Health care - administrative incompetence

[Rolfe]

[....] Some drugs will simply not be covered. Since I'm not in the PPO, my MD can Rx drugs as often as s/he determines is needed.

My friend's PPO: he pays a fairly standard co-pay for most drugs--say $10-20. But his PPO keeps a tighter reign on the MDs ability to prescribe drugs willy nilly. He was on Accutane (for Acne); his PPO balked when his MD wanted to prescribe a second course, so the MD prescribed doxycycline. My insurer would have simply paid for a second Rx.

And xjx388 thinks this is absolutely fine, but denounces the entire NHS because of a couple of tabloid newspaper reports about people not receiving stuff a lot more expensive and questionable than Accutane.

"Some drugs will simply not be covered." If the NHS treated us like that, there would be riots on the streets.

Rolfe.

 

[xjx388]

This thread has turned into the biggest strawman argument I've yet seen . . .

I never said doctors deserve millions of dollars...

I never said my wife is more valuable than JK Rowling...

I never said let's redistribute the wealth...

What I actually said was that I want doctors, teachers, footballers, writers -just about everybody to get paid what they are worth to society. I believe the best way to accomplish that is through the free market.

You are the ones who say that health care is a basic right. OK, then why don't you prioritize at as such? You don't deny there is inequity in your system. You don't deny that people who need care are denied. The reason that this is so is that there are not enough resources to go around, so you have to ration care. Yet, the UK spends about £3bil on football each year. You spend £13.4bil on tobacco products. How many more people could be served with £16bil? Ah, but the people want Football and Ciggies. But those things are not rights like Health Care is, so why not take that money and spend it on Health Care if it's so damned important?

I say Health Care is no more a right than food and shelter are. We distribute the latter two through the free market and healthcare should be no different.

 

[xjx388]

"Some drugs will simply not be covered." If the NHS treated us like that, there would be riots on the streets.

So are you telling me that all drugs are covered for all people?

No, even in the NHS, some drugs will simply not be covered.

 

[xjx388]

@xjx388 - You're operating in/near McAllen, Texas, correct?

If so, this article points out that it's one of the most expensive cities in the country for medical care, mostly from overutilization.



This article is a great read. It was quote earlier in the thread, but everyone should read it.

This article is a brilliant Democrat manifesto.

It is not based in reality. There are many factors why the RGV spends more and Physician greed is the least one.

 

[Emet]

I say Health Care is no more a right than food and shelter are. We distribute the latter two through the free market and healthcare should be no different.

And there you have it, my compassionate friends across the Pond. We're going to boil this down to Constitutional rights, and the Declaration of Independence.

No discussion of what's in the best interest of human beings and society as a whole.

Get a job, educate yourself, and all will be fine. If not, tough nookies. You can live under a bridge, and dumpster dive to stay alive, or find a homeless shelter or a soup kitchen. Walk to a free clinic if you can find one. You won't be voting; the middle and upper class will. If you commit a crime, we will spend a lot of money to incarcerate you--and you'll have food and shelter. But otherwise, no assistance will be forthcoming. I did it, why can't you?

And you will die sooner anyways...

Wait, you were employed, but were laid off? You lost your home, your insurance, your possessions? Wah, cry me a river. Pound the pavement, re-train. Micky D's is always hiring.

 

[Tatyana]

This thread has turned into the biggest strawman argument I've yet seen . . .

I never said doctors deserve millions of dollars...

I never said my wife is more valuable than JK Rowling...

I never said let's redistribute the wealth...

What I actually said was that I want doctors, teachers, footballers, writers -just about everybody to get paid what they are worth to society. I believe the best way to accomplish that is through the free market.

