Obama and health care

[RichardE]

Originally posted by: M0RPH

Originally posted by: RichardE

Even Hilarys plan is not UHC....Its "Forced Health Insurance for Every American!"

UHC is government paid for medical expenses..

Yes, that is the most PURE form of UHC, where a person just walks into a hospital and gets whatever they need without cost ever coming up. The government handles all the costs and it's transparent to the citizens. I commend Canada for having such a system.

However, all that's really happening here is that you are paying, through your taxes, the same thing that we are paying through our health insurance. So basically you are being forced to buy into a really good health insurance plan (with zero copays) through your taxes... i.e. "Forced health insurance for every Canadian!" Congrats on that.

Except your guys taxes are already going to health insurance on a level much higher than Canadian ones (per citizen average). Which means theoretically you should be able to provide service to every citizen at a level higher than the Canadian service. As I said earlier, these forced health insurance plans are a band aid solution that will not fix the money sink hole your health care has become.

 

[RichardE]

Originally posted by: M0RPH

Originally posted by: RichardE

Why is it a moral travesty when its a choice? Why should people have to pay for insurance? Auto-insurance makes sense since you might directly affect someones life, but why not mandate all insurance than? Mandate renters insurance, home insurance, boat insurance, land insurance, dental insurance ect ect? Seriously, you want to force 95% of the people to purchase insurance to make sure 5% get it. Why should they not have a choice? Maybe they don't have the money for insurance? So instead of fixing that issue you want to take what little money they have for insurance?

It's not just yourself that is affected when you get sick without health insurance. In this country we don't just let people die, we treat them whether they have insurance or not. But if they cannot pay, those costs are paid by all the rest of us who do pay for insurance. So yes, it does afffect others.

And no universal heath care (or insurance if you like) plan can go anywhere without provisions to ensure that everyone can afford to buy the insurance they are required to keep. Hillary Clinton's plan, for example, would subsidize insurance so that it would never cost more than a certain percentage of anyone's income. And if they have no income, then obviously they get covered for free under some government program.

And why are you so worried about having a law that requires those 95% of people to have insurance when they already have insurance anyways? By the way, that 5% is more like 15% in the USA, smart guy.

I was just taking Bombers stats of 15million people (5% of 300mil) You are saying 45 million people would be without insurance. I still stand by my reasoning that all these UHI plans are nothing but band aid solutions designed to pull on your heart strings and give you warm fuzzies when the real issues of the health care system are ignored.

 

[episodic]

My question is:

If the 'private plan' at my employer costs an arm and a leg (which it does) - can I elect to get the lower cost plan - or am I stuck?

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: CADsortaGUY
Can people please stop using "care" and "insurance" interchangeably. They are NOT the same. UHC is not UHI just as UHI is not UHC.

QFT

Fern

 

[M0RPH]

Originally posted by: CADsortaGUY
Can people please stop using "care" and "insurance" interchangeably. They are NOT the same. UHC is not UHI just as UHI is not UHC.

UHI is, in effect, UHC. If you mandate that everyone has to have a certain level of health insurance coverage, then they will always be able to get care for a reasonable cost without incurring financial hardship or becoming a burden on the system for high-cost care. You can nitpick definitions all you want, but this sort of plan is in fact a form of universal health care. It is certainly much more correct to call a UHI plan UHC then it is to call a plan like Obama's UHC.

 

[CADsortaGUY]

Originally posted by: M0RPH

Originally posted by: CADsortaGUY
Can people please stop using "care" and "insurance" interchangeably. They are NOT the same. UHC is not UHI just as UHI is not UHC.

UHI is, in effect, UHC. If you mandate that everyone has to have a certain level of health insurance coverage, then they will always be able to get care for a reasonable cost without incurring financial hardship or becoming a burden on the system for high-cost care. You can nitpick definitions all you want, but this sort of plan is in fact a form of universal health care. It is certainly much more correct to call a UHI plan UHC then it is to call a plan like Obama's UHC.

No it is not "in effect" UHC. INSURANCE is not CARE. CARE is being taken care of and has nothing to do with cost. INSURANCE is a cost protection (risk mitigation). Mandating people mitigate their risk does not mean they actually get care.

 

[extra]

Sure, I'd love a single payer simple system. However, political reality prevents this from happening. Obama's plan addresses many of the issues we have in this country with health insurance. It also helps smaller employers and the poor who want insurance. It also has components to keep costs under control and encourage competition.

It's not perfect, but it's pretty damn good. I think Obama is a realist and knows that a single payer type system would not get passed in this country at this point in time. His plan will get passed easily and will address some of the things that people like my wife and I NEED RIGHT NOW.

All the people whining about how they don't want it to take effect because it's not single payer, or on the other side don't want it to take effect because guvernment iz ebil and bad...please consider this:

Obama's plan will help a ton of us dramatically and will be fairly easy to pass and implement and actually get started. People like me with no insurance need something like Obama's plan *now*. Small businesses dealing with skyrocketing costs need something like Obama's plan *now*.

Would single payer be nice? Yes.

Does single payer have a chance in hell of passing in this country right now? I doubt it.