Split Thread Screening tests in USA v universal healthcare countries

[ponderingturtle]

Look, whaddaya want, accuracy?

Who did, anyway? (Probably a Scot.... )

Rolfe.

Karl Benz, so a german not a scot.

It seems that Robert Anderson who was a scot built a form of electric car first though. But before him Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot a frenchman built the first self powered steam vehical in the 1770's. No tracks so it was a car of a form.

 

[wolfgirl]

Perhaps people who have lived in both countries can comment.

I grew up in Canada. My husband grew up in the UK. We both still have family members in both countries.

We can't for the life of us understand what all the fear-mongering is about. We keep being told we're going to end up with "Canadian-style" healthcare. Or an "NHS-like system." As though those were horrible, terrifying things. Gee, I don't know any Canadians or Brits who've gone bankrupt because they or a family member has gotten sick. I don't know any of them who've died because they couldn't afford to see a doctor. Yet I don't see any of them going around without adequate treatment because of the "government take-over" of their healthcare. It's very simply something they don't ever have to think or worry about.

I don't know anyone in Canada who would trade what they have for what we have. And my husband's family in the UK is constantly worried about us getting sick and not being able to afford the care we need. (We're insured, but just barely able to afford the insurance, and the benefits keep going down as the premiums keep going up. I'm paying twice now what I was paying just a couple of years ago for a much better policy - lower copays, lower deductible, etc.)

 

[Magyar]

ETA: Anybody got actual per capita spending numbers? I think they would be pertinant to this thread, which seems to be asking about what we get for the money. And the per capita ought to be corrected for cost of living too.Perhaps the percentage of GDP, divided by population? No need to convert to dollars or sheckels? Just a "health care expenditures per capita as a percent of per capita production?" I believe that America is the most efficient economy in the world, we ought to spend more per capita on any/everything. Is it a fallacy that "Americans spend lots more to get lots less?"

Here you are - http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/2009/05/what_is_the_cause_of_excess_co.php

as you can see The US spends more than, and in some cases like the Netherlands, Japan and Australia almost 50% MORE for example, any other first world country.


And keep in mind that I am ONLY looking at the dark blue PUBLIC option portion where the other countries cover 100% of their population where in the US it only covers the old and the totally destitute so the numbers are REALLY scewed!

 

[dtugg]

If "able to afford it" includes never buying anything new, not being able to save for retirement, kid's college, etc, then sure. The average "we" can afford it just fine.

The average income is about $38,000 a year, and the average family pays about $17,000 a year for healthcare. NOT including taxes going to medicare.
http://www.milliman.com/expertise/healthcare/products-tools/mmi/pdfs/milliman-medical-index-2009.pdf
(figure 1)

Real affordable.

This is so wildly inaccurate that I had to comment.

1) The median household income is about $50,000.

2) The $17,000 figure is for a family of four while the average family size in the US is 3.14 people.

3) The $17,000 figure is for PPOs while many Americans have HMOs which are typically cheaper.

4) The $17,000 figure (presumably) includes costs paid by employers.

I agree that something needs to be done about healthcare in the US. But making totally inaccurate posts like this certainly does not help matters.

 

[casebro]

I just googled the MMI. Hoping to find some discussion as to it's math. No soap. No doubters out there.

But I did find a couple more data to add:

Avg income per family is $70,000.

Per person expenses for the whole country is about $9,700.

Single wage earner's premiums are about $4,000.

I suspect that the 'family members' are the healthiest part of society. Neither the children nor the parents are on dialysis, nor in need of bypass surgery. Their premiums are probably doing to subsidize the folks in an older bracket. But the MMI doesn't discuss actual medical cost, it discusses out of pocket expenses, plus premiums. I can see that a young person's expenses are 1/10 of an old persons, to get the average of $9700.

Hmm, I think I'll try to google up the Medicare cost per patient. Those are the sickest folks, being either old or disabled, or both.

Found that avg cost per medicare patient was $8300 in 2006. In other words, Medicare takes care of the oldest, sickest people for about the average cost per patient of the country as a whole. Seems way cheap to me.

 

[Beerina]

I happen to have gone through this process with a colonoscopy myself. The insurance company rejected my claim. They ended up paying, but not without me spending considerable time and effort to convince them that the test was justified. My brother in law wasn't quite so fortunate, financially. His doctor ordered a biopsy that the insurance company decided was unnecessary, and he ended up paying 1200 dollars out of pocket.

ETA: Just read the response to Professor Yaffle. To try to drag it back on topic, what might happen in the US is that someone will order a doctor will order a high tech procedure, a patient will follow the instructions, and the insurance company will decide retroactively if it was necessary. If they decide it wasn't, or that a cheaper procedure was available, the patient can be on the hook for the full cost.

That's horrendous. And you guys hear "bureaucrats between me and my healthcare" as a constant argument against universal care? Strewth.

Anyone even proposing a system in Britain would be chased down with pitchforks.

Umm, this is how saving money works. Scientific medicine and all. There's this type of bump or whatever, and it almost certainly is or is not, or maybe 50% might be, or whatever, cancer. If it almost certainly is not, then taking a biopsy might be almost an elective-level procedure at that point.

Do you mind if I ask what the result was?

Also, $1200 is a lot, but not really out of the ballpark for "your medicine". There are more and more treatments daily, and these cost money. More and more money. But at least the option is there. The choice isn't between having it expensive and having it cheap (read: accounting gimmicks). The choice is between having it expensive and having it cheap, years later, or not at all.

Why relatively healthy people aren't budgeting $4000+ per year or more in preparation for whatever, I don't know. Yes I do. People live at their limits, and don't want to live the otherwise perfectly fine lifestyle of someone earning a paltry $4k less than they do.

But no matter. This twisted sob story makes for good panic-inducing rhetoric. Remember the goal isn't actually helping anyone, but spreading a meme via forcibly placing it on people who don't want it.

 

[WildCat]

4) The $17,000 figure (presumably) includes costs paid by employers.

Not really. Whatever the employer pays is actually money you could otherwise be making in salary. But it is tax-free.

 

[volatile]

Umm, this is how saving money works.

Yes, it is. Did you forget, too, that in Britain where this cannot ever happen, we pay less money than you do?

So any case, even if that weren't true - are you happy that the bureaucrats are overruling practices which Meadmaker's doctor thinks are medically necessary? Is a healthcare system in which insurance company pen-pushers (who, let's not forget, get bonuses based on how many claims they can refuse!) can trump the decisions of physicians even worthy of the name?

"Twisted little sob-story" indeed.

 

[Earthborn]

Why relatively healthy people aren't budgeting $4000+ per year or more in preparation for whatever, I don't know. Yes I do.

$4000? Hope and pray that it will be enough. If I hear about the amounts Americans sometimes have to pay out of pocket, saving $4000 a year doesn't sound like a lot. It sounds like one medical emergency might burn through many many years of savings in a matter of hours. Minutes, if you want any of those fantastic medical innovations you are always beating your chest about. You are very fortunate that you can afford to save $4000 a year, which many others are not. But it seems that you are still one illness away from having to hold your hand up to the government in order to survive.

 

[Rolfe]

Went to see "Up" last weekend. Nice film.

The young couple had such plans to see South America. And they saved, and stuff happened, and they had to break into the savings. And again. And again. Until they were an old couple. And finally the wife died, and they hadn't been anywhere,

At least one of the dream-shattering expenses was medical.

Only in America....

Rolfe.