Michael Moore was in Seattle tonight previewing his new documentary Sicko, and I was privileged to be there in the audience. I sat next to Postman, who took copious notes, so I’ll leave it to him to describe Moore and his movie in objective detail. But I did want to briefly pass on my immediate impression.
The film was funny, it was moving, and yes, at times it was uplifting. I laughed out loud throughout, which those who know me well will tell you is a huge compliment indeed. The film also brought tears to my eyes on a number of occasions. (Postman was busy taking notes, so I don’t think he noticed. Good. I wouldn’t want him to see through my fierce facade.)
But as I sat there watching the film, I just found myself getting angrier and angrier and angrier. Angry at our health care industry, our political leaders, my nation… and myself.
Sicko opens June 29th. Watch it.
GOLDY If you loved it so much why dont you move your sorry ass to Cuba.
Yeah GOLDY, if you liked it so much, why don’t you marry it?!!?!?!?
lol internets!
What the fuck are you morons talking about…
Dumbshit motherfuckers already.
Go back to fucking texas or georgia or ala-fucking-bama or wherever else your cracker asses came from.
Just get the fuck away from here.
Stop the anger. Engage the brain. If you were diagnosed with cencer today, would you:
A – go to Havana?
B – go to Canada?
or C – go the Fred Hutch, Swedish and The University of Washington?
We’ve got the best medical system to fix the bad things. Countries like Canada don’t because they are too cheap to commit the resources, but we aren’t. Medical care is expensive here because it’s the best.
Move to Canada, you liberal moron. Get on the waiting list.
We have the best justice system in the world…if your rich.
We have the most freedom in the world….if your rich.
Our communities are the best in the world…if your rich.
We have the greatest and best medical care in the world…if your rich.
The Republican justice system…don’t be black.
The Republican pension system…. don’t be old…or poor.
The Republican health care system…don’t get sick.
The Republican legal system….be rich, so you can afford great lawyers.
Yes, The Canadian and French health care systems are so bad that their rich people come here for treatment, because our system serves them better. Since they are rich.
I wonder if people are ever going to pull their heads out of their collective asses and see the light of day on these issues.
I doubt it.
And if you think I am some lazy ass liberal, take a look at the time stamp. I’m going to work about the same time our genius president gets up in the morning. I will get from work about the time he usually goes to bed.
As Mel Brooks said “Its good to be da King”
Busdrivermike makes good points about the current system. A few other tidbits to look at.
The Republicans want self-managed Social Security accounts. This will benefit stockbrokers, accountants and folks with the time and background to carefully research investments, along with shady operators that advertise “guaranteed return investments”.
The Republicans like the current health care system, except for the part where poor people with no health care clog up the emergency rooms. Their answer seems to be to get rid of the poor people, or not let them use the emergency rooms.
The Republicans like the justice and legal systems, except that we need to lock up more
poor folksfelons. Unfortunately, prisons are expensive because we are “coddling” criminals. Their answer is to model prisons after the one in Maricopa County, Arizona.( http://www.arpaio.com/joe_arpaio_topten.htm )
(Sorry I haven’t been around much the last few days. It’s been a busy week, and it isn’t over yet.)
Oh, and I missed out on the discussion about Mr. Pope spooking the King County Republicans, but I did notice someone complaining that we needed to run a “real Democrat” instead of Mr. Pope in that heavily Democratic district.
The simple answer is that Mr. Pope is the only person that was willing to step up and challenge Ms. Hague. The proper response to that is “thank you”. He was smart enough to see a need and try to fill it. Good for him. If we want someone further left than Mr. Pope, then get such a person to run next time. (It’s too late to file now.)
Until then, Mr. Pope is our candidate. He seems honest and intelligent. I wish him the best of luck, and might even send along a few bucks in campaign donations, although I don’t live in that district.
If you think you could do a better job, then the simple question is why didn’t you run?
Wingnuts: several of you have claimed that we have the best health care system in the world. I don’t believe that’s true, but I’m open to a cogent argument that I’m wrong.
Frankly, I don’t think any of you will bother. You’ll call me names. You’ll tell me to move to Canada or Cuba or whatever. The one thing I’m betting none of you will do is come forth with a cogent argument based on properly sourced facts. The only real question is how long before the crickets start chirping.
The clock’s ticking…
I haven’t seen the film yet but I hope he points out just how fucking lame it is that the right claims to be pro-life and wants to in fact spend tax dollars to KEEP women from getting an abortion, but then once the baby is born – well fuck the little bastard. Let em die from lack of pre or post-natal care.
As for moving to Canada, when the first one of you chickenshit, chickenhawk Publicans will pay to move me, my family and my business there – I’ll gladly go.
Don, All I can reference is how members of my family get treated in the UK by their health care system. They wait. One of them is dead from the same heart ailment that my dad was treated for immediately here. The Doc here said it is time and in daddy went for a new heart valve and bypass. His cousin died while on a waiting list for this “exotic” treatment. Old folks over there seem to get rationed for care as they get older. This is happening to my aunt right now. Other folks I knowover there that ar eyounger do get good treatment for basic injuries and general stuff. The off the shelf stuff (broken arms, hernias, etc) they seem to do all right with.
Wait a minute about this rich crap. I ain’t rich and I can get good medical coverage. Sure if you are wealthy you can “buy” anything.
Think Jon Corzine… he bought the NJ Senate seat he had and now the NJ guvnur mansion. He paid for his medical bills cuz of his stupidity on the NJ Turnpike. He rich and he surely ain’t one of us.
Think Baba Streisand. She rich and she ain’t one of us.
Think Nancy Pelosi. She rich and she ain’t one of us.
Think Dianne Feinstein. She rich and she ain’t one of us.
Think Baba Boxer. She rich and she ain’t one of us.
Think Chucky Schumer. He rich and she ain’t one of us.
Think Mikey Moore. He rich and she ain’t one of us.
Think Hilary Cliton. She rich and she ain’t one of us.
Hmmm…?
I made a typo but I like it!
I think the solution to health care in this country is to have three times as many doctors and only one-third as many trial lawyers. More docs means lower price for docs. Less lawyers means less dumb law suits.
Too bad so many entrenched special interest groups stand in the way, including the isurance biz, government and a BIG lack of money!!
Don Joe: Use the Internet to answer your own question man!
January 2005, Canada 176 MRI scanners – 25.5 MRI exams/1000 people
January 2005, Canada 361 PET/CT scanners – 87.3 CT exams/1000 people
January 2005, US ~10,000 MRI scanners – 83.2 MRI exams/1,000 people
January 2005, US ~6000 PET/CT scanners – 172.5 CT exams/1000 people
Sources, Canada & US MSM
Mark @4,
Well, if I were diagnosed with cancer and I didn’t have health insurance, I wouldn’t go to Fred Hutch, because I wouldn’t be able to pay for the treatment.
The fact is both Canada and Cuba (and Britain and France) have higher life expectancy and lower infant mortality rates than the US. So if we’re talking about a health care “system”, ours is clearly not the best.
The extraordinary quality of care available in the US is meaningless if it is not available to you.
Don Joe: Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) evaluates the top 20 countries for MRI and CT scanners per 1MM people.
For the countries who reported MRI scanners,
Canada ranked 12th with 5.5 scanners 1MM people.
U.S. ranked 2nd with 27.0 scanners 1MM people
For the countries who reported CT scanners,
Canada ranked 15th with 11.3 scanners 1MM people
US ranked 2nd with 32.0 scanners 1MM people
Puddy,
You fail on two counts. First, the number of diagnostic scans per person doesn’t translate into a better health care system. You have too many implicit assumptions there to make the argument cogent. Spell them out, please.
Even if you manage to satisfy the first issue, which, frankly, I don’t think you can, you’ve only manged to compare our system to Canada’s. Is Canada the best alternative in existence?
Puddy @ 16
Please explain why, if Canada’s diagnostic systems and capability are so much inferior to those in the US, Canada’s life expetancy is longer than ours.
Voice of Chalk Scratching: I already answered the life expectancy canard. Apparently you pick and choose figures as needed to seed your horsesass argument like cluelessman and stupidman.
America is obese. We die earlier due to our overeating habits, plain and simple. I supplied to data on ‘Wipes some time ago when someone else threw you retread life expectancy argument earlier this year.
The crickets are chirping, Puddy. Gotta get better than this.
We also have a large population who smokes and smoking causes approximately half of all heart attacks.
All we really need to do is move to Iraq – while the turd-infested right wing nuts don’t want to pay a DIME to save a life here in the USA, they’ll gladly spend their tax dollars (and yours) on providing free-ride health care for Iraqi citizens.
Go figure. LIKE everything else on the Publican agenda…the right is against public health care, except when they are for it.
Puddy, this deals with your canard. Remember, I mentioned properly sourced data.
Don Joe: I’m going to work. Your crickets are chirping comment is the same used by Donnageddon long ago. Puddy don’t forget Moonbat! mantras!
If you had the cojones, you could find the same data on the Internet I can find. Do your own due diligence. It’s all there IF (a tough word for Pelletman to comprehend) you can create a cogent Google search string.
Good job Don Joe: But there are later statistics. I used ones from 2004-2005 for the CT & MRI scanners!
Keep searching. You are improving your sleuth skillz!
Good bye for now.
BTW Stupidman – where are you getting your #22 data from?
Your ASS maybe?
By the way, Puddy, a vast majority of your punditizing is going to fail, because you have an unstated definition of what constitutes a “better” health care system. You might want to start there, before you go off citing a variety of statistics that could very well have little relevance to the over-arching question.
@ 25,
So, the age of the statistics somehow matters to the question? Is your argument now that we didn’t have a better health care system in the 90’s, but we have one now?
By the way, Puddy, the remark about my cajones is a strike against you. At that point, I could easily declare victory in this entire argument, but I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt. See you when you get back from work.
Don Joe: To your small paramecium brain my data is irrelevant. If there are fewer machines in a country to evaluate problems like clogged arteries, intestinal problems, joint damage, brain injuries and strokes, in your mind waiting for a long time for the procedure is a good thing.
Regarding public care – who pays for it? Much of the $3-$4 tax per gallon on gas in Europe pays for these “freebies”.
Puddybud @ 14
All that says is that rich hypochondriacs have sprouted an industry in their confusion regarding the fact that we haven’t made it to Star Trek levels of medical science.
Lots of tests don’t mean shit in terms of quality of care. It means that someone is making money selling scans, that’s all.
Don Joe: I found my original document I read long ago. Enjoy!
http://tinyurl.com/2je6tc
Aaron, read my link just posted!
Now I am leaving since I found the document.
Enjoy the Moonbat! education!
I just can’t leave as my mind reminds me of other facts I read.
Look up the J-1 Visa program and how it has been modified to allow more foreign students to stay and practice medicine in the US to EXPAND health care here.
If you remember, 60 Minutes did a show on doctors in rural communities!
There\’s No Place Like Home
What I learned from my wife\’s month in the British medical system.
BY DAVID ASMAN
Wednesday, June 8, 2005 12:00 a.m. EDT
\”Mr. Asman, could you come down to the gym? Your wife appears to be having a small problem.\” In typical British understatement, this was the first word I received of my wife\’s stroke.
We had arrived in London the night before for a two-week vacation. We spent the day sightseeing and were planning to go to the theater. I decided to take a nap, but my wife wanted to get in a workout in the hotel\’s gym before theater. Little did either of us know that a tiny blood clot had developed in her leg on the flight to London and was quietly working its way up to her heart. Her workout on the Stairmaster pumped the clot right through a too-porous wall in the heart on a direct path to the right side of her brain.
Hurrying down to the gym, I suspected that whatever the \”small\” problem was, we might still have time to make the play. Instead, our lives were about to change fundamentally, and we were both about to experience firsthand the inner workings of British health care.
We spent almost a full month in a British public hospital. We also arranged for a complex medical procedure to be done in one of the few remaining private hospitals in Britain. (*Fuh Que NOTE: it seems PRIVATE is better in Britain too… imagine that! Fuh Que) My wife then spent about three weeks recuperating in a New York City hospital as an inpatient and has since used another city hospital for physical therapy as an outpatient. We thus have had a chance to sample the health diet available under two very different systems of health care. Neither system is without its faults and advantages. To paraphrase Thomas Sowell, there are no solutions to modern health care problems, only trade-offs. What follows is a sampling of those tradeoffs as we viewed them firsthand.
As I saw my wife collapsed on the hotel\’s gym floor, my concern about making the curtain was replaced by a bone-chilling recognition that she was in mortal danger. Despite her protestations that everything was fine, her left side was paralyzed and her eyes were rolling around unfocused. She was making sense, but her words were slurred. Right away I suspected a stroke, even though she is a young, healthy nonsmoker. Over her continuing protests, I knew we had to get her to a hospital right away.
The emergency workers who came within five minutes were wonderful. The two young East Enders looked and sounded for all the world like a couple of skinhead soccer fans, cockney accents and all. But their professionalism in immediately stabilizing my wife and taking her vitals was matched with exceptional kindness. I was moved to tears to see how comforting they were both to my wife and to me. As I was to discover time and again in the British health system, despite the often deplorable conditions of a bankrupt infrastructure, British caregivers–whether nurses, doctors, or ambulance drivers–are extraordinarily kind and hardworking. Since there\’s no real money to be made in the system, those who get into public medicine do so as a pure vocation. And they show it. In the case of these EMTs, I kick myself for not having noticed their names to later thank them, for almost as soon as they dropped us off at the emergency room of the University College of London Hospital, they disappeared.
Suddenly we were in the hands of British Health Service, and after a battery of tests we were being pressured into officially admitting my wife to UCL. As we discovered later, emergency care is free for everyone in Britain; it\’s only when one is officially admitted to a hospital that a foreigner begins to pay. I didn\’t know that. But I did know that I was not about to admit my wife to a hospital that could not diagnose an obviously life-threatening affliction. And even after having given her an MRI, the doctors could not tell if she had a stroke.
Now, the smartest thing I did before we left the hotel was to delay the ambulance driver long enough to run back to my room and grab my wife\’s cell phone. With that phone I began making about a thousand dollars worth of trans-Atlantic calls, the first of which was to the world-renowned cardiologist Dr. Isadore Rosenfeld, who I\’m lucky enough to have as my GP. As it turned out, not only did Izzy diagnose the problem correctly, he even suggested a cause for the stroke, which later turned out to be correct. \”There\’s no reason for her to have a stroke except if it\’s a PFO.\” I didn\’t know what Izzy meant, but I wrote down the initials and later found out that a PFO (a patent foramen ovale) is a flap-like opening in the heart through which we get our oxygen in utero. For most of us, the opening closes shortly after birth. But in as many as 30% of us, the flap doesn\’t seal tight, and that can allow a blood clot to travel through the heart up to the brain. Izzy agreed that I should not admit my wife to UCL but hold out for a hospital that specialized in neurology.
As it happened, the best such hospital in England, Queen\’s Square Hospital for Neurology, was a short distance away, but it had no beds available. That\’s when I started dialing furiously again, tracking down contacts and calling in chits with any influential contact around the world for whom I\’d ever done a favor. I also got my employer, News Corp., involved, and a team of extremely helpful folks I\’d never met worked overtime helping me out. (*Fuh Que NOTE:Get that ASSholes… he had to pull string to get her in the RIGHT hospital)
Suddenly, a bed was found in Queen\’s Square, and by 2 a.m. my wife was officially admitted to a British public hospital. The neurologist on call that night looked at the same MRI where the emergency doctors had seen nothing and immediately saw that my wife had suffered a severe stroke. It was awful news, but I realized we were finally in the right place.
That first night (or what was left of it) my wife was sent off to intensive care, and the nurses convinced me that I should get a few hours sleep. We found a supply closet, in which there was a small examination table, and the nurses helped me fashion fake pillows and blankets from old supplies. The loving attention of these nurses was touching. But the conditions of the hospital were rather shockingly apparent even then.
The acute brain injury ward to which my wife was assigned the next day consisted of four sections, each having six beds. Whether it was dumb luck or some unseen connection, we ended up with a bed next to a window, through which we could catch a glimpse of the sky. Better yet, the window actually opened, which was also a blessing since the smells wafting through the ward were often overwhelming.
When I covered Latin America for The Wall Street Journal, I\’d visit hospitals, prisons and schools as barometers of public services in the country. Based on my Latin American scale, Queen\’s Square would rate somewhere in the middle. It certainly wasn\’t as bad as public hospitals in El Salvador, where patients often share beds. But it wasn\’t as nice as some of the hospitals I\’ve seen in Buenos Aires or southern Brazil. And compared with virtually any hospital ward in the U.S., Queen\’s Square would fall short by a mile.
The equipment wasn\’t ancient, but it was often quite old. On occasion my wife and I would giggle at heart and blood-pressure monitors that were literally taped together and would come apart as they were being moved into place. The nurses and hospital technicians had become expert at jerry-rigging temporary fixes for a lot of the damaged equipment. I pitched in as best as I could with simple things, like fixing the wiring for the one TV in the ward. And I\’d make frequent trips to the local pharmacies to buy extra tissues and cleaning wipes, which were always in short supply.
In fact, cleaning was my main occupation for the month we were at Queen\’s Square. Infections in hospitals are, of course, a problem everywhere. But in Britain, hospital-borne infections are getting out of control. At least 100,000 British patients a year are hit by hospital-acquired infections, including the penicillin-resistant \”superbug\” MRSA. A new study carried out by the British Health Protection Agency says that MRSA plays a part in the deaths of up to 32,000 patients every year. But even at lower numbers, Britain has the worst MRSA infection rates in Europe. It\’s not hard to see why.
As far as we could tell in our month at Queen\’s Square, the only method of keeping the floors clean was an industrious worker from the Philippines named Marcello, equipped with a mop and pail. Marcello did the best that he could. But there\’s only so much a single worker can do with a mop and pail against a ward full of germ-laden filth. Only a constant cleaning by me kept our little corner of the ward relatively germ-free. When my wife and I walked into Cornell University Hospital in New York after a month in England, the first thing we noticed was the floors. They were not only clean. They were shining! We were giddy with the prospect of not constantly engaging in germ warfare.
As for the caliber of medicine practiced at Queen\’s Square, we were quite impressed at the collegiality of the doctors and the tendency to make medical judgments based on group consultations. There is much better teamwork among doctors, nurses and physical therapists in Britain. In fact, once a week at Queen\’s Square, all the hospital\’s health workers–from high to low–would assemble for an open forum on each patient in the ward. That way each level knows what the other level is up to, something glaringly absent from U.S. hospital management. Also, British nurses have far more direct managerial control over how the hospital wards are run. This may somewhat compensate for their meager wages–which averaged about £20,000 ($36,000) a year (in a city where almost everything costs twice as much as it does in Manhattan!).
