why are people against socialized medicine?

[feh]

I find it depressing that so many people believe in the Socialism Boogeyman.

[Inkstain82]

Originally Posted by feh

I find it depressing that so many people believe in the Socialism Boogeyman.

I really think liberalism and socialism are very emotional, intrinsic qualities.

If the idea of people in bad situations horrifies you, you are a liberal.

If the idea of government control horrifies you, you are a conservative.

[akrogers]

Originally Posted by Inkstain82

I really think liberalism and socialism are very emotional, intrinsic qualities.

If the idea of people in bad situations horrifies you, you are a liberal.

If the idea of government control horrifies you, you are a conservative.

And if both horrify you, you are a libertarian a la moi

[Inkstain82]

Originally Posted by akrogers

And if both horrify you, you are a libertarian a la moi

Libertarian is a subset of conservatism.

Personally, I'd say that it comes from a fear of reality (in which libertarian ideals are impossible to apply), but then, I'm a government-hugging, lazy, socialistic liberal

[feh]

Not exactly on topic with original post, but was reading this and thought others might find it interesting. It's an analysis of why the public option is having a tough go of it, using hard numbers:

FiveThirtyEight: Politics Done Right: Special Interest Money Means Longer Odds for Public Option

[Goldy1]

Well, what else can I say here? There are so many side topics ie prevention vs disease management, taxes etc.

I was just tihnking about this whole thing lately. I have heard buzz here and there that Obama etc were working on healthcare reform that might include a single payer sstem or SOMETHING.
I have not been following it much b/c I don't like to worry about things.
Then I heard something got shot down in terms of expanding healthcare to low income folks. A quote was that it was going to cover a family of 4 making 30K per year.
If all they are going to do is give more people "medicaid/or whatver the no cost gov healthcare is called" by saying you can make a little more money, what good does that do people who actually work and make more than a little over poverty? I am not for this at all b/c it takes away incentive to earn. I heard a quote about something like if you give man all his basic needs for free, you take away his will to work.
It's a big hairy mess and I guess I will just have to wait and see.

Medicare at 55 sounds great, but it's going broke as it is so I have been expecting it to increase to 70 or 75. lol, and you can plan for it then it changes and it's not there anymore.

anyway there is halp out there. I just found out my local county has a free healthcare program that gives access to dr. visits and rx and urgent care(no hospitalization) and the income requirements are much much more lax than the medicaid type no cost care. This is actually healthcare for people out of private insurance and medicaid anyway apparantly to my surprise.

[Inkstain82]

Originally Posted by Goldy1

I am not for this at all b/c it takes away incentive to earn. I heard a quote about something like if you give man all his basic needs for free, you take away his will to work.

Even ignoring the fact that it isn't true (work can be its own reward), it ignores the point.

In a society of well-fed, healthy, well-adjusted individuals, *everybody's* work is more productive and fruitful. The hard-working types actually end up better off in the long run from supporting the (theoretically) non-working types.

[snafu]

There is no 'Free' health care. Everyone is covered and can choose to abuse the system; visit doctors because they crave attention. Canadians complain because the system isn't perfect, doesn't include prescriptions, nor elective procedures like Botox, but no one is denied care, there is no pre-existing condition denial, it is fully portable. Dr. do not need permission to order a medically necessary procedure and are paid, without default, on a fee schedule negotiated and approved by the executive CMA.

Our systems are provincial [state] and while v/similar there are small differences because fees were negotiated and some provinces include procedures that are dispensed in an alternate way. Example: flu shots are covered by Medicare in my province, in others they are free at Clinics offered at shopping centres.

When Medicare was introduced in 1961, modest premiums were charged which quickly became employee benefit, paid by employers. Subsequently provinces rolled those into their sales tax, 1,2,3 cents. My province eliminated premiums two y/o they were $ 48. per month, per family.

Hospitals in Canada are public, not-for-profit, government funded and operated. Patients are unaware of what their stay costs, they are not asked for a dime when they enter nor pay/owe a dime when they leave. There are v/few Private hospitals and they function primarily for elective procedures.

