In countries with Nationalized healthcare the aim is to make people better as quickly and efficiently as possible. The American healthcare system however is designed to make money. This leads to Insurance companies not insuring anyone with a pre existing condition as well as employing entire departments of people finding excuses not to pay when someone makes a claim. The reason why they can get away with it is because your health is the most important thing you have and people will pay anything to keep it. Healthcare is too important to be privately owned. Would America ever have a privatized police force or fire service? No of course not. Could you imagine paying protection insurance every month? Police insurance companies would refuse to cover you if you have been suspected of illegal downloading, watching porn under the age of 18 or smoking weed. Firemen would have to ask people to provide insurance documents whilst they're house is burning down. Some industries are just too important to let shareholders decide what to do and i find it baffling that certain Americans defend this morally wrong mess that they call a healthcare system.
USA health system... umm... what the hell?!
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I'm a Brit who unfortunately had to move to the US of A due to parental employment when I was but a wee child.
Maybe it's just where I live in California, but EVERYONE wants socialized health care.
If someone started a campaign showing how it would help low income families and all the cases of people being turned away due to insurance issues or not being able to afford the treatment, many people would change their tune.
It's just here, doctors are doctors because of the pay. I'm not saying they don't deserve money for the work they do, but shouldn't you become a doctor because you genuinely want to help people?
My friend who is going to school and works his ass to the bone to become a neural surgeon said he wouldn't care if he worked for as little as what a McDonalds manager makes as long as he knew he was helping people.
It's all greed really, people wanting to make a buck off others suffering.
The rich get richer, the poor loose their arms and eventually die from cancer because they can't afford good insurance.
Maybe it's just where I live in California, but EVERYONE wants socialized health care.
If someone started a campaign showing how it would help low income families and all the cases of people being turned away due to insurance issues or not being able to afford the treatment, many people would change their tune.
It's just here, doctors are doctors because of the pay. I'm not saying they don't deserve money for the work they do, but shouldn't you become a doctor because you genuinely want to help people?
My friend who is going to school and works his ass to the bone to become a neural surgeon said he wouldn't care if he worked for as little as what a McDonalds manager makes as long as he knew he was helping people.
It's all greed really, people wanting to make a buck off others suffering.
The rich get richer, the poor loose their arms and eventually die from cancer because they can't afford good insurance.
I believe you are misinformed. The government didn't force banks to give loans to unqualified applicants. What they did do is force banks to charge the same rates to black people as they did for white people.cerebus23 said:
The banks have sole discretion on who and how they authorize loans. You're placing the blame on the wrong people.
Ok cheersKaizokuouHasu said:Yeah, anyone can apply for the bursary. The only requirement is that it is to an NHS funded course. Simples.Rockchimp69 said:
Is that course only available at certain unis then?
*Ahem*
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.297617-Screwed-by-Medical-Insurance
*cough* beat you to it... *cough*
I believe I may be coming down with something.
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.297617-Screwed-by-Medical-Insurance
*cough* beat you to it... *cough*
I believe I may be coming down with something.
NHS funded courses are widely available. Use UCAS or NHS' own website to find them. You can also just Google NHS funded courses in the local area around you.Rockchimp69 said:Ok cheersKaizokuouHasu said:Yeah, anyone can apply for the bursary. The only requirement is that it is to an NHS funded course. Simples.Rockchimp69 said:
Is that course only available at certain unis then?
Pro-tip: if the name of the course sounds hospital-y, there is a good chance you can find it.
The whole Obama healthcare thing was something i saw as a positive thing, but every single time I heard about it I still though:
"ummm...Why does he need to work so hard legalize something that basic for a functioning society?: Everybody pays a communal pot (taxes) which will pay for both the costs of organizing the society (government) while building/maintaining infrastructure, but also make sure social emergencies are taken care of (when ppl don't have money for schooling healthcare, for whatever reason)"
And I know all ppl from developed parts of the world thought the same. It's common sense to us, especially when it comes to healthcare, because we find it ruthlessly unethical to let someone die or spend the remainder of their life disabled/injured/handicapped simply because they can't afford the healthcare bills (We know the society as a whole has more than enough money, so we just make sure it's properly distributed).
"ummm...Why does he need to work so hard legalize something that basic for a functioning society?: Everybody pays a communal pot (taxes) which will pay for both the costs of organizing the society (government) while building/maintaining infrastructure, but also make sure social emergencies are taken care of (when ppl don't have money for schooling healthcare, for whatever reason)"
And I know all ppl from developed parts of the world thought the same. It's common sense to us, especially when it comes to healthcare, because we find it ruthlessly unethical to let someone die or spend the remainder of their life disabled/injured/handicapped simply because they can't afford the healthcare bills (We know the society as a whole has more than enough money, so we just make sure it's properly distributed).
