Do You Want Universal Healthcare?

rph3664 · Jul 17, 2008

I don't know how much my opinion matters because I am new here, but I am NOT in favor of universal health care. I don't think the government could do it without screwing it up.

ITA x 10,000! Like one of my co-workers said about Medicare Part D(isaster), "When it goes online, you will find out just how free it is."

Like the problem of seniors and prescriptions, SOMETHING has to be done, but this isn't it.

cpnegrad07 · Jul 17, 2008

Check out the NPR series http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=91972152

for some facts on how it is in other advanced countries. Enuf with the guesses and wild anecdotes. :yeah:

**canoehead, BSN, RN** · Jul 17, 2008

When you say "basic" universal healthcare I am all for it if that means acess to a family doc without worrying about the cost. When we go further into millions, or thousands of dollars in treatment I'm not all for it. I think those thousands could be better spent on education, or prevention. I'm NOT for universal, all you can eat healthcare. Or complete free access to the ER for instant gratification.

Now that I think about it I would be satisfied if people had to pay for 20% of their usage. Just enough so it's not free, but not so much that a few community potlucks wouldn't cover a surgery, and the leftover can be paid off over time.

I honestly think that if millions of dollars weren't available for some services, and everyone paid the same amount of money, then the price of services would plummett. I know we are charging people $60 for an Ace bandage in the ER I work in, plus another procedure fee of $50 to put it on. That's highway robbery, and don't tell me that insurance companies are paying the full price.

rita359 · Jul 17, 2008

No, no, no!! We do not have universal health care now but if you have no insurance and no job and no way to pay for a hospital stay but go to the ER and need hospitalization the hospital cannot turn you away and you get the same care that anybody with insurance gets so it might as well be universal. If universal health care meant that everybody with long term health problems took execelent care of their problem that would be good but people would still be as lazy as ever and those of us who actually pay taxes would just take home less and less of our pay check,

djc1981 · Jul 18, 2008

I'm not sure about universal healthcare or not. In a way, we already have it with medicare and medicaid. And lets face it, the ER is "free" for all..meaning even those without insurance will be treated...and the hospital will probably never see a dime. But something needs to be done. Our healthcare system is broken for sure. I in no way feel that the right to live is a "privilege" that boils down to survival of the richest.

Insurance companies have become more corrupt than any institution in the world, literally deciding every day who lives or dies based on desperately trying to find ways to deny people their claims with any excuse possible. There has to be some govt. oversight of these places, or they'll just keep hiking the premiums and denying any claim -- in fact, most companies procedures are to "deny first, then pay if the customer fights it". That is inexcusable. Im not sure if John or Barry can fix it, but I pray they can.

Acosmo27 · Jul 18, 2008

John Stossel wrote an amazing article in response to Michael Moore's doc "Sicko"........ if you have the time to read it ill copy and paste it here.. enjoy!

Sick Sob Stories

By JOHN STOSSEL

September 13, 2007

In Michael Moore's movie "Sicko," a widow named Julie Pierce tells a tearful story: Her husband died of kidney cancer after their health-insurance company denied payment for a bone-marrow transplant that might have saved his life. Ms. Pierce's rage is palpable as she repeats the word her insurers used in response to her husband's request. "They denied it," she sneers. "Said it was 'experimental.'"

Viewers of the documentary are meant to understand that "experimental" is health-insurance code for "expensive," and that Ms. Pierce's husband was left to die for the sake of profit. According to Mr. Moore's movie, "Any payment for a claim is referred to as a medical loss," and when a claim is denied, "it's a savings to the company."

But Mr. Moore is so busy following the money that he doesn't take the time to follow the science. Treating cancer patients with bone-marrow transplants has a dubious history.

Twenty years ago, many oncologists believed that bone-marrow transplants, along with high doses of chemotherapy, might offer a cure for breast cancer. Insurance companies refused to pay, calling the treatment experimental and unproven. Breast-cancer sufferers went to court: In one case, a jury awarded $77 million to the family of a woman who was denied payment for the treatment. Wives and mothers told heart-rending stories in newspapers and on TV. Politicians quickly moved to guarantee the treatment to all breast-cancer patients. Ten state legislatures mandated that every insurance policy cover bone-marrow transplantation for breast-cancer patients. Amid the media circus and political self-congratulation, the question of whether bone-marrow transplants are medically effective faded into the background.

The sad truth is that the treatment isn't effective. When researchers released the results of their clinical trials to the American Society of Clinical Oncology in 1999, they showed that the treatment offered no benefit. Worse, it often killed women faster than their cancer, and caused them unnecessary pain. At a time when their health was at its greatest risk, more than 30,000 women were exposed to an invasive, harmful and ultimately useless treatment that the National Institutes of Health no longer recommends. But only one state legislature has repealed its law requiring insurance companies to pay for the treatment. Some doctors believe bone-marrow transplants might help kidney cancer patients, and the NIH is conducting clinical trials to find out. Until the treatment has been shown to do more good than harm, insurers are reluctant to pay for it.

