Health Care

The Health Care Industry got lots of money to fight a national heath care package. They are afraid their bread and butter the USA will be lost to them. Especially the pharmaceutical companies. We are paying high prices for the rest of the world to take medications cheaply. As far as the provided care we would get from a national health care organization I think in time would be better. We can not fire the CEO of a Private organization but we can remove our elected politicians for not providing the care needed.

The only problems I for see is the red tape bureaucrats will make of the organization. They are good at that in the USA.

The system in the USA is made for the benefit of the health insurance lobby and the doctors. About 50% of the money for health care in the USA is consumed by the insurance companies and other administrative costs within the system.

That is their motive, keep that cash. Some of the worlds highest paid people work in health insurance.

Doctors and med school are in cahoots to limit the number of doctors trained, less price competition arise.

These two are behind the huge amounts paid to politicians via lobby groups, that camouflage these funds in some manner?

The average age of death in the USA is lower because of this.

I live in Canada, doctors get a lot less and we lose many doctors to the USA each year where they are offered 3-4 times the pay for a typical 30 hour work week. Specialists are poached as well. Social pressures, wife, family, etc keep some here, but we have a crisis.

Health care unions have receieved a cost of living allowance for the past 35 years. In additionh, they have also received wage inscreases of 2-3% above that. Run the math on that for 35 years and see why floor cleaners at hospitals get $25+ per hour, nurses $75, etc.

In fact the wages for nurses got so high that the hospitals only defence was to reduce the numbers of nurses and use them only for those tasks that muct be done by nurses. Others do routine tests and change pans etc.

Unions have sucked the money out of health care in Canada as the doctors have not had the same growth in wages as their staff.

As we age the problem gets worse. There is not enough money earned to pay all the health care unions all they want. Much like the unions have killed off the USA/Canada car industry...(count the workers left compared to 40 years ago), they have damaged the Canadian health care industry.

It is cheaper to fly to India and get procedures done (dental and medical) in order to save money and get an elective procedure done for which in Canada there is a 2 year waiting period (Knee, hip) and where they use the cheapest possible atriticail joints.

India has high quality health care in their top hospitals with london UK schooled staff via med schools set up as affiliates of the London system that supervise. The Indian rich go there.

The future of HMOs and Medical Insurance practices will undoubtedly be to send people to India. Currently, most US hospitals electronically send there radiographic (Xray) data to India for analysis rather tahn pay for trained US doctors. Preposterous!!!

Not preposterous at all. Xray analysis is time consuming and you get well trained Indian doctors able to do a more comprehensive job than US/Canadian doctors who are under pressure to save money and do a cheap job.

Bear in mind that the label "union made" in the USA means low quality. the AMA is nothing more than a union keeping wages high...

Unions in the USA/Canada, most notable the UAW, have exported 80% of their workers jobs over the past 50 years. If you do not believe me, just count them then and now.

Now I'm hearing about the worst possible solution, requiring every worker to have private insurance as a requirement for employment, shifting the burden on to those least able to afford.

The key to making insurance affordable is implementing advanced information technology, every health care provider has huge racks of paper files & computers. medical records should be kept on secure servers the same way as financial records.

cutting down on the grossly inflated admin costs, would free up enough assets to lower everyones costs.

once again look @ the financial model, if your money manager was sucking up 30-50% in fees, would you stay with that company?

"The key to making insurance affordable is implementing advanced information technology, every health care provider has huge racks of paper files & computers. medical records should be kept on secure servers the same way as financial records."

My daughter and son-in-law (both MDs) indicate that this is probably the most fruitful area for improvement in health care service in the US. They have both worked on occasion with the VA (Veterans Administration hospitals. They indicate the VA is far ahead of private hospitals in this regard and that it makes medical treatment more efficient. As I see it, having records trandferrable in this manner is great and it should eliminate the need some hospitals see for "running up the bill" because they are unwilling to accept the results of other medical institutions.
I guess I dont see why is it such a an issue to get on-line medical records transferred; must be legal issues again, as the technology has been available for years.

Change cost money in todays dollars, even though in the long term such changes will save money.