Clinton calls for socialized health care

Originally Posted by FallDragon

OK, lets first settle on what this "vast majority opinion" is confirming. That history textbooks gloss over the truth? That history books tell outright lies?

Really, you should just read the book.

Also, if you want a demonstration of how the system is set up to indoctrinate kids, read this (as you all should). An education system imported from Prussia? Couldn't be anything wrong with that...

I understand why people doubt governmental control, of course the government is always its own best friend, but SO ARE INSURANCE COMPANIES, believe me. The only difference is that the government relies on a broad range of voters, the poor included, whereas companies mainly rely on those who can afford to pay them, and therefore don't have to care about attracting people they wouldn't benefit from.

I think a socialised health system is good, as long as it works. It creates greater social equality than a system like the German or the Finnish one, where there is a great divide between those with private insurance and those with a governmental one, or the U.S., where some people don't even have insurance. I'm not saying the NHS is perfect; it's costing the government a lot of money, and people have to wait longer and longer to get treatment, but at least it attempts to treat people equally.

No offence to anyone, but I think this is something that you only really understand once you've been affected by it, like so many things. True, you may have paid for services you haven't used yet, but you never know what's going to happen next, you may be perfectly healthy one day, and get involved in a car accident or be diagnosed with cancer the next day. And what then?

As long as the money is actually used to provide medical services, it's a good thing. The downside to it all is, of course, that the taxes would in fact rise, but honestly, isn't saving lives a better purpose than investing in weapons (that's the first expense I would complain about)?

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I think a socialised health system is good, as long as it works.

Talk about stating the obvious.

But you fail to understand how much of a mammoth logistical undertaking such a system would be in the United States. Whenever the government begins to offer a service on this level, choices and options become virtually non-existant.

Even with my reconsideration of a nationalized health care plan, I'm still not convinced that any of the proposals put forth or that are in place in other countries would be favorable at all.

Personally, I still can't get past the concept that one segment of the population gets a service at the expense of another. I still find it to be wrong, even though at the current moment I find myself with the short end of the stick.

Fair enough, I get your point. And I agree - it would be a practical problem, an expensive plan that would take a while to turn into reality. On the other hand, the government does seem to have the money for it, if it has the money to spend on other things such as defence, education, etc. The very basic thing, to me, is healthcare. Keeping people alive and as healthy as possible. It should come first.

And the way I see it, not everyone can get health care in the United States at the moment, because there is no "back up" system, no general insurance or anything. That leaves a large group of people without anything, and although there are a few hospitals who would still treat them, their chances are pretty bad. And that just makes me sick.

I don't think the German system is that much better, to be fair. I've made pretty bad experiences with it, when my dad didn't get an appointment for a vital examination with a specialist for three months because he didn't have the private insurance, for example (they favourise people with private insurance in terms of appointments, treatment and everything). After three months, he was dead. There were lots of other things that happened at that hospital that I don't really want to get int right now, but in any case, it was just pretty awful to see the injustice of it.

That's why I'm still in favour of the British system and the NHS, and I do hope that they find a way to maintain it, because it does work in many ways, and to be honest, in such a vital issue, I'd rather have equality than choice. Usually, 'choice' only means a choice for those who can afford it, anyway. The rest are left at the bottom.

Sorry I have to jump in here with some other considerations.

Simply considering the cost of medical care in countries with socialized health care ignores one major factor --the quality of the medical facilities in many of these countries. We can use Canada as a perfect example of this. The wait list for an advanced MRI scan in Canada is about 3 months now because only 5 facilities in all of Canada are equipped with the MRI equipment to do this. On the other hand most major and minor cities in the United States have facilities equipped to do this and most Canadians end up just hoping down south to the nearest US city and pay for the scan out of pocket.

South Korea, another good example. They are ranked number one in the world in skilled medical worker graduates but ranked 15th in the world in medical care quality because most of those graduates come to the United States where doctors are paid better in the private sector.

Japan: Number 2 in world GDP. Second to last in medical care for a 1st world country mostly because their socialized medical program can't afford newer equipment or highly skilled medical workers.