The first image that comes up with safe search off is a picture of some statue of a stick figure holding an American flag and the one after that is my profile picture and then there's some random Pony stuff...
And when I scroll down enough I find Centaur/Dragon porn. -_- Yay. Scrolling down even more holy crap that's a lot of pictures of Ponies.
And when I scroll down enough I find Centaur/Dragon porn. -_- Yay. Scrolling down even more holy crap that's a lot of pictures of Ponies.
(sorry, this post is a biggin')
The problem right now is that America has the infrastructure to support a government healthcare system, it's even functional (despite talking points to the contrary, when you actually crunch the numbers and look at the politics behind it, Medicare and Social Security are surprisingly efficient).
But, here's the thing, right now the debate in the country isn't even about extending medicare (the major US government healthcare systems) to all (right now it's just for senior citizens) but instead to draw it back or possibly even convert it to a voucher system. This makes my blood boil.
A few years ago my grandmother, who had medicare and had been using it for years, started to have some severe problems. Mainly, her heart was about to explode and it was starting to impact her brain. It wasn't enough to stop her, but it meant she had to go onto a wide array of medications to try to prevent any more incidents of what were essentially "micro-strokes" (correct term escaping me at the moment, but similar mechanics to a stroke) and heart attacks. Basically, she needed her medication to live.
But then my grandfather, her ex-husband, died and generously left her some money. Sadly, this actually screwed her over.
See, right now the big debate has included this talking point about checking for someone's "means" to see what they should get. Now, this is their way of trying to trick people into saying "millionaires shouldn't get medicare!" but it means they'd be checking if someone could pay for something and then deciding that medicare doesn't have to cover it if people can cover it. Guess what? They kind of already do that.
And with my grandmother's tiny inheritance (grandpa wasn't rolling in it, he was just generous), she suddenly needed to get private insurance to supplement! She quickly came about to a thousand dollars a month in medication costs because the private insurance company decided that she fell into "tier 2". "Tier 2" meant that her insurance company had decided that it will pay for NONE of her medication while she continued to pay them. Yeah, lovely folks.
Grandma still got medicare, but her benefits weren't quite what they should have been because someone decided that having any money was too much for their taste. So, she ended up becoming terrified of going to the doctor because it meant a possible financial burden. One day, she ended up with a terrible pain like an ear infection. She put off getting it looked into then, when it didn't go away, she put off getting a second opinion. You get the idea.
Turns out it was cancer. A tumor grew in her ear and wrapped around her brain like a set of tendrils. To everyone's credit, they did cover the scans she needed to be able to have people see this monster growing in her head. But the point was she'd been so terrified of the costs she didn't push for a closer examination. She got a little inheritance, then she couldn't afford not to die.
Oh, and when they found the tumor? Her doctors informed her that surgeons wouldn't take the risk of operating on a senior citizen with a heart condition. So she used her benefits for the last thing anyone would cover: hospice care. She died 2 months later on the week of my birthday.
I'm not saying a more robust medicare system would have prevented her (rather painful) death. But you know what? It would have been nice to see if it was possible.
The problem right now is that America has the infrastructure to support a government healthcare system, it's even functional (despite talking points to the contrary, when you actually crunch the numbers and look at the politics behind it, Medicare and Social Security are surprisingly efficient).
But, here's the thing, right now the debate in the country isn't even about extending medicare (the major US government healthcare systems) to all (right now it's just for senior citizens) but instead to draw it back or possibly even convert it to a voucher system. This makes my blood boil.
A few years ago my grandmother, who had medicare and had been using it for years, started to have some severe problems. Mainly, her heart was about to explode and it was starting to impact her brain. It wasn't enough to stop her, but it meant she had to go onto a wide array of medications to try to prevent any more incidents of what were essentially "micro-strokes" (correct term escaping me at the moment, but similar mechanics to a stroke) and heart attacks. Basically, she needed her medication to live.
But then my grandfather, her ex-husband, died and generously left her some money. Sadly, this actually screwed her over.
See, right now the big debate has included this talking point about checking for someone's "means" to see what they should get. Now, this is their way of trying to trick people into saying "millionaires shouldn't get medicare!" but it means they'd be checking if someone could pay for something and then deciding that medicare doesn't have to cover it if people can cover it. Guess what? They kind of already do that.
