What Did You Expect?
By Mitch Berg
Chad the Elder, Brian “Saint Paul” Ward and JB Doubtless – rock-ribbed conservatives, Catholics and Republicans all – team up to write a scathing, but unsurprising, review of Sicko, Micheal Moore’s paeon to socialized heath care.
The three, in a rare team posting, take on Moore’s take on Cuba’s system with timing that is, given the events of the day, eerie. Moore lauds Cuba in Sicko. The Fraters lads? Well…:
Fidel Castro’s island dictatorship, now in its 40th year of being listed as a human-rights violator by Amnesty International, is here depicted as a balmy paradise not unlike the Iraq of Saddam Hussein that Moore showed us in his earlier film, “Fahrenheit 9/11.” He and his charges make their way — their pre-arranged way, if it need be said — to a state-of-the-art hospital where they receive a picturesquely warm welcome. In a voiceover, Moore, shown beaming at his little band of visitors, says he told the Cuban doctors to “give them the same care they’d give Cuban citizens.” Then he adds, dramatically: “And they did.”
If Moore really believes this, he may be a greater fool than even his most feverish detractors claim him to be. Nevertheless, medical care is provided to the visiting Americans, and it is indeed excellent. Cuba is in fact the site of some world-class medical facilities (surprising in a country that, as Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar noted in the Los Angeles Times last month, “imprisoned a doctor in the late 1990s for speaking out against government failure to respond to an epidemic of a mosquito-borne virus”). What Moore doesn’t mention is the flourishing Cuban industry of “health tourism” — a system in which foreigners (including self-admitted multimillionaire film directors and, of course, government bigwigs) who are willing to pay cash for anything from brain-surgery to dental work can purchase a level of treatment that’s unavailable to the majority of Cubans with no hard currency at their disposal. The Cuban American National Foundation (admittedly a group with no love for the Castro regime) calls this “medical apartheid.” And in a 2004 article in Canada’s National Post, writer Isabel Vincent quoted a dissident Cuban neurosurgeon, Doctor Hilda Molina, as saying, “Cubans should be treated the same as foreigners. Cubans have less rights in their own country than foreigners who visit here.”
They also shred France…:
Moore’s most ardent enthusiasm is reserved for the French health care system, which he portrays as the crowning glory of a Gallic lifestyle far superior to our own. The French! They work only 35 hours a week, by law. They get at least five weeks’ vacation every year. Their health care is free, and they can take an unlimited number of sick days. It is here that Moore shoots himself in the foot. He introduces us to a young man who’s reached the end of three months of paid sick leave and is asked by his doctor if he’s finally ready to return to work. No, not yet, he says. So the doctor gives him another three months of paid leave — and the young man immediately decamps for the South of France, where we see him lounging on the sunny Riviera, chatting up babes and generally enjoying what would be for most people a very expensive vacation. Moore apparently expects us to witness this dumbfounding spectacle and ask why we can’t have such a great health care system, too. I think a more common response would be, how can any country afford such economic insanity?
As it turns out, France can’t.
…and Canada…:
In the case of Canada — which Moore, like many other political activists, holds up as a utopian ideal of benevolent health-care regulation — a very different picture is conveyed by a short 2005 documentary called “Dead Meat,” by Stuart Browning and Blaine Greenberg. These two filmmakers talked to a number of Canadians of a kind that Moore’s movie would have you believe don’t exist:
A 52-year-old woman in Calgary recalls being in severe need of joint-replacement surgery after the cartilage in her knee wore out. She was put on a wait list and wound up waiting 16 months for the surgery. Her pain was so excruciating, she says, that she was prescribed large doses of Oxycontin, and soon became addicted. After finally getting her operation, she was put on another wait list — this time for drug rehab.
A man tells about his mother waiting two years for life-saving cancer surgery — and then twice having her surgical appointments canceled. She was still waiting when she died.
A man in critical need of neck surgery plays a voicemail message from a doctor he’d contacted: “As of today,” she says, “it’s a two-year wait-list to see me for an initial consultation.”
It’s a scathing indictment. Too bad it was written by a bunch of rock-ribbed conservatives. You expect them to rip on Moore and on socialized medicine.
UPDATE: Doh. The piece was actually written by uber-liberal MTV “News” anchor and former Rolling Stone writer Kurt Loder.
Not sure how I mixed that up.
