Insurance company First-Health Coventry "...wrote a prescription for him to die."

[Spiffor]

It seems to me that universal healthcare will be hugely expensive in its own right, but the real danger may lie in stiffling research as the only consumer of that research will be a government that sets prices and not a demand market.

The market is far from being something perfect when it comes to medical research. For example, the market promotes research on medication against Malaria, which is very expansive, and which one has to take every day. The market for this medication is fairly small (westerners going to Malaria-infected areas), but there's more money to be made than by developing an anti-malaria vaccine.

As a result, hundreds of millions people are suffering from malaria on this planet. Meanwhile, the labs can make huge money by selling 12 days worth of preventive medication for 43€.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
I hope they sue the insurance company and get millions for this despicable action

Don't you remember Bush's "medical reform laws"? It is almost impossible to sue a hospital or insurance company now days and instead you must go to binding arbitration which has been stacked with the insurance company's own people. They've run the numbers and figured out that it is cheaper to let people die and go through this pseudo-legal process then it is to actually treat many patients.

It is a national disgrace and it is entirely the result of Republicans allowing insurance companies to write their own laws.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Arrian

We, as a society, really need to make some tough choices about health care. How much are we willing to pay?

The reality is we have an incrediblely inefficient system which costs more (as a percentage of GDP) then any other system but has the worst coverage of any industrialized nation. We simply have to many middle men who push papers and suck up funds which could be better spent on actual medical care. To do this right it has to be a nation wide program so that we eliminate the worthless paper pushers and spread out the cost of care over the entire population. That's how you get the economies of scale and the muscle to reduce prices and improve coverage.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Oerdin
Don't you remember Bush's "medical reform laws"? It is almost impossible to sue a hospital or insurance company now days and instead you must go to binding arbitration which has been stacked with the insurance company's own people. They've run the numbers and figured out that it is cheaper to let people die and go through this pseudo-legal process then it is to actually treat many patients.

It is a national disgrace and it is entirely the result of Republicans allowing insurance companies to write their own laws.

AFAIK, they never passed.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui


Eh.. what? Do you know anything about the projected costs of the Medicaid perscription program? It definetly isn't going to cost the government less overall (in fact, much, much more)

That doesn't mean that it couldn't ultimately cost the elderly consumer more. Until now they've been getting procedures, office visits, hospitalization, tests, and radiology exams essentially free after meeting their Medicare deductibles. The providers of these services were prohibited from billing Medicare recipients for the balance of charges in excess of the "usual and customary fees" set by Medicare. Once Medicare recipients are shifted to private insurance healthcare providers will be able to bill them for the difference between what the insurance pays and what the provider demands. Let me assure you that the private insurers will set their "usual and customary fees" - what they will be willing to pay - to the same fee schedules that Medicare uses. The Medicare fee schedules are usually much less, often about half, the fees billed by most healthcare providers to non-Medicare patients.

An elderly person with hypertension, diabetes mellitus, and hyperlipidemia can easily have a monthly pharmacy bill of $400, totaling $4800/year. The new Medicare prescription program will pay about $1200 of that. Sounds good doesn't it? The question is though, if the Medicare recipient is put on private insurance and begins receiving bills from doctors, hospitals, labs and other medical services for charges in excess of what Medicare provides. how much of that bonus will be left? My advice to old folks from now on is - don't get sick.

[Imran Siddiqui]

That doesn't mean that it couldn't ultimately cost the elderly consumer more.

Not the point.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

That doesn't mean that it couldn't ultimately cost the elderly consumer more.

Not the point.

Maybe to you it isn't.

[Dinner]

I think we can all agree that the current medicare drug benifet is about the single worst way you imagine doing a drug benifet. It is excessively complex and designed more as a subsidy to drug companies then anything else. I mean medicare can't even pay market rate for perscribed drugs and most legally pay MSRP which is often double the market rate. If Walmart can negotiate with drug companies for lower prices then why can't Medicare? How can that be seen as anything but a massive subsidy to drug companies at the expensive of the tax payer?

[Spiffor]

BENEFIT


Thank you

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by aneeshm
Why is healthcare in th USA to goshawful expensive ?

Because Americans spend more on unnecessary health insurace bureaucracy that on the entire U.S. military. Estimate range from 1 our of every 5 to 1 out of every 2 U.S. heath dollar goes to administration. In contrast, our Veterans' Administration and Europeans spend 1 out of every 10-20 on administration.

SB 840 is going thru the California Legislature right now. If passed, all California residents will have complete health coverage--and Californians will spend $ 9 billion less on healthcare in the first year alone.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove
Maybe to you it isn't.

To anyone in that particular discussion (PH's threadjack) it wasn't.