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Both in rich and poor countries, universal health care brings huge benefits

economist.com

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Re: Both in rich and poor countries, universal health care brings huge benefits

#161

Post by nisa »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #81
nisa wrote: post #15

There are lots of problems you can avoid when you are able to regularly get a checkup from your doctor. Also not everything is only a cold and having someone who can check early for complications might save a lot of lives or prevent people from far worse conditions. Last but not least: Access to mental health services like cognitive behavior therapy that replace or supplement only eating pills might help a lot of fol…

What are your thoughts on this Oregon study which showed no significant effect on health outcomes for people who were given Medicaid vs the uninsured? https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2013/05/02/oregon...

That's wrong - here is the study: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMsa1212321#t=articl...

We found that insurance led to increased access to and utilization of health care, substantial improvements in mental health, and reductions in financial strain, but we did not observe reductions in measured blood-pressure, cholesterol, or glycated hemoglobin levels.

Re: Both in rich and poor countries, universal health care brings huge benefits

#162

Post by austincheney »

Pharylon wrote: post #134
conanbatt wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think emotional arguments are a distraction, they're the whole point. This is a moral issue. I find the moral argument to be disingenuous. It is immoral to make poor people pay a tax that cure the diseases of rich people. "Nobody should go hungry, so everyone should be able to eat anywhere they want and not look at the tab".

Disingenuous? You think people arguing that it's immoral for someone to die because they were born poor are not actually sincere in their argument? Tell me, what is my evil ulterior motive? Do I actually just want to increase taxes for the hell of it?

> You think people arguing that it's immoral for someone to die because they were born poor are not actually sincere in their argument?

That would depend upon the specifics of the argument at hand. I also don't think increased funding is a solution to the problem.

Re: Both in rich and poor countries, universal health care brings huge benefits

#163

Post by bborud »

austincheney wrote: post #51

When the issue of universal health care comes up with regards to US policy I often see those emotional arguments pulling on the heart strings. Unfortunately, this is a distraction. I know this sounds cold, but it comes down to money. Healthcare in America is expensive. The problems appear to be commonly identified by various forms of research and including things like pricing inefficiencies of drugs, malpractice insu…

Healthcare is expensive because of the three-way symbiosis between insurance companies, drug companies and regulation that is designed to only take care of the aforementioned.

Re: Both in rich and poor countries, universal health care brings huge benefits

#164

Post by creaghpatr »

sykh wrote: post #101
merpnderp wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think the private healthcare system is immoral, you should take a look at the 100% government ran healthcare system that is the VA. You literally couldn't make up worse things than their administration has been caught doing with little or to consequence. If the VA is the best the US government can do, with some of the most sympathetic citizens, then it is incapable of doing better than our private system.

The people on TRICARE don’t seek to leave the system, do they? That’s a government run healthcare system. Do Medicare recipients seek to leave it? That’s a government run healthcare system. Universal healthcare can be implemented poorly but it doesn’t have to be. It can be done right. There are lots of examples of this.

>Do Medicare recipients seek to leave it?

No, because it's free, but 1/3 of Medicare recipients opt to receive their coverage through private insurers that typically add on additional coverage, an indicator that Medicare alone is not enough for a large segment of the population, or that they prefer a private insurer even with government subsidization.

https://www.kff.org/medicare/fact-sheet/medicare-advantage/

Re: Both in rich and poor countries, universal health care brings huge benefits

#166

Post by sykh »

Beltiras wrote: post #40
sykh wrote: post #6

When a person gets a life threatening disease they ought not worry about whether or not their treatment will leave their family in penury. This is especially so in a nation as wealthy as the U.S. The American healthcare system is immoral and I hope it drastically changes. Americans need to change their underlying notions of what it means to be a society. An author was once made fun of for suggesting that it takes a v…

This is a principal reason why the US was crossed off my list of countries where I would work and live. I fight against the privatization that is occurring within healthcare in my native country, Iceland. We used to have the Scandinavian model but decades of attacks from the right-wing Independence Party has broken our healthcare system. The next phase described by Chomsky is handing it over to private capital since…

I don’t understand why you were downvoted. That you were downvoted for your comment suggests how bad things are in the U.S. for a progressive like me.

Re: Both in rich and poor countries, universal health care brings huge benefits

#167

Post by veidr »

glhaynes wrote: post #102
rukittenme wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you think universal healthcare would be any different? If you recognize the VA's failings, and you blame Republicans for it, what's to stop them from doing it to every "good" idea you have? If a few motivated politicians can ruin the lives of millions those politicians shouldn't have that power in the first place.

So because Republicans will fuck up any government in an effort to prove that government doesn't work, we shouldn't have government?

No, in the first place, you shouldn't have a significant percentage of elected officials in the government who will fuck up any government in an effort to prove that government doesn't work.

If you do have that, then it is highly unlikely that your country will be able to implement a health care system that is competitive with Canada, Japan, Netherlands, etc.

But beyond that, it's very unlikely that your country will be able to implement other fundamentals, such as uncontaminated drinking water, safe schools, etc.

In other words, if your country has three branches of government, and the party that controls the executive, legislative, and judicial branches really is willing to fuck up any government in an effort to prove that government doesn't work... then, I'm afraid you are really pretty fucked.

Re: Both in rich and poor countries, universal health care brings huge benefits

#168

Post by coolaliasbro »

DamnYuppie wrote: post #118
sykh wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a well known fact that all medical care systems ration care. A person in America who gets cancer, say, often times faces bankrupt and financial ruin. The same can not be said of people in other wealthy nations. I fail to see your point. All healthcare systems ration care. Not all of them lead to financial ruin at the rate the American healthcare system does. My statement stands. A person ought not face financia…

They don't face financial ruin, unless they don't have health insurance and or they opt for various drugs that aren't covered by their plan. Before everyone screams that all things should be covered please consider that due diligence has actually been done and the drug was considered to either not be effective or not needed based upon other existing treatments.

Wrong--it is certainly the case that many insured individuals are left insolvent after necessary but costly medical procedures.

Re: Both in rich and poor countries, universal health care brings huge benefits

#170

Post by HankB99 »

clarkevans wrote: post #94
sykh wrote: post #6

When a person gets a life threatening disease they ought not worry about whether or not their treatment will leave their family in penury. This is especially so in a nation as wealthy as the U.S. The American healthcare system is immoral and I hope it drastically changes. Americans need to change their underlying notions of what it means to be a society. An author was once made fun of for suggesting that it takes a v…

> It seems the public interest is subordinate to private interests and often times with immoral consequences. This perspective of public vs private interest is rather puzzling to me -- it's more a matter of short-term vs long-term thinking. In the long-term, it's in the private interest of those having sustainable companies to have a broad base of educated and healthy workers to employ. The short-term interest of any…

I agree with the long term / short term dichotomy.

I believe the same dynamic is at work WRT the concentration of wealth in the US. I understand the short term desire to accumulate wealth. I do it myself. It seems to me that if trends continue, there will be less and less income for the other 99% to spend. (Yes, I'm mixing income and wealth here because I believe that the desire to increase wealth on the part of the wealthy results in downward pressure on income for the rest of us.) In my Econ 101 class they spoke of the velocity of money - how much gets spent. It seems to me that the velocity has to go down as earnings go down and at that point, the ability to accumulate wealth would start to decrease.

(These thoughts ignore the possibility that those who are not wealthy could provoke social upheaval. I don't know if that's a real possibility.)

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