February 19th, 2008 at 8:57 am
Truly Liberal Facism. The American left loves the aparthied state of Cuba. I wonder what Moore thinks about the 3rd class citizenship of Afro-Cubans?
February 19th, 2008 at 10:43 am
stop the presses, stop the presses, a libertarian is bashing socialized medicine!
“…Loder is unabashedly libertarian in his politics and optimisticin [sic] his cultural outlook.”
http://www.reason.com/news/show/123916.html
February 19th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
Before the usual suspects start defending wonderful Canadian socialized healthcare system because you can purchase drugs cheaper north of 49th paerallel. here is a link to an article from today’s Toronto Star:
http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/304134
Fact that this firsthand account editorial appeared in Toronto Communist Star, the paper Left of the Socialist Red Star Tribune (Yes, hard to believe, but it is possible!) shows that Canadian Healthcare system is failing even the groupthink apparatchiks. And this is what our Socialist Tics want – another nod to another failed socialist experiment. Always, always on the wrong side of history.
February 19th, 2008 at 1:18 pm
Before the usual suspects start jamming the bandwidth defending Canadian Socialized Healthcare system by pointing out that drugs cost less north of the 49th parallel, here is a link to a an article from today’s Toronto Star.
http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/304134
Fact that this firsthand account editorial appeared on the pages of Toronto Star and Sickle, paper to the Left of the Socialist Red Star Tribune (yes, it is hard to believe that could be possible, but nevertheless it is true), shows that even groupthink apparatchiks are beginning to see that king has no clothes. It is sad that Socialist Tics in this country are refusing to learn from facts and history and are clamoring to implement yet another failed, and therefore doomed, socialist experiment. One would think Tics would learn by ending up on the wrong side of history time after time, but apparently not.
February 19th, 2008 at 2:52 pm
Sorry for the double post – I did not think my first one came through. Mitch, can you delete one of them – take your pick. Thanks.
February 19th, 2008 at 2:59 pm
Posts with links get tossed into the moderation queue. I don’t always get to it immediately.
February 19th, 2008 at 3:00 pm
“I think a more common response would be, how can any country afford such economic insanity?”
By not blowing 5% of its Gross Domestic Product on a large private health insurance sector. We could afford a lot of stuff with an extra 650 Billion dollars per year.
Nowhere in Loder’s article does he deny any of the following:
1. The U.S. spends far more per person on health care.
2. The U.S. government spends more per person on health care than almost every other government.
3. A smaller percentage of Americans have access to regular health care than in any other major industrial country.
4. The quality of care Americans receive is not substantially better than the care in other countries.
So give Loder points for showing no health care system is perfect, but his post fails to demonstrate any comparative advantage to the U.S. system.
February 19th, 2008 at 3:12 pm
1. The U.S. spends far more per person on health care.
In part, to be fair, because people actually get it, here.
It’s easy to cut costs if people die waiting to be seen.
2. The U.S. government spends more per person on health care than almost every other government.
Although nowhere are we told how socializing medicine will change this – short of fairly draconic rationing.
3. A smaller percentage of Americans have access to regular health care than in any other major industrial country.
Which is inevitable when comparing voluntary and mandatory systems!
4. The quality of care Americans receive is not substantially better than the care in other countries.
A hopelessly broad statement that depends entirely on the criteria of the comparison.
And before you chime in with your inevitable canned responses about longevity and infant mortality, just stop. Those are fairly meaningless when taken in context.
A recent Gallup poll showed that Americans, per capita, are more satisfied with their health care [PDF warning] than any other western nation.
February 19th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
How does the amount of freedom and choice in the U.S. “health care system” compare with those other systems? I understand that might not be important to everyone, but it may be a consideration for those used to such choices and freedoms.
February 19th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
Justplainangry:
Your Canadian seems to get free care for his sinus infection at the local walk-in clinic, after a short wait. He could have avoided the wait, if he a signed up with a family doctor (again free), but he choose not to (damm socialists trying to impose a sense of personal responsibility). To find a family doctor (free one more time) he had to make some calls and go a a couple of meetings.
If this is a Socialist hell, what sin must I commit to bring it here.
February 19th, 2008 at 3:24 pm
I want a system that delivers the very best in health care to my self & my loved ones, and the cheapest to everyone else.
