Senior Project On American Health Care System. What Do We Do, America? [if Not American, Tell Me About Yours]?
I really think that we Americans need to get off of our bloated butts and really start looking at our Health care. Or maybe I’m just a dumb kid, I don’t know. But I know sometimes that this world looks pretty scary.
I used to speak my mind a whole lot. Everyone else seems too damned stupid to say anything about what’s going on. I mean, that’s my age. I watched Michael Moore’s “infamous” Sicko, and I was very impressed and taken with it. Kind of gave me the heart to follow through with my project.
Our current system’s no good. Because it’s greedy and capitalistic. Socialism’s no good. Everyone’s afraid of free-loaders. Don’t other countries have to pay for freeloaders? There’s no way to stop that. Also, people worry about a decline in health care if this happened.
I’ve talked about the way the HMO’s make their profits. How the congressmen have sold themselves over to the drug companies.
America, what should we do? I want to leave my audience in tears. I really do.
No need for tears–logic and facts lead us to practical solutions.
I want Quality, Affordable, Accessible health care for all and I can’t see any justification, logical or moral, to disagree with that. So how to deliver it? Actually the free market does deliver it BUT we do NOT have a free market in health care in the US.
Read:http://www.azcentral.com/community/gilbe…
A doctor owned and run hospital that sees everyone gets care, no matter what happens to the bottom line.http://www.simplecare.com/ a doctor-driven group where reasonable rates are charged.
Note you can go to a walk-in clinic at Wal-Mart or CVS or the like in many cities and get many of the most typical reasons for seeing a doc addressed for under $100.
The price of LASIK has DROPPED dramatically over a decade. Plastic surgery is CHEAP. Compare a major procedure like a tummy tuck with the bill an uninsured patient will get for a medically necessary appendectomy WITHOUT complications.
So using those FACTS, here’s the essence of a plan that would work but will be a hard sell because the usual suspects can’t take advantage of the public or doctors with this plan:http://www.booklocker.com/books/3068.htm…
Read the PDF, not the blurb, for the bulk of the plan. Book is searchable on Amazon.com
Cassandra Nathan’s Save America, Save the World
Here’s the essence of it:
To summarize the sensible plan again, which should be reviewed here (and it is the PDF, NOT the blurb): http://www.booklocker.com/books/3068.htm…
It offers ALL Americans a catastrophic health care package for an AFFORDABLE price.
Key points:
ALL Americans are eligible (and yes, there would be the traditional breakdowns into categories by age, sex, medical condition so that accurate premiums could be offered).
It is a CHOICE, not mandated with scare tactics and punishment—right now the UNINSURABLE are screwed again with things like “Must have insurance or we’ll fine you.” How about making a legit plan available to all before dumping on the victim again?
Catastrophic health care package is ALL that ANYONE NEEDS. The actual purpose of insurance is to share risk so you avoid bankruptcy. This is NOT done at all these days. First, over half of all bankruptcies are for medical bills and most of those folks were insured. Thus the current system clearly does NOT work. Second, this stupid “if you’ve got a nice policy and a sniffle, stop by the doc’s and others will pay for it” runs up medical costs for NO good reason at all. Resources are wasted every day. IF people had to pay for their tendency towards hypochondria or refusal to follow basic sensible provisions, they’d be more likely to change their behavior.
AFFORDABLE is key. Insurance is NOT now affordable and the UHC story helps shed light on why that is. This plan would use a sliding-scale for the premium AND the co-pays so that those who really are not making much money (be they students or folks just starting out in the work force or the retired or disabled) would not pay more than they can afford. There would be a REAL limit on out-of-pocket NECESSARY medical expenditures as well.
Other key plan points:
There would be one physical with follow-up visit per year as well as one ER visit IF NEEDED (how to prevent ER abuse is covered) for reasonable co-pays.
The point here:
Prevention is ALWAYS cheaper than waiting for a problem to develop. It is also the moral approach to medical care. By getting folks in annually we’d be able to save a lot of lives and improve peoples’ productivity. We could also review meds (or if they’re needed), keep people immunized appropriately, answer questions about nutrition and more, and have a baseline of info should the person be in an accident or fall ill. Again, with a reasonable co-pay, there is now NO good reason for folks not to see the doctor. The follow-up makes sense for anyone who HAS a medical issue. If someone came through with flying colors, he would not even need to use that follow-up. Not everyone needs the ER, but it would be sensible IF needed to not leave people SOL. This logical plan would address ALL the legitimate needs of probably 80% of the population.
Another key plan point:
Necessary medications are covered as well as NO caps on necessary medical treatments.
Right now, we have BS like the “donut hole” of Medicare. This would be eliminated as would all fertility treatments, ED med coverage, and anything else which is not NECESSARY. This does not prevent people from receiving treatment for such things—let them find an insurance plan (this plan doesn’t stop others from being offered) or pay for it themselves, but there is no justification to make the taxpayer help someone have kids or sex. There is a reasonable reason for people on insurance to help those with cancer, strokes, heart disease, diabetes, etc. as this is far beyond a quality of life issue and goes to the heart of life and death. This is the same rationale for ending caps on legitimate procedures, like bone marrow transplants, which are quite expensive. Too often now a plan lies and claims something is covered, but by shunting off $25-250K on the patient to pay, that’s NOT a covered item in a rational person’s book.
Funding is discussed in the PDF and resolves another abuse of the taxpayer. It is NOT sticking employers with a bill of any sort (in fact would make us more competitive in the world economy because health care would NOT be expected to be provided by them anymore); it’s no tax increase for people; it’s not attempting to seize big pharma either. It also deals with the FACT that government spends multi-millions of OUR dollars on “health care” but doesn’t spend wisely.
The main reason our current system has trouble is due to government meddling. Get the government completely out of the healthcare system and it will improve.
Socialist healthcare is a bloated bureaucratic mess that slowly killing the the healthcare industry mostly be mandating the care of people who will not or can’t pay. Somehow, politicians and left leaning people think that doctors, nurses, medical equipment just appear for free.
In Canada and the UK, they are starting private healthcare centers because the staterun ones are overloaded and the care level is terrible.
Most people seem to agree that America’s health care system needs reformed. There are numerous factors that add to our current “heathcare crisis,” and it is widely accepted among critics of our current system that the problem-entities consist of a combination of HMO’s, lawyers, and insurance companies.
Universal health care is an option. Monopolize the system.
However, I personally would like to see a different kind of reform. I would like to see a plan that simultaneously attempts to eliminate HMO’s and managed care systems altogether to cease catering to employers, advocates tort reform to cut down on frivolous medical malpractice suits, and attempts to initiate a competitive non-profit healthcare insurance industry.
Just like in any system, a change in one element will affect every other element in the system. That is why, whatever reform our country chooses to pursue, it must be all-encompassing.