You just don't have very many conservative friends, do you? -g-
Mine (conservative friend, that is) replied after watching that Moyers piece thusly:
"Do Patients in Other Countries Have Better Access to Care?
Britain has only one-fourth as many CT scanners per capita as the U.S., and one-third as many MRI scanners. The rate at which the British provide coronary-bypass surgery or angioplasty to heart patients is only one-fourth the U.S. rate, and hip replacements are only two-thirds the U.S. rate. The rate for treating kidney failure (dialysis or transplant) is five times higher in the U.S. for patients between the ages of 45 and 84, and nine times higher for patients 85 years or older.
Overall, nearly 1.8 million Britons are waiting for hospital or outpatient treatments at any given time. In 2002-2004, dialysis patients waited an average of 16 days for permanent blood-vessel access in the U.S., 20 days in Europe, and 62 days in Canada. In 2000, Norwegian patients waited an average of 133 days for hip replacement, 63 days for cataract surgery, 160 days for a knee replacement, and 46 days for bypass surgery after being approved for treatment. Short waits for cataract surgery produce better outcomes, prompt coronary-artery bypass reduces mortality, and rapid hip replacement reduces disability and death. Studies show that only 5 percent of Americans wait more than four months for surgery, compared with 23 percent of Australians, 26 percent of New Zealanders, 27 percent of Canadians, and 36 percent of Britons.
Do Other Countries Do a Better Job of Delivering Preventive Care?
If people have to pay for care directly, it is often claimed, they will be inclined to skimp on preventive care--care that can catch diseases in their early stages, saving lives and money. Yet the proportion of middle-aged Canadian women who have never had a mammogram is twice that of the U.S., and three times as many Canadian women have never had a Pap smear. Fewer than a fifth of Canadian men have ever been tested for prostate-specific antigen, compared with about half of American men. Only one in ten adult Canadians has had a colonoscopy, compared with about a third of adult Americans.
These differences in screening may partly explain why the mortality rate in Canada is 25 percent higher for breast cancer, 18 percent higher for prostate cancer, and 13 percent higher for colorectal cancer. In addition, while half of all diabetics have high blood pressure, it is controlled in 36 percent of U.S. cases, compared with only 9 percent of cases in Canada.
Do the Uninsured in the U.S. Lack Access to Health Care?
Of the 46 million nominally uninsured, about 12 million are eligible for such public programs as Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP). They can usually enroll even at the time of treatment, arguably making them de facto insured. About 17 million of the uninsured are living in households with annual incomes of at least $50,000. More than half of those earn more than $75,000, suggesting that they are uninsured by choice.
Like unemployment, uninsurance is usually transitory: 75 percent of uninsured spells last one year or less, and 91 percent last two years or less. Although the fraction of the population with health insurance rises and falls with the business cycle, it has been fairly constant for the past two decades, despite an unprecedented influx of immigrants with an uninsurance rate 2.5 times that of the native-born population. Guaranteed-issue laws, state high-risk pools, and retroactive Medicaid eligibility make it increasingly easy to obtain insurance after becoming ill.
Are Low-Income Families More Disadvantaged in the U.S. System?
Aneurin Bevan, father of the British National Health Service (NHS), declared, "The essence of a satisfactory health service is that rich and poor are treated alike, that poverty is not a disability and wealth is not advantaged." More than 30 years after the NHS's founding, an official task force found little evidence that it had equalized health-care access. Another study, 20 years later, concluded that access had become more unequal in the years between the two studies.
In Canada, the wealthy and powerful have significantly greater access to medical specialists than do the less well-connected poor. High-profile patients enjoy more frequent services, shorter waiting times, and greater choice of specialists. Moreover, non-elderly, white, low-income Canadians are 22 percent more likely to be in poor health than their U.S. counterparts.
In developed countries generally, among people with similar health conditions, high earners use the system more intensely, and use costlier services, than do low earners. It seems likely that the personal characteristics that ensure success in a market economy also enhance success in bureaucratic systems.
Mr. Goodman is the founder, president, and CEO of the National Center for Policy Analysis. A fuller survey of these and similar data is available at www.ncpa.org.
Conclusions? 1. You wait longer--much longer. 2. you loose your freedom to choose your Dr. and hospital. 3. Expensive procedures are rationed or disallowed much more often for all and especially for seniors . 4. Preventive care in socialized medicine countries does not result in healthier population than US, therefore it will NOT reduce costs as Obama claims. 5. Wealthy and privileged people in socialized medicine countries often go to US for faster, freedom of choice, and higher quality health care services, so it is not more "fair" than now. 5. The uninsured by law still can be treated at the ER including illegal immigrants so this fix the 47 Million uninsured is bogus.
So I don't call that a better system and I haven't even debated the capitalist advantages vs government run results for ANY service where profit rather than "fairness and control" is the motive. Just look at computer chips, Microsoft, Google search engines and ask yourself would the rapid advances and huge cost reductions have occurred without the profit incentives vs. the bureaucratic plan development processes??
You state, "The seeming fact is that there is a better way to keep people healthy without giving a big ratzazz about companies trying to make a profit." I ask you what is that way? Can you show how it has worked better. This is the same great question that Milton Freedman challenged Phil Donahue to show him where government has worked better. This is an absolute must see for 2:24 of your valuable time. youtube.com;
Sheesh, jousting those conservative windmills gets tiresome sometimes unless you just enjoy the pure noise of your stick rattling on the blades! |