February 19th, 2008 at 3:50 pm
Mitch Says:
“In part, to be fair, because people actually get it, here.”
But they don’t. If they did, more people would have regular access to basic care.
“It’s easy to cut costs if people die waiting to be seen.”
Which would show up in mortality or health care outcome statistics. It doesn’t show up, so that is not how other countries save money.
“Although nowhere are we told how socializing medicine will change this – short of fairly draconic rationing.”
Eliminating excessive overhead, waste, fraud, marketing, and profit associated with the private health insurance industry. Plus a universal system can devote more efforts to preventive care which saves the system money.
“Which is inevitable when comparing voluntary and mandatory systems!”
A good result is still good even if it is inevitable.
“A hopelessly broad statement that depends entirely on the criteria of the comparison.”
Then pick some criteria by which the U.S. does better in terms of quality. Outside of some cancer outcomes, I can’t find any.
“A recent Gallup poll showed that Americans, per capita, are more satisfied with their health care [PDF warning] than any other western nation.”
Nor does the poll say what you say. Slightly more in the U.S. rate their system Excellent. Equal numbers rate their systems good. Slightly fewer
February 19th, 2008 at 4:12 pm
“Eliminating excessive overhead, waste, fraud, marketing, and profit associated with the private health insurance industry. Plus a universal system can devote more efforts to preventive care which saves the system money.”
Another socialist lie.
There is not enough health care to go around. It is always rationed, in the US as elsewhere. Honest proponents of universal, single-payer healthcare acknowledge that they ration by wait time, or by making certain procedures unavailable. Dishonest socialists (as always) claim you can have your cake and eat it too.
RickDFL makes a lousy assumption driven by his ideology. He assumes the high price of health care in the US is due to its being partially paid for by the private sector. He ignores the ballooning, bankrupting costs of medicare & medicaid.
February 19th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
And Malpractice insurance. The Torte lawyers gots to get theirs.
February 19th, 2008 at 5:55 pm
“It’s easy to cut costs if people die waiting to be seen.”
Which would show up in mortality or health care outcome statistics. It doesn’t show up, so that is not how other countries save money.
RickDFL thinks that you determine unconscionable wait times for medical attention by looking at mortality rates. Bunkum. You measure wait times by measuring wait times.
February 19th, 2008 at 6:21 pm
Terry:
“It is always rationed, in the US as elsewhere.”
Rationed or not, there is is more available at less cost in countries with universal care. They bake a bigger cake at less cost. If the U.S. adopted a universal system we could all get a bigger piece of cake than we have now and still pay less. Sort of like ‘tax cuts pay for themselves’ except true.
“He ignores the ballooning, bankrupting costs of medicare & medicaid.” No they are included in the overall cost of the U.S. health care system. But there is no reason to think they are the reason for excessive health care costs in the U.S. Other countries with universal public health care programs spend far less per person. Why do public health care programs in the U.S. cost so much? Because health care generally in the U.S. costs so much. After all, both Medicare and Medicaid simply pay the market rate for health care services.
In the U.S. health care is uniquely expensive. The U.S. also is unique in lacking a universal coverage program and giving such a large role to competitive private insurers. QED
“RickDFL thinks that you determine unconscionable wait times for medical attention by looking at mortality rates. Bunkum. You measure wait times by measuring wait times.”
No, I said you use mortality rates to measure wait times people die from. You want to measure wait times generally have at it.
February 19th, 2008 at 6:24 pm
But they don’t. If they did, more people would have regular access to basic care.
Trite conclusion based on talking points. “They” do get basic care; most Americans are covered in one way or another, 40% by government programs.
Which would show up in mortality or health care outcome statistics. It doesn’t show up, so that is not how other countries save money.
Two faulty conclusions, a self-contradiction, and one non-sequitur. Overall mortality statistics wouldn’t necessarily show deaths while waiting for rationed procedures – dialysis, transplants, chemo – as well as specialist examinations and lack of care toward the high end of the life expectancy ranges. Other countries don’t “save” money in the sense that their systems are “more efficient”, they – as countless examples show – ration pretty ruthlessly. The mortality statistic you quote are skewed on both ends – by American social issues on the one hand, and an overall doubling of European life expectancy which was every bit as much fuelled by changes in sanitation, safety, and the lack of World Wars as by socialized medicine.