You are the ones who say that health care is a basic right. OK, then why don't you prioritize at as such? You don't deny there is inequity in your system. You don't deny that people who need care are denied. The reason that this is so is that there are not enough resources to go around, so you have to ration care. Yet, the UK spends about £3bil on football each year. You spend £13.4bil on tobacco products. How many more people could be served with £16bil? Ah, but the people want Football and Ciggies. But those things are not rights like Health Care is, so why not take that money and spend it on Health Care if it's so damned important?

I say Health Care is no more a right than food and shelter are. We distribute the latter two through the free market and healthcare should be no different.

I think you have lost the plot.

For one who goes on so much about freedom and free market, are you seriously suggesting that 'the big bad gobernment' bans football and tobacco and/or takes all the money from the proceeds (tobacco is taxed severely) and give it to the NHS?

In case you haven't noticed, NICE and the NHS make far more use out of the free market when it comes to prescription drugs, which is why we spend far less, and may also result in ALL drugs being available.

The propaganda for drugs in the US is retarded. The campaign that is run against generic drugs is relentless. For example, despite the fact that we figured out how to synthesis thyroxine, a super simple molecule of tyrosine (one amino acid) and four iodine molecules, there is still the mantra that 'ooooooooooh the dose may not be correct'.

This, in a country that is still using dessicated pig thyroid (Armor) and people take 'grains' of it which can vary from 22 mg - 54 mg per grain.

Along with this goes the mantra 'its better because it is natural' forgetting that there are all sorts of other compounds, instead of the EXACT thyroid hormone we secrete.

Utter madness.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=are-generic-drugs-bad-for-you

How we run a lot of the hospitals is not some monolithic government tyranny, there are boards of governors that the public are asked to sit on.

Health care in the US is not a free market, it is a monopoly of the insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies, and I find it so sad that there are people who have been brainwashed into thinking that this is the best way to deliver health care.

 

[Agatha]

What I actually said was that I want doctors, teachers, footballers, writers -just about everybody to get paid what they are worth to society. I believe the best way to accomplish that is through the free market.

You are the ones who say that health care is a basic right. OK, then why don't you prioritize at as such? You don't deny there is inequity in your system. You don't deny that people who need care are denied.

We do deny that people who need care are denied care in our system, which is why when it happens or appears to happen, it's headline news and reviews are ordered, and if necessary things change. In your system, people are denied care which they need every single day on the ground of cost.

The reason that this is so is that there are not enough resources to go around, so you have to ration care.

Zing! This is where your misunderstanding lies. People are not denied treatment on the basis of cost, they are denied treatment on the basis of clinical need and the evidence-based assessments of the effectiveness of the proposed treatments. This is why tabloid headlines may scream out about "treatment denied due to cost" but it's actually "treatment denied due to cost-effectiveness". An expensive drug which is no more effective than other treatments will not be prescribed because there is no evidence that it will give a better outcome. Surely you should be applauding evidence-based rather than cost-based medicine?

For example: An alcoholic who cannot/will not abstain from alcohol for six months will be denied a liver transplant, until they get off the alcohol. Once they do abstain, they are on the transplant list.

Someone who is so morbidly obese that surgery would be too dangerous would be denied all but life saving surgery until they lose weight - but they'd also be helped to lose it, by whatever means is deemed to be the best for that individual.

We keep saying that cost is not the driver of the (rare, and headline making) decisions to deny care, clinical need and evidence-based medicine is what drives these decisions. Possibly we're not saying it loud enough, because you don't seem to be hearing it.

Yet, the UK spends about £3bil on football each year. You spend £13.4bil on tobacco products. How many more people could be served with £16bil? Ah, but the people want Football and Ciggies. But those things are not rights like Health Care is, so why not take that money and spend it on Health Care if it's so damned important?

I say Health Care is no more a right than food and shelter are. We distribute the latter two through the free market and healthcare should be no different.

And we say it's a right that we in our society are happy to pay for, and we do it at half the cost of your broken system. BTW, are there are no homeless shelters or social housing projects over there? Strange. I also thought I'd heard of food stamps in the US.

