How do folks feel about outfits like Liberty Health Share?
They are positioned as an alternative non-profit shared health cost collective.
I have some friends who swear by it.
Health Insurance That Doesn’t Cover the Bills Has Flooded the Market
71–80 of 101 posts
Re: Health Insurance That Doesn’t Cover the Bills Has Flooded the Market
#72In European countries I visited, primarily Scandinavian ones, they take such pride in their social system. If some European countries is any example, publicly run healthcare can incentivize innovation in private health insurances. Apparently EU citizens (and visa holders?) get a healthcare card that's portable across EU. Is this true? Any Europeans healthcare users have opinions on the healthcare system there? Any wi…
There is no wisdom to impart. There are 2 countries in the world who do not have public healthcare: the US and Liberia. The US does not have public healthcare because of a lack of wisdom, it’s because of greed. Literally anything other than what you’re doing now is better. Roll the fucking dice on public health policy and it will be better than what you have now. It’s not a lack of wisdom, you aren’t even listening t…
> There is no wisdom to impart. There are 2 countries in the world who do not have public healthcare: the US and Liberia.
Where is this from?
There has to be example of countries without public healthcare.
Off topic: I was just reading about Liberia yesterday because they have a similar style/structure of government to USA: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberia#Politics.
Re: Health Insurance That Doesn’t Cover the Bills Has Flooded the Market
#73What I know is that before ACA, my health insurance was about $150 a month. Now it’s $650 a month. I can’t afford to subsidize other people’s bad choices and inability to pay. Health insurance should not be robbing Peter to pay Paul, we should return to an open market place.
There has been no spike in insurance premiums after the ACA. They've been rising at the same rate for a long time. http://healthaffairs.imgus11.com/public//332ce71d3968fad1b21...
Re: Health Insurance That Doesn’t Cover the Bills Has Flooded the Market
#74The US system really needs to be torn down and rebuilt from scratch. Stories like this simply shouldn’t happen. There is almost no way as a patient to ensure your coverage is sufficient besides having a lot of money in case. It’s insane and hard to understand how anyone can defend this. With the lack of information the patient has nobody should talk about free markets. A functioning market requires that all participa…
Honestly, a free market might even be better than what we have (though something like single-payer would be ideal). As usual, we have the weird half-assed worst of both works policy solution that comes from neither self-consistent solution being palatable to the electorate.
It's not just about free market. It has to be transparent to customers or you get the exact result you have now.
This means at least a minimum amount of regulation is necessary.
Re: Health Insurance That Doesn’t Cover the Bills Has Flooded the Market
#75Earlier quoted context omitted.
Torn down by whom? There is a whole system of laws and companies and staff that would object to such a dictatorial move. We agree that it’s fucked. We likely disagree on where it needs to go, and possibly on how it needs to get there. Actionable steps to improve are what is needed, especially now that stance on healthcare regulation has become a point of political identity in the USA. I think it will probably get wor…
> Torn down by whom? Trump can and should do it. He's one of the few in Washington who isn't actually owned by the Pharma companies.
Excellent performance so far by him, right?
Re: Health Insurance That Doesn’t Cover the Bills Has Flooded the Market
#76The US system really needs to be torn down and rebuilt from scratch. Stories like this simply shouldn’t happen. There is almost no way as a patient to ensure your coverage is sufficient besides having a lot of money in case. It’s insane and hard to understand how anyone can defend this. With the lack of information the patient has nobody should talk about free markets. A functioning market requires that all participa…
Honestly, a free market might even be better than what we have (though something like single-payer would be ideal). As usual, we have the weird half-assed worst of both works policy solution that comes from neither self-consistent solution being palatable to the electorate.
In my view a free market can only work if participation is optional. When you have a heart attack you can't really negotiate with the ambulance or the hospital. There needs to be some kind of regulations to keep costs in check. But I would advocate total price transparency so you can at least shop around before non-emergency treatments. Also, insured and uninsured patients need to be charged the same money.
Re: Health Insurance That Doesn’t Cover the Bills Has Flooded the Market
#77In European countries I visited, primarily Scandinavian ones, they take such pride in their social system. If some European countries is any example, publicly run healthcare can incentivize innovation in private health insurances. Apparently EU citizens (and visa holders?) get a healthcare card that's portable across EU. Is this true? Any Europeans healthcare users have opinions on the healthcare system there? Any wi…
You can get a cheap (like $10) EU-wide health insurance with wide coverage, or get a refund from your country after getting healthcare in another member country but it's quite the bureaucracy. (That's where the insurance company helps.)
Now even if paying from out of pocket, the cost is unlikely to bankrupt you. The expensive things are experimental biological therapies (e.g. new antibodies) and some cancer treatments.
As for quality, it depends, e.g. Poland has the healthcare starved for money and qualified people. That's because it's way too small bit of GDP. (I think around 5%.) That mostly makes specialist care much slower, not the general care, and hospital workers overloaded. Cost cutting is visible everywhere. (Only Romania and Bulgaria are more starved.)
It's still much better than US situation.
As a number, it is around 700 Euro per year per capita. And the money is supposed to increase to some 6% gradually.
Re: Health Insurance That Doesn’t Cover the Bills Has Flooded the Market
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
60% of Americans believe the government (in some form) should ensure healthcare for its citizens (per Pew Research). 70% of Americans support Medicare for All. We’re going single payer (Medicare For All), it’s just a matter of when (the younger you are, the more you’re likely to support it). https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/10/03/most-contin... https://thehill.com/hilltv/what-americas-thinking/412545-70-...
I don't look forward to this day. What many people don't realize is that the majority of new medicine is patented and created in the US. Once it's released, governments that have socialized health care create generics and get around these costs, mostly because they don't have to put any money into R&D. The world of medicine will be in trouble without our system, because govetnments are really not that good at innovat…
"Socialized medicine is great for simple checkups, but breaks down as you get older and need major surgery"
That's a very odd statement - at least in the US - because health care for the elderly is paid for through Medicare. It's done that way because the elderly are more-or-less uninsurable due to the high costs of providing care. In other words, the US's free-market-style health care only works for the elderly because it's socialized.
Re: Health Insurance That Doesn’t Cover the Bills Has Flooded the Market
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
Aren't you paying for insurance against the exact same thing that happened to the couple in the linked article? You're paying for coverage against a $250K bill for an unexpected health problem, not coverage for routine care. I've paid for car and home insurance for over a decade, but have gotten no paying from either, but that doesn't mean that I haven't gotten value out of it. I'd still purchase that insurance even…
Well again, you’re illustrating how screwed up American healthcare is. The reality is that most Americans need varying levels of routine care (vs insurance against catastrophic events only), and a system where healthcare is accessible via insurance instead of a system of universal healthcare doesn’t make sense for something that you need to access routinely.
No doubt, the American healthcare system is completely screwed up, I'm just pointing out that catastrophic healthcare insurance is not worthless. Unless you are completely destitute and have no assets that you can lose to pay off catastrophic medical bills, it may very well be worth the high cost.
(assuming that it actually pays, unlike the insurance in the linked article)
Re: Health Insurance That Doesn’t Cover the Bills Has Flooded the Market
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
Honestly, a free market might even be better than what we have (though something like single-payer would be ideal). As usual, we have the weird half-assed worst of both works policy solution that comes from neither self-consistent solution being palatable to the electorate.
In my view a free market can only work if participation is optional. When you have a heart attack you can't really negotiate with the ambulance or the hospital. There needs to be some kind of regulations to keep costs in check. But I would advocate total price transparency so you can at least shop around before non-emergency treatments. Also, insured and uninsured patients need to be charged the same money.
> When you have a heart attack you can't really negotiate with the ambulance or the hospital
I mean, in some crazy alternate universe, this is exactly what insurance is for. I pay you a fixed premium ahead of time in exchange for you paying out the costs when it occurs.
Truly we're in the darkest timeline.