Eliminating excessive overhead, waste, fraud, marketing, and profit associated with the private health insurance industry.
You sound like one of those people who talks about reforming the federal budget by cutting out “waste”. It’s a small fraction of the cost of ANY system.
And the French, Brit and Dutch systems have done such a wonderful job of cutting overhead etc etc that they’re all on the brink of insolvency!
Plus a universal system can devote more efforts to preventive care which saves the system money.
Indeed, they have to, since their critical care is so lousy.
And it’s not true, anyway – have you seen the obesity, smoking and drinking stats for Europeans?
A good result is still good even if it is inevitable.
Perverting the word “good” is still perversion. Destroying free choice to foist substandard, eventually-unsupportable rationed care on the people is not “good”, unless by “good” you mean “yet another power grab”.
Then pick some criteria by which the U.S. does better in terms of quality. Outside of some cancer outcomes, I can’t find any.
Well, there’s a shock.
Emergency care, for starters – nobody in the world comes close, even WITH the overloading of emergency rooms in major cities.
Organ transplants.
Elective care of all types.
Phamaceutical research, which isn’t “care”, per se, but would be a primary casualty of socialized medicine.
Nor does the poll say what you say. Slightly more in the U.S. rate their system Excellent. Equal numbers rate their systems good. Slightly fewer
It was more than “slightly” more, RickObtuse, and if foreign health care was as fantastic as you continuously-to-the-point-of-robotically claim, it wouldn’t have even been that!
February 19th, 2008 at 6:28 pm
“How does the amount of freedom and choice in the U.S. “health care system” compare with those other systems? ”
In the U.S. most people have far less. Most people have to take the health plan offered by their employer and accept all rules and limits on choice they establish.
In the European model, you have a far wider range of service providers. Your doctor has far more freedom to treat you as he/she thinks best.
And since the system is run by public servants the average citizen has far more ability to have a grievance resolved. Plus, b/c insurance is not tied to employment you have greater freedom to switch out of a bad job or start your own business.
February 19th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
Mitch says:
“Other countries don’t “save” money in the sense that their systems are “more efficient”, they – as countless examples show – ration pretty ruthlessly.”
And there are countless more examples of Americans suffering and dying from lack of health care. What statistical measure tells you it happens more there?
“they’re all on the brink of insolvency” Hogwash. They could all increase spending 75-100% tomorrow and still be more solvent than the U.S.
“Emergency care, for starters” What about it? Numbers? Length of wait?
“Organ transplants” Ditto. Numbers performed? Success rates?
“Elective care of all types” I will grant you our awesome dominance of the boob and nose job sector. Happily, they are unaffected by any national health care program. Otherwise, numbers and outcomes please.
“Phamaceutical research, which isn’t “care”, per se, but would be a primary casualty of socialized medicine.” Evidence please.
February 19th, 2008 at 7:32 pm
Live by wikipedia, die by wikipedia . . .
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Canada#Wait_times
Note that the ‘major elective surgery’ mentioned here is not a noe or a boob job, but hip replacement:
February 19th, 2008 at 10:27 pm
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20070409/cda_doctors_070409/20070409?hub=Canada
TORONTO — One in nine trained-in-Canada doctors is practising medicine in the United States, says a study published in Tuesday’s issue of the Canadian Medical Association Journal.
If Canadian-educated doctors who were born in the U.S. are excluded, the number is one in 12 — and the study suggests that luring back some of these Canadian physicians would go a long way towards solving the country’s doctor shortage.
February 19th, 2008 at 10:29 pm
A&E patients left in ambulances for up to FIVE hours ‘so trusts can meet government targets’
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=515332&in_page_id=1770
February 20th, 2008 at 8:31 am
Terry:
1. Yes Canadian doctors come here because they can take more money out of your pocket than they can take out of the pockets of Canadians. But if Republicans want to run on ‘we can not reform health care because Doctors might get less of your paycheck’ feel free.
2. Bad on the NHS, looks like an informed public is holding their feet to the fire. Any health care system has bad stories like this. U.S. emergency rooms do stuff as bad or worse all the time. Or do Americans never wait in the emergency room (for which they get to pay a small fortune). Get back to me when you have data.
February 20th, 2008 at 9:24 am
Get back to me when you have data.
But this is a matter of faith to you, RickDFL. Data has nothing to do with it — if it did, 8.5% of Canadian doctors bailing out their system or British patients being kept waiting in an ambulance so a bureaucrat could look good would make you doubt their system.
