What if Government Ran Health Care? (Sprint Ad Remix)

[Lumi]

What if Government Ran Health Care? (Sprint Ad Remix)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPC6CqAFA4E

 

[Spytheweb]

What if Government ran healthcare? These countries governments do.

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Watch whole program here:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/video/flv/generic.html?s=frol02p101&continuous=1

What if HMO's and insurance companies ran Healthcare?

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watch whole program here:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sickaroundamerica/view/

 

[gardenweasel]

obama wants to cut medicare for our elderly to expand medicaid to illegals and the non-productive....

so,you work your ass off your whole life in this country,and when you get a little age on you,you get pushed aside because obama wants healthcare for non-citizens and dregs like spytheweb...

all your parents are going to pay dearly(as will you,eventually).....believe it...

i can`t believe anybody is buying into this bullshit....why aren`t americans flocking to canada to get healthcare?...truth is,canadians,brits and other europeans come here for their healthcare...

where are is all the groundbreaking research in new drugs and medical technology happening?...

theres a reason it`s in america....in america....

chew on that,omar...

 

[Lumi]

I happens here in California every day. A 65 year old + illegal runs the gauntlet, works 1 year in the Casino, and CAAAAA CHING !

 

[Spytheweb]

Need healthcare, go to Mexico

Need healthcare, go to Mexico

Medical tourism is a rapidly growing industry, estimated to bring in gross revenues now well in excess of $60 billion per year, and Mexico is a convenient destination for many Americans in need of pharmaceutical drugs, dental work, and surgical procedures. Prices may be as much as two-thirds below those in the United States for comparable goods and services. The Los Angeles Times reports, for example, that at Los Algodones, a Mexican town of about 10,000 population on the border with California, ?dental offices outnumber restaurants 49 to nine. Add in the 26 pharmacies, 20 optical shops and 14 physicians offices, and you?ve got something of a mecca of medicine.? Similar towns may be found here and there along the entire Mexican border, especially across from Texas.

http://www.independent.org/blog/?p=588


Bumrungrad hospital Thailand

Steven Cherkas expresses similar views. When he had a heart attack while visiting Thailand in 2005, his impulse was to rush home to Columbus, Ohio, for treatment. Advised that air travel could prove dangerous, the 64-year-old businessman underwent double bypass surgery at Bumrungrad.

"I was treated like a respected guest as well as a patient in need of good medical care," he says. "Press the button, and they respond." His surgery cost less than $17,000, and his insurance covered all but $3,000 of it. Stateside, he estimates, he'd have paid up to $20,000 out of pocket.

"They have state-of-the-art everything," says Cherkas, who says he avoids U.S. medical care now and returned to Bumrungrad in 2006 for cellulitis treatment.

HALF A MILLION CLIENTS

Cherkas is among an estimated 500,000 Americans treated abroad in 2006. As U.S. health care and insurance costs soar, more people are opting for medical and dental care in unfamiliar surroundings and thousands of miles from their families and doctors. "Medical tourism" has morphed in recent years from an obscure phenomenon into a global industry, fueled by the Internet, ease of travel, shorter wait times for appointments and greater international sharing of medical "best practices," says Karen H. Timmons, CEO of the Joint Commission International (JCI), the overseas arm of the nonprofit Joint Commission, which accredits U.S. health facilities.

http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourhealth/articles/traveling_for_treatment.html

 

[Lumi]

Medical tourism is a rapidly growing industry, estimated to bring in gross revenues now well in excess of $60 billion per year, and Mexico is a convenient destination for many Americans in need of pharmaceutical drugs, dental work, and surgical procedures. Prices may be as much as two-thirds below those in the United States for comparable goods and services. The Los Angeles Times reports, for example, that at Los Algodones, a Mexican town of about 10,000 population on the border with California, ?dental offices outnumber restaurants 49 to nine. Add in the 26 pharmacies, 20 optical shops and 14 physicians offices, and you?ve got something of a mecca of medicine.? Similar towns may be found here and there along the entire Mexican border, especially across from Texas.

http://www.independent.org/blog/?p=588


Bumrungrad hospital Thailand

Steven Cherkas expresses similar views. When he had a heart attack while visiting Thailand in 2005, his impulse was to rush home to Columbus, Ohio, for treatment. Advised that air travel could prove dangerous, the 64-year-old businessman underwent double bypass surgery at Bumrungrad.