The major issue is hospitals are used as political tools. Government wants to punish a group - they withhold funds; just now they have withdrawn budgeted sums for cataract surgery day beds. It isn't considered life threatening so seniors who have apparently been complaining will have to wait several more weeks for planned, booked day surgery. Of course they can jump the que and pay for it at a private clinic. Hospitals are built to provide jobs or when the economy is booming or to help win an election.
However, anyone needing care for cancer, cardiac, hip/knee replacement and any life threatening problem, goes to the head of the line. For example, when a young mother who would be delivering twins could not be cared for in her small community's hospital, she was medivaced to a near-by American Hospital and we, the taxpayers, picked up the cost of several million dollars for her and babies successful delivery and after care.

Our medical providers are very well trained, we see flocks of them recruited for American Hospitals/Clinics. [I still believe I got better surgical care in a local hospital than my mom did at Mayo Clinic [paid out-of-pocket]. I've worked for the famous Bumrungrad Hospital in Bangkok where the movies stars and celebrities go... they have beautiful decor but medi is about the same]

I tried to check the funding figures but they were evasive. Best I could figure, the federal government pays 32% of the costs of the medicare program, provinces pay 65%, donations/fund raising pays the difference. The federal government increases the tax on gas of which 40 cents per gallon goes to Medicare for distribution [or so the PR suggests].

Yes, we pay much higher income tax, value added tax, and a list of tax that is just too long. In exchange we have a 'Nanny' state, a government that looks after us from cradle to grave. If you saw the benefits handed out to mothers, refugees, immigrants, family reunification, start-up business, environmental commodes, university subsidies, social services, native care, subsidy, care and feeding of homless and so much more...you'd understand why we pay such high taxes. Also we have a gigantic sized country and a tiny population 35 million

[disneysteve]

Originally Posted by Goldy1

I heard something got shot down in terms of expanding healthcare to low income folks. A quote was that it was going to cover a family of 4 making 30K per year.

I am not for this at all b/c it takes away incentive to earn.

Originally Posted by Inkstain82

Even ignoring the fact that it isn't true (work can be its own reward), it ignores the point.

I have patients who are on disability. Many of them could return to gainful employment but if they do, they lose their medical insurance, so they remain on disability. The same thing would happen with expanded Medicaid coverage. That family earning 30K or less gets coverage. If their income climbs to 31K, the coverage disappears. Where is the incentive to move up the ladder in that scenario.

[Inkstain82]

Originally Posted by disneysteve

I have patients who are on disability. Many of them could return to gainful employment but if they do, they lose their medical insurance, so they remain on disability. The same thing would happen with expanded Medicaid coverage. That family earning 30K or less gets coverage. If their income climbs to 31K, the coverage disappears. Where is the incentive to move up the ladder in that scenario.

There's a difference between a specific flaw in a specific system and the blanket statement I was responding to.

[maat55]

National healthcare will rely on massive taxation and be poorly ran by a government that cannot tie its shoe laces.

If the post office, SS, medicare and medicaid, department of education are not ebough proof that national healthcare would be a major disaster, I'm at a loss for how to explain that grass is green.

This would be a major step into socialism. It is the wrong step and our children will suffer for it.

[rc1078]

I am not

[snafu]

maat55 if they follow a model similar to England, Australia, Sweden, or Canada, it will be run by the medical profession. It could be paid with a Value Added Tax [VAT] charged to every purchased item and service. It's very efficient and everyone contributes, even those who pay no income tax or get tax free income.

Currently you have an insurance clerk decide which procedures you deserve and which shall be denied. Added to that is your co-pay. Those without insurance give up all or do without treatment for life threatening illness. But caring about others is the slippery slope to 'socialism.' What is your definition?

[disneysteve]

Originally Posted by snafu

Currently you have an insurance clerk decide which procedures you deserve and which shall be denied.

This is really an oversimplification of the current system.

Yes, a non-clinical person answers the phone or receives the fax requesting authorization for a test, procedure or medication. But that person evaluates the request based on a set of criteria established by a group including medical personnel. If a request is denied, the requesting physician can appeal and have the case reviewed or can pick up the phone and call the medical director, a physician working for the insurance company, and explain why the test/drug is needed. I've done that many times and only on a handful of occasions in my 17 years of practice has my request ever been denied.