February 20th, 2008 at 9:47 am
Why would Canadian doctors leaving Canada to make more money in the U.S. make me doubt the Canadian system? Holding down excessive payments to doctors is a good thing.
People waiting for care is a bad thing. But it happens everywhere. I personally know people who waited longer than 4 hours to get into a U.S. emergency room. Then there are the people with no insurance who must wait until they are sick enough that the U.S. emergency room must treat them. If you think it is harder for the average person to get seen in a U.K. emergency room, find some data that shows that. It is not my job to do your research for you. Show some of that personal responsibility you always talk about.
February 20th, 2008 at 10:11 am
“To find a family doctor (free one more time) he had to make some calls and go a a couple of meetings”
RDFL – your reading comprehension skills astonish me. Etiher that, or you did not read the entire article. Rahaf spent weeks, weeks>, calling up clinics and doctors trying to find an M.D. who would see him. He even had interviews with Doctors, who would not diagnose him at the meeting and would send him on his way! You consider this quality healthcare? This is acceptable to YOU? I guess if it’s free it’s allright with You if you die waiting.
February 20th, 2008 at 10:15 am
Darn tags!
“Why would Canadian doctors leaving Canada to make more money in the U.S. make me doubt the Canadian system? Holding down excessive payments to doctors is a good thing.”
And what do YOU think an M.D. should earn, Mr. DFL? Are advocating government regulation of salaries? Your communist, yes, COMMUNIST slip is showng!
February 20th, 2008 at 10:25 am
“I personally know people who waited longer than 4 hours to get into a U.S. emergency room. Then there are the people with no insurance who must wait until they are sick enough that the U.S. emergency room must treat them. If you think it is harder for the average person to get seen in a U.K. emergency room, find some data that shows that.”
But I’m not trying to prove the superiority of the US health care system. You are trying to prove that socialized medicine is better than what I get now. You’ve failed, and worse, you don’t even acknowledge that their are serious drawbacks to socialized medicine in the countries where it is practiced. You simply ignore problems like getting qualified doctors and long wait times for routine medical procedures.
“It is not my job to do your research for you.”
No, but it is your job to convince me — and millions more like me — that your health care reforms would result in better health care, as we define it, at less cost, again as we define it. The burden of proof is on you, not me.
February 20th, 2008 at 11:11 am
(fixed the open tag hopefully)
Rick wanting to limit profits and earnings of doctors says everything that needs to be said about him and his ideals. Socialism and communism never work, and will never work no matter who is in power. They are antithetical to the very instinctual nature of all animals, INCLUDING the human one.
February 20th, 2008 at 2:27 pm
“I personally know people who waited longer than 4 hours to get into a U.S. emergency room”
What happened? Did the police physically prevent them being admitted to the ER?
I think you mean that they waited more than four hours in the emergency room before being seen by an MD.
The article says:
Thousands of people a year are having to wait outside accident and emergency departments because trusts will not let them in until they can treat them within four hours, in line with a Labour pledge.
They wait in ambulances for hours, then are admitted to the ER only to wait another four hours or so for treatment. Britain has the national health. These are not people using the ER in place of a family physician. Everyone in the UK has access to routine medical care, right?
Your love of socialism has blinded you, RickDFL. I wouldn’t trust you make proper change for a dollar.
February 20th, 2008 at 2:54 pm
“It is not my job to do your research for you.”
I laugh every time I read that. RickDFL wants us all to search until we find support for his “argument”. The mention of “personal responsibility” is just hilarious icing on the cake. His views on this subject do indeed seem a matter of faith, “supported” by false presumption and loads of ineptly interpreted data.
February 20th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
Justplainangry:
My reading skills are fine. Your Canadian subject was not waiting for care. He says anytime he could get care after a short wait at a walk-in clinic. In oder to be seen without wait, he needed to get a personal doctor, something most Canadians take care of long before they ever need care. In fact, your subject admitted his own laxness. Your subject managed to spread a couple dozen phone calls and a few meetings over several months. My wife had the same hassle here is America.
February 20th, 2008 at 6:22 pm
“YOU think an M.D. should earn”
Whatever they can negotiate with their employer.
February 20th, 2008 at 6:42 pm
RickDFL said:
“My reading skills are fine.”