"I was treated like a respected guest as well as a patient in need of good medical care," he says. "Press the button, and they respond." His surgery cost less than $17,000, and his insurance covered all but $3,000 of it. Stateside, he estimates, he'd have paid up to $20,000 out of pocket.

"They have state-of-the-art everything," says Cherkas, who says he avoids U.S. medical care now and returned to Bumrungrad in 2006 for cellulitis treatment.

HALF A MILLION CLIENTS

Cherkas is among an estimated 500,000 Americans treated abroad in 2006. As U.S. health care and insurance costs soar, more people are opting for medical and dental care in unfamiliar surroundings and thousands of miles from their families and doctors. "Medical tourism" has morphed in recent years from an obscure phenomenon into a global industry, fueled by the Internet, ease of travel, shorter wait times for appointments and greater international sharing of medical "best practices," says Karen H. Timmons, CEO of the Joint Commission International (JCI), the overseas arm of the nonprofit Joint Commission, which accredits U.S. health facilities.

http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourhealth/articles/traveling_for_treatment.html

If you are Gringo , it's got to be pretty dangerous to go on an oxy or soma run

 

[ferdville]

Comparable drugs, dentistry and medical services in Mexico? You must be crazy. I live about 100 miles from the border and know a few people who have tried it. Many of the drugs are fakes. You don't really think an American trained pharmacist is dispensing those drugs do you? And the doctors and dentists are those (if you are lucky) that went to medical or dental school in Mexico and can't pass the boards in the U.S. I mean, doesn't it make sense that if you could practice in the U.S. instead of Mexico you would? There is one reason and one reason only - it's cheaper and you don't need prescriptions. If it is something like vicodin it may be harder to get but the pharmacy sends you to one of their "doctors" for a prescription so they can get another $50 or so from you. Had a friend who wanted vicodin and had to go through this every time.

 

[Spytheweb]

You don't have to go outside the country to be a victim of counterfeit drugs. Where is it better to sell fake drugs than the highest priced healthcare market in the world where you can make the most money, in America.

You're getting fake drugs and paying top dollar for them.

"Counterfeit drugs in America are a serious problem," Dr. Bryan A. Liang, executive director of the Institute of Health Law Studies at California Western School of Law and co-director of the San Diego Center for Patient Safety at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, said in a prepared statement.

"Counterfeiters are getting more sophisticated at exploiting weak links in the supply chain and expanding the types of drugs they're faking. Americans must be more vigilant about the prescription drugs they're taking," said Liang, who is also an expert advisor to the Partnership for Safe Medicines.
http://news.healingwell.com/index.php?p=news1&id=524751


Most of us think the term "counterfeit drug" must describe drugs that are being manufactured and ordered from outside the country where the US can't guarantee their purity. In fact, that describes only some counterfeits. This article describes the counterfeiting that is a thriving business inside our borders, often with drugs that are manufactured by American pharmaceutical companies, and may have already sickened hundreds of thousands of Americans.

You may be one of the people who has been affected and not even know about it. For example:

* If you take Lipitor, you may be one of 600,000 people who received bogus Lipitor in 2003.

* Have you been treated for cancer? Then you may be one of 25,000 people who in 2002 and 2003 were infused with a counterfeit blood boosting drug, either Procrit or Epogen.

