Topic: Socialized Medicine - page 2. (Read 3662 times)

A really interesting article about Canada vs USA health care:
http://ayoungmomsmusings.blogspot.ca/2012/07/how-i-lost-my-fear-of-universal-health.html

I swear to never complain against the Canadian health care again. And as much I wanted to moved to USA a couple of years ago, now, it seems like a really unattractive place to live.

Even if insurance was optional, most people would probably still want it because they're risk-averse with their health. In a Bitcoin world with no legal barriers, insurance will be only a tiny bit more expensive than saving anyways. IMHO the main reason we aren't seeing this already is because of Bitcoin exchange rate instability and our immature financial infrastructure.

Awesome insurance rates might turn out to be the "killer app" for Bitcoin.

Well, I hate to say it, but in a bitcoin world, a "preexisting condition" clause will still exist.  Although, I'd argue healthcare in general would be cheaper (because the govt won't exist) so people could afford to live w/o insurance.  Otherwise you better hope bitcoin dies a quick death so you can continue to ride the wave of socialism.  In the meantime, if I had a preexisting condition that prevented me from getting insurance, I'd move to Canada or Europe.

This implied dichotomy between "government funds healthcare" and "choose your doctors" is false. Vouchers for private health care would help the poor AND allow the market to encourage good care.

Everyone. Almost every life could be extended with more money, so at some point in any system you will have to deny healthcare to someone who can't afford it. Only our cutoff points differ, between $0 and "freeze everyone who dies".

Since when is insurance socialism?  When I think of socialism I think of a monopolized system I'm forced to pay for.  There are multiple insurance companies & and in most industries it is optional.  How is that socialism?  I'll agree that they share similarities that you previously pointed out, but the similarities stop there.  I definitely agree that most healthcare is very socialized, but insurance companies are one of the few reasons it isn't.

Not sure who in their right mind would wait in line to receive borderline malpractice, most of the time. "First do no harm" would be setting up a "break glass in case of..." box in every waiting room with this inside, with a disclaimer underneath that you are more likely to want to wish you were dead after receiving treatment and medication than when you came in.

The public hospitals of today are easily overwhelmed. The waiting lists are staggering.

They wouldn't easily be overwhelmed by everyone that needed treatment.

(You can't just do away with disease etc., they would still remain if you completely privatised medicine) .

Anyway, I must go to work. That tax won't pay itself.

What about private charity hospitals and ones ran by churches?

Not in the socialised or partially socialised systems of the UK and US, no.

Before poor diet and globalized disease, the only time death occurred was through injury.

Is anyone denied treatment of moderate physical injuries today?

In a previous debate on this, it became clear that a few posters would rather let someone die than have their healthcare paid through taxation.

OP, please correct this open-ended question if this is off-topic.

Who here can honestly be in favor of denying healthcare to those who can't afford it?

Seriously, that's a tax I'm happy to pay. I think.

I know you're out there...

Every hostage suffers from Stockholm syndrome eventually.

Every child loves their parents.

Tyranny in the form of taxes and regulations times infinity (effectively banning free enterprise) does.

Well, thankfully Obamacare makes sure that we still have private health insurance rather than a government run single payer system.  Certainly we can never have anything so awful happen as long as we are paying private sector insurance companies for our health insurance.

Personally, I don't like the idea in general. I do, however, like the idea that everyone gets the help they need (in theory), even though it is abused, and even though it comes out of my tax dollars.

Everyone I have met in europe loves their medical system.

No one stopped you from making more money and getting a private doctor. *Hint*

It's noteworthy that "non-socialized medicine" in the developed world is an oxymoron.

Even in the United States, where the majority delude themselves that they don't use socialized medicine, in reality they do.

Employer-based, group insurance is socialized medicine, because the employees as a group pay for a substantial portion of the healthcare of the sick members of the employee group...

The vast American military operates fully socialized medicine. The overwhelming majority of American senior citizens use socialized medicine.

A great deal of government (socialized) subsidies are provided for all kinds of medical research, hospitals and clinics...

The majority of the US medical personnel received some sort of government/socialized subsidies in the form of socially-subsidized student loans and grants they never have to repay to society...

The medical professionals who come to America from "socialized medicine" countries, typically received their training completely at the expense of those countries' taxpayers, from which the latter then receive little if any benefit. So, in that sense, countries without "socialized medicine" mooch health care from the taxpayers of "socialized medicine" countries... 

Anyone in the developed world who thinks they are not using "socialized medicine" when they interact with the medical or pharmaceutical industries in any way, is living a fantasy...