And with my grandmother's tiny inheritance (grandpa wasn't rolling in it, he was just generous), she suddenly needed to get private insurance to supplement! She quickly came about to a thousand dollars a month in medication costs because the private insurance company decided that she fell into "tier 2". "Tier 2" meant that her insurance company had decided that it will pay for NONE of her medication while she continued to pay them. Yeah, lovely folks.
Grandma still got medicare, but her benefits weren't quite what they should have been because someone decided that having any money was too much for their taste. So, she ended up becoming terrified of going to the doctor because it meant a possible financial burden. One day, she ended up with a terrible pain like an ear infection. She put off getting it looked into then, when it didn't go away, she put off getting a second opinion. You get the idea.
Turns out it was cancer. A tumor grew in her ear and wrapped around her brain like a set of tendrils. To everyone's credit, they did cover the scans she needed to be able to have people see this monster growing in her head. But the point was she'd been so terrified of the costs she didn't push for a closer examination. She got a little inheritance, then she couldn't afford not to die.
Oh, and when they found the tumor? Her doctors informed her that surgeons wouldn't take the risk of operating on a senior citizen with a heart condition. So she used her benefits for the last thing anyone would cover: hospice care. She died 2 months later on the week of my birthday.
I'm not saying a more robust medicare system would have prevented her (rather painful) death. But you know what? It would have been nice to see if it was possible.
I will simply say:Dense_Electric said:
The National Health Service (NHS) is the shared name of three of the four publicly funded healthcare systems in the United Kingdom. Only the English NHS is officially called the National Health Service, the others being NHS Scotland and NHS Wales. Despite their separate funding and administration, there is no discrimination when a resident of one country of the United Kingdom requires treatment in another. The financial and administrative consequences are dealt with by the organisations involved and no personal involvement by the patient is required...
The NHS was born out of a long-held ideal that good healthcare should be available to all, regardless of wealth. At its launch by the then minister of health, Aneurin Bevan, on July 5, 1948, it had at its heart three core principles:
-That it meet the needs of everyone,
-That it be free at the point of delivery,
-That it be based on clinical need, not ability to pay.
These three principles have guided the development of the NHS over more than half a century and remain.
The United Kingdom has free health care...
Unrelated to the OT, but wasn't Denmark judged to have the generally happiest population in the world? I'm pretty sure I've read an article about it somewhere...EverythingIncredible said:Yeah, I am sure every square inch of those countries is so nice. Hell, the city I am living in right now is excellent.plexxiss said:Canada, UK, Australia, Denmark and Switzerland are all very nice places to live as well (in fact many are much nicer than some of your cities such as Detroit and quite frankly nicer places in general.EverythingIncredible said:For starters, the U.S.A. is an incredibly nice place to liveicaritos said:
Really though, I'm sure it's nice and all but I prefer privatized insurance given the big picture.
I love these threads, nearly everyone punches each other in the genitals for ten pages.
Edit: I erased most of this...because I re-read it, and I didn't like it. lol
Edit: I erased most of this...because I re-read it, and I didn't like it. lol
Heres the thing. Until the US can come up with a way to pay for it, national health care isn't an option. We already have a tremendous deficit, paying for Universal health care would only make it worse.
Most countries with Universal Health care also have a dramatically higher tax rate. Americans in general are against tax increases. Any politician that suggests raising taxes, no matter how valid the reason or what the funds will be used for, is committing political suicide.
Until we get a Congress willing to make a balanced budget by slashing unnecessary activities, America simply cannot afford to provide universal health care.
Most countries with Universal Health care also have a dramatically higher tax rate. Americans in general are against tax increases. Any politician that suggests raising taxes, no matter how valid the reason or what the funds will be used for, is committing political suicide.
Until we get a Congress willing to make a balanced budget by slashing unnecessary activities, America simply cannot afford to provide universal health care.
I blame it on the inability for the two main houses to work together. I mean when the Republicans took the house after all the shit they said they would do, they decided the most important thing would be begin campaigning against Obama. I mean seriously Obama's got quite a while left in office regardless. They could at least attempt to get something done. It's ridiculous, but a problem with living in a democratic country with terribly misinformed public.
C-SPAN AND FAUCKS FUCK YOU!!!!
And to all those US hating European kids reading this I'm happier living in my country than I would be there. Socialism is fine to a degree, but in your country(Continent) it is impossible to be a failure. Those of you who go to college and work hard have to pay for the failures who keep fucking up. If someone wants to live in minimal existence they should be able to.