Mr. Moore claims that because private insurance companies are driven by profit, they will always deny care to deserving patients. For this reason, he argues, profit-making health-insurance companies should be abolished, our health- care dollars turned over to the government, and the U.S. should institute a health-care system like the ones in Canada, Britain or France. But does Mr. Moore think, even for a second, that any of the government systems he touts in his movie would have provided a bone-marrow transplant to Ms. Pierce's husband? Fat chance.

When government is in charge of health care, the result is not that everyone gets access to experimental treatments, but that people get less of the care that is absolutely necessary. At any given time, just under a million Canadians are on waiting lists to receive care, and one in eight British patients must wait more than a year for hospital treatment. Canadian Karen Jepp, who gave birth to quadruplets last month, had to fly to Montana for the delivery: neonatal units in her own country had no room.

Rationing in Britain is so severe that one hospital recently tried saving money by not changing bed-sheets between patients. Instead of washing sheets, the staff was encouraged to just turn them over, British papers report. The wait for an appointment with a dentist is so long that people are using pliers to pull out their own rotting teeth.

Patients in countries with government-run health care can't get timely access to many basic medical treatments, never mind experimental treatments. That's why, if you suffer from cancer, you're better off in the U.S., which is home to the newest treatments and where patients have access to the best diagnostic equipment. People diagnosed with cancer in America have a better chance of living a full life than people in countries with socialized systems. Among women diagnosed with breast cancer, only one-quarter die in the U.S., compared to one-third in France and nearly half in the United Kingdom.

Mr. Moore thinks that profit is the enemy and government is the answer. The opposite is true. Profit is what has created the amazing scientific innovations that the U.S. offers to the world. If government takes over, innovation slows, health care is rationed, and spending is controlled by politicians more influenced by the sob story of the moment than by medical science.

Pipsqueak, ADN · Jul 18, 2008

Nope.
I'm tired of paying for irresponsible people to use the ER as their free drug clinic. I'm also tired of paying for multiple baby deliveries to unemployed, unattached women who refuse to use free birth control after their 5th crack baby...

But we're already paying for the irresponsible people with our taxes.

I'd rather pay extra taxes to ensure that I am covered financially instead of the HUNDREDS of dollars I'm paying the insurance company just so they can profit off of me then tell me "no" when I need care.

To those that are worried about the gvmt interfering and delaying your care, don't think the insurance companies are doing this now?

I pay taxes to pay for the poor to have health coverage (welfare), I pay the insurance company to provide me with "health care", but then I also pay out the a** for all the copays, deductibles, and needed care that my insurance co refuses to cover. You know what, it's my turn to want to feel entitled (along with all the other middle class people)! You shouldn't have to be either super poor or super rich to be able to receive health care!

Pretty in Ink · Jul 18, 2008

I don't know if I believe in universal healthcare, I'm willing to go for it and see what happens. Perhaps there is some way we can learn from the downfalls of a NHS of other countries and make sure it does not happen in the states, (unlikely but why not give it a try). One thing I am in favor of however is that there has to be some kind of middle ground for the people who make too much and are denied medicare/medicaid but yet don't have enough to afford health coverage for their family. I think thats a damn shame. They go to work, pay their taxes but God forbid if one of them or their children get sick because yes they can go to the ER and get hospitalized asap but walk away with 5,000 - 15,000 or more in debt.

ayla2004, ASN, RN · Jul 18, 2008

John Stossel wrote an amazing article in response to Michael Moore's doc "Sicko"........ if you have the time to read it ill copy and paste it here.. enjoy!
Sick Sob Stories
By JOHN STOSSEL
September 13, 2007

Rationing in Britain is so severe that one hospital recently tried saving money by not changing bed-sheets between patients. Instead of washing sheets, the staff was encouraged to just turn them over, British papers report. The wait for an appointment with a dentist is so long that people are using pliers to pull out their own rotting teeth.

Not changing sheets is highly unusual practice in the UK, in my experience they are changes every day routinely and more frequently if soiled or for patient comfort.

Dentistry is largely private and there are few dentist working within the NHS system as charges to patients are capped if work exceeds a certain fee of which the patient pays 85% or free to old/young/unemployed.

Dentists prefer to make more money from private as they earn more per patient and so can work less.

ThatPoshGirl · Jul 18, 2008

It really disappoints me that so many healthcare professionals would say that they don't think everyone deserves to have access to healthcare. In the US over 100,000 people die every year from lack of healthcare and we rank somewhere like 46 in infant mortality.

Valerie Salva, BSN, RN · Jul 18, 2008

Yes, I do.

But- I don't trust our government or the private sector to do it.

Valerie Salva, BSN, RN · Jul 18, 2008

But we're already paying for the irresponsible people with our taxes.
I'd rather pay extra taxes to ensure that I am covered financially instead of the HUNDREDS of dollars I'm paying the insurance company just so they can profit off of me then tell me "no" when I need care.
To those that are worried about the gvmt interfering and delaying your care, don't think the insurance companies are doing this now?
I pay taxes to pay for the poor to have health coverage (welfare), I pay the insurance company to provide me with "health care", but then I also pay out the a** for all the copays, deductibles, and needed care that my insurance co refuses to cover. You know what, it's my turn to want to feel entitled (along with all the other middle class people)! You shouldn't have to be either super poor or super rich to be able to receive health care!

:up: :up: :up: