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Richard Lynch, an awesome PHP community guy and former colleague needs our help

richardlynch.blogspot.com

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Re: Richard Lynch, an awesome PHP community guy and former colleague needs our help

#231

Post by tripzilch »

natrius wrote: post #162
secstate wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's new in the past 45 days. For what it's worth, under the ADA the insurance subsidy I get from taxes is enough that I actually am insured, but it doesn't bring the monthly cost of an insurance plan down any ... just pushes the cost off to taxpayers. The miserable irony of this is that then the government winds up making a deal with FOR PROFIT insurance companies. Companies which would be failing their investors…

Insurance companies generally have to spend 80% of premiums on medical expenses[1]. The profit and marketing expenses aren't that much of your premiums. What you seem to be asking for is price fixing the way much of the rest of the world handles healthcare, which will reduce the incentives to advance medicine. I prefer our current approach, where those who can afford to pay are left to pay as much as they're willing…

> the best doctors in the world head there because they can make the most money.

To "make the most money" is not necessarily a motivation for "the best doctors in the world".

It doesn't even necessarily get you "the best doctors money can buy".

Re: Richard Lynch, an awesome PHP community guy and former colleague needs our help

#232

Post by tripzilch »

natrius wrote: post #206
secstate wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But 90% of the world doesn't die from exotic cancers, at least not below the age of 50 (or 60 ... keeps creeping up). The idea that advanced medicine is an justification for for-profit medicine is a straw man argument. The reality is that there are many more nuanced single-payer healthcare systems in the world than the one where the government tells you who gets to live and who gets to die. In the U.K. for example, t…

I don't fear the rest of the world getting better than us at medicine. Money motivates most people. The best doctors will go where they can get the most money. That is here. If I had to pick between the UK's system, where price controls help pay for healthcare for those who can't afford it, and the Affordable Care Act, where wealthy people pay for healthcare for those who can't afford it, I'd choose the Affordable Ca…

> Money motivates most people. The best doctors will go where they can get the most money.

Except that most doctors already make plenty and that most doctors are in fact also strongly motivated by the desire to help and treat people. That's why they became doctors, and the latter desire helps them achieve becoming better doctors much more than a desire for money.

I'm not saying they're not motivated by money. Just that "the best doctors" are probably driven by a couple of other motivations too.

Re: Richard Lynch, an awesome PHP community guy and former colleague needs our help

#233

Post by rparsad »

The "problem" in America used to be that not everyone paid into the insurance programs. "Obamacare" aims to fix that problem but Congress is full of assholes who tend to use the Constitution as a political weapon to fight the so-called "tax" for universal healthcare. Tough a myopic lense, e

Re: Richard Lynch, an awesome PHP community guy and former colleague needs our help

#234

Post by mikeash »

lotharbot wrote: post #180
benched wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very sorry. Speaking from experience, this is exactly how it is. When there's a serious medical situation, the focus is necessarily on the bills. They even send you separate envelopes for every little line item and provider, staggered over time, even more than a year after the service, so you can never stop thinking about it. Always fearing opening the mailbox, having to deal with confusing hard to reconcile charges,…

> "you can get this public picture that everything is great" I'm not aware of anyone, from any political background, who thinks the US system is anything above "pretty crappy". I've heard some people express positive sentiments regarding small parts of the system -- the quality of certain types of care, for example -- but never for the system as a whole. The primary disagreements I'm aware of concern how to fix the c…

"The best health care system in the world" is a pretty common refrain among American right wingers. Many of them truly think that we are #1 in this area and that the great tragedy of socialization will be destroying that.

Re: Richard Lynch, an awesome PHP community guy and former colleague needs our help

#235

Post by frigg »

markbao wrote: post #33

Wow. Can't even imagine what that's like. My $20 are a drop in the bucket, but hope that bucket is getting more full. He mentioned that he suffered a seizure and that led him to be taken into the ER. Does he mention any other previous symptoms that might have led up to it? In general, what symptoms do exist for this sort of thing?

The only symptom he mentioned before his grand mal seizure was tingling in his fingers which he ignored.

Re: Richard Lynch, an awesome PHP community guy and former colleague needs our help

#238

Post by jdswain »

arethuza wrote: post #220
jwdunne wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm from the UK. The NHS is shambles and is spread very, very thin. Doctors are pissed off. Patients are pissed off. The government seems to be too. However I would prefer the 3 hour A&E (ER) waiting times, being spoken to like shit if it isn't as serious as originally thought and epic waiting lists for outpatient services than having companies profit from my health and the massive vulnerability that puts me in (on t…

"The NHS is shambles" In 2013 my son received treatment from NHS Scotland for a very serious eye infection and, later on, a nasty shoulder injury - in both cases the care was fantastic and even though I have private health insurance I never thought about using it. I know lots of people have problems with the NHS (a few years back my wife got some care that was less than "caring" - but that seemed to be a staff proble…

In my experience the location matters. I sprained my ankle in Edinburgh once, and the hospital visit was almost enjoyable. The staff were great. Where I live in London, it's not so great. They have to deal with a lot of annoying drunks and are overworked, but also the place was just not very clean. Our local A&E is closing down too.

Re: Richard Lynch, an awesome PHP community guy and former colleague needs our help

#239

Post by chrisseaton »

jwdunne wrote: post #217
lucisferre wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You would be surprised. It wasn't long ago when I met an intelligent and otherwise very well informed American who truly believed that the "socialized" Canadian healthcare system was a 3rd rate disaster and feared any change to the precious US system would lead to a similar situation. Don't get me wrong he acknowledged it wasn't great, but there is more than sufficient doubt and confusion amongst most Americans with…

I'm from the UK. The NHS is shambles and is spread very, very thin. Doctors are pissed off. Patients are pissed off. The government seems to be too. However I would prefer the 3 hour A&E (ER) waiting times, being spoken to like shit if it isn't as serious as originally thought and epic waiting lists for outpatient services than having companies profit from my health and the massive vulnerability that puts me in (on t…

Your fiancée shouldn't have had to pay for a prescription if she's pregnant.

Re: Richard Lynch, an awesome PHP community guy and former colleague needs our help

#240

Post by ElDiablo666 »

overgard wrote: post #117
amix wrote: post #104

I donated $50, but I really wish US (and other countries) would reconsider their broken healthcare systems. My dad died of cancer a few years ago and I am really glad we lived in Denmark when he got it - - with a great public healthcare system. He lived 2 years with his cancer, which is a lot when you are counting days. Not many normal people can afford these things (as each of my dads treatments cost about 20.000USD…

I donated $100, and yeah, our healthcare system is a goddamn travesty. I don't get it. If you're fortunate to live long enough, the one thing that's guaranteed to eventually happen is you're going to get sick in a very expensive manner. It's not an "if" question, it's a "when" question. I don't think that should mean financial ruin. People against universal healthcare must think they're just immune to ever getting si…

People against universal healthcare are just good people who are confused and/or deluded. Their arguments will never really add up because it's only about corporations making profits and to that end people will need to be deluded and manipulated into believing that we shouldn't implement a proper system. Just remember this when you say you don't get it: it's just the political power of traitors speaking through humans via propaganda.
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