The problem is that doctors shouldn't have to jump through hoops like that in order to get their patients the care they need.

How do things work in the countries you mentioned (England, Australia, Sweden and Canada)? There must be some system in place to certify care. Otherwise, costs couldn't be controlled. Does anyone know how authorizations, drug formularies and such are handled in any of those places?

[Inkstain82]

Originally Posted by maat55

If the post office, SS, medicare and medicaid, department of education are not ebough proof that national healthcare would be a major disaster, I'm at a loss for how to explain that grass is green.

Your final sentence is telling. Some people have accepted it as an article of faith that government is inefficient and all market-based solutions are inherently superior. I see little to no empiric evidence of this as a universal truth (although it's certainly true a lot of the time). But I guess that's just one of the basic differences between a conservative and a liberal that cannot be overcome.

I'm a pretty big fan of the post office, the army, the higher education system, NASA and the highway system, off the top of my head. And while the overall education system could be better, it's light-years ahead of what we'd have under a purely private system.

[Inkstain82]

Actually, I think higher education is a fantastic example. It's an example of the government running public institutions while private options still remain, it's generally considered to be the best in the world (although India and China are gunning for us), and it is a major reason why the U.S. is prosperous.

[disneysteve]

I think the fact that I can drop a letter in a mailbox at the corner of my street and have it hand-delivered to someone 3,000 miles away within 48-72 hours for less than 50 cents is absolutely incredible.

[EEinNJ]

I think anyone who is against health care insurance reform is either ignorant, selfish, or a right-wing idealogue. I could list numerous examples of the collusion between insurance companies, hospitals, doctors, and drug companies, and ways they screw consumers- patients, people at their most vulnerable. Price fixing, gouging, upcharges are all routine.

The government doesn't have to run care itself, they just have to open up the pool of insured to all of us, and regulate pricing.

Those that say this is socialism, who have an "every man for himself" attitude, are ignoring that we ARE a society, and we will all one day get sick, old and die. Think it won't happen to you?

[disneysteve]

Originally Posted by EEinNJ

I think anyone who is against health care insurance reform is either ignorant, selfish, or a right-wing idealogue.

I'm not sure anyone is arguing against reform, but reform can take many different shapes. It does not have to mean switching to a single-payer, government-run national plan. There are numerous examples right now, operating very successfully today, of system reform. I've mentioned the Mayo Clinic. There is also excellent work being done in one area in Colorado (sorry, I don't remember what town). The methods and technology to cut costs dramatically already exist. They just aren't being widely used.

Under these systems, doctors still earn just as much if not more, hospitals make more more by reducing waste and write-off charges, and most importantly, patients get a higher quality of care with better outcomes at a lower cost. We just need to figure out how to implement these paradigm-shifting methods on a larger scale.

[snafu]

dsteve: Everyone has medical insurance which covers everything from a sliver to body part transplant whether in an office, clinic, ER centre, hospital or a long term care facility...an some are covered for all private nursing home care [private care has income barriers].

Doctors are paid per person seen or per procedure. Both the Board of the Medical Assoc. and the Gov't hire professional negotiators to hammer out the fee schedule and length of time it will be in effect. That schedule may seem lower to American physicians but it takes into account that there is no pro bono, no default, no time lapse and one clerk in most large clinics can easily manage all the billing to a single insurer. Drs. in individual practice use an agency.

Since the Canadian system was devised there have been gia-normous changes in medical treatment and care. The costs have hugely increased due to new technologies, constant replacing of equipment, and transplants. EMS education has them keeping people alive during transport. People who are much sicker can recover, and people living longer have more body parts break-down.

I am guessing if a physician plans a procedure that is not in the schedule, s/he would likely need his Board's approval. The government does not decide who shall have and who shall be denied.

We liken universal medical care to universal education. We feel or have been brainwashed to believe that every child [including those that are challenged] is entitled to a reasonable Education K-12. Teachers must meet required credentials; both principals and parents have the power [with cause] to turf non performing teachers. There is a good system of scholarship, grants and loans that gets people through public college, trade/technical school or university. I agree we lack the prestige of your top ten but they accept Canadian students without problem so long as they can pay the double or triple costs required for foreign students.