I note you have skipped over this bit again:

A free market would exclude the complex, expensive cases because the recipients would never be able to afford them. A free market would exclude those people born into poverty who need care from birth (or before).

A free market would leave me out in the cold, even if I put every penny I ever earn over my whole life into healthcare. I could prioritise healthcare over everything else; no money ever for mortgage or rent, no money to feed or clothe myself, and still I could never earn enough to pay for the care I need.

And not just me, everyone born into poverty, everybody with a lifelong chronic illness (which, remember, severely limits their earning power), everyone who develops a rare cancer, and people like Stephen Hawking who need the treatment and support for ALS before they can possibly earn the money to pay for their care.

Is it your position that it is acceptable for people born into poverty, people with lifelong chronic illnesses, people with rare cancers, people with early onset ALS (etc) to be denied care by the free market on the grounds that they do not and will never have the means to pay for their care?

 

[varwoche]

I say Health Care is no more a right than food and shelter are. We distribute the latter two through the free market and healthcare should be no different.

Unless your "should" is based on some Ann Rand sort of philosophical hogwash, here's hoping you can share my bleak amusement at the fact that Europe kicks our ass in terms of health care quality/efficiency.

You can live under a bridge the Diet Pepsi Tollway

Fixed it for ya. Get with the program, this is Libertopia.

 

[xjx388]

I think you have lost the plot.

For one who goes on so much about freedom and free market, are you seriously suggesting that 'the big bad gobernment' bans football and tobacco and/or takes all the money from the proceeds (tobacco is taxed severely) and give it to the NHS?

Another straw man. I never used the word ban. We should let people choose which is more important. If they want to spend money on football instead of their health, bully for them. Go for it; it's a free country. But don't expect me to pick up the bill because they spent their income on something relatively trivial. Smoking is a more complex issue because for most people, it's an addiction. Tobacco companies make their money by addicting people to their products. Personally, I would support a complete ban on tobacco products; we ban much less harmful substances.

In case you haven't noticed, NICE and the NHS make far more use out of the free market when it comes to prescription drugs, which is why we spend far less, and may also result in ALL drugs being available.

Oh sure, except the one that extended Nikki Blunden's life by a year.

The propaganda for drugs in the US is retarded. The campaign that is run against generic drugs is relentless. For example, despite the fact that we figured out how to synthesis thyroxine, a super simple molecule of tyrosine (one amino acid) and four iodine molecules, there is still the mantra that 'ooooooooooh the dose may not be correct'.

This, in a country that is still using dessicated pig thyroid (Armor) and people take 'grains' of it which can vary from 22 mg - 54 mg per grain.

Generics are usually the first choice unless there is compelling reason to do otherwise. Armor is not commonly used, except by old-school doctors. It's also cheap. I'm not an endocrinologist and I don't expect you are either, so neither one of us is really qualified to argue this much.

Along with this goes the mantra 'its better because it is natural' forgetting that there are all sorts of other compounds, instead of the EXACT thyroid hormone we secrete.

Utter madness.

Synthroid is the most commonly used thyroid treatment. What else are you suggesting?

How we run a lot of the hospitals is not some monolithic government tyranny, there are boards of governors that the public are asked to sit on.

And they are charged with an impossible task.

Health care in the US is not a free market, it is a monopoly of the insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies, and I find it so sad that there are people who have been brainwashed into thinking that this is the best way to deliver health care.

Another straw man. I never said private insurance is the best way to deliver healthcare. And right you are, the US is not a free market. It should be, IMHO.

 

[Architect]

You don't deny that people who need care are denied.

Wrong.

What we've told you is that just about every treatment where there is clinical need is availabe on the NHS. You introduced some sort of argument about laser eye surgery and argued, without any evidence, that the failure to routinely prescribe antibiotics for strep throat was a cost-saving measure.

