It is beyond fucked up. I have type 1 diabetes and even with EXCELLENT insurance I am still paying thousands a year out of pocket to cover my insulin, insulin pump, and CGM supplies, as well as doctor’s visits, lab work, and other necessary diagnostics testing. And these are just the diabetes things I have to do to stay alive. There’s also the regular people medical stuff that I still need. It’s absolutely crazy that some people have to forgo basic medical care, even when they have insurance, because of cost.
My wife is deaf. She gets given batteries for her free hearing aid plus an assessment from the audiology department once a year.
My daughter was born 5 weeks premature. She was in the ante natal care unit for three weeks.
My daughter also had open heart surgery when she was 9 years old. Full medical team at a world-famous teaching hospital, 2 days in the paediatric cardiology intensive care (nurse to patient ratio 1:1, 24/7) and 2 days in the post-op ward (ratio 2:1).
None of this has ever cost us anything.
America needs to fix its health “service”. While you’re at it, fix your gun laws too (children practising hiding from gunmen in schools? Really??). And your legal system. And women’s rights. And police corruption. Once you get those sorted, the rest of the civilised world has a long list of other suggestions.
fix your gun laws too (children practising hiding from gunmen in schools? Really??). And your legal system. And women’s rights. And police corruption.
I’d say they are all symptoms of the same problem, economic insecurity and misaligned incentives. People like to blame communism and praise capitalism for the results of the cold war, but I see the US making the same mistake that lost the USSR the cold war, but inflexibility and misaligned incentives. The US in the 20th century went from almost unregulated capitalism to a regulated market economy. IMO, it was that ability to change that brought the US ahead, not some magic of capitalism or brokenness of communism. Now we are stubbornly stuck on the ideology that could very well could have led to the collapse of the US in the 1930s.
Take the freight rail strike fiasco and recent train wrecks. Capitalism creates an incentive for the companies to reduce costs as much as possible. The rail unions are practically useless due to a terrible federal law. What we need is a more pragmatic government and population that will allow them to be and pass legislation that deals with it. One reasonable approach is to deregulate the unions a bit to ensure a quality workforce. Another is regulations that micromanage operations. Maybe fine companies in key industries for both preventable environmental disasters and failure operate under the threat of forced liquidation if they can’t get their act together. Another is professionalizing rail workers so no worker will risk personal liability or loss of licensure for cutting corners. Something else?
At the scales we are talking about, there is so much complexity that it is almost impossible to predict the outcome of a policy, so I am a big advocate for flexibility.
Or… We could eliminate conservatives (including neo-liberals) from positions of power. That would also solve these “complex issues”.
Politicians sucking corporate teats and taking legal bribes are the problem, and no one does that better than conservatives.
It’s working just as intended for the people at the top and their supporters. There would only be a problem if this wasn’t the case. The disparity in wealth must grow, not shrink.
The system is working. It’s designed to enrich the wealthy and extract that wealth from the poor.
The entire medical industrial complex is not going to give up their wealth willingly.
Plus most doctors are born into money already. They don’t ever associate with ordinary people in the lower 80% of households.
I work for rich people once in a while and they don’t understand why I can’t wait 1 month to get paid. There is a total disconnect, they can’t even imagine how I live, and I’m not the poorest of the poor anymore.
I work construction, and I have to be super mindful of injury, because that’d basically be it for me.
“I don’t get it MiddleWeigh, don’t you have some art you could auction? Surely your money manager has some stock you can loan off in the mean time?”
Good ol arrested development “It’s one banana Michael, what could it cost $10?”
:P
nah, it more like ‘just ask your parents for the money from your inheritance/trust early’
A lot of folks who otherwise would have become doctors have pursued other careers because the money just isn’t there anymore.
American insurance is such a scam, how can they even call it insurance if it costs more then it’s realistically worth
People will argue against universal healthcare because they don’t want to pay into a pool of money that gets distributed among people who use the healthcare services, and they don’t like the idea of paying for someone else’s care.
So instead they support a system where everyone pays into health insurance, which by definition is folks paying into a pool of money that gets distributed among the people who use the services the insurance provider provides. They’re still paying for other people’s healthcare, but for some reason they don’t see that. It’s the same as paying car insurance if you’re never in an accident.
And this latter system allows insurance companies to simply not provide coverage for certain care, meaning that you pay into a shared pool of money that no one can use to get that care provided.
Even if you’re wealthy; and you can afford the best insurance, how is this better? You might think you’ll have shorter hospital times, but the hospitals are still running on thinner margins for profits, so its not like the Doctors are waiting around for you to show up. If there’s less patients, they hire less staff.
You’re still constantly running the risk of having some healthcare problem that isn’t covered, just by the nature of letting the provider stipulate what they do or don’t cover.
I’ve worked for doctors in the past, can confirm they’re just as corrupt as every for-profit industry. The doctors I worked for took gifts from pharmaceutical companies, overprescribed medication, and overbooked patients, while paying their administrative staff minimum wage
Summation of very conversation I’ve had with a doctor about the healthcare system.