It is unfortunate that processing the information after the reading doesn’t work so well for you… *shrug*
February 20th, 2008 at 6:46 pm
Terry:
“The burden of proof is on you, not me.”
And I have introduced plenty of evidence. Life expectancy, infant mortality, nurse ratios, acute care bed ratios, death rates for c-v, death rates for diabetes, death rates for respiratory disease. You say these won’t convince you. So what will? I can not keep tracking down comparative statistics for you. Before I am going to find the data, I want you to say it is a fair comparison.
But you are not interested in a comparison, because you might lose. Yes people in Britain wait to be seen in an E.R., sometimes in a ambulance. Does it happen in the U.S.? Yes, people in the U.S. without insurance are often sent for E.R. to E.R. until they get treated. People show up at one E.R. only to find out that that E.R. is not on their insurance network, so they must travel across town to the right E.R. Insurance companies will air lift patients from Mankato to their specialty clinic in the Cities, just because the local provider is not in-network.
So after you add up all the various problems with different systems, I can not find many that show any clear cut advantage to teh U.S.
February 20th, 2008 at 11:48 pm
RickDFL said:
“And I have introduced plenty of evidence”
Facts and figured are most effective when marshaled in support of a good argument, RickDFL. I don’t think you have it in you, but here is a test:
What thing does that current U.S. health care system do better than any other health care system in existence today?
February 21st, 2008 at 8:58 am
“What thing does that current U.S. health care system do better than any other health care system in existence today?”
Spend money.
We also pretty good at cancer treatment, best I can tell.
February 21st, 2008 at 1:45 pm
Almost…but not quite.
Not that the cancer thing was bad at all, but you could not seem to do it without combining it with something to negate the effect. Until you can really make concessions and demonstrate that you truly understand the whole issue, and not just your side of it (and not that an ever flowing fountain of statistics actually does that, either), you will never construct a convincing argument.
February 21st, 2008 at 3:51 pm
Gee Troy:
The high intellectual quality of your posts makes me oh so curious, but on the other hand there is fresh paint to watch dry . . . .
February 21st, 2008 at 4:29 pm
Well, there you go then. But of course DFL Dick, you’re wrong as you have been wrong this whole comment section. Here is an object lesson for Republicans about Liberals. They are always right, no matter what Republicans say. Facts never get in their way. First, though, I want to comment about what Fulcrum said. He thought he was brilliant in pointing out that Kurt Loder was a Libertarian! Of course Dumb-o-craps think that Libertarians are another kind of Republican. Well pal, Liber-tarians are Liber-als with one main difference. Both believe that there should be few if any boundaries on society. Where they differ is that Liber-als think that government should guarantee that society and Liber-tarians think that government should keep its big fat nose out of it.
Now to Dick, all of what you’ve written is Papp, its sewer water. You haven’t introduced any evidence what so ever. All of what you’ve said is talking points that are heard everyday in the nightly MS News shows from the TV which never get backed up with in depth research journalism. Your whole argument is predicated on your first comment. Points 1 and 2 are the same point 2 elaborates on 1. And my response is…… ya,…so? The U.S. economy is the largest economy in the world. Here are some simple numbers I got from my MSN search engine so you can understand how dumb those statements were.
Canada’s population is 32,976,026 as of ‘07
U.S.’s population is 301,621,157 as of ‘07
What Canada spends on Health Care: $160 Billion which is 10.6% of GDP
What the U.S. spends on Health Care: $12.5 Trillion which is 15% of GDP
Our population is 10 times that of Canada’s and Canada’s Health Care costs are 3.125 SMALLER than the .5 Trillion mentioned above much less the rest of that number. So I repeat, ya….so? What’s your point? Loder’s article also mentions France and Cuba, do you want those numbers? No? Tough, I’m going to give them to you anyway because I don’t want you whining about it.
Population of France: 64,094,658 Health costs: $181 Billion, 10.6% of GDP
Population of Cuba: 11,423,952 Health Costs: $32 Billion Cuba won’t talk about their GDP (I wonder why?)
OK, point number 3 is completely incorrect, Dick. EVERYONE in America has access to health care. Just ask some of those Emergency rooms that are overloaded and shutting down in California because illegal Mexicans are flooding them with as simple an ailment as a sever cold! If you get sick or injured you only have to show up, they have to treat you. Hospitals can’t turn people away.
