[lit-ideas] Re: UK cancer survival rates worst in Western Europe
- From: "Lawrence Helm"<lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 10 May 2007 21:22:23 +0000
Hounding of an illegal alien working for minimum wage doesn't produce results
worth the effort. Yes, there is perfunctory "hounding," but it is not
cost-effective to keep after someone who has no significant assets. As to
your anecdote about your husband, Susan has several anecdotes of her own. For
example, the most important of her various drugs, one slowing down the liver
disease, was recently disallowed by our insurance. It took several phone calls
to get this straightened out, and she was without this drug for a couple of
weeks. The impact of not having this drug isn't clear to us.
I personally have difficulty not feeling contempt for bureaucracies --
health-care bureaucracies not excluded. They smack of the evils of Socialism.
You must meet their little requirements and they give you no alternative. They
often are petty tyrants.. Bureaucrats are outraged that you aren't intimately
familiar with all their petty little rules, and their rules are far more
important to them than you are. My exposure to Medical bureaucrats has been
through Susan. My primary experiences were in the military and Aerospace. I
don't have an alternative to bureaucracies, but a bureaucrat should be like a
Tax Collector in the Bible: he should be ashamed of himself.
Lawrence
------------Original Message------------
From: "Julie Krueger" <juliereneb@xxxxxxxxx>
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Thu, May-10-2007 1:24 PM
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: UK cancer survival rates worst in Western Europe
No, hospitals will not turn the uninsured or poor away. However, they will
send them hefty bills, in the thousands of dollars for even a minimal ER visit,
hound them with bill collectors, with threats of lawsuits, etc. Wages can be
garnished, etc. ER visits are FREE for NO ONE. Nor should they be. Hospitals
are businesses, too. However, the practice of charging individuals who cannot
afford adequate insurance two and a half times as much as the hosp. charges an
insurance company is criminal. Or should be.
I will reiterate something I've said on this list before. It obviously bears
repeating. My husband was hospitalized several years ago with severe angina.
He needed a bypass. His credit was good. He was insured with Blue Cross Blue
Shield, with a minimal deductible. He took all the necessary steps before
having surgery to ensure that BCBS would cover the surgery & accompanying
costs. They documented the procedure as pre-approved. $30,000 later BCBS
denied coverage, saying it was a "pre-existing condition". The hospital filed
a lawsuit and he nearly lost his (then) home and his business office. He was
able to negotiate with the hosp. to make monthly payments -- although, of
course, each monthly payment is partially a "late fee" and interest. He'll be
paying on that bill for the rest of his life; his credit is in tatters; and he
is now absolutely uninsurable -- that is -- there isn't a private health
insurance in the country who would sell him a policy. His good credit, his
being responsibly insured, etc., did not mitigate against the situation in the
least. He says in retrospect that if he had known ahead of time that the
insurance would not cover the procedure they told him they would cover, he
would not have accepted surgery.
Julie Krueger
On 5/10/07, Lawrence Helm <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Actually, no, I don't read them on such subjects. To clarify the point I
didn't realize needed clarifying, I could have said, "every time the subject of
medicine and health care comes up IN A DISCUSSION I AM INVOLVED IN, Judy and a
few others . . . "
I am amazed that the situation could have gone to one in which US health care
is lambasted is abysmal to one in which it is lauded and the UK is moved down
to abysmal without my having noticed. Maybe I should read more of their notes.
How about Welfarism? Have Judy and the others given up on that as well? I
suppose I could check the archives . . .
But you seem not to have read my notes on the subject of "cost and availability
of medical care," although this doesn't make me embarrassed for you. One can't
read everything. You may recall that my wife has a serious illness, one that
causes some bleeding that can't be controlled. She isn't quite on the
Liver-Transplant list, but the progress of her disease is being checked several
times a year. With increasing regularity she needs transfusions which
necessitate our going to Emergency Rooms. Even though this is a regular
occurrence there is no way around going to ERs. What we have both noticed is
the large number of poor and what seem to be illegal aliens who seem to be
without medical insurance. Hospital attendants informed Susan (hospital
gossip) that these people cannot be turned away. They can show up with any
sort of ailment whatsoever. "Emergency" apparently doesn't exclude anything
and they do not have to have insurance. According to the attendants, many of
these people use the ER for their regular medical concerns -- and for them it
is free.
Lawrence
------------Original Message------------
From: Robert Paul <rpaul@xxxxxxxx>
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Thu, May-10-2007 10:21 AM
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: UK cancer survival rates worst in Western Europe
> Not that I've gone looking for such articles, but I do recall that
> every time the subject of medicine and health care comes up, Judy &
> a few others lambaste the U.S. and laud Europe, especially the UK
> for being far far ahead of the US in all areas. The article above
> suggests that some in the UK may hold a different opinion -- at
> least at present.
As Judy says, you recall incorrectly, and I am embarrassed for you
that you believe that pointing out a mote in the eye of the NHS will
remove the beam from that of the US healthcare 'system's.' (Do you not
read Carol or Julie's posts?)
That anyone has ever claimed here that Europe, 'especially the UK,'
has been 'far, far ahead of the US in all areas,' is simply false.
The issue, when it has come up on this list, has been the cost and the
availability of medical care, not its quality.
Britain may be slow to adopt new cancer drugs; here many people cannot
afford them even when they are available.
Robert Paul
Reed College
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