Doctor: “The system needs fixing.”
Me: “Agreed, we need to socialize the healthcare system.”
Doctor:“Not like that, I still wanna be rich!”
How many times have you had that conversation?
Methinks zero.
I have had something like it with my doctors. Talking about how bad the healthcare system is and not seeing a single payer as a good option without providing any other good option. My doctors are conservatives though that think lowering taxes is going to help them. They don’t seem to get in the current system they pay the highest taxes because they don’t increase them for anyone doing better for them (bussiness owners of a certain size or larger)
You never had such a conversation, no doctor ever said anything like that to you, and I’m fairly certain that all happened in your head during a shower.
Why do people make up such unbelievably bad stories to tell on social media? Like if you’re 16 or 17 I get it but you’re not are you? You’re an adult. Making up stories for brownie points from strangers.
Woosh? I’m paraphrasing for comedic effect, but the sentiment was the same. I brought up socialized medicine and the doctor bemoaned medicare because the payouts to are too low. “I can’t run a business on medicare patients.” Is probably closest to what one actually said. You gotta read between the lines.
Sorry dude I have. Also had a doctor who asked me if I was married and I said no and so felt there is no need to discuss birth control them. Im sorry your experience in life is different than other peoples and you can’t even imagine circumstances or relationships that can be different than what you have experienced.
never had a convo with your doctor? lol
Every medical professional I’ve ever talked to has the opposite opinion.
You think the doctor has some say in how much medical care costs? This has nothing to do with the doctors. This entirely about the health insurance companies.
It is working.
Joe Biden took almost nine million in Big Pharma money. Every member of Congress has probably taken a large sum of money from them too, and they can loan their campaigns money at 20% interest and legally pocket those lobbyist contributions.
That is why diabetics in this country are stuck paying a mortgage payment to inhabit their own bodies. It’s by design, and you will never change it voting for the two ruling parties.
Conservatism is a plague of corporatism, deception and death. Conservatives (including neo-liberals like Biden) are the reason we don’t have a legitimate healthcare system. Killing us benefits them.
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Also something, the number of people delaying care due to costs is still increasing YoY.
Some forego treatment altogether. Even myself have decided that if I am ever diagnosed with advanced stage disease to just die rather roll the dice and be sacked with seven to eight digits of debt on a, “maybe you’ll still be alive and even then you’ll just be a shell of the person you were before.”
If we’re going to keep the medical system the US has, then I honestly really want assisted suicide as well. Not this palliative, let’s keep you drugged up while you decay bullshit. No, I want in the US the ability to see the choice of $1,000,000+ maybe you’ll live versus $250 we put you in a box and suck out all the oxygen and replace it with nitrogen.
I’m not saying everyone is going to pick the death box, but after two major healthcare things in my life that I’ve gotten through, I sure as shit am not going through a third. Be that via an approved or unapproved manner. There’s just no way this system is going to put me through that again.
Healthcare should be free. There should be no matter of ‘affording’ it.
Not possible no one will ‘help’ for free. If it’s free, taxpayers will have to fund it.
Oh the horror! Guess what, that’s exactly how most European countries work. We pay taxes. The rich pay a lot of taxes (not nearly enough but that’s another issue), the poor pay a lot less or almost none (except VAT, which is much more of a burden for the poor than the rich). We have public infrastructure. We have “free” public education. We have “free” public healthcare. We have “free” life saving meds. We have paid sick days. The doctors must get their license by studying and working in public teaching hospitals instead of 100k+ a year private universities. It works. Most of the public systems are still dysfunctional, but it works. No one needs to go bankrupt because they broke an ankle or their kid got the flu.
I’m so fuckin sick of this argument. “bUt mUh tAxPaYeR muNeY”. You’re actively working against your own fucking interests. Enjoy your debilitating lifelong injury that could have been entirely prevented if you had a healthcare system.
If taxes aren’t used to provide healthcare and services to the public, what are they used fo… oh thats right… usa spends it on killing machines…
it works, we aren’t the “users.” The billionaire who leech off of us are. We’re just a resource for them to exploit
I watched a video explaining why the American Healthcare system is the way that it is. Pretty interesting. https://youtu.be/C6Rk9WtO554
Jesus… I hate reality
I don’t know how to show my ultra capitalist family how ultra capitalism is literally the thing causing all of the problems they blame “libruls” for.
Fuck
What’s also sad is that most GPs, interns and generally younger doctors in all fields are underpaid and malpractice insurance costs them a fortune. Healthcare is prohibitively expensive for the patient and most of that money doesn’t even end up with the doctors that actually provide healthcare but instead bleeds out to a whole mess of parasites within the system.
That’s a feature of the system. Plebs do all the work while capital class collects rents which increasingly became lion’s share of every transaction.
Boomers essentially sold out the proffession. Not just medical but every other one also from trades to law.
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It’s not a bug, it’s a feature.