Your point 4 is the real reason I even bothered to comment. “The quality of care Americans receive is not substantially better than the care in other countries.” Also, your next to last comment is related, “So after you add up all the various problems with different systems, I can not find many that show any clear cut advantage to the U.S.” I’m living proof that those statements are most certainly incorrect and if you think those things, you have another think coming. Let me tell you what happened to me last Saturday.
Saturday morning I got my heart rate too high much too early without proper warm up for a man my age and that threw my heart rate to 192 beats a minute and it wouldn’t settle down. My wife finally called 911 after 10 minutes or so and an ambulance took me to the hospital. In the Emergency Room they had to resort to electro-shock to reduce my heart rate to normal, an experience I don’t recommend as I was wide awake. (I didn’t know I could still do a V sit-up). Anyway everything looked good, but they wanted to be sure and they were worried about the condition of my heart. So’ of to Angioplasty they sent me. When I woke up from that they were very excited, they told me that my heart was in really good shape considering that I’ve had a previous heart attack and what my age is. They took me to intensive care for observation and I sat there for a while looking at my heart monitor. Later an Oriental man came to see me, he was very pleasant. He said he was the head physician in the EP Lab at the hospital and he had a theory why my heart did what it did. (EP stands for electrophysiology). He believed that a nerve close to the main nerve that sent the signal to pump from a node on the top part of my heart to the node on the bottom part of my heart, got a current induced into it and that pulse ran back up to my top node. Because my heart had been beating so strong just before my incident, that loop back charge was strong enough to keep generating a strong pulse back to the top node. Hence, 192 BPM sustained. He said he thought he could fix it. So later, off I went to the EP Lab where they stuck electrical probes through veins in my right groin and one from the right side of my neck into my heart. The doctor literally played with my heart under controlled conditions, he found the nerve that was giving me trouble and he zapped it back far enough that a current couldn’t be induced in it any more. Later, back at my bed, my nurse re-hooked me to the heart monitor. As I sat there while she fussed around I noticed that my pulse rate on the monitor had changed and I commented to my Nurse about it. She looked up and smiled and said, “Yes it’s different, It’s a nice healthy sine curve. It’s just what it should be.” A day later I walked out of there, with no heart damage and a heart that for the first time in my life, worked correctly.
So Dick, where do you think all that technology that was used on me last weekend came from, hmmmm? Canada? France? Look back up at those numbers I gave you. Where do you think that technology came from, Dick? The $12.5 Trillion should leap out at you. It’s numbers like that that fuel research. U.S. Health Care does spend money, but its money well spent. And guys like me break ground so that when guys like you need that technology you will have it available for you, EVEN if you can’t pay.
Gee, there you go again. Since I started writing this you’ve gone and added another smart ass comment and I know that you’ll twist and turn what I’ve said here until you think you’ve found a wrinkle because, as I said to start with, you Dumb-o-craps are NEEEEEEEVER wrong. I look forward to reading your stupidity. I’m going to leave you now and paraphrase some Shakespeare. “Me thinks thou doth protest too much!”
February 21st, 2008 at 8:27 pm
Plymouthmike:
“And my response is…… ya,…so? The U.S. economy is the largest economy in the world.”
Well, that is a new one – our economy is so big we can afford to waste 5% of GDP. If the GOP wants to run on a platform of ‘we need to take 650 billion dollars of your money to waste’ go ahead.
“If you get sick or injured you only have to show up, they have to treat you. Hospitals can’t turn people away.” What world are you living on? Emergency rooms are not required all sickness or injury, they are only required to treat emergency conditions. Google EMTALA. Next time you need chemo for cancer or drugs to control your high blood pressure visit your E.R. and see what they say.
“Let me tell you what happened to me last Saturday.”
First, imagine what would have happened if like 1 in 10 Americans you had no health insurance. You think they would have given you the special treatment?
Second, your experience is not unique to the U.S. People all over the world get the same treatment you got. If your treatment was far more likely to happen in the U.S., then the U.S. would not have one of the highest standardized death rates for heart disease.