OP: Australia may be the place to be except for that shitty video game law.
C-SPAN AND FAUCKS FUCK YOU!!!!
And to all those US hating European kids reading this I'm happier living in my country than I would be there. Socialism is fine to a degree, but in your country(Continent) it is impossible to be a failure. Those of you who go to college and work hard have to pay for the failures who keep fucking up. If someone wants to live in minimal existence they should be able to.
OP: Australia may be the place to be except for that shitty video game law.
The healthcare system in the united states is Bull. Shit. Period.
Health care is a business.
Socrates once said (or perhaps Plato) that if you wanted to have a chariot built, you'd go to a chariot maker. If you wanted to get a bone fixed, you'd go to a doctor etc. The point being that these people/practices exist to fill a need in society.
Now we're back to health care is a business.
Health care, being a business as it is, does not exist to fix people. It exists to make money. That's why businesses exist. Insurance companies don't give a shit about people and making them healthy. They care about their bottom line and making it healthy. This is why they have people (seriously, wish I was kidding but fuck I'm not) who scour patient claims for reasons to deny coverage through loop holes or their own jargon'd contracts/health plans. It's bullshit, plain and simple. It's existence for the wrong reason. It's damaging and destructive. And the people behind it don't give a shit. They have money to act as a salve for their wounds.
In closing, someone asked me once (as a diabetic from age 10 - healthy btw and looking to stay that way but finding insurance for the cost is... difficult) how I thought insurance company execs sleep at night.
My response: Quite heavenly, I imagine. *sullen pause*
They probably lie their heads on pillows stuffed with angel-soft down clipped from the wings of patients they've slain, whose familes had to watch as their bodies swung suspended with loopholes around their necks like nooses.
Health care is a business.
Socrates once said (or perhaps Plato) that if you wanted to have a chariot built, you'd go to a chariot maker. If you wanted to get a bone fixed, you'd go to a doctor etc. The point being that these people/practices exist to fill a need in society.
Now we're back to health care is a business.
Health care, being a business as it is, does not exist to fix people. It exists to make money. That's why businesses exist. Insurance companies don't give a shit about people and making them healthy. They care about their bottom line and making it healthy. This is why they have people (seriously, wish I was kidding but fuck I'm not) who scour patient claims for reasons to deny coverage through loop holes or their own jargon'd contracts/health plans. It's bullshit, plain and simple. It's existence for the wrong reason. It's damaging and destructive. And the people behind it don't give a shit. They have money to act as a salve for their wounds.
In closing, someone asked me once (as a diabetic from age 10 - healthy btw and looking to stay that way but finding insurance for the cost is... difficult) how I thought insurance company execs sleep at night.
My response: Quite heavenly, I imagine. *sullen pause*
They probably lie their heads on pillows stuffed with angel-soft down clipped from the wings of patients they've slain, whose familes had to watch as their bodies swung suspended with loopholes around their necks like nooses.
I never got the "if we socialise health care people will wait for ages" thing. I'm in France and once I was sick, I called in sick at work, then I looked up a doctor, found one in my street, called them and got an appointment for two hours later. And it was just a cold or something.
And it's not a rare stroke of luck, either, when you call in sick at work you have 48 hours to send the medical slip thing to justify you were really sick (we don't get a specified amount of sick days like you do in the US).
On the other hand, France also has free education, which means we might have more doctors? Since it's free to study to become one and they get paid well... On the other, other hand, to become a doctor you need to pass a "concours", which is a type of exam. Here we have two types, "examens" and "concours". In an "examen", you need to have over a certain grade to pass. In a "concours", there is a specific amount of room, and only the best so many people get the degree (if you have less than a specific grade, you also don't pass, but usually there are many more people who get a good grade than spots).
So the number of people who can become doctor any given year is limited anyways, and yet I've never had a problem finding one on short notice. I've always gone to a different doctor every time, too, because I move a lot so I just pick someone close to where I live.
The French system isn't 100% free by the way. It covers basic stuff and people have the option to get insurance to cover more. Insurances state what they do or don't cover, but I've never heard of "pre-existing conditions" for insurance companies. I mean, they cover stuff such as aesthetic surgery for instance (well, some insurance companies do. As I said, which you pick decides how much coverage you get, and how much you pay for it).
I think it's a good way to do things (everyone gets the minimum, you can pay the difference to get more) but I hear we have some budget problems so I can't swear it would work everywhere.