There is also much less of a tendency in British medicine to make decisions on the basis of whether one will be sued for that decision. This can lead to a much healthier period of recuperation. For example, as soon as my wife was ambulatory, I was determined to get her out of the hospital as much as possible. Since a stroke is all about the brain, I wanted to clear her head of as much sickness as I could. We\’d take off in a wheelchair for two-hour lunches in the lovely little park outside, and three-hour dinners at a nice Japanese restaurant located at a hotel down the street. I swear those long, leisurely dinners, after which we\’d sit in the lobby where I\’d smoke a cigar and we\’d talk for another hour or so, actually helped in my wife\’s recovery. It made both of us feel, well, normal. It also helped restore a bit of fun in our relationship, which too often slips away when you just see your loved one in a hospital setting.
Now try leaving a hospital as an inpatient in the U.S. In fact, we did try and were frustrated at every step. You\’d have better luck breaking out of prison. Forms, permission slips and guards at the gate all conspire to keep you in bounds. It was clear that what prevented us from getting out was the pressing fear on everyone\’s part of getting sued. Anything happens on the outside and folks naturally sue the hospital for not doing their job as the patient\’s nanny.
Why are the Brits so less concerned about being sued? I can only guess that Britain\’s practice of forcing losers in civil cases to pay for court costs has lessened the number of lawsuits, and thus the paranoia about lawsuits from which American medical services suffer.
British doctors, nurses and physical therapists also seem to put much more stock in the spiritual side of healing. Not to say that they bring religion into the ward. (In fact, they passed right over my wife\’s insistence that prayer played a part in what they had to admit was a miraculously quick return of movement to her left side.) Put simply, they invest a lot of effort at keeping one\’s spirits up. Sometimes it\’s a bit over the top, such as when the physical or occupational therapists compliment any tiny achievement with a \”Brilliant!\” or \”Fantastic!\” But better that than taking a chance of planting a negative suggestion that can grow quickly and dampen spirits for a long time.
Since we returned, we\’ve actually had two American physical therapists who did just that–one who told my wife that she\’d never use her hand again and another who said she\’d never bend her ankle again. Both of these therapists were wrong, but they succeeded in depressing my wife\’s spirits and delaying her recovery for a considerable period. For the life of me, I can\’t understand how they could have been so insensitive, unless this again was an attempt to forestall a lawsuit: I never claimed you would walk again.
Having praised the caregivers, I\’m forced to return to the inefficiencies of a health system devoid of incentives. One can tell that the edge has disappeared in treatment in Britain. For example, when we returned to the U.S. we discovered that treatment exists for thwarting the effects of blood clots in the brain if administered shortly after a stroke. Such treatment was never mentioned, even after we were admitted to the neurology hospital. Indeed, the only medication my wife was given for a severe stroke was a daily dose of aspirin. Now, treating stroke victims is tricky business. My wife had a low hemoglobin count, so with all the medications in the world, she still might have been better off with just aspirin. But consultations with doctors never brought up the possibilities of alternative drug therapies. (Of course, U.S. doctors tend to be pill pushers, but that\’s a different discussion.)
Then there was the condition of Queen\’s Square compared with the physical plant of the New York hospitals. As I mentioned, the cleanliness of U.S. hospitals is immediately apparent to all the senses. But Cornell and New York University hospitals (both of which my wife has been using since we returned) have ready access to technical equipment that is either hard to find or nonexistent in Britain. This includes both diagnostic equipment and state-of-the-art equipment used for physical therapy.
We did have one brief encounter with a more comprehensive type of British medical treatment–a day trip to one of the few remaining private hospitals in London.
Before she could travel back home, my wife needed to have the weak wall in her heart fortified with a metal clamp. The procedure is minimally invasive (a catheter is passed up to the heart from a small incision made in the groin), but it requires enormous skill. The cardiologist responsible for the procedure, Seamus Cullen, worked in both the public system and as a private clinician. He informed us that the waiting line to perform the procedure in a public hospital would take days if not weeks, but we could have the procedure done in a private hospital almost immediately. (*Fuh Que NOTE:Oh gee! Those rich bastards in Britain get better/faster treatment too… when they PAY for it!) Since we\’d already been separated from our 12-year-old daughter for almost a month, we opted to have the procedure done (with enormous assistance from my employer) at a private hospital.
There was clean carpeting, more than enough help, a private room (and a private bath!) in which to recover from the procedure, even a choice of wines offered with a wide variety of entrees. As we were feasting on our fancy new digs, Dr. Cullen came by, took my wife\’s hand, and quietly told us in detail about the procedure. He actually paused to ask us whether we understood him completely and had any questions. Only one, we both thought to ask: Is this a dream?
It wasn\’t long before the dream was over and we were back at Queen\’s Square. But on our return, one of the ever-accommodating nurses had found us a single room in the back of the ward where they usually throw rowdy patients. For the last five days, my wife and I prayed for well-behaved patients, and we managed to last out our days at Queen\’s Square basking in a private room.
But what of the bottom line? When I received the bill for my wife\’s one-month stay at Queen\’s Square, I thought there was a mistake. The bill included all doctors\’ costs, two MRI scans, more than a dozen physical therapy sessions, numerous blood and pathology tests, and of course room and board in the hospital for a month. And perhaps most important, it included the loving care of the finest nurses we\’d encountered anywhere. The total cost: $25,752. That ain\’t chump change. But to put this in context, the cost of just 10 physical therapy sessions at New York\’s Cornell University Hospital came to $27,000–greater than the entire bill from British Health Service!
There is something seriously out of whack about 10 therapy sessions that cost more than a month\’s worth of hospital bills in England. Still, while costs in U.S. hospitals might well have become exorbitant because of too few incentives to keep costs down, the British system has simply lost sight of costs and incentives altogether. (The exception would appear to be the few remaining private clinics in Britain. The heart procedure done in the private clinic in London cost about $20,000.)
\”Free health care\” is a mantra that one hears all the time from advocates of the British system. But British health care is not \”free.\” I mentioned the cost of living in London, which is twice as high for almost any good or service as prices in Manhattan. Folks like to blame an overvalued pound (or undervalued dollar). But that only explains about 30% of the extra cost. A far larger part of those extra costs come in the hidden value-added taxes–which can add up to 40% when you combine costs to consumers and producers. And with salaries tending to be about 20% lower in England than they are here, the purchasing power of Brits must be close to what we would define as the poverty level. The enormous costs of socialized medicine explain at least some of this disparity in the standard of living.
As for the quality of British health care, advocates of socialized medicine point out that while the British system may not be as rich as U.S. heath care, no patient is turned away. To which I would respond that my wife\’s one roommate at Cornell University Hospital in New York was an uninsured homeless woman, who shared the same spectacular view of the East River and was receiving about the same quality of health care as my wife. Uninsured Americans are not left on the street to die.
Something is clearly wrong with medical pricing over here. Ten therapy sessions aren\’t worth $27,000, no matter how shiny the floors are. On the other hand my wife was wheeled into Cornell and managed to partially walk out after a relatively pleasant stay in a relatively clean environment. Can one really put a price on that?
(*Fuh Que NOTE: I await the day that fat fuck Moore croaks an ugly death in an empty hotel. I sincerely hope the medical crew attending him aren\’t too pissed off … well actually I hope they are, but don\’t expect they would let that affect his care. Too bad. After his attack on America… again, he better arrangfe for the ambulance to take him immediately to an international airport.
Wait… Moonbat!s don’t have LTM.
June 16, 2005
Canadian Health Care A Contradiction in Terms
By Steve Chapman
To critics of the American health care system, Shangri-La is not a fantasy but a shimmering reality, though it goes by another name: Canada. Any debate on health care eventually arrives at the point where one participant says, \”We should have what Canadians have. Free care, universal access and low cost — who could ask for more?\” (*FUH QUE NOTE: Ignorant liberals)
Well, plenty of people could ask for more — starting with the Supreme Court of Canada. Last week, ruling on a challenge to the health care in the province of Quebec, the court sent a clear message south: Don\’t believe the hype.
The program, said the court, has such serious flaws that it is violating constitutional rights and must be fundamentally changed. And the flaws, far from being unique to Quebec, are part of the basic structure of Canada\’s health care policy.
No one doubts that the American model has serious defects, particularly rising costs and lack of access to medical insurance. But anyone who thinks the Canadians have come up with a magical solution is doomed to disappointment.
The dirty secret of the system is that universal access is no guarantee of treatment. Sick Canadians spend months and even years on waiting lists for surgery and other procedures. In 1993, the average wait to see a specialist after getting a doctor\’s referral was nine weeks. Since then, according to the Fraser Institute of Vancouver, it\’s increased to 18 weeks.
The typical patient needing orthopedic surgery has time to get pregnant and deliver a baby before being called. The Supreme Court cited the testimony of one orthopedic surgeon that 95 percent of patients in Canada waited over a year for knee replacements — with many of them in limbo for two years.
In some cases, the delay lasts longer than the person enduring it. Or as the Supreme Court put it: \”Patients die as a result of waiting lists for public health care.\”
Not only does the government subject its citizens to painful and even fatal delays in the public system, it bars them from seeking alternatives in the private market. You see, it\’s illegal for private insurers to pay for services covered by the public system. (*FUH QUE NOTE: Ah the wet dream of YOUR very own Cavez in a pantsuit!)
That policy is what forced the Supreme Court to order changes. \”The prohibition on obtaining private health insurance,\” it declared, \”is not constitutional where the public system fails to deliver reasonable services.\”
The program has created a gap between supply and demand that is wider than Hudson Bay. Its failings, however, go beyond that. The single-payer approach, for example, is often held up as the only way to simultaneously control costs and deliver quality care.
