What the Canadians have done makes a lot of sense. Yes, they pay more in taxes, but the amount they pay in taxes is far LESS than what we pay in taxes plus the cost of health insurance prermiums, if we're fortunate to be able to either afford it or have it provided to us. Plus there's no pre-existing condition, no being dropped on technicalities, and none of the other games and gimmicks we're subjected to by the health insurance companies to shave costs, which go into their pockets.
How do they pay for it? Through the taxes that everyone pays, and the burden is a lot less because (a) they don't have the overhead that we have of having to support billions in salaries and bonuses of health care executives, (b) they don't have to support the billions in salaries for a huge army of health insurance bureaucrats whose only job is to stand in between patients and doctors and deny care, and (c) the government is allowed, unlike the US, to bargain for prescription drugs with the pharmaceutical companies, for buying in bulk.
Now, there are those who would say they are against "government run health care" because they "don't want to pay for anyone else's care. Set aside the sheer selfisheness of that, but lets look at the foolishness of it. Which would you rather do, have others less fortunate have access to health care through a few more dollars in taxes, or have the extra money you pay for health care (on top of taxes) go to pay for the yachts and mansions of health care executives who sit on the insurance company "death panels," denying care so they can gain more in profit, while adding absolutely nothing in value to the mission of providing care?
The system we have is insanity; the only way it makes any sense at all is if you is if you assume it exists to enrich the owners of these companies. And I do not get those who say "we don't want government run health care" while threatening the government to not take away their Medicare, or while being under the VA system. And if these systems are "broke," its not because of the systems themselves but because of the fact that the money in these systems have been "borrowed from" and not paid back. The systems as they are, are self-sustaining.
The real question is this: if we are the "greatest country in the world," how can it be that other countries can deliver health care for their citizens, and not go broke, and we can't?
...The system we have is insanity; The real question is this: if we are the "greatest country in the world," how can it be that other countries can deliver health care for their citizens, and not go broke, and we can't?...
I could agree with you more Brother Clark, but also we taxpayers do have to end of paying for the uninsured when they use the Emergency Department for their care as well as when they are admitted to the hospital without any means of being able to pay. Taxpayers end up paying in the long run, because the hospitals increase the costs across the board for various test like blood work, diagnostic tests, and procedures.
The fact that we can't provide health care to every citizen and permanent residence is embarrassing. I hope that we can get beyond these distractions that various people and groups are bringing in order to focus on what would be best for all of our country's people.
Thursday, September 3rd 2009 at 5:37PM
Jen Fad
Kind of late, but the post is so good! I have never seen this advertised on television, but that's not surprising, since it doesn't benefit Big Insurance.
I have a friend that visited Canada. She slipped and fell on some black ice (the kind you can't see). When they whisked her to the local hospital, she rifled her purse for her insurance card. She was told: "Not a problem." They performed an X-ray, MRI, observed her for 2 days and discharged her. Her cost? ZERO. No co-pay. NADA. She considers herself a Conservative, and wonders why we as a country can't seem to do this.
Sunday, October 11th 2009 at 3:15PM
Reginald Goodwin
