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42 percent of new cancer patients lose their life savings

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Re: 42 percent of new cancer patients lose their life savings

#61

Post by jakelazaroff »

henryfjordan wrote: post #10
toomuchtodo wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And spend the rest of her life paying back medical debts that she shouldn't have to? To me, this sounds like indentured servitude and not acceptable in a first world country.

Divorce is an option. Legally divorce then cut a new will to leave 100% to the wife before you start your treatment. That way she's only out half at most if the medical debts take everything. You'd have to be careful to not treat any money or assets as communal but so long as you go through the motions there's not much anyone can do.

It's crazy that the U.S. healthcare system is so messed up that this is actually being made as a serious suggestion.

Re: 42 percent of new cancer patients lose their life savings

#62

Post by moonbug »

so_tired wrote: post #49

I am sympathetic. From HN stories, the US health care situations seems abysmal. BUT, i want to make 3 counter points, if only for the sake of discussion. a. Cancer for many is a terminal disease. There are always some very very expensive and experimental or marginal treatments. If u have money, and are going to die, and decide to spend all you can to squeeze an extra year of life , i am very sympathetic but even the…

Except that net US personal taxation isn't far off that found across the EU.

Re: 42 percent of new cancer patients lose their life savings

#63

Post by PenguinCoder »

Retric wrote: post #30
colordrops wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is China civilized? Cuz it definitely happens there. I've heard a doctor ask a family how much money they've got in the bank, and took it all to keep a dying uncle on life support for another month. A crime.

> Is China civilized? No. The rampant corruption, lack of free speech, etc don't qualify as civilized IMO.

By those metrics (and others), United States isn't a civilized country either.

Re: 42 percent of new cancer patients lose their life savings

#64

Post by bonzini »

rayiner wrote: post #57
mikeash wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entire point of insurance is to pool risk so that a bunch of people together pay reasonable amounts, instead of a few people paying enormous amounts and the others paying less. Lifetime limits give you lower rates in exchange for making the insurance much less like actual insurance. If we’re talking about “don’t piss on my leg and tell me its raining,” don’t sell me “health insurance” that will leave me high and…

It's absurd to say that imposing a limit is somehow misleading for something sold as "insurance." "Actual insurance" almost always has a policy limit. Everything from car insurance to corporate liability insurance has a limit. I can't think of any "actual insurance" besides health insurance that doesn't have a limit. Again, I'm not arguing against having health insurance be unlimited. I'm taking exception to your rhe…

Car insurance has no lifetime limit. The limit is either per year or per event.

Re: 42 percent of new cancer patients lose their life savings

#65

Post by J5892 »

so_tired wrote: post #49

I am sympathetic. From HN stories, the US health care situations seems abysmal. BUT, i want to make 3 counter points, if only for the sake of discussion. a. Cancer for many is a terminal disease. There are always some very very expensive and experimental or marginal treatments. If u have money, and are going to die, and decide to spend all you can to squeeze an extra year of life , i am very sympathetic but even the…

Buying a $60k car seems like a completely insane concept to me, even with a Silicon Valley tech industry salary. Even $16k (used) was higher than I wanted to pay for my current car.

Re: 42 percent of new cancer patients lose their life savings

#66

Post by anonuser123456 »

anigbrowl wrote: post #26

Thanks, capitalism. Snarky as that may sound, it's a simple statement of fact: our society places a higher value on capital allocation than human life, and so the most vulnerable people are stripped of their assets and dignity to satisfy the demand for wealth. Frankly, I think socialized medicine would also reduce violence in society if deployed as part of a larger economic realignment.

Don't blame capitalism for regulatory capture. The healthcare industry has done a fantastic job at ensuring consumers can only choose the options the industry wants.

Re: 42 percent of new cancer patients lose their life savings

#67

Post by lawn »

mikeyouse wrote: post #9

Feels like the headline should include "In America". This certainly doesn't happen in the rest of the civilized world.

There was a comment a while ago I think about. It's about what it means to be poor.

Being poor is more than not having a roof over your head, having trouble getting food on the table or not having a job.

Being poor is how you can handle unforeseen expenses. For example your car or your freezer breaking down or you getting fired. Or getting sick or injured.

If getting sick in America means you'll lose your life savings how many people are actually poor in America?

Re: 42 percent of new cancer patients lose their life savings

#68

Post by expertentipp »

watertom wrote: post #44
Pharmakon wrote: post #4

Sometimes I’m just amazed that people haven’t risen up in bloody revolt yet. Recently my mother had a flare-up up radiation-induced pneumonitis and the PPO insurance she pays $14,000 annually wouldn’t approve a single unit of Advair. It took a week of talking to doctors and insurance drones to figure out that they were pushing her to an alternative that cost them $100 less. If I woke up tomorrow and people were burni…

Half the population have below average IQ's, and even people with above average IQ's still struggle with abstractions. These topics are complex and it's easy to frame the negative state in a way for low IQ and poorly educated people to grasp, so they tend to side with what they "think" they understand.

Half the population have below median IQs.

Re: 42 percent of new cancer patients lose their life savings

#69

Post by jopsen »

so_tired wrote: post #49

I am sympathetic. From HN stories, the US health care situations seems abysmal. BUT, i want to make 3 counter points, if only for the sake of discussion. a. Cancer for many is a terminal disease. There are always some very very expensive and experimental or marginal treatments. If u have money, and are going to die, and decide to spend all you can to squeeze an extra year of life , i am very sympathetic but even the…

> a. Cancer for many is a terminal disease.

True, for about 50% of people it is terminal. I doubt the overlap is perfect.

> c. No one mentions the non terminally ill 95% who presumably enjoy...

True, however, about 50% of people will get cancer at some point in their life.

So I guess for a lot of people it's more like you live well, until you get sick. And almost everybody gets serious illness at some point (such is life -- it ends).

But (b) is certainly a fair point.

Re: 42 percent of new cancer patients lose their life savings

#70

Post by lawn »

sdegutis wrote: post #13
Pharmakon wrote: post #4

Sometimes I’m just amazed that people haven’t risen up in bloody revolt yet. Recently my mother had a flare-up up radiation-induced pneumonitis and the PPO insurance she pays $14,000 annually wouldn’t approve a single unit of Advair. It took a week of talking to doctors and insurance drones to figure out that they were pushing her to an alternative that cost them $100 less. If I woke up tomorrow and people were burni…

Insurance is a legalized scam and it’s a shame it’s been made mandatory for everyone. Literally just a middleman now that does nothing except steal money from both sides. Edit: wow yall are incredibly divided on this comment. I'd love to see the internal statistics on the upvote/downvotes this got, but it seems like it's something like -12 and +12

Some instances of insurance can be yes but insurance in general can make sense for both buyer and issuer.
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