In fact, Canada has somehow managed to do neither.
After adjusting for the age of the population, the Fraser Institute compared 27 countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development that guarantee universal access to health care. By some mysterious alchemy, Canada has proportionately fewer physicians than most of these nations but spends more on health care than any except Iceland. (*FUH QUE NOTE: duh!)
It would be a dubious feat to control costs only by depriving people of treatment. But to forcibly deprive people of treatment while letting costs surge is no achievement at all.
Admirers of our good neighbor to the north say the United States pours money into all sorts of fancy equipment but doesn\’t get better results by such measures as life expectancy. But life expectancy is affected by multiple factors, including education, crime rates and diet — with health care playing only a modest role. In those areas where modern medicine can make a big difference, the United States does very well.
Take breast cancer. In Britain, which is famous for its socialized system, close to half of all victims die of the disease, according to a recent Cato Institute study by John Goodman, head of the National Center for Policy Analysis. In Germany and France, almost one-third do. In Canada, the figure is 28 percent — and here, it\’s 25 percent. Our mortality rate for prostate cancer is 67 percent lower than Britain\’s and 24 percent lower than Canada\’s.
The usual story we hear is that the health care system next door provides first-rate care to all, at low cost. The realities — dangerous delays, bloated expenditures and mediocre results — are not so appealing. American liberals may not welcome evidence that the single-payer model works far better in theory than in practice. But for that, they can blame Canada.
Want op in the UK? Wait one year
So injuried teen flies to India where surgery is cheaper
August 07, 2005
HE has to wait 17 weeks just for an appointment. Then he has to wait at least another nine months for an operation in the UK.
So British mum Karen Knott, who couldn\’t bear to see her 14-year-old son, Elliot, in pain has decided to fly him to India for an operation.
She has to fork out 6,000-pound ($17,000) for the trip and the cost of surgery in New Delhi, reported the Daily Mail.
She discovered that the alternative in the UK – going private – would have cost about 25,000(pound).
Her son is suffering from spondylolisthesis, a condition which developed after he injured his back while ice-skating. It is caused when a vertebra slips out of line and presses on a nerve.
STOPPED CLASSES
Elliot can barely stand and has to be helped around his home near Dorchester. He was due to begin his GCSE courses next term, but has had to stop attending classes because of the pain.
His local hospital does not carry out the procedure and referred him to Southampton General Hospital.
But since the referral, he has not been seen by a doctor.
After making inquiries about going private, his parents, who are both design engineers for Westland Helicopters, discovered that the operation could be carried out in India for 4,700.
Elliot and his mother fly out on Tuesday and will be in India for 18 days.
Mrs Knott is appalled by the irony of the situation when many new doctors in the UK are unable to find positions in hospitals because there aren\’t enough training places.
\’It is the worst age for something like this to happen (to Elliot). He is still growing and active, and about to start his GCSEs,\’ said Mrs Knott, who has another son, Ryan, 10.
She arranged the operation through the Taj Medical group. The price includes hospital accommodation for herself. Flights cost 1,300.
\’It is a fraction of the cost of going private,\’ she said.
A spokesman from Southampton General Hospital said: \’Even though our waiting times are within the national levels it is difficult when you are the person affected.
\’Staff who have these specialised skills are in short supply and a lot of their time is taken up with emergency cases.
Is nationalized health care terminal?
Posted: August 26, 2006
1:00 a.m. Eastern
Canada\’s nationalized health-care system, admired by the left all over the world and deplored by the right all over Canada, took another hit last week. The Canadian Medical Association, long its unfailing supporter, suddenly turned against it.
The CMA elected as president Dr. Brian Day, a Vancouver surgeon and one-time supporter of state medicine, who is now an outspoken critic of Canada\’s \”Medicare\” system. In fact, he runs the largest private clinic in the country, offering an array of surgical procedures to people prepared to pay for them. In doing so, he challenges the Canada Health Act, which prohibits for-profit medical practice.
For two reasons, Dr. Day\’s election was viewed as a tidal change in the CMA attitude. For one, he not only opposes Medicare, he is one of its most articulate critics. \”This is a country in which dogs can get a hip replacement in under a week,\” he told the New York Times earlier his year. \”Humans can wait two to three years. … In a free and democratic society, where you can spend money on gambling and alcohol and tobacco, the state has no business preventing us from spending our own money on health care.\”
Raised in Britain, he came from a socialist family and began by supporting the state system. \”But then when you find that your operating room time is cut from 22 hours a week progressively over the years to five hours a week, and you have 450 patients waiting for health care, you realize that something has to give.\” (*FUH QUE NOTE… something about a liberal being mugged…)
Second, that Dr. Day had to stand for this election at all was an intriguing irregularity. The CMA has a rotating presidency, and it was British Columbia\’s turn to provide its chief officer. In the B.C. voting, Dr. Day won handily over the other candidates, all of whom ran on the understanding that the B.C. winner would not be opposed nationally. But one man among them reneged.
Dr. Jack Burak, also of Vancouver, an unreserved supporter of state medicine, decided it was his public duty to force a national election. After all, with an important social cause at stake, why quibble over some trivial moral principle about keeping promises? He campaigned vigorously, probably on the assumption that B.C. doctors may be prepared to allow for-profit medicine but the national body would prove more \”truly Canadian.\” So the national vote became a referendum on the state system. Dr. Burak and the state system both lost.
Once elected, Dr Day hastened to protest that he does not favor dismantling the public system; he merely thinks Canada needs supplementary private services. This did not reassure Medicare\’s defenders, who viewed his election with obvious consternation. \”Medicare has been good for patients and it\’s been good for doctors,\” said outgoing president Dr. Ruth Collins-Nakai. \”If we begin to put doctors\’ interests ahead of patients\’ interests … we will lose public trust.\”
Added Dr. Danielle Martin, chairwoman of Canadian Doctors for Medicare: \”CMA delegates appear to be out of touch with the evidence, with the values of Canadians.\” The union-financed Canadian Health Coalition and the Registered Nurses Association of Ontario declared that Day\’s election clearly indicated withdrawal of CMA support from Medicare.
This was the second reversal inflicted upon Medicare this summer. In June the Supreme Court, arguably the most liberal judicial body in the Western world, decided that even it was not quite liberal enough to endorse the Medicare monopoly. It thereupon threw out a Quebec ban on private medical insurance. \”Access to waiting lists is not access to health care,\” observed Justice Jack Major, who wrote the decision.
Long waits for medical and hospital services are the system\’s chief symptom of failure. The causes are many, not least a steady exodus of young Canadian doctors to the U.S. – which means, of course, that Canadians are training many doctors to work elsewhere. System proponents, however, cite an exhaustive report on Medicare commissioned by the late Liberal government, authored by Roy Romanow, previously the socialist premier of Saskatchewan. Its conclusion: Spend more money and let the government fix the system.
But more and more Canadians are starting to wonder whether any government can fix much of anything and are ready to contemplate alternatives. Not long ago, for instance, one B.C. surgeon publicly offered to take over the majority of surgeries of the local regional health board and perform them at 60 percent of present cost. The offer was angrily rejected as frivolous. The doctor who made it was Brian Day.
Do we really want socialized medicine?
Posted: February 14, 2007
1:00 a.m. Eastern
Problems with our health-care system are leading some to fall prey to proposals calling for a nationalized single-payer health-care system like Canada\’s or Britain\’s. There are a few things that we might take into consideration before falling for these proposals.
London\’s Observer (March 3, 2002) carried a story saying that an \”unpublished report shows some patients are now having to wait more than eight months for treatment, during which time many of their cancers become incurable.\” Another story said, \”According to a World Health Organization report to be published later this year, around 10,000 British people die unnecessarily from cancer each year – three times as many as are killed on our roads.\”
The Observer (Dec. 16, 2001) also reported, \”A recent academic study showed National Health Service delays in bowel cancer treatment were so great that, in one in five cases, cancer which was curable at the time of diagnosis had become incurable by the time of treatment.\”
The story is no better in Canada\’s national health-care system. The Vancouver, British Columbia-based Fraser Institute has a yearly publication titled, \”Waiting Your Turn.\” Its 2006 edition gives waiting times, by treatments, from a person\’s referral by a general practitioner to treatment by a specialist. The shortest waiting time was for oncology (4.9 weeks). The longest waiting time was for orthopedic surgery (40.3 weeks), followed by plastic surgery (35.4 weeks) and neurosurgery (31.7 weeks).
Canadians face significant waiting times for various diagnostics such as computed tomography (CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and ultrasound scans. The median wait for a CT scan across Canada was 4.3 weeks, but in Prince Edward Island, it\’s 9 weeks. A Canadian\’s median wait for an MRI was 10.3 weeks, but in Newfoundland, patients waited 28 weeks. Finally, the median wait for an ultrasound was 3.8 weeks across Canada, but in Manitoba and Prince Edward Island it was 8 weeks.
Despite the long waiting times Canadians suffer, sometimes resulting in death, under federal law, private clinics are not legally allowed to provide services covered by the Canada Health Act. Regardless of this prohibition, a few black-market clinics service patients who are willing to break the law to get treatment. In British Columbia, for example, Bill 82 provides that a physician can be fined up to $20,000 for accepting fees for surgery. According to a Canada News article, \”Shortage of Doctors and Nurses Could Hurt Medicare Reforms\” (March 5, 2003), about 10,000 doctors left Canada during the 1990s.