The only other item is the tabloid fodder about one woman, but didn't address (for example) the legal mechanisms which permit challenge of any such decisions (the appellant's costs to be met by the state) or comment on the fact that NICE made such decisions on the base of medical appraisal.

Just as an aside, I'd love you tell us how an insurer could be held to account in the same way.

The reason that this is so is that there are not enough resources to go around, so you have to ration care.

Evidence? Beyond your Daily Mail-type story illustrating isolated incidents?

But those things are not rights like Health Care is, so why not take that money and spend it on Health Care if it's so damned important?

1. Our health service costs half what yours does.

2. Our health service treats all UK residents.

3. By key indicators such as life expectancy and child mortality, we are healthier than you.

4. You have failed to produce any alternative data to show better clinical outcomes in the US despite you blowng all that cash. All you did was whine that life expectancy wasn't an appropriate measurement.

I say Health Care is no more a right than food and shelter are.

A couple of pages ago, you tried to claim that we didn't provide housing to all who needed it. You were told this was wrong and strangely chose not to pursue it.

I must say, you're having trouble with this whole argument, because all you can keep doing is going back to your unsubstantiated claim that the private sector approach is better than ours.

Not looking good for you on this one, I have to say. Even BaC manages to put up a better (but still flawed) case against UHC.

 

[RemieV]

Another straw man. I never used the word ban. We should let people choose which is more important. If they want to spend money on football instead of their health, bully for them.

It's like we moved forward several pages worth of discussion, and you stayed in exactly the same place. I suppose when you claimed to be open to ideas or being proven wrong, I should've rolled my eyes the same way I do when dealing with ghost hunters, and closed the window.

 

[Tatyana]

Oh sure, except the one that extended Nikki Blunden's life by a year.

Yes, one woman, who is on the very new drug now.

Psychiatric News February 6, 2009
Volume 44 Number 3 Page 14
© American Psychiatric Association

* Health Care Economics

More Americans Can't Afford Needed Medications

About 36.1 million working-age adults and children went without prescription drugs in 2007 because of cost concerns—about 11.7 million more people than in 2003, according to the survey report.

Generics are usually the first choice unless there is compelling reason to do otherwise. Armor is not commonly used, except by old-school doctors. It's also cheap. I'm not an endocrinologist and I don't expect you are either, so neither one of us is really qualified to argue this much.

Synthroid is the most commonly used thyroid treatment. What else are you suggesting?

Synthroid is not a generic drug.

Generics have an unfounded bad reputation in the US.

http://jama.ama-assn.org/content/300/21/2514.short

Review
JAMA. 2008;300(21):2514-2526. doi: 10.1001/jama.2008.758
Clinical Equivalence of Generic and Brand-Name Drugs Used in Cardiovascular Disease
A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis
Conclusions Whereas evidence does not support the notion that brand-name drugs used in cardiovascular disease are superior to generic drugs, a substantial number of editorials counsel against the interchangeability of generic drugs.


More propaganda against generic drugs, levothyroxine included:
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/ConsumerNews/generic-drugs-cheaper-caution/story?id=8925388

Generic Drugs Are Much Cheaper, but Use Caution for Those That Have 'Narrow Therapeutic Windows'
Switching From Generic to Brand and From One Generic to Another Can Cause Reactions Too

 

[xjx388]

And there you have it, my compassionate friends across the Pond. We're going to boil this down to Constitutional rights, and the Declaration of Independence.

Well, I am an American. The Constitution and Declaration are what make America what it is. So if we are discussing bringing Socialized Medicine to America, I think American Values are germane.

No discussion of what's in the best interest of human beings and society as a whole.

Socialized Medicine is not necessarily in the best interest of American human beings or American society as a whole.

Get a job, educate yourself, and all will be fine.

How is this wrong?

If not, tough nookies. You can live under a bridge, and dumpster dive to stay alive, or find a homeless shelter or a soup kitchen.

The threat of those things happening should be motivation to work hard and succeed. You have the right and opportunity to pursue happiness in America, not to have happiness handed to you on a silver platter.