What I don't get is that if insurance companies in the US call everything pre-existing conditions, then wouldn't it make more sense not to get one at all, since when you need it it will bail out anyways, and this way you save on insurance payments? Or do they tend to still end up costing less on the long run despite trying their hardest not to pay after promising they would?
And it's not a rare stroke of luck, either, when you call in sick at work you have 48 hours to send the medical slip thing to justify you were really sick (we don't get a specified amount of sick days like you do in the US).
On the other hand, France also has free education, which means we might have more doctors? Since it's free to study to become one and they get paid well... On the other, other hand, to become a doctor you need to pass a "concours", which is a type of exam. Here we have two types, "examens" and "concours". In an "examen", you need to have over a certain grade to pass. In a "concours", there is a specific amount of room, and only the best so many people get the degree (if you have less than a specific grade, you also don't pass, but usually there are many more people who get a good grade than spots).
So the number of people who can become doctor any given year is limited anyways, and yet I've never had a problem finding one on short notice. I've always gone to a different doctor every time, too, because I move a lot so I just pick someone close to where I live.
The French system isn't 100% free by the way. It covers basic stuff and people have the option to get insurance to cover more. Insurances state what they do or don't cover, but I've never heard of "pre-existing conditions" for insurance companies. I mean, they cover stuff such as aesthetic surgery for instance (well, some insurance companies do. As I said, which you pick decides how much coverage you get, and how much you pay for it).
I think it's a good way to do things (everyone gets the minimum, you can pay the difference to get more) but I hear we have some budget problems so I can't swear it would work everywhere.
What I don't get is that if insurance companies in the US call everything pre-existing conditions, then wouldn't it make more sense not to get one at all, since when you need it it will bail out anyways, and this way you save on insurance payments? Or do they tend to still end up costing less on the long run despite trying their hardest not to pay after promising they would?
No it was greedy bankers actually. They thought they could take their debts and then sell them off on what basically amounted to a set of gambles called securitization and credit default swaps. It was an extremely lucrative business for a time, but they got carried away with it.cerebus23 said:
The problem was that they unloaded so many of these loans that the money that existed in credit dwarfed what was available in the system, and when that happens a collapse is imminent which is a pattern that has repeated itself dozens of times, even going back to Renaissance Holland's tulip boom.
Securitization was not the invention of the government, nor were the sheer numbers of loans made impressed upon poor, defenseless banks. Furthermore HUD loans to the poor don't call for unnecessary risk on the bank's part and are government backed. The banks didn't care that these people couldn't repay, they were leveraging their own security ratings to pass the burden of collection onto somebody else without a care for the outcome, as though once the debt was sold it was no longer their problem. You're trying to make sense of the situation (the logic of a lender) from a traditional standpoint which doesn't take into account these financial devices which ultimately were a bad idea.
It was a lack of regulation that allowed the banks to utterly, utterly crush any securities the FDIC had against loan defaults.
Yep. Welcome to America. My girlfriend had to pay 100 dollars to go to the doctor for her infected thumb just so they could tell her, yes, her thumb was infected. no, we wont be giving you treatment. thank you for your 100 dollars.
Unless you have super premium insurance a go go, you simply do not matter.
Unless you have super premium insurance a go go, you simply do not matter.
That's a little complicated so here's Charlie Brooker with a slightly less complex and more humorous explanation.Ghengis John said:No it was greedy bankers actually. They thought they could take their debts and then sell them off on what basically amounted to a set of gambles called securitization and credit default swaps. It was an extremely lucrative business for a time, but they got carried away with it.cerebus23 said:
The problem was that they unloaded so many of these loans that the money that existed in credit dwarfed what was available in the system, and when that happens a collapse is imminent which is a pattern that has repeated itself dozens of times, even going back to Renaissance Holland's tulip boom.
Securitization was not the invention of the government, nor were the sheer numbers of loans made impressed upon poor, defenseless banks. Furthermore HUD loans to the poor don't call for unnecessary risk on the bank's part and are government backed.
The explanation begins at 0.13 and ends at 0:47.
Hilariously enough, I'm a very conservative Canadian. But since when should anyone support you wrecking yourself?orangeban said:Oooh, now this demonstrates the political gap between Britain and USA (not saying this person represents the USA or anything), but you see the Conservatives mentioned smokers not getting free treatment for lung cancer and similar stuff and there was OUTRAGE! People were furious, but in a country as right-wing as America you'd have to start off with something like that, you have to take baby-stepslacktheknack said: