Scam Alert: Hospitals All Over America Are Wildly Inflating Medical Bills

[ivwshane]

It might have if we actually had a free market.

Oh yeah matt? And this is based on what exactly? Can you name any free market health care system in the world that provides better coverage than the OECD average and gets better results than the average OECD country? No? Then once again you have no fucking clue what you are talking about.

I await your rebuttal, it should be easy to find a country that has a free market health care system that's better than ours, there were only two other countries that had a free market based health care system. I wonder if those countries are moving more towards a free market system or more to a socialized system? It doesn't matter, I'm sure they aren't as smart as you matt, they are probably just ignorant of the miracles of a free market health care system.









Of course I really don't expect a serious reply from you since you've been proven to be a troll.

 

[squarecut1]

America is the only industrialized country in the world which does not have universal health coverage. So many citizens of supposedly the richest country on earth cannot get essential medical care. So many go bankrupt in the process.

On the other hand, we have countless dollars to fire missiles and bombs all over the world on hapless people. Like I said, it is all about national priorities.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

It might have if we actually had a free market.

Sorry, but you're an idiot.

 

[Darwin333]

Sounds like these people didn't have insurance. I had rotator cuff surgery last December 31st but due to the fact I had hit my max out of pocket limit for the year prior to the surgery I paid didn't a cent of the approximately $38,000 bill (hospital/doctors).

Sounds like these people didn't have insurance. I had rotator cuff surgery last December 31st but due to the fact I had hit my max out of pocket limit for the year prior to the surgery I paid didn't a cent of the approximately $38,000 bill (hospital/doctors).

The point you should be taking from the article, if you even read it, is THAT is the reason insurance is so expensive and not because health insurance companies are big bad greedy assholes. When it costs hundreds of thousands for procedures of course insurance against that cost is going to be expensive.

Did you know that we already have laws in place that say what hospitals do is black letter law illegal, except they are one of the very few exemptions. We keep talking about the absurd cost of medical care in this country but for some reason we don't discuss the fact that the people doing the real charging, the medical providers not the insurers, are exempt from antitrust laws and have exploited that exemption.

When you can get quotes (IF you can get a quote beforehand) prices can vary by over 1,000% in the same region for no reason at all. Stuff that should cost $100 a dose they are charging $30,000 for, which they conveniently don't tell you until AFTER you've been treated, and you quite literally have no choice but to take it or die. How many pages was the ACA and they couldn't make that shit illegal? You jack up the price of gas a single dollar during a hurricane and they can put your ass in jail or fine you out of existence but hospitals marking up a $100 dose of antivenom to $30,000, perfectly legit and its really those fucking insurance companies fault!

 

[Darwin333]

Time for the government to start regulating hospitals as public utilities.

How about we just make them follow laws that apply to every other industry in the country?

 

[MongGrel]

America is the only industrialized country in the world which does not have universal health coverage. So many citizens of supposedly the richest country on earth cannot get essential medical care. So many go bankrupt in the process.

On the other hand, we have countless dollars to fire missiles and bombs all over the world on hapless people. Like I said, it is all about national priorities.

Good point, actually.

 

[Grey_Beard]

How about we just make them follow laws that apply to every other industry in the country?

What laws do they not follow? Please explain.

 

[Ronstang]

On the other hand, we have countless dollars to fire missiles and bombs all over the world on hapless people. Like I said, it is all about national priorities.

Well, what we should do is take all the great nations of the world that receive $$$$ from us and start reducing their aid by a percentage relative to how much aide they receive indexed to how much all these bombs cost each year so all these wonderful people across the globe can feel good that they are doing their part of the world policing.

 

[unokitty]

Swiss voters reject shift to state-run health insurance

Swiss voters on Sunday rejected a plan to ditch the country's all-private health insurance system and create a state-run scheme, exit polls showed.

Some 64 percent of the electorate shot down a plan pushed by left-leaning parties...

In a country where the average monthly net salary is 4,950 Swiss francs (4,100 euros, $5,268), health premiums are around 400 francs per adult per month.

All private health insurance?

Interesting...

Uno

 

[Victorian Gray]

The government just wrote the largest piece of legislation to nationalize/fix health insurance yet you still cant shop across your own states border for it. Sounds like free market to me.

The American govt. nationalized all private medical insurance companies in the United States?

 

[Darwin333]

What laws do they not follow? Please explain.

The Sherman, Clayton and Robinson-Patman Acts off the top of my head. And its not that they are actually "breaking" the law, for the most part, they are one of (it not the) only industries that are exempt from large parts of antitrust laws.

 

[shortylickens]

No you are wrong.

High Lord Obama fixed everything wrong with health care and now everybody can pay with pocket change. Dont you watch the liberal run media?

 

[Grey_Beard]

The Sherman, Clayton and Robinson-Patman Acts off the top of my head. And its not that they are actually "breaking" the law, for the most part, they are one of (it not the) only industries that are exempt from large parts of antitrust laws.