There\’s help for some Canadian patients. According to a Canadian Medical Association Journal article, \”U.S. Hospitals Use Waiting-List Woes to Woo Canadians\” (Feb. 22, 2000), \”British Columbia patients fed up with sojourns on waiting lists as they await tests or treatment are being wooed by a hospital in Washington state that has begun offering package deals. A second U.S. hospital is also considering marketing its services.\” One of the attractions is that an MRI, which can take anywhere from 10 to 28 weeks in Canada, can be had in two days at Olympic Memorial Hospital in Port Angeles, Wash. Already, Cleveland is Canada\’s hip-replacement center.
Some of our politicians hold up the Canadian and British nationalized health-care systems as models for us. You can bet that should we ever have such a system, they would exempt themselves from what the rest of us would have to endure.
There\’s a cure for our health-care problems. That cure is not to demand more government but less government. I challenge anyone to identify a problem with health care in America that is not caused or aggravated by federal, state and local governments. And, I challenge anyone to show me people dying on the streets because they don\’t have health insurance.
The moral of the stories: YOU FUCKING IGNORANT ARROGANT LIBERALS *STILL* SUBSCRIBE TO THE THEORY THAT VERY BAD PREMISES FAIL ONLY BECAUSE *YOU* HAVEN\’T BEEN ABLE TO BE IN CHARGE OF THEM.
Fuh Que at 40:
Woman at a hospital in Los Angeles, King Harbor I believe, died in the waiting room. Discharged for lack of insurance. This happened this week. All over the news.
Now look it up then argue with me.
and Fuck you!
It amazes me that folks come here with fancy monikers, Fuh Que is one of the latest, spew outright bullshit believing it to be true. Sadly their ability to think ends with the clever moniker.
Even sadder, they never realize it.
Fuh Que,
With all your lengthy posts, you’re turning into the Roger Rabbit of the far right on this blog! Be pithy!
I misspoke in 42, treatment was REFUSED by the hospital, there are laws about rendering emergency aid for just this reason. She was allowed to die within feet of the “finest medical treatment on the planet”. I know she was black. I know there are far too many black people with no insurance and I know one more dying just thins the herd and I know that Wingnuts feel that everyone makes their own destiny. I also know that no one should die when the care is available just because someone decided profits were more important than a human life.
Justify that Fuh Que! Give it your best shot. I am sure you can tell us how the woman deserved to die. We put animals down in a more humane manner than we are treating our fellow Americans.
You know what Fuh Que? Fuck you and the horse you rode in on. You have not posted one “fact” that holds up under scrutiny. It is my sincere hope that you will just get tired of having your ass kicked here and simply fade away.
Fuh Que is the master of the cut and paste. Can’t think for himself. He is a true ignoranus.
IGNORANUS- One who is not only stupid but an asshole as well.
Carl Left Foot: What is not true above?
You on the left say socialized medicine is the utopia for all physical ills. We on the right point out it ain’t true. You can’t swallow it because you need the Moonbat! kool-aid for an assist!
Carl Elft Foot:
Are U saying – NATIONAL CENTER FOR POLICY ANALYSIS is a liar?
Are U saying the J-1 visa program change is a lie?
Are you saying the posted articles from Mr Que are fabrications?
BTW Carl – just what are you saying?
Goldy @ 15,
I wouldn’t believe for a second Cuba’s statistics. They come from a regime that lies worse than the Bush administration.
Also, are they using the same measuring protocol for gathering infant mortality data?
http://neveryetmelted.com/wp-images/WalterReed.jpg
BTW Carl which one is it? Looks to me she was at the hospital but received lousy care. Read all the links about this hospital in MOONBAT! land!
http://tinyurl.com/2yyvql
I go back to work Carl. I feel sorry for Ms Rodriguez. The medical staff let her down and they should pay with more than their jobs. But since the hospital is in Moonbat! land, nuthin will happen. Moonbat!s just slap each other on the wrist.
Regarding the “statistics” of infant mortality:
http://findarticles.com/p/arti.....59858/pg_1
I was very clear in what I said Puddybutt. He made the statement/challenge: “And, I challenge anyone to show me people dying on the streets because they don\’t have health insurance.”
I simply called bullshit and cited just the latest example.
You on the other hand make a baseless statement saying that I am for socialized medicine, not even addressing the issue of my post. Not even close. I am for a system that will provide emergency, life saving care regardless of social and economic status. It is the proper thing to do. We have laws mandating this, but they are routinely circumvented by our heath care system. And you wish to just continue to blame the poor. You fail to see the big picture. People are dying daily for lack of medical care and the ability to afford it. Medical care is not like buying a Lexus or Gucci bag.
Everyone deserves medical care and it cannot be based on ability to pay. So you tell me your solution, Puddybutt. How do we eliminate the abuses, provide equal care, and insure the pofitability of the hospitals and doctors?
I am open to ANY solution that provides the above. I am open to universal insurance, I am open to paying based on income, I am open to a health care tax. Tell me puddybutt, how do we fix this so that people are not dying for lack of funds?
Groupthink
Groupthink is a term coined by psychologist Irving Janis in 1972 to describe one process by which a group can make bad or irrational decisions. In a groupthink situation, each member of the group attempts to conform his or her opinions to what they believe to be the consensus of the group. This results in a situation in which the group ultimately agrees on an action which each member might normally consider to be unwise.
Janis listed eight symptoms that he said were indicative of groupthink:
1. Illusion of invulnerability
2. Unquestioned belief in the inherent morality of the group
3. Collective rationalization of group\’s decisions
4. Shared stereotypes of outgroup, particularly opponents
5. Self-censorship; members withhold criticisms
6. Illusion of unanimity (see false consensus effect)
7. Direct pressure on dissenters to conform
8. Self-appointed \”mindguards\” protect the group from negative information
LEFTY WAS THE LAB RAT THAT PROVED HIS THEORY.
LEFTY IS JUST ANOTHER IN A LONG LINE OF DROOLING LEMMINGS MINDLESSLY REPEATING LIBERAL TALKING POINTS. FACTS BASED ON ACTUAL EVENTS AND FIRST PERSON ACCOUNTS CONFUSE HIM.
I HOPE HE HAS HIS STROKE IN CANADA…SOON.
From Fuh Que regarding my blowing him out of the water and asking him to show me where I was wrong:
(sound of crickets)
Typical Wingnuttery at its finest. Take a shot. Then cut and run.
FUCKING MORON… THE BITCH IN LA WAS A REPEAT DRUG USER CONSTANTLY TRYING TO SCAM ER\’S OUT OF DRUGS.. THEY APPROPRIATELY TURNED HER AWAY BASED ON HER PAST REPEAT BEHAVIOR … HOW SAD ANOTHER DEAD DRUGGIE… IT\’S WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU CONSTANTLY \’CRY WOLF\’. LEARN FROM IT AND JOIN HER SOON LEFTASS…
Typical Wingnuttery at its finest. Take a shot. Then cut and run.
06/15/2007 at 9:36 am
AND YET HERE I AM.. TAKE YOUR BEST SHOT ASSHOLE./.. OR WAS THAT IT?
YOU NEED SOME MENTAL VIAGRA, ASSHOLE, TO GET IT UP AND KEEP IT THERE
http://bp1.blogger.com/_Xn_O-m.....y_Reid.jpg
Fuh Que:
Here is something to chew on asshole.
I have cardiomyopathy, non-ischemic, dialated. The cause is ideopathic. Feel free to Google it. I receive care at the UCLA Cardiomyopathy Clinic. When my ejection fraction reaches a level of deterioration where my life expectancy is 1 year or less, I will be placed on a transplant list. Without insurance, I would not make the list. I have that insurance. Others don’t. My concern is, excuse the pun, heartfelt.
The reason Teresa took the promotion and transfer to Los Angeles from Seattle was, in large part, due to the level of care available at UCLA. Not everyone can afford such a luxury. And that is the problem. It should not be a luxury.
So, you mindless fuck, I have personal experience, I am not a victim of GroupThink. You are, however, a shining example of the phenomenon. Pull your head out of your fucking ass. Your ad hominem attack on me while addressing none of the issues and facts that I used to knock you down is obvious to everyone here at HA.
You are only impressing yourself. Perhaps your mom should cut down on your internet time.
Who the fuck cares? Die faster and let some deserving kid get the heart…. do it for the children.
I’ll just point out that none of the folks who have attempted to answer my challenge have made any effort to define “better” in this context. It’s a pitty that you guys can’t think through this issue with any kind of clarity.
While you’re thinking about how to define “better” in this context, check out the table near the bottom of Wikipedia’s entry on health care in Canada.
While you’re at it, also note that the World Health Organization’s ranking places our health care system at 37th and Canada’s at 30th. I think the UK’s system is even worse, so spending a lot of time comparing the US to Canada and the UK is not likely to convince me that the US has the best health care system in the world.
I’ll repeat: if you want to come up with a cogent argument, start by trying to define “better” in this context. You might want to take a look at the WHO’s definition, and go from there. The WHO’s definition isn’t perfect, but it does provide a good place from which you might construct a cogent argument.
I love that you idiot liberals thing you can twang the heartstrings by playing on FEELINGS.
Get a clue… Seattle or LA would be far better off with one less sanctimonious selfish liberal. You\’re an old fucker potentially denying a heart from someone younger and definietly more deserving.
Fuh Que @ 55
Ad hominem doesn’t make for a cogent argument. You lose, but thank you for playing.
She was still a human being. A cursory exam would have revealed her very real problem. You have still not addressed even one issue. And yet again you blame the person who died, and you exonerate and excuse the hospital. Which by the way is going to lose their license. How do you explain that? A Republican administration is going to cut off their federal funding. How do you explain that?
