accually no they dont ...remember hosipitals pull in there own money therefore...they have more updated technology to give to the people

HEALTHCARE = bad quality and quantity

DUE to hospitals making that good money it pays for the people who are "uninsured" so....techinically why are you people complaining if you need help they pay for it...but it does riase the price of w/e u went in for ..for others.

and its also like this throughout the whole USA...if i need an MRI scan i can go in whenever and get it...unlike canada and europe..

What does this have to do with healthcare?

You're not making any sense.

For the record, neither Obama's or Hillary's healthcare plans involve the government taking over the hospitals. Instead, they just want to subsidize the insurance industry so that rates will be cheaper.

You guys seem to be having a panic attack over the prospect of a democrat getting elected - you should educate yourself on their actual healthcare proposals rather than assume that they want to completely take over, overhaul, and micromanage the healthcare industy. We the taxpayers already subsidize corporations such as Boeing, Xerox, IBM, Motorola, Dow Chemical, General Electric, etc....why not subsidize insurance companies too if it means more affordable medical insurance rates for everyone?

If those 36 countries all have better healthcare and its that important to you...go move over there. There are 36 others places with "better healthcare" for you to choose from. We are a capitalist country, and would like to keep it that way.

We didn't fight 230+ years ago in a revolution to split off from england just to adopt their government system 230 years later. This is a capitalist country, with a free market system. If you want federal socialist policies, move to a socialist country.

We also didn't fight 230 years ago so that we can be indebted to big businesses each and every day, either. I seriously doubt the founders had Wal mart or Exxon in mind when they penned the Constitution, and they certainly didn't have the kind of massive corporate greed seen in the insurance companies in mind.

You need to educate yourself. We are not a capitalist country. Due to lassez faire thinking like yours, it is quickly devolving into a corporate oligarchy. Pure capitalism is as dangerous to humanity as pure socialism.

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The moment we want to believe something, we suddenly see all the arguments for it, and become blind to the arguments against it. ~George Bernard Shaw

I reject your reality and substitute my own.

New technology is not always better, and patients have no way of telling if it is. Doctors often don't know because the evidence for or against the new procedure/test is not out yet.

For-profit healthcare does not maximize health, it maximizes profit at the expense of patients and the rest of the economy. This is because preventive care is cheaper, and less profitable, but better at promoting better health. Your argument totally neglects the importance of preventive care, much like American healthcare.

It also neglects the fact that healthcare is different from other areas of the economy. This is because doctors are the ones who tell patients what they need, and a sick/dying patient is in no position to dispute whatever the doctor dictates. How much are they or society willing to pay for their life? Whatever it takes. While doctors may be more virtuous than the average person, they are not immune to pressures for more profit at the expense of health. Surgeries, medications, and many tests come with risks and complications and thus their inappropriate use is both dangerous and inefficient. On the insurance side, for-profit HMOs also undertreat people in the quest to save money with dubious practices like capitation. A single-payer government system could ameliorate this conflict of interest between health and profit, as well as promote preventive care to save money for the wider society, promote evidence-based medicine rather than rely on biased industry studies, and many other benefits that would improve the quality of, access to, and simplicity of healthcare.

[quote]There is no competition between hospitals. If you call two seperate hospitals and ask them the cost of any given form of surgery they will give you radically different price ranges, possibly in the thousands. And their not going to change their prices just because their competitor down the block is charging a different price either. I've heard similar issues with overnight stay, since you can't always just ask the hospital you end up at to move you to another because it's cheaper (assuming your conscious).

There are many problems that one would face with a government healthcare, but competition between hospitals isn't one of them.

[quote=nemesis;165798]And there's a better than even chance that the most inexpensive hospital isn't in your benefits network, either...

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The moment we want to believe something, we suddenly see all the arguments for it, and become blind to the arguments against it. ~George Bernard Shaw

I reject your reality and substitute my own.

First of all most of those countries if not all have a way lower population than the USA second let me quote another poster from the universal healthcare thread on the USA forums.

"What government program has worked? What industry has the Government taken control over, and done a better job than the private sector? This Idea that the government can do a better job is a bunch of BS. You want to lower the quality of care for those who are insured.I've heard the number of 49million uninsured people in the US. Let us assume That all those people want health care(Which is a huge assumption but it really doesn't matter). The Population of the US is a round 300 million. With the simple math that i learned with my private school education, 251 million Americans are insured. You are going to screw up the Health care for 84% of US citizens? That doesn't seem very logical to me."

Ok yes...down the line somebody did pay for it...i believe it was the State due to the fact she had kids....so? the whole point is ..if you need care you get it SO simple...

I DONT WANA PAY FOR SOMEBODY WHO ISNT EATING HEALTHY through MY! tax dollars..simple as that.


its just stupid ..why should i pay the extra enormous tax so that a person who was 400 pounds so he can get liposucktion AND STILL!!! EAT AT MCDONALDS!

now the only ones who benefit from healthcare are the unhealthy and the ones who want everything "handed" to them but in the end insurance is just a better route...

simple ONCE YOU cap insurance prices they go out of business low and behold the GOVENMENT SAVES THE DAY WITH HEALTHCARE then our taxes shoot through the roof good job