The bottom line? None of us are safe or immune to the potential problems that could result from one of the very aspects of health care we have trusted the most: filling prescriptions and taking our medicine.
http://patients.about.com/od/counterfeitdrugs/a/counterfeitdrug.htm

 

[Spytheweb]

Comparable drugs, dentistry and medical services in Mexico? You must be crazy. I live about 100 miles from the border and know a few people who have tried it. Many of the drugs are fakes. You don't really think an American trained pharmacist is dispensing those drugs do you? And the doctors and dentists are those (if you are lucky) that went to medical or dental school in Mexico and can't pass the boards in the U.S. I mean, doesn't it make sense that if you could practice in the U.S. instead of Mexico you would? There is one reason and one reason only - it's cheaper and you don't need prescriptions. If it is something like vicodin it may be harder to get but the pharmacy sends you to one of their "doctors" for a prescription so they can get another $50 or so from you. Had a friend who wanted vicodin and had to go through this every time.

the numbers of people who are medical tourists is rather small. But when you get to a U.S. border, the numbers stop being small very quickly. As UCLA?s Center for Health Policy Research determined in a recent study, ?at least 952,000 California adults ? 488,000 of them described by the study as Mexican immigrants and about a quarter as non-Latino whites ? head south annually for their medical, dental and prescription services.? And why are they going, aside from the obvious concerns of cost and lack of insurance? See if this resonates with you: ?Among non-Latino whites, prescription drugs were the most common medical service obtained in Mexico.? Yeah, that?s right. We have American citizens going to Mexico to take advantage of their health care.

Look, where you travel to care has a lot to do with your situation. If I were a king or a celebrity looking for an expensive and dangerous medical intervention, yes, I?d come to the United States. Money would be no object. If I?m struggling to make $35,000 a year, have no health benefits, and need that exact same expensive and dangerous medical intervention, I?d want to be in any industrialized nation other than the U.S. There, I?d be treated. Here, I wouldn?t just be sick; I?d be ruined.

http://healthcare.change.org/blog/view/traveling_for_care_--_outside_the_us

 

[Spytheweb]

The real story
Here are the facts as to why Canada?s medical system, far from perfect, is dramatically better than America?s:
1. It is cheaper even though it takes care of the entire population, or 10% of GDP compared with 15% in the U.S.
2. Canada?s health care system which fully looks after 32 million people costs roughly what the private-sector health insurance companies make in profits in the United States looking after less than half the population for excessive premiums.
3. Canada?s health care system is cheaper still if the litigation costs of fighting over medical bills is eliminated as it is when the government is the sole-insurer. Estimates are that court costs and judgments add another 2 to 3% of GDP to the total medical tab.
4. Canada?s health care system enhances economic productivity. Workers diagnosed with illnesses can still change employers and be employable because they are not rejected by employers with health benefits due to pre-conditions.
5. Infant mortality is much lower in Canada and Europe than in the U.S.
6. Outcomes with major illnesses, such as cancer and heart disease, are better than in the United States.
7. Longevity is better in Canada and Europe than in the U.S.
8. No emergency is neglected in Canada.
9. Some elective procedures may take longer if compared to blue-ribbon U.S. health care but that?s no comparing apples with apples. More appropriately, the overall population?s care should be compared and there are tens of millions of Americans who are uninsured or uninsurable.
10. No one in Canada goes broke because of medical bills whereas ARP estimates half of personal bankruptcies are due to unpaid, high medical bills.
11. Canadians are able to choose their own physicians and to seek multiple opinions.
12. Canadian doctors and nurses are better trained than American counterparts and U.S. physicians must study for at least a year in order to qualify to practice in Canada.
13. Drugs made and invented in the United States are cheaper in Canada, Europe and Japan because our communal health care means volume discounts and savings passed along to society. Americans are overpaying.
14. Americans are being cheated by a patchwork quilt system where the highest risk people ? veterans, the indigent and elderly ? are insured by governments but the ?gravy? or young, healthy people are handed over to private insurance companies.

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22649.htm