You morally bankrupt and intellectually dishonest. Some people would simply call you a fool. I believe you to be just a evil little man with a complex that drives him to say and do anything to feel better than the next guy.
Fuck you.
Fuck off Don Joe… you skewed the game by naming yourself as arbitor of what is and is not proof.
She was a drugged out shell of a human being… scamming drugs, costing society.
I tell ya what, get the fuckers at Planned Baby Murder to donate their $55.8 million PROFIT to pay for the care of useless druggies.
@ 66
No there’s an intelligent response. I’ve pointed out the flaws in your reasoning. Nothing arbitrary about those flaws. You can either fix the flaws, or the rest of us will know that you are incomptent when it comes to constructing a cogent argument. Telling me to “fuck off” doesn’t fix the flaws in your reasoning.
63:
You have no idea how old, or young, I am. But your ignorance has once again come shining through.
By the way, dipwad, you it is spelled definitely.
As for deserving: what do you base that on? My political leaning? My ability to kick your ass with logic? I am sure it is not based on my life of service to this country? Or my integrity? These would be attributes with which you are completely and totally unfamiliar.
Again, thank you for the well wishes.
$55.8 million will buy a whole lot of \’health care\’ for the \’uninsured\’… even the kids who CHOOSE not to be insured
Don Joe: I never said the US health care system is the BEST. I said it was better than socialized medicine.
@ 71
Ah, so you now claim that I am correct in believing that we do not have the best health care system in the world?
Actually I DO know how old you are and how tall and how fat your wife is… God knows you never miss an opportunity to talk about them, OR your \”military\” service, OR your goats OR your travel OR your farm OR your bastard kid currently \”serving\”… although I suspect he\’s serving time, not MY country.
Carl, I have an idea how old you are from previous posts.
While I think you are a supreme leftist political asshole at times, I do have sympathy for your heart ailment. One of my buds since 1978 is a heart specialist at NIH so I understand your predicament!
But to your argument on Ms Rodriguez, she was in the hospital and RECEIVED LOUSY SERVICE! You seem to discount it is a MOONBAT! led hospital in one of the largest MOONBAT AREAS OF THE WORLD, LOS ANGELES, home of the Hollyweird elite like Baba Streisand, Tim Robbins, etc.
Fuh Que says to take the “profit” from Planned Baby Murder and pay for health care.
How about we take the billions and billions that are being spent on the cluster fuck in Iraq and pay for every Americans health care. OOPS! If we do that the terrorists will come and take our country away. I forgot about that for a second.
Abortion, you Christian Coalition RightWing War Mongering Freadazoid, has nothing to do with the issue here.
Dumass.
Don Joe, you threw down the gauntlet and I said our health care system is better than rationing. I even placed a the NATIONAL CENTER FOR POLICY ANALYSIS article which you reject because it doesn’t fit your mantra. And I wrote our ills are due to our overeating and smoking.
More than half the crap shitted by Moonbat!s such as stupidman have no statistical backing but are regurgitated from left-wingnut sites. I post an article which the libtard NY Times agrees with and you reject it!
Keep drinking the kool-aid brutha, cuz I can’t help you!
Fuh Que @55
That looks liek a description of the Republican party and the “War on Terror”.
Puddy, the quantlet I threw down was:
No changing goal posts. No shifting of standards. That’s the gauntlet I threw down. If you don’t want to answer that challenge, fine, but you’re not going to convince me of anything unless you rise to that challenge.
By the way, that is, by far, the most important question in this entire debate. The ones that are, if it isn’t the best, then why the hell isn’t it and what can we do to make it the best?
NB, the above should read, “The ones that follow are, …”
Aren\’t you dead yet?
Shit.
Save a kid: DIE!
Fuh Que is proudofherfatlyingcheatingass! Nice to have you back. Thank you again for the well wishes. He has not clue one about my wife, her build, my son or his service.
By the way, this is OUR country. And we are taking it back.
Fuck you.
By the way, I am 50 years old. It is not a secret.
You have \”taken it back\” and it\’s failing miserably. The foul air in Seattle is the stench of failed liberalism, not \”global warming\”
How\’s Harry doing??
How\’s nancy doing?
Still waving your white flag?
God, I am so glad to know about your near dead heart. Tell whomever to post your obit when you finally bite it. Save a kid: DIE!
By the way, Puddy, I don’t think you’ve managed to even proove the point you set out to proove. What about all those other health care systems that the WHO ranks above the US and Canada? What are the distinguishing factors between those health care systems and ours, and is “rationing” among those distinguishing factors?
Right wingers have no choice but to move goal posts – otherwise they can’t win.
Puffybutt do your own research. It’s well known that you and I and every other taxpayer get to pay for free health care in Iraq. You pretending it’s not true doesn’t make it false you ass-licking, Muslim loving, coward.
Your wife says hi!
Fuh Que must have one of those health plans that limit benefits for mental illness. The sorry-assed sonofabitch plainly needs tranquilizers and a helluva therapist. Perhaps we should take up a collection so the fucker can get the help he needs. Or, better, maybe we should just tell his mother that a post-birth abortion is advisable for her. Her placenta seems to believe it has something to say.
81
Are you sure? The style reminds me a lot of the late, unlamented Auntie Liberal, the person who defined liberal by showing us just how spiteful, petty, ignorant, arrogant, tedious and humorless the opposite of liberal is.
Of course they could be the same person for all I know or care. There are a number of handles on this blog that, when that handle heads up a post, I go right on past without reading. Guess which one is the most recent addition to the list.
I haven’t been able to find which theaters in Seattle will be showing Sicko. Anyone know? Presumably the times and theaters will be showing up in the daily fishwrap as the 29th approaches, but I’d like to make plans early.
I\’ve come to an enlightening realization in these past moments: what goes around comes around. When you live your life badly, shit happens (hello, Left Foot).
In light of that realization, I am supremely blessed with great health and family genetics of a long life.
Left foot, good luck.
You piss me off, as most of you fucking smarmy Seattle liberals do with their closed minds, but even you deserve better. You take pleasure in deriding \”Christian Coalition RightWing War Mongering Freadazoid\”, but that won\’t stop prayers for your continued health and long life.
We need to look at the countries that are at the top of the World Health Organization list, such as France (# 1) and Italy (# 2). Obviously, Canada is more problematic, since they are at # 30 and we are at # 37.
The suggestion that our system should be more “private” is unfair and unworkable. For better or worse, we spend 16% of GNP on health care. Our per capita GNP in 2006 was $44,000. There are lots of people with lower incomes and greater health needs, whose health care costs exceed their incomes. So should these people just die, because they don’t have the money?
Stupidman, there is nothing to research because you can’t prove it. IDIOT.
I proved my points with cogent researched articles.
Other countries who report infant mortality rates use different criteria than does the US; premature births in those countries are not considered viable ages in some cases but they are considered viable in the US. Therefore their infant mortality rates look better. So it’s apples to oranges. Also in the US the those 22 week sextuplets will be considered viable and so when they expire as they probably will, those will go into the infant mortality column here, even though at 22 weeks they would not be expected to be viable even if singleton births.
Fuh Que at 90:
Nice Christian values. Your first paragraph effectively negates your second paragraph.
Christian values, which you rightwingnuts espouse here daily, would require you to heed the “Judge not, lest ye be judged” part of your Holy Bible.
Calling me names, wishing me dead, calling the lady who died at the hospital a drugged out whatever certainly is not my idea of Christian values. I suppose we could ask John Barelli, he is both Christian and liberal. Who knows, I might be wrong.
But I doubt it.
And you could be the infamous Auntie Liberal. You keep changing your moniker in an effort to hide. If I were you I would want to hide too. I would be too ashamed to have anyone know how hateful and spiteful and ugly I really am.
Richard at 91:
Thank you!
Regarding Fuh Que’s response to my request for his offer of solution to the health care problem in this country.
(sound of crickets)
The man has no intellectual integrity. He is capable only of attacking the messenger. He just does not get it.
Asshole.
Attacking the messenger excuse Carl?
That’s the modus operandi of ‘Wipes Moonbat!s.
1. This is a liberal blog
2 – Whatever. blah blah blah
Whatever+1. Attack the Messenger when there is nothing left in the tank.
Puddy,
Are you going to answer the questions I raised @ 84?
Think what you may, your attacking my coming to the realization of a mistake speaks loudly of your moral bankrupty.
Good luck with your heart thing. I pray that whomever it is that is becomes your donor has lived a happy life and that it continues on in you.
For those who are really interested in medical facts since Don Joe and others WILL NOT investigate it but shoot the messenger:
http://tinyurl.com/2u9wre – Europe
http://tinyurl.com/2ldcs6 – For the World
Puddy has to provide the facts cuz Moonbat!s rely on Stink Progress, Michael Moron, Daily Kurse, and Media Morons!
The use of the word COGENT in any post by Puffybutt proves that there is no connection between him and reality.
You’ve never proven one point here Puffy except that you’re a hypocrite, asshole and punk.
You tell people to do their own research when challenged and expect a free pass in return. I am not as stupid as your wife so eat shit. You can’t DISPROVE a fucking thing I say. Until you can, I win.
4 Well, Mark, if I had brain cancer, I guess I sure wouldn’t go to Valley General.
“Fuh Que” appears to have demonstrated that his literary talents include not only the more-or-less correct spelling of four-letter Anglo-Saxon colloquialisms, but nimble use of the “Ctl-C” and “Ctl-V” keys, and and–holy Moses! a rudimentary understanding of HTML tags. (Betcha his Mom helped him with that last one, though.)