Walk to a free clinic if you can find one. You won't be voting; the middle and upper class will.

Everyone has the right to vote. If you want to vote Democrat and don't have a car, the candidates will send a car to pick you up.

If you commit a crime, we will spend a lot of money to incarcerate you--and you'll have food and shelter. But otherwise, no assistance will be forthcoming. I did it, why can't you?

Why can't you? I came from a poor family. Through nothing but austerity, my wife and I battled through teenage pregnancy and outright poverty. We lived between parents and family members. We depended on what they could give us. Luckily, her brilliance in school got her a full paid scholarship. We took out loans for the rest. Still paying those bastards off but it was worth it to get where we are now. Delayed gratification and all that.

I don't have a problem helping people get through hardship in their lives with my tax money and charitable contributions. But living on Welfare should be a temporary state of being. Get it, improve your life and do better. Or don't and suffer the consequences.

And you will die sooner anyways...

Wait, you were employed, but were laid off? You lost your home, your insurance, your possessions? Wah, cry me a river. Pound the pavement, re-train. Micky D's is always hiring.

Oh because across the pond these things are never a concern? The UK has a 7.7 unemployment rate and they were just as affected by the recession as we were.

 

[xjx388]

Yes, one woman, who is on the very new drug now.

She's the only breast cancer victim who has been denied the drug? No. She's the only one who found an angel to pay for it for her, which is what made the headlines. It is still not provided by NHS and thousands of women could have the same benefit as Mrs. Blunden. Not cost-effective.

My point in illustrating this is that it doesn't matter if you do it your way or our way, there are still inequalities. In a free market, that drug could be much cheaper allowing more to afford it. But as long as government controls the decisions and not patients and doctors it never will.

 

[FattyCatty]

I say Health Care is no more a right than food and shelter are. We distribute the latter two through the free market and healthcare should be no different.

Your posts sound uncaring and egocentric. I disagree that the "free market" is the best way to manage health care. It seems, instead to be the best way to enrich insurance companies and deprive many American citizens of access to health care. The "free market" in the area of food production has resulted in the loss of many small, family-owned farms and an increase in big agribusiness. And how do farming subsidies equal a "free market"?

I also disagree that health care, food, and shelter are not rights. They are basic human rights. Why else do we (the United States) try to provide them to developing countries? And if we think it is important enough to provide these rights to people in other countries, how can it not be even more important to provide them to our own citizens?

I am ashamed of our record on behalf of our own citizens, due in large part to people like you. And I think you are completely wrong about what being an American entails. It isn't just saying "tough noogies" when someone has problems (especially when the problems are caused by the greed and illegal actions of large corporations), it is figuring out how our society can offer the best life possible to all its citizens.

I'm not saying everybody should live like movie stars or doctors. But all citizens should certainly have a place to live, enough to eat, and access to health care. The same way they have police protection and fire departments and a military to guard their safety.

And although starvation is (so far) not common in the U.S., hunger is. From
Hunger and Food Insecurity in the United States:

Hunger and Food Insecurity Data

State Statistics

One of the most disturbing and extraordinary aspects of life in this very wealthy country is the persistence of hunger. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) reported that in 2008:

• Of the 49.1 million people living in food insecure households (up from 36.2 million in 2007), 32.4 million are adults (14.4 percent of all adults) and 16.7 million are children (22.5 percent of all children).
• 17.3 million people lived in households that were considered to have "very low food security," a USDA term (previously denominated "food insecure with hunger") that means one or more people in the household were hungry over the course of the year because of the inability to afford enough food. This was up from 11.9 million in 2007 and 8.5 million in 2000.
• Very low food security had been getting worse even before the recession. The number of people in this category in 2008 is more than double the number in 2000.
• Black (25.7 percent) and Hispanic (26.9 percent) households experienced food insecurity at far higher rates than the national average.

