. So, as much as the insurance co.s claim they don't want elected government involved in health care, they're glad to have all those old folks off their hands, and be able to prey on younger, healthier people.
If Americans had to face the spectacle of a bunch of uninsured old people dying because they couldn't afford their medical bills they'd probably come up with, well, Medicare.

It's a multifaceted problem and I don't think kicking back and waiting for monopolistic competition between insurance companies to save us is our best bet.

Qliance in Seattle which provides primary care has a system that works great. It works great because it provides patients with unlimited care and doesn't deny them because of any pre-existing conditions. Doctors even get paid more than doctors.

The way it works is that they get rid of medicaid, medicare and insurance. Then they charge patients a small monthly fee, the same way you run a gym membership.

It's cheaper for the patient, they get better care, can go to the doctor 30 times a month if they want and pay the same flat rate. In fact they are booming, there is a huge demand for physicians to start their own practices with this model.

All the patient needs to do is take care of catastrophic problems with insurance. They can use a health saving account or go with the usual insurance providers for that.

So there are solutions to at least primary care to reduce cost and provide better care. The same thing could be done with major illnesses, but with all the regulations most people just go with the major insurance companies because it's all they can do. They are slaves to the system.

As Rand Paul pointed out, with lasik eye surgeries that he performs, he has to compete with other eye doctors and keep his procedure prices as low as possible. That's because the government doesn't regulate those operations since they classify them as cosmetic.

So with a government option, what it seems to do is put a band aid on a big gaping wound. They know the money is not there and it will end up hurting people financially in our current economy. And it doesn't address the problems of government regulation itself. One of the main reasons costs are kept so high.

While a free market system won't make all the costs go away, just imagine if a typical operation was priced $10,000.00 less for a $40,000.00 operation if competition was allowed between regulated surgical procedures. Would $30,000.00 still be a lot? Yes, but saving $10,000.00 is still a huge savings in that kind of system. It would make health savings accounts more viable and if someone didn't have insurance, it would be much easier to pay off.

The Rockefeller-Carnegie medical system (circa 1910) begot the corporate insurance scheme when that system ... never intended to cure illness ... became too expensive for the average person. So, rather than lose the business, they devised the insurance industry scheme whereby everybody got to share in the payments extracted from the hapless sick by the medical industry.

Government is just the legal entity whereby the robber barons keep robbing us, legally. A faceless government bureaucracy is used to keep the lid on alternative medicine and promote the medical industry, the pharmaceutical industry, "Brave New World" experimentation, etc. Government intrusion into medicine destroyed what used to be the charity hospitals and, by force of laws and regulations, co-opted them into the system.

I wouldn't go near an AMA doctor or one of their hospitals, or take one of their poison pharmaceuticals, so I don't need or want their "health care" insurance. Alternative care exists. The treatments, by comparison, are dirt cheap. You can cure almost anything ... including cancer ... for a pittance of the $13,000 yearly insurance payment Cohen makes (and for which, he receives nothing but promises).

Finally, we are all destined to die. I will not donate organs nor would I accept organs or any extraordinary means to prolong my life. (Irony of ironies, these days they withhold food and water ... nothing too extraordinary about them ... to kill people off as fast as possible). Besides, the way this country is going, I'm more likely to die during a war or revolution than from natural causes.

The sad thing is, with the overarching faceless Frankenstinian government intrusion into our bodies, they will probably do their jackboot dance on the alternative doctors.

God have mercy on us.

Excellent post !!! All those private insurance are one of the biggest scams ever existed in this country... only the fractional reserve banking is bigger.

oh, I know, we paid our own bills! Take A-man's advice & quit complaining. I hate insurance & only carry what is absolutely required. You know, government mandated car insurance, mortgage insurance, etc.

you're flushing 13k a year down the toilet. If you're truly "healthy" then you really don't need a health "plan."

Get catastrophic insurance only, with 10k deductable, it will be much cheaper in the long run. Take the savings and put into an emergency fund that collects interest and/or buy precious metals.

Health "plans" are very expensive and only benefit the insurance company. Funny how this is exactly what is being forced down our throats.

does not go bankrupt and pass the cost of its mistakes onto individuals who did not desire its services and did not invest in it.

If you don't like it. Don't purchase it.
If you think it can be done better. Go do it better.

If you think that 'waste' can be cut out of the system then go start an insurance company.

They set the price, tell me what treatment I can and can’t get, and, every three or four months, raise the price whether I like it or not.

They do the math. They decide what treatments are affordable based on 1. how many people are contributing to the same risk pool, 2. how much they each pay in, and 3. how likely it is that people in the pool will become sick.

Its a system of rationing, but its a system you voluntarily elected to become a part of.

Rising prices in a sector of the economy that the government lavishes with money? You don't say.

News flash! Economics 101: Supply and demand-- When there are more buyers than sellers prices go up (Especially when one of the primary buyers monetizes debt *cough* prints money *cough cough* in order to purchase the goods being sought).

For the love of god not everything needs to be solved with a nationwide federal program.

stuck in, I just think the only way out is to trim down government legislation, licensing, permits, regulations, bureaucracy, etc. so it can't continue to screw up everything it touches including health care.
If alternative practitioners weren't restricted from practicing so many types of health care, for instance, we'd have cheaper (and in my opinion) better choices, and some competition among insurers for those clients who practice a healthy lifestyle and don't participate in the drug/slash/burn medical modes promoted by government monopolies for the AMA, BigPharma, etc.

Btw, I'm reading your Army of the Republic now, am thoroughly enjoying it, wondering how it's going to play out. Wicked tension you set up with the Dad and Lando.