Puddy,
At what point did I shoot you? And, you still haven’t answered my questions at 84. The data to which you’ve provided links might form the basis for a cogent argument, but they do not, in and of themselves, constitute a cogent argument.
99
I accept your apology.
Richard Pope says:
We need to look at the countries that are at the top of the World Health Organization list, such as France (# 1) and Italy (# 2). Obviously, Canada is more problematic, since they are at # 30 and we are at # 37.
I guess I would want to know how the WHO derives their rankings. I’m also curious as to the tax rate on wages in Canada, France and Italy…..compared to that of the USA.
What happened in CA was terrible. I don’t see how we improve our healthcare system by turning the burden onto working families to pay for social medicine…
To use medical terms, we need to stop the bleeding. (reduce the number of people using the ER as a primary care facility). Treat the wound- come up with a way for communities to organize groups of people and have insurers compete to cover these organizations…
John B above. You said
“The Republicans want self-managed Social Security accounts. This will benefit stockbrokers, accountants and folks with the time and background to carefully research investments, along with shady operators that advertise “guaranteed return investments”.
Yes, and so what? What is bad about that? You also forgot to point out that currently our “social security lock box” is empty. It’s always empty…Congress has to find a way to fund its obligations every year.
Someone putting their money in tax free bonds, an index fund, anything would gain a better return on their money that what is currently happening which is zilch…..
I am way more comfortable managing my money rather that hoping that there will be any SS $$$ left when I retire.
uhhhhh, by the way,
Where’s Roger?
40 MILLION PLUS HAVE NO HEALTH COVERAGE. HOW ARE THE WINGNUTS GOING TO SOLVE THAT PROBLEM?
HEALTH SAVINGS ACCOUNTS?
BULLSHIT! LIKE EVERYTHING ELSE THESE WINGNUTS “PUT UP”..
@ 106
Everything you need is at http://www.who.int/whr/2000/en/.
By the way, the issue with Social Security isn’t so much a matter of people’s return on investment. The issue is the inherent dishonesty in trying to convince the American people to trade in an insurance program for an investment program.
@109
Ahh but there is the rub now isn’t it..?
I don’t think it’s anymore dishonest than convincing the people that there is a “lock box”, or money set aside for each person…which is not true.
http://takeastandagainstlibera.....moore.html
>>ROTFLMAO!!! Suck It Moore!
\”Michael Moore\’s new documentary \”Sicko\” has been pirated and is now widely available for download on peer-to-peer content sites like http://www.thepiratebay.org.\”
\”If the breach is as wide as it appears — and this reporter downloaded a copy and watched it late Thursday night with ease — Moore, and his distributor, The Weinstein Company, have a every film maker\’s worst marketing nightmare on their hands — how to persuade people to go to the theater to see a show that\’s available free on the Internet.\”
How\’s that for Karma you fat ass beeeyotch!!!!!!! To whomever released this,so that this fat feck makes no money, you are brilliant and I love you.
Labels: FatAss, liberals light on facts, Michael Moore
Cluelessman@108: Did you know when GWB came to his job there were 39.2 million Americans without health care? Wait a minute… yous a Moonbat! so that fact was lost on your puny mind.
Now, what did they do about the problem? Nuthin!
RS, I don’t know of anyone who thinks that Social Security will remain solvent, and there are a lot of proposals that people have put on the table to solve the problem. I happen to favor raising the FICA limit (which, by the way, would have an adverse affect on me personally).
Puddy, I’m not sure I follow your agument. The problem, which got worse under a Republican-controlled congress during six years of Clinton’s Presidency, get handed off to GWB and a still Republican-controlled congress. And the problem got worse, not better. This is supposed to be an endorsement for Republican philosophy? ‘Fraid you lost me on that one.
Goldy,
You’re a dumb ass if you think you can’t afford good insurance. I’ll give you a tip. I work for myself, and I do OK, but I’m not living any kind of wealthy life. Instead of bitching and being emotionally led by Michael Moore’s propaganda like you, I called some insurance carriers. I’ve had a great policy for well over a year now from Regence Blue Shield. It’s a high deductible policy, you have to do a little digging to find it, but basically by getting a high deductible you get a great monthly rate that even a lame blogger / very low level radio talk show host should be able to afford. If you can’t afford it with the high level of unemployment and your education, writing skills and resume, then you are just not trying hard enough, and frankly you deserve what you get.
Then end result of the policy I have is that you get disaster coverage that WOULD cover you at the Hutch for cancer if you needed it, but that still costs less. I pay my own preventative dental, and I keep myself in great shape, with good eating habits, etc. It is possible to get good insurance in our system, but sitting on your ass and whining like a liberal won’t get you anywhere.
I agree that the system needs work. But the primary problem is not that we can’t afford healthcare, it’s that the payer is not the same as the consumer. So the consumer has a disconnect with the service. Imagine if you had HMO or PPO hair care coverage. Divorced from the true end consumer, it would not be long before routine hair care prices went way up. Who’s gonna question the outlandish bills for a routine haircut? It’s all a rig between hospitals orgs and the insurers. The solution is to put healthcare credits into individuals hands and let them make their own choices and demand good healthcare at a reasonable prices. In other words, a real health care market, not the fake heavily subsidized one that we have today with zero tort reform that doctors really hate. That’s how I play the system. It allows me to pay less, and still get a great policy for the disaster scenario, but it also encourages me to get off my ass and take care of my own health too.
I can see by the progression of pictures of you on your blog over the past few years that you’ve let is slide Goldy. You’re becoming a fat ass and spending too much time drinking liberally. And then you have the gall to whine about not being able to afford insurance and playing your victim card like some low skilled and uneducated person. Your health is primarily your responsibility.
You need to get a real job Goldy, and then you’ll get healthcare built in to the benefits. There’s no crisis, just propagandists like you and Michael Moore looking for ways to get more voters.
I’ll be waiting for the Sicko debunking sites to appear just like the one’s that factually dissected Fahrenheit 9/11. But no doubt you are a true believer who won’t be swayed, no matter how many lies Michael Moore tells.
Sorry to be out of the conversation, although Mr. Que seems to be a rather uninteresting iteration of one of our older cut-and-paste wingnuts, and really not worth much time.
(I’ve been busy as one of the delegates at the Pacific Northwest Conference of the United Methodist Church, and working with my real estate clients in the evening.)
And while I am reluctant to judge another person, judging their words is an entirely different matter. I really hope that Mr. Que doesn’t actually believe the venom that he’s spewing. When dealing with such a person, I usually feel a bit sorry for them. When I get tired of it, I can leave. They’re stuck with themselves.
Mr. Que has not, to my understanding, claimed to be Christian, and certainly his words would be unacceptable in any Christian denomination. (No, I don’t consider the Westboro Baptist Church to be Christian, and certainly not Baptist.)
For My Left Foot. I hadn’t known why you moved, although I knew that it must have been something important to make you move to Southern California. Hope you don’t mind an old Methodist putting you in his prayers.
http://www.ofm.wa.gov/researchbriefs/brief039.pdf
It seems that the State of Washington disagrees with you. Or maybe not, depending on whether you consider people near the poverty line to be worth considering.
If you wish, I can find the data that shows that the uninsured around the poverty line are working folks. Not all that difficult, as the folks on public assistance usually also receive Medicaid, and so are not “uninsured”.
PUDDYSTUPID @ 112
WHAT’S HAPPENING PWHACKO? NOT SUNDOWN YET?
THE CLINTONS TRIED TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. A LOT OF PEOPLE FOUND FAULT WITH IT (ESPECIALLY MORONS ON THE RIGHT) BUT AT LEAST THEY TRIED.
THE DEMS ARE AT LEAST DEBATING NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE. THE WINGNUT R’S OF COURSE ARE ONLY TALKING ABOUT HEALTH SAVING ACCOUNTS WHICH SO FAR HAVE ONLY SERVED AS ANOTHER TAX SHELTER FOR RICH PEOPLE.
THE DEMS ARE DEBATING IDEAS, THE R’S ARE SHILLING FEAR AND TAX SHELTERS FOR RICH PEOPLE.
114 – GOOD FOR YOU! YOU FOUND AFFORDABLE HEALTH COVERAGE! NOW I HOPE YOU KEEP TAKING GOOD CARE OF YOURSELF AND DON’T GET INTO AN ACCIDENT OR SOMETHING SO YOU DON’T HAVE TO ACTUALLY USE THAT INSURANCE!
BECAUSE THERE’S A LOT OF PEOPLE WHO HAVE SO-CALLED “AFFORDABLE” COVERAGE WHO FIND THEMSELVES IN THE HOSPITAL AND AFTER THEY GET OUT – THEY END UP LOSING THEIR HOUSE!
JUST LIKE THE FOLKS IN NEW ORLEANS GETTING A PITTANCE FROM THE POLICIES THEY’VE PAID INTO FOR YEARS.
Buy It @114,
You are a mean-spirited, selfish prick, who is clearly living in capitalist cloud cuckoo land.
We might even subscribe to the exact same insurance plan. Next year it will cost me $144/month, with a $1500 deductible. It provides no prescription medication or preventative care. In addition to the deductible there are copays ranging from $15 to $75. The plan pays 80% of most “necessary” services until my out of pocket expenses (excluding deductible) pass $3000 in a calendar year.