Do you even know what these acts entail? Please explain how these laws apply to health care? What public harm is there with a health care monopoly? Prices go up because there are too many. A few less would reduce costs. Throwing out names does not make it so. How is there price discrimination? What if Walmart built more stores and when they did they increased the prices of the products they sold? Then Target did the exact same thing and so on. It is clear that you do not understand anything about health care. Throwing out acts about price discrimination, monopolies and anti-competition without explaining how they apply shows your lack of overall knowledge. Try again. Do these laws not apply to insurance companies or do you have stock in those?

EDIT: How do you judge service and quality in health care to determine price? Since you can see a product and production is fixed, this applies. So, they should charge a base fee, the an additional cost for each condition you have (called a co-morbidity), kind of like the options, such as a leather interior, when buying a car, right?

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

hospitals marking up a $100 dose of antivenom to $30,000, perfectly legit and its really those fucking insurance companies fault!

You realize that what is paid for that dose in the US was not anything near $100? That's why the article is bullshit, because it goes out of it's way to misrepresent. But with government it's just as bad because every toilet seat in government buildings costs $2000. Well, no they don't but any dishonest shill can play that game.

 

[ivwshane]

No you are wrong.

High Lord Obama fixed everything wrong with health care and now everybody can pay with pocket change. Dont you watch the liberal run media?

Apparently you don't!

 

[Brainonska511]

What about in-network ERs filled with out of network doctors?

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/29/u...er-is-in-network-but-the-doctors-are-not.html

 

[Mai72]

When I go back home to teach the taxpayers will be paying for my medical expenses.

Thank you taxpayers.

 

[Jeff7]

Hi Jeff7. Are you making the claim that the healthcare system in place now is a "free market"?

I'm saying that a common point made in opposition of nationalized healthcare is that a free market for coverage will solve the problem just fine.

I'm a bit too cynical to believe that.

We do have plenty of players though, and they can evidently charge what they darn well feel like.




God, I've got two teeth that look like they're cracked. I'm not only concerned about what painfully unpleasant things might need to be done to get them taken care of, but also what the costs might be, and how this screwed up system will handle it.
Watch me end up with some $25 cotton balls stuffed in my mouth at some point.

 

[Darwin333]

You realize that what is paid for that dose in the US was not anything near $100? That's why the article is bullshit, because it goes out of it's way to misrepresent. But with government it's just as bad because every toilet seat in government buildings costs $2000. Well, no they don't but any dishonest shill can play that game.

So why does the exact same name brand of medication cost $100 a few hundred miles away and $30,000 here. Last I checked Mexico didn't have any sort of great socialized healthcare system but craptastic Mexico can purchase a product from the same company as US hospitals and sell that product for $100 but the best we can do is $30,000 or whatever the absurd price was.

Why does the exact same procedure vary by 1000% at different hospitals in the same region?

How in the world do you justify the prices they charge when they often settle for 10% of the quoted price if you have insurance. If I have cash in hand, upfront, they actually save money by not having to do the bullshit billing dances yet I would still have to pay the absurdly inflated price.

 

[Londo_Jowo]

The point you should be taking from the article, if you even read it, is THAT is the reason insurance is so expensive and not because health insurance companies are big bad greedy assholes. When it costs hundreds of thousands for procedures of course insurance against that cost is going to be expensive.

Did you know that we already have laws in place that say what hospitals do is black letter law illegal, except they are one of the very few exemptions. We keep talking about the absurd cost of medical care in this country but for some reason we don't discuss the fact that the people doing the real charging, the medical providers not the insurers, are exempt from antitrust laws and have exploited that exemption.

When you can get quotes (IF you can get a quote beforehand) prices can vary by over 1,000% in the same region for no reason at all. Stuff that should cost $100 a dose they are charging $30,000 for, which they conveniently don't tell you until AFTER you've been treated, and you quite literally have no choice but to take it or die. How many pages was the ACA and they couldn't make that shit illegal? You jack up the price of gas a single dollar during a hurricane and they can put your ass in jail or fine you out of existence but hospitals marking up a $100 dose of antivenom to $30,000, perfectly legit and its really those fucking insurance companies fault!

You do realize most insurance companies have per-negotiated fees for providers within a PPO network. I've never seen where my company paid a huge negotiated fee for any of the services or medication I've received during a medical procedure in the last 24 years, I have never paid more than $2,000 out of pocket during that same time frame. Sounds more like the OP is describing prices that were out of network for the person or the person was not insured.

 

[piasabird]

The way I see it is no hospital has a set charge for services that is written down. They just arbitrarily charge you whatever they want.

 

[Grey_Beard]

The way I see it is no hospital has a set charge for services that is written down. They just arbitrarily charge you whatever they want.

Wrong. They all do, it's the law. Licensure and accreditation require it. It is not public and it is not universally the same. They charge a different amount for each contract the negotiate, but the base amount is written down and consistently applied to all contracts. A self pay client has no contract so they start at the highest point, which is why we see all this outrage about overcharging the public, but that is less than 2% of the overall business each year.