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Politics : A US National Health Care System? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TimF who wrote (6318)	3/12/2009 8:09:34 PM
From: Road Walker	1 Recommendation Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 42652

I'll repeat... Bottom line we are in poorer health, and spend more, which is certainly (at least partially) related. And it's killing our competitiveness. Do the libertarians have a solution to this?

To: TimF who wrote (6318)	3/12/2009 8:46:57 PM
From: i-node	2 Recommendations Respond to of 42652

As far as treatment for them goes, I think the US probably has pretty common and aggressive treatment compared to other countries, even other wealthy countries. That may actually be a bad thing in some cases, when the treatment isn't cost effective, or esp. when its actually harmful, but the problem here isn't a lack of access to treatment. Exactly. I started to mention this earlier -- my doc last month, after my physical, gave me a prescription for a drug to take to lower my cholesterol and triglycerides. Both were the lowest they've been in a decade, but not good enough. As it turned out there is a new drug on the market that allows them to treat triglycerides at the same time as they treat cholesterol with statins. Of course, it having been on the market for only 2 months, I thought, "I'm not sure I want to go there". But I called the drugstore about getting it filled. $125/month. To treat a damned number? They can't even say it reduces heart disease, only these numbers (which HAPPEN to correlate with heart disease, which doesn't mean a damned thing). I told them they were "nuts". $1,500 a year? No way. Even though my insurance would have picked it up. The treatment isn't cost effective, even though we can afford it. But that doesn't it mean it shouldn't be available. Because 15 years from now, that drug will be available for $12/month, and then it MIGHT save lives. The higher pricing of new drugs is essential because without it, the manufacturers cannot make a profit on the drug before the patent expires or a better, competing drug appears.