Man fired after notifying employer of wife's cancer.

[mrstickball]

Soleron said:

mrstickball said:

...

We have systems like that in America. It is still insanely expensive. Its called the Veterans Administration (VA). Its for service veterans from wars. They have their own hospitals that do not charge monies for their services, and the government merely pays out for salary, and not services rendered. It is far more expensive than private care and even more expensive than medicare - about 90% higher than private insurances.

Americans expect their doctors to be proactive. Here you have to fight to have anything done - testing, prescriptions, and anything else. Unless you are dying, your local doctor will send you home with nothing. In hospitals they will again leave you alone with minimal care unless you are dying.

It's rationing for the determined, pretty much.

If your VA doctors prescribe and test like the US doctors I saw when I lived in Texas I can see exactly why it costs so much.

So then why argue for a universal system that does nothing unless you are dying? Given the very minimal difference in life expectancies between the US and other developed nations, it would seem that universal health care should only be used in a way to control costs here, which we've seen will not be the case, as is with the VA - the cost issues are elsewhere in the system.

And having said that, I cannot believe the amount of time other nations have for many procedures. When I was bleeding out of my inner intestines (which didn't require hospitalization, which I'd assume is one of those 'only get care if your dying' situations), it took just 12hrs to schedule a colonoscopy and CT scan for me.....Compared to weeks in Canada or other universal comparables.