<snip>
What are the implications of high hunger rates?

The ability to obtain enough food for an active, healthy life is the most basic of human needs. Food insecure households cannot achieve this fundamental element of well-being. They are the ones in our country most likely to be hungry, undernourished, and in poor health, and the ones most in need of assistance. A high number of food insecure households in a nation with our economic plenty means that the fruits of our economy, and the benefits of public and private programs for needy people, are not yet reaching millions of low-income people who are at great risk.

From Hunger in America 2010:

Hunger in America 2010 is the largest study of domestic hunger, providing comprehensive and statistically-valid data on our emergency food distribution system and the people Feeding America serves. Hunger in America 2010 is extremely detailed, drawing on data from more than 61,000 interviews with clients and surveys of 37,000 feeding agencies.

The report shows that hunger is increasing at an alarming rate in the United States, and our network is expanding its reach in response:

• Feeding America is annually providing food to 37 million Americans, including 14 million children. This is an increase of 46 percent over 2006, when we were feeding 25 million Americans, including 9 million children, each year.
• That means one in eight Americans now rely on Feeding America for food and groceries.
• Feeding America's nationwide network of food banks is feeding 1 million more Americans each week than we did in 2006.
• Thirty-six percent of the households we serve have at least one person working.
• More than one-third of client households report having to choose between food and other basic necessities, such as rent, utilities and medical care.
• The number of children the Feeding America network serves has increased by 50 percent since 2006.

<snip>
In case you haven't noticed, NICE and the NHS make far more use out of the free market when it comes to prescription drugs, which is why we spend far less, and may also result in ALL drugs being available.

The propaganda for drugs in the US is retarded. The campaign that is run against generic drugs is relentless. <snip>

Utter madness.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=are-generic-drugs-bad-for-you

How we run a lot of the hospitals is not some monolithic government tyranny, there are boards of governors that the public are asked to sit on.

Health care in the US is not a free market, it is a monopoly of the insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies, and I find it so sad that there are people who have been brainwashed into thinking that this is the best way to deliver health care.

I have to agree with you. It's madness. (I won't say it's retarded, as I find that usage offensive). It's stupid. It's a result of a combination of the stupidity, political beliefs uber alles, lack of compassion for those less fortunate (the "hey, who cares if I've got mine" approach falls in this category), greed on the part of insurance and pharmaceutical companies, and more stupidity on the part of citizens in not seeing this, and politicians in not doing something about it. Even though many in the U.S. believe in feeding the hungry:

Voters report that they want their government to be generous to hungry people at home and abroad. When asked where the government should cut spending, only 4 percent endorsed cutting hunger programs while 55 percent said they would rather repeal tax cuts and 18 percent recommended cutting defense spending.

they don't realize that the same reasoning leads to UHC. And I fear the situation will not change in my lifetime, because the stupidity, greed, and lack of compassion seem to be growing instead of lessening.

 

[Emet]

Generics are usually the first choice unless there is compelling reason to do otherwise. Armor is not commonly used, except by old-school doctors. It's also cheap. I'm not an endocrinologist and I don't expect you are either, so neither one of us is really qualified to argue this much.

Synthroid is the most commonly used thyroid treatment. What else are you suggesting?

Perhaps you might educate yourself about T3, T4, and T3/T4 combinations before you so blithely poo-poo Armor as simply old school.

I suspect everyone in this thread that has mentioned it already understands a lot more about hypothyroidism and thyroid replacement therapy than you do. One does not have to be an endocrinologist to use Google and gain a basic understanding of the condition, how it is treated, and what the issues are.

 

[Darat]

...snip...

For example: An alcoholic who cannot/will not abstain from alcohol for six months will be denied a liver transplant, until they get off the alcohol. Once they do abstain, they are on the transplant list.

...snip...