The United States also dominates the preclinical development sector (aka developing new drugs) while the rest of the world spends all of their socialized medical budget on taking care of the people while depending on US preclinical breakthroughs to advance medicine. I saw someone mention that the word 'cancer' in America can result in bankruptcy. The word 'cancer' in many of these countries with a socialized medical program means 'death' because they are ill equipped to even deal with disease in the first place.

Like with any socialized program, there are major risks in quality drop. If the US adopts a socialized medical program we will most likely see a decline in a skilled workforce, a tremendous decline in preclinical development and an overall stagnation of medical advancement in the world. Providing affordable medicine to everyone will most likely result in lowering the quality of US medical care to everyone.

The word 'cancer' can mean death in the U.S. to many people as well, if they haven't got the insurance and can't afford surgery/radiation therapy/chemo.

You've brought up some very important points here, however, technical equipment is of NO HELP whatsoever if you can't get the treatment quickly enough, simply because you don't have the right kind of insurance.

Originally Posted by Traveller87

The word 'cancer' can mean death in the U.S. to many people as well, if they haven't got the insurance and can't afford surgery/radiation therapy/chemo.

You've brought up some very important points here, however, technical equipment is of NO HELP whatsoever if you can't get the treatment quickly enough, simply because you don't have the right kind of insurance.

Absolutely, though I wish I had some figures for people in the US who have died due to lack of insurance compared to people who have died in socialized medical programs due to long wait lists, lack of proper equipment and/or lack of skilled physicians.

There are advantages and disadvantages to both, but I truly fear the impact socialized medicine would have on the advancement of medical technology. So much of the world depends on the private US pharmaceutical industry and there is no telling how much of an impact socialized medicine would have on it.

Oh please, Big Pharma is the slimiest pack of grafters on the planet, of just about any industry. When they complain about the potential impacts of a complementary universal system, they're saying they will only be able to scrounge nine tenths as much capital as they could in the 'good old days' thanks to some pesky new regulation, or something else equally unreasonable.

They're also shitscared that one of the byproducts of a prospective national system running alongside will be a PBS (Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme), a panel of experts who meet annually to evaluate which drugs should enjoy major subsidy, determined across a criteria including consumer need, quality, safety, preclinical development expense, etc. For a while I assumed something equivalent was run by your FDA, but then I read about pensioners popping up to Canada for really basic stuff that should cost 30/40 dollars. Perhaps there is such a mechanism in the US, but it's broken or easily evaded.

Originally Posted by Night Phoenix

Personally, I still can't get past the concept that one segment of the population gets a service at the expense of another.

Get past it, mate. Seriously. You enjoy public reserves? Garbage removal? Freeways with proper seal grades, no potholes and the like? People earning both less and more than you are paying for that. You can scream blue murder about how an 18th century document never ever sanctioned A or B! or you can look at modern, effective solutions to today's problems.

The problem with that analysis is that everybody benefits equally from garbage removal and public roads, while socialized medicine deals with scarce resources which have variable demand.

The idea of a committee determining what's necessary in order to advance medicine scares the shit out of me. Why should a committee be judging consumer need? Don't consumers determine consumer need? Why should some beurocrat be dictating whether we should be getting new cold medicine instead of new jock itch medicine? What happens when more of us have jock itch?

The FDA is already bad enough when it comes to approving new medicines, driving up prices and causing people to suffer in the meantime. We don't need more nonsense stacked up against the advancement of pharmaceuticals.

Clinton is not talking about a European health care style system. Essentially she's talking about the same current state of affairs, only subsidized by the public. Which is the worse possibly scenario. It will change nothing, yet cost more of the public's money. Requiring taxpayers to subsidize Big Pharma's profits. (Corporate socialism) Anything more is politically unacceptable. Big Pharma has a very influential lobby.

Of course, maybe I'm just being cynical and all this populist rhetoric on behalf of the Democrats is genuine.

Then again, how many people voted for/against Democrats thinking they'd stop the Iraq war.......

Unless I'm mistaken, isn't her plan basically "Everybody buys health insurance... or else?"