What does this mean? Well, let’s say I do get cancer. It will cost me $4,500 a year in deductible and co-pay, plus $1,728 in premiums. That’s $6,228 a year… plus the cost o routine visits and prescription drugs. And oh yeah… they put bizarrely low caps on things like organ transplants ($250,000 lifetime, $50,000 per organ) which means much of the expense for that would come out of my pocket.
Maybe I can manage that. I’ve got some resources. And my family has resources. But I’m not the average American.
Some Joe earning $20,000 is better off with no insurance at all than an insurance plan that bankrupts them even when it does pay off.
What would it cost me to buy a “comprehensive” plan? $329/month ($3,888/year) with a $500.00 deductible and a $2,000 cap on copays (pays 80% of services.) That’s a maximum outlay of $6,333 in a calendar year… a few bucks higher than the catastrophic plan.
On the other hand, the “comprehensive” plan does pay 50% of prescription drugs… but only up to a maximum benefit of $2000 per calendar year. And it does pay for preventative care.
Quite frankly, both these options suck. And we haven’t even started talking about dental. Make it a family of four earning, say $50,000 instead of a single Joe, and it really becomes unaffordable.
So don’t give me this shit that if I can’t afford medical care I get what I deserve. It’s not about me. I’m relatively privileged.
Goldy,
You missed the worst part of Buy’s comments: the notion of health credits. The one unanswered question in that proposal is, how do we decide who gets how many credits? Do we give the same number of credits to a near 50-yr old, overweight smoker that we give to a 25-yr old athlete? By the time you get down to the details, what you end up with is just a different falvor of rationing, which, if you ask Puddy, won’t work.
There’s no crisis, just propagandists like
RIGHT-WING PRICKS WHO THINK 40 MILLION PLUS WITHOUT DECENT HEALTH COVERAGE IS NO CRISIS, WHO THINK COUNTRIES WITHOUT THIS PROBLEM ARE “NANNY-STATES”, WHO THINK ANYONE WITHOUT THIS PROBLEM AREN’T “DIGGING ENOUGH”.
@119
Goldy, So are you some kind of victim here? Should we feel bad for you?
Get a JOB. Start with that. Be a provider to your kid! take care of business man and quite whinning about how the gov’t owes you health care coverage.
John @ 115:
I will accept all the help I can get. I am not so arrogant to think that there is no value in prayer. Thank you.
122 Wrong Stuff:
Come back to us when your “coverage” won’t cover a transplant, your medications are costing more than your monthly rent and you can’t get a specialist to take your insurance as payment in full.
As for Goldy getting a job and being provider, what part of his post did you not understand? Go back and read it real slow…. He is quite clear. You just got your panties in a bunch because he blew another wingnut right out of the water.
What an asshole! Your parents must be so proud.
@122
Easy Foot.
The last line he throws in in becuase I’m sure he must have started to feel a little guilty about his whining. I just wanted to accentuate that for him. Goldy’s situation is of his own making. Now, I have posted ideas about bringing costs down to folks who don’t get coverage thru EMPLOYMENT. I disagree completely with the notion of Gov’t provided health care funded on the backs of wage earners.
I’ve lived without coverage.
Goldy,
But you completely ignore the alternative of having no insurance. Cancer will cost you a lot more if you have to bear the full burden of the treatments. A lot more than your yearly figures, which are higher than mine, so we must be on a different plan.
The point is that if you want to pay less, you get less. Why don’t you get that? And why should anyone have to pay for anyone else? Frankly, I don’t care about a $20K per year worker that I don’t know. Why should I care? Why should that person care about me if they don’t know me? Healthcare is not a right. If you want more, pay more. If you can’t afford it, too bad. Life sucks.
If the system were reformed, there would be options for the low end that might be less quality, but at least something. Just like poorer folks should not expect to be eating out in nice restaurants and instead subsisting on the minimums. That you think that there is some automatic qualification for goods and services just because one is alive shows why you have a broken ideology. And what part of the government funded system will encourage people to take more responsibility for their health? It will be the opposite, and then there will be even more health issues. Ask any Canadian how they like their healthcare. I know many who are new immigrants because they prefer the quality of our system.
A government funded system will encourage scarcity. Good luck getting cancer treatment then, even if you can afford the free price tag.
If you want more, pay more, or shut up. No one owes you a damn thing.
Buy it said:
No comment here, as this person and I don’t share enough values for us to have a meaningful discussion of issues.
I just thought that we should all see the basis for his argument, rather than leaving it buried in the middle of his post.
Health Care in this country is an absolute joke. None of you know this because you don’t live with the realities. You’re going to die.
The question is how will you die? Will you die in pain? Will you succumb to a mirade of treatments designed to make a doctor rich. Will your organs shut down from bad medicines prescibed by a bad doctor?
I love the MRI comparison. Who the fuck cares? Did you know that there are MRI clinics in the USA? For a hundred bucks you get get yourself scanned; so what?
We pay billions upon billions of dollars on our health care system for elective treatments, bad drugs, and doctors who have more money than they could spend in ten life times.
Now let’s adress the insurance companies. You’re going to die. The insurance companies want to ensure they collect as much as they can for the least amount of cost. An actuary in an insurance company is determining your level of care. That’s a fact.
The American public prefers having insurance companies churning your policies to to having a government run system. My goverment is accountable to me. The insurance industry is accountable to no one.
The reality is that you don’t know how fucked up our system is until you are dying. I’ve seen people die in third world countries with more dignity, and less pain. Those people didn’t spend a life time trying to figure out how to pay insurance premiums.
In South America I pay a fraction of the costs for drugs. There again I can’t get drugs easily anywhere. Our United States government spend billions upon billions of dollars dictating drug policies to the entire mother fucking world.
You stupid, whiney, bunch of pussy ass mother fuckers, are debating if we have a health care system?
It’s not a debate, it’s a problem. Yes Cuba has a better health care system. It’s a fact. The entire world could benefit from a comprehensive health care system. This rah rah, we got ours mentality is for guns, and soccer.
Health care is a right. Death with dignity is a right. Death with honor at my chosing is a right.
Yes, I use both our system and go out of the country for health care. That should also be my right.
I wonder if we should change our system of dealing with fire to match our health care system: fire departments will only go to those houses whose owners have paid fire insurance, and fight the fire according to the coverage (on the “if you pay less, you get less; no one owes you anything” model). And the same with police services while we’re at it.
Not.
Just like any of us could have a fire in our home or need the help of the police, any one of us could get in an accident or get ill through no fault of our own. Having a system to take care of that should be just as basic as funding our fire fighters and police force.
Manu@128 Ummm, to a certain extent, we do run our system of dealing with fire in the same fashion as we do health care. Not exactly, since most urban fire districts are supported by universal property taxation. But in rural settings, this isn’t the case. Of particular note are many homes, and summer cabins to the north of Spokane, that do not have fire protection, and many of whom opted out of paying the fees and taxes to support their local rural fire districts. . .leading to some wrenching events where hoemowners were left to watch their homes burn to the ground while imploring fire district personnel to ‘save’ their uncovered property. . . . . .
If you build far enough away from population centers, you simply do not have the infrastructure to support organized fire protection. If you live in a boundary zone, you can have uneven protection, and may find that you can ‘opt out’ and pay the consequences. I point this out because the comparison to fire fighting is an inexact analogue to health care.
I am in favor of universally available health care. I must agree with the sentiment that a well regulated society will provide some measure of freedom from suffering, and to promote dignity in dying.
Arguing about how to pay for this, or the manner of providing it is the political wrangling point. . .this is where the sausage actually gets made.
Frankly, I don’t care about a $20K per year worker that I don’t know.
OK YOU DON’T CARE ABOUT ME OR A HOMELESS VET, A WORKING POOR FAMILY OR ANYONE ELSE?
FINE. TELL ME YOUR PLACE OF BUSINESS SO I WILL NEVER, EVER CONTRIBUTE TO YOUR MEANS OF MAKING A LIVING.
Damn! Sorry I missed the chance to throw a tomato at that fat-slob, one-sided, non-factual piece of human garbage.
Don Joe says:
While you’re thinking about how to define “better” in this context, check out the table near the bottom of Wikipedia’s entry on health care in Canada.
Wikipedia . . . there’s a reputable source. Riiight.
While you’re at it, also note that the World Health Organization’s ranking places our health care system at 37th and Canada’s at 30th.
Exactly. Canada’s rates seven places above ours while we spend orders of magnitudes more on health care than they do. We’re first in the world in spending and it all goes to insurance companies, Big Pharma and the Doctor’s Union. The latter is well-known for taking steps to prevent “physician oversupply” by making residency program slots scarce. Many med students don’t get into residency, making their four years of pressure-cooker med school for naught.
As for the comments about malpractice lawsuits, that’s insurance industry propaganda. Overall, the number of suits filed and sizes of jury awards have gone down, not up, in the last few years. In the med mal context, most attorneys won’t take the cases because they so hard to win. A med mal plaintiff has one chance in four at best in front of a jury. Most med mal trials, in fact, result in straight defense verdicts where the plaintiff gets nothing.
And the truth is, the medical profession has done a horrible job of policing itself and an even worse job of exposing incompetent doctors. Case in point: HHS keeps a registry of fuckup doctors, it’s called the National Practitioner Data Bank. Hospitals and insurance companies can query it, of course, but it’s a crime for you and I to do so. Why? They’re more interested in protecting the “doctor lifestyle” than patients.
Money over people, it’s what capitalism is all about, always has been about, and always will be about. The difference between the care you need and the care you get? That’s called “profit.” At least the government doesn’t have a profit motive.
@134
See you later! That is until you need real medical attention. You’ll be back.