Just want to make this clear before someone gets the wrong end of the stick - it is not a value judgement between a "deserving" non-alcoholic and an "undeserving" alcoholic, the decision is made on likely clinical outcomes i.e. someone who continues to drink after the transplant will have very little chance of the transplant being successful (due to a combination of factors). And since suitable organs are always in short supply* they are distributed based on clinical need and likely outcome.

*Just a thought if we had a free market system the cost of liver transplants would of course come down as I am sure some enterprising company will start to farm people so their organs can be harvested when the rich need one. Isn't it amazing that Swift's A Modest Proposal is still as relevant today?

 

[Darat]

....snip...

I say Health Care is no more a right than food and shelter are. ...snip...

On this we are in agreement.

 

[xjx388]

Your posts sound uncaring and egocentric.

The strawmanned version of them are.

I disagree that the "free market" is the best way to manage health care. It seems, instead to be the best way to enrich insurance companies and deprive many American citizens of access to health care.

How can you say this when we don't even have a free market right now? What's the test for this theory? Government regulation is the best way to enrich the few people who are in a position to take advantage. Guess who is a big beneficiary of the government run system? Nazir Mohammed who paid for Nikki Blunden's care. He's rich off the government system.

The "free market" in the area of food production has resulted in the loss of many small, family-owned farms and an increase in big agribusiness. And how do farming subsidies equal a "free market"?

They don't. Get rid of them immediately. And independent farmers make plenty of money. My area is full of them. They grow fields of corn that they have no intention of harvesting just to collect the subsidy. Horrible.

I also disagree that health care, food, and shelter are not rights. They are basic human rights. Why else do we (the United States) try to provide them to developing countries? And if we think it is important enough to provide these rights to people in other countries, how can it not be even more important to provide them to our own citizens?

How do we provide health care to other countries again?

I am ashamed of our record on behalf of our own citizens, due in large part to people like you.

You don't know me enough to make that judgement. You only know a set of arguments on the internet and not what I practice in real life.

And I think you are completely wrong about what being an American entails. It isn't just saying "tough noogies" when someone has problems (especially when the problems are caused by the greed and illegal actions of large corporations), it is figuring out how our society can offer the best life possible to all its citizens.

Offer the best possible life? I don't remember reading that in the Constitution. Maybe the best possible life is liberty to make their own decisions as to what's best for them.

I'm not saying everybody should live like movie stars or doctors. But all citizens should certainly have a place to live, enough to eat, and access to health care. The same way they have police protection and fire departments and a military to guard their safety.

Food, shelter, protection from harm and healthcare are all rights? One of things is not like the other . . .

I have to agree with you. It's madness. (I won't say it's retarded, as I find that usage offensive). It's stupid. It's a result of a combination of the stupidity, political beliefs uber alles, lack of compassion for those less fortunate (the "hey, who cares if I've got mine" approach falls in this category), greed on the part of insurance and pharmaceutical companies, and more stupidity on the part of citizens in not seeing this, and politicians in not doing something about it.

People who don't agree with you are stupid. Got it.

Even though many in the U.S. believe in feeding the hungry:
they don't realize that the same reasoning leads to UHC. And I fear the situation will not change in my lifetime, because the stupidity, greed, and lack of compassion seem to be growing instead of lessening.

What is basic food? What is basic healthcare? No one has defined these things, except for "Prime Rib" is not basic food, but "Liver Transplants" (but not life-extending breast cancer drugs ) are basic healthcare. Be more definitive about what these things are, then we can argue it.

 

[xjx388]

Perhaps you might educate yourself about T3, T4, and T3/T4 combinations before you so blithely poo-poo Armor as simply old school.

I suspect everyone in this thread that has mentioned it already understands a lot more about hypothyroidism and thyroid replacement therapy than you do. One does not have to be an endocrinologist to use Google and gain a basic understanding of the condition, how it is treated, and what the issues are.

Ah! More medicine by Google! Let's just do that and everyone can take care of themselves. Who needs doctors.