Originally Posted by Bradylama

Unless I'm mistaken, isn't her plan basically "Everybody buys health insurance... or else?"

There's actually a plan? Where? I thought this was all empty rhetoric and broken promises to get people to vote for the Democrats/Hillary.

If there is a plan it would probably involve a redundant payroll tax akin to Medicare. Which begs the question why are people paying Medicare payroll taxes if we need a universal health care, because the people that need it the most aren't receiving help in the first place.....?

I'm more then a little confused.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

The idea of a committee determining what's necessary in order to advance medicine scares the shit out of me. Why should a committee be judging consumer need? Don't consumers determine consumer need? Why should some beurocrat be dictating whether we should be getting new cold medicine instead of new jock itch medicine? What happens when more of us have jock itch?

The FDA is already bad enough when it comes to approving new medicines, driving up prices and causing people to suffer in the meantime. We don't need more nonsense stacked up against the advancement of pharmaceuticals.

sigh

A PBS body has no role in drugs development, nor are they authorised to say what can and cannot go on the market. What they do is draw conclusions from consumer and medical data about which drugs, available and forthcoming, should be subsidised.

You Catotards are paranoid, I swear.

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A PBS body has no role in drugs development

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What they do is draw conclusions from consumer and medical data about which drugs, available and forthcoming, should be subsidised.

These aren't the same thing.

Or, looking at it another way, a PBS board will cause Pharmas to second-guess whether the drug they're developing can be granted a subsidy and then do everything they possibly can to get that subsidy. I mean, maybe this works for Australia but 8 years of Sr. Bush el Danjior hasn't exactly left me confident in government.

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You enjoy public reserves? Garbage removal? Freeways with proper seal grades, no potholes and the like? People earning both less and more than you are paying for that. You can scream blue murder about how an 18th century document never ever sanctioned A or B! or you can look at modern, effective solutions to today's problems.

You don't understand. I don't have a problem with basic public services that everyone derives benefit from. I have a problem with the government providing services to one segment of the population AT THE EXPENSE of another.

For example: People who tend to receive WIC receive those benefits at the expense of everyone else, because their federal tax burden is virtually nonexistent. Furthermore, because WIC is means-tested, it means that not every taxpayer receives the benefits of government-subsidized food purchases. Meaning that some people are paying for government programs they derive no benefit from whatsoever.

Whereas with freeways, garbage pickup, and the like, everyone has equal access to regardless of tax burden. You don't get preferred access to the freeways if you're poor, rich, or middle class. You simply get to use them. They are paid for via excise taxes (the fuel tax).

That's the difference. When you start offering govt services that not everyone can benefit from equally, then it becomes unfair.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

The problem with that analysis is that everybody benefits equally from garbage removal and public roads, while socialized medicine deals with scarce resources which have variable demand.

I'd argue that everyone benefits fairly equally from social healthcare, to be honest. No one likes being served by sick cashiers, or watching their health care premiums get jacked up because their company statistically employs more older people than another company. Having a healthy workforce is good for everyone's bottom line.

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The FDA is already bad enough when it comes to approving new medicines, driving up prices and causing people to suffer in the meantime.

You know what, nevermind. I can't afford the stress your answer will give me, my insurance won't cover it.

Additional Spam:

Originally Posted by Night Phoenix

You don't understand. I don't have a problem with basic public services that everyone derives benefit from. I have a problem with the government providing services to one segment of the population AT THE EXPENSE of another.

For example: People who tend to receive WIC receive those benefits at the expense of everyone else, because their federal tax burden is virtually nonexistent. Furthermore, because WIC is means-tested, it means that not every taxpayer receives the benefits of government-subsidized food purchases. Meaning that some people are paying for government programs they derive no benefit from whatsoever.

you object to WIC?

will you keep objecting to WIC until it pays for food for your baby mommas' mouths?

yeah that one was a low blow.

Originally Posted by Night Phoenix

You don't understand. I don't have a problem with basic public services that everyone derives benefit from. I have a problem with the government providing services to one segment of t