@ KASZ - UK healthcare is free and we don't particularly have that problem. If something needs to be done it tends to be quite good. In fact, our family gets private healthcare for free due to my dads job. But I still go to the NHS for everything. Sometimes it works well if the government do it right.

I'm guessing they don't live in Ontario? Elective care is a problem too.... but that's elective stuff.  Which is really what universal healthcare should focus on anwyay, since hospitals have to treat dieing people in the US anyway.

Preventitive care is what you should focus any healthcare system on.

As for an article about the critically ill....

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1956732/posts

Yes, but as awesome as Reagan is, he survived.

I think Halogamer is writing from prison...

Oh, i believe in giving everyone access to the healthcare they need.  It's just taking the Supply and Demand aspect out of it is a bad idea.

Whether that's better or not is argueable. 

In your father in laws case... better.  People who are bleeding in their heads and suffering brain damage because of it.... worse.

A better option is to empower the people in some way.

Like perhaps... a draft of doctors.

Everyone who is a liscensed doctor has to perform so many yearly hours in clinics that provide non life saving treatment to the poor. (Life saving treatment always being provided anyway.)

The number of hours you need to serve would be proportional to the number of hours you work.  You work more.... you need to work more hours for the government at a lower paygrade... or suffer a larger tax bracket penalty that would be used to pay other doctors to work there.

That makes the demand scaleable.

I understand what you mean.

However, I have heard that many of the people who need immediate care are top priority, not the other way around.

However, I do not live in Canadia, so I cannot confirm this in any way.

I wouldn't say that the UK system doesn't have it's delay problems.

http://www.liberty-page.com/issues/healthcare/ukheartdelay2.html

Sure the heart healthcare is good... but the same problems occur in the system... and would be worse in a country like the US which is much bigger.

I'd say free preventative healthcare FTW!

We should be providing free checkups and stuff so that people don't develop big problems later on. anything that's not "preventative" I guess would be taken care of through insurance through work or whatnot

Always remember: 'free' health care is never, ever free. Someone pays for it. If it's socialist, everyone pays for it. Every US citizen (or at least a decent bit of them) that holds a job here pays part of their check out for healthcare as it is. I can only imagine what'll happen if they tack on an extra 10% for socialistic medicine.

Then our $8/hr paychecks that really give us $6.50 drop to around $5.90. Brilliant!

I would gladly tag another 10% in taxes for a social health care system.

another 10% on my paycheck isn't shit when it comes to me, my wife and my son's health.