No Healthcare for Smokers,Drinkers,Fat,Old..

Doctors are calling for NHS treatment to be withheld from patients who are old or who lead unhealthy lives. Smokers, drinkers, obese, and the elderly should be barred from receiving some operations, according to doctors, with most saying the health service cannot afford to provide free care to everyone.

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/01/27/nhs127.xml

This is what happens when you let the government control any aspect of your life. If socialized medicine comes to the USA, this is just a peek of what we're in for. That and waiting up to 3 years for emergency operations from less than good doctors.

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bullshit every single country that has universal healthcare has overall better health care than the us

 

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You're thinking short term and missing the point pjdude. What sandy is pointing out is that such a system isn't sustainable. Eventually you're going to run into the same problems as today's health care such as the elderly and the poor (who tend to be smokers, drinkers and obese) not having health care. The only difference is it's harder to dismantle a government system once put in place then it is to simply find a better or cheaper provider. Not to mention the burden socialized medicine places on hospitals.

 

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a government run single payer system is the cheapest system that covers everyone. the health care per capita spending stats prove it. yes old sickly people are more of a burden but is it ethical just to let them die? you do know most people in the medical field in the us support some form of universal health care

 

Again, you're thinking short term. It's simply not sustainable. As more money is needed to maintain a socialized system where everyone gets free health care, the more debt a government has to accumulate. And that will end up hurting everyone, not just the elderly. How ethical is that?

 

its sustainable if you use cost controls. and it cost less than the current system we have in the us.

 

Cost controls? Such as? And don't get me wrong, I think the current system sucks too. I just don't think moving towards a socialized system is the way to fix it.

 

I'm in the medical field, and I don't support it.

Well over half of a person's lifetime cost for healthcare is spent when they are over the age of 65. 80% of our lifetime healthcare cost is spent after the age of 40. http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1361028

Do you really think that when the government is the one paying the bill we won't come to the point where some accountant says, "Why are we wasting all this money? These old farts are just going to die anyway! Fuck 'em!"

We'll see more of this. When something is "free", the only way to control costs is rationing. I'd rather not have my life depend upon the good graces of some government bureaucrat.

 

I would hope that we could develop a healthcare system that incorporates the best of each. We need a system that is competitive and rewards superior performance...one can get that from a free market. Unfortunately, we do not have a free healthcare market in the United States. It is anything but, the supply of suppliers is strictly regulated by vested interests and law.
Let's apply some good old Ronald Regan supply side economics to this situtation.

 

We already have government paid medical care for the expensive old folks, and we already have HMOs screening coverage for smokers and drinkers and old people and "pre-existing conditions" and chronic disease, and we already have long waits for appointments and non-emergency surgery, and we are already pricing ourselves out of medical care.

Everything wrong with socialized medicine is wrong with our current system, and we're paying 50% more for it, and more than half the people in the country don't get standard first world care from it.

You think the socialized systems are in trouble, look at the US - imagine if Britain's NHS threw 25% of the citizenry off the regular system completely, or France's quit supplying preventive care, or Canada forced its women to schedule their ob/gyn appointments months in advance while devoting hundreds of millions in medical resources to breast implants, and doubled its drug prices.

Per dollar and percentage of resource, the US system is the worst in the world. The only inferior systems are "market based" in societies that have less money. If we had France's money, we'd have third world health care in this country, with this system. It's a glowing example of what you get when you try to solve a problem by blindly throwing money at corporations.

 

You do realize that some countries have both private and federal healthcare right ?
So, If you're worried about not being first in line, go buy yourself private insurance, and get red carpet treatment at the private hospital.
If you're just an average joe, well, then the federal system should be fine for you.
there are flaws, with management and equipment issues, but any capable government should be able to handle it.

I'd rather have everyone suffer equally than have healthcare for the rich, and none for the poor.

 

You do realize that's an oxymoron, don't you?

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So people who have worked hard/smart should be punished for those who didn't/wouldn't?

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I disagree. The USA has the best doctors and the best healthcare in the world. That despite hospitals being nearly bankrupt by criminal aliens.

Tax credits are a GREAT way to help Americans. They cover your deductible so you can get an even higher deductible and lower premiums.

The pathetic entitlement mentality is one of our big problems right now:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/01/the_scary_sense_of_american_en.html

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What's the most important thing, in your opinion, about your health care?

If you say anything other than, "The profits of the investors and executives of my healthcare providers," you're looking at the situation wrongly.

And that, m'lady, is what's wrong with healthcare in the United States.

 

That I have the top doctor if I need him/her. I don't do doctors/hospitals because I have chosen to NEVER be sick. Not ever. Not even a cold. IF anything catastrophic ever happens, I want the best. That's all. And that will NEVER happen with socialized healthcare.

 

Socialised healthcare is what civilised societies provide.

If you haven't got it, you are living in a country yet to become fully civilised.

 

Well, good luck with that.

 

For the record we do have a limited form of socialized medicine in the form of Medicare (for elderly), Medicaid (indigent), and Military. The working people are not covered, unless coverage is provided by an employer or someone buys private insurance. But insurance companies are always looking for ways to trim coverage. We had a case recently where the insurance denied coverage for a transplant. When enough political pressure was placed on the insurance company, they relented and agreed to pay. But it was too late, the patient, a young girl died hours after the insurance company agreed to pay for the operation.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22357873/

Insurance companies pay their employees bonus if they can prevent claims. In this case, the technology is very old and well established. The 6 month survival rate for this girl was 65 percent. But that was not enough for the insurance company. This is another tatic of insurance companies, if they delay treatment long enough the patient dies which is the most cost effective solution from their perspective.

One of the problems we have today, is that we never know when an insurance company will contest a proceedure and refuse to pay for it. So we think we have coverage for a proceedure per our policy agreement. But when the proceedure is needed, the insurer balks and stalls until the insured dies.

 

Wrong. Socialized medicine is what BIG government wants. They want to control EVERY aspect of their citizens including what they can/not eat/drink/smoke etc...

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There are 2 reasons the Democrats are working so hard for complete government control of this huge segment of our economy. One is power. Health care comprises about 15% of our national economy. If the government can seize control of this large a segment of our economy a giant step toward a socialist economy will have been achieved. The second reason is control. Think about it. If you control a person's access to healthcare ... you effectively control that person.

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http://boortz.com/more/demsecrets.html

 

i would rather the government control me than some amoral corporation that only wants more money. the arguement you just made works against you