“Where do you think that technology came from, Dick? The $12.5 Trillion should leap out at you. It’s numbers like that that fuel research. U.S. Health Care does spend money, but its money well spent”
Yes, the U.S. spends more on research than the EU, but that is not a significant factor in higher U.S. medical spending. If you have numbers I would love to see them. Here is the best I found: “A new study by the European Medical Research Councils concludes that non-market sector medical research in the EU amounts to .17 percent of GDP compared to .37-.40 percent in the U.S.” If the research spending difference is less than .25% of GDP, it can hardly be the prime driver of a 5% of GDP difference in total spending.
P.S. Hope your recovery goes well.
February 22nd, 2008 at 1:09 am
Just cause it is kind of funny,
Apparently Plymouthmike, got himself treated the old-fashioned way
http://www.eplabdigest.com/displaynews.cfm?newsid=010807
““The new robotic catheter system allowed me to very easily place mapping catheters in hard-to-reach anatomical locations within the heart, with enhanced stability during cardiac arrhythmia mapping,” said Wyn Davies, MD, FRCP, FHRS, consultant cardiologist, St. Mary’s Hospital, London [you know land of socialized medicine], and principal investigator of the trial. “Therefore, this new technology has the potential to fundamentally change the way electrophysiology procedures are performed worldwide and make it possible for a broader group of physicians to offer these complex procedures.”
Currently, cardiac electrophysiology procedures are performed using a manual technique that requires physicians to perform a series of complex manipulations at one end of the catheter with inadequate assurance that the tip of the catheter will respond as desired while inside a patient’s heart. As a result, achieving stable contact at every anatomic site within the heart necessary for successful mapping can be difficult. Insufficient contact between the catheter tip and the inside of the heart wall can lead to highly variable and less than optimal procedure outcomes.
. . . .
To date, 83 cardiac procedures have been performed on patients in Europe [yes again land of socialized medicine] using the Sensei Robotic Catheter System.”
The very procedure that so impressed Mike is being replaced by technology first developed and sold in Europe.
February 22nd, 2008 at 12:18 pm
RickDFL said:
“but on the other hand there is fresh paint to watch dry”
If you find you’re up to that “intellectual” challenge, RickDFL, have at it. Convince anybody yet? Yeah, I thought not.
February 25th, 2008 at 11:42 am
See! I predicted that you’d ignore facts that don’t support you argument and find a way to rationalize your liberal template, Dick. I’m going to repeat something another person said to you, your reading skills suck. First, I’m not recovering from anything except four very tiny incisions. If you bothered to listen to what I wrote you’d realize that what I described having was arrhythmia and I got cured. Also, I don’t need your well wishes, considering the utter contempt you show for Republicans in general on this website. Secondly, I know your proud of the little research article you found because you think it supports your view but you didn’t actually READ it. Try reading the first sentence over and over again, it might sink in. Go…..read……do ya get it? BTW, robotic technology has been around for a long, long time in surgery (an American invention). The fact that some Limey has adapted robotics to Electrophysiology isn’t cutting edge at all, sorry.
But then your a Dumb-o-crap, it’s what you do. I know because like Mitch, I used to be a Dumb-o-crap myself and I know what you did here. See, when you read what I wrote, the first word I spoke that didn’t fit your template you stopped listening and you started planning what your response was going to be. You think you have all the answers and you’re going to enlighten us poor stupid Republicans. That’s so typical of you Dumb-o-craps. One of your typical tactics is to take a general statement and then find a specific exception and then disqualify the general statement. That works on many Republicans who visit this website, but I see what you’re doing, nice try. The free market health care kicks ass on socialized medicine every time, oh, I just remembered that flu pandemic that happened in China a few years ago which threatened the whole world, wow, socialized medicine on full display there!
It’s typical of Dumb-o-craps to lecture and preach at Republicans. You wag your collective finger in our face and tell us we must be tolerant. You wag that finger and tell us you’re outraged that we’re not tolerant. You rage that we better embrace diversity. You remind us that our Party isn’t diverse. The truth of the matter, though, is that the very act of telling us we must be tolerant is in itself INTOLERANT. Demanding that we accept diversity is IN FACT denying the diversity of political thought that WE represent. That is the true face of hypocrisy and Dumb-o-craps are big huge hypocrites. You should be ashamed of yourself for criticizing Republicans. But, of course, you won’t. As a matter of fact your internal dialog has probably been going since you started reading this comment and I’m sure you intend on giving me a piece of your mind, just make sure it’s not your last piece. Also, what ever you write will have already been covered by this comment.