[geeks] healthcare was: nVidia 8800GT for Apple Mac Pro

[Nadine Miller]

Phil Stracchino wrote:
> Patrick Giagnocavo wrote:
>> Mike Meredith wrote:
>>> On Wed, 21 May 2008 17:28:15 -0400, Patrick Giagnocavo wrote:
>>>> Socialized healthcare == RATIONED healthcare
>>>
>>> ROFL! Unless the US has infinite resources to allocate to healthcare,
>>> it also has healthcare rationing. Open your wallet. See those bits
>>> of paper with "$" written on them ? They're ration tickets. It may
>>> or may not be a better rationing systems, but it's still a
>>> rationing system.
>>>
>>
>> My point is, that you can have as much health care as you can afford 
>> and the market can provide.  You get to be in charge, not some 
>> bureaucrat who doesn't even have an MD.
> 
> Instead, you're subject to the whims of some accountant who doesn't even 
> have an MD.  And if the accountant doesn't think you need that 
> treatment, you'll pay a "full price" that no-one else does.
> 
> I personally think most of the healthcare problems in this country could 
> be solved simply by requiring the hospitals to charge everyone the same 
> rate.  That room that you want to charge me $1000 a day for, but my 
> medical insurance company can get it for $75 a day?  Charge me $75 a day 
> for it, and cut out the middleman.
> 
> If they can stay in business while charging my insurance company 
> "contracted rate", then they can stay in business while charging me the 
> same rate.  And if everyone was charged the "contracted rate" that 
> medical insurance companies get to pay, most people would never need to 
> have medical insurance at all, because they could afford their own 
> medical care.  The medical insurance business as it now exists is 
> little, if anything, more than a way for a bunch of accountants and 
> speculators to stand in between the patients and the caregivers and 
> siphon off a fat share of the money.  Let's face it - if they weren't 
> making a profit off the business, they wouldn't be IN the business.  The 
> hospitals are complicit in the scheme by agreeing to charge insurers 
> anywhere from five to twenty times less than they charge uninsured 
> private petients.

Medical bills are negotiable, most people just don't bother to ask.  The 
worst thing that happened in the US was the tying of insurance to 
employment; people no longer have a vested interest in how much their 
treatment costs because their insurance costs are hidden by too many 
layers of indirection.

Doctors aren't happy with the system either.  Specialists still make 
money large incomes, but for instance, ObGyn is getting hard to find in 
certain states b/c of the liability issues.  The reason why your GP 
office is overloaded is due to the patient/profit ratio due to overhead 
and negotiated contract rates, etc, etc.

Some of the tricks the insurance companies pull to avoid paying valid 
bills are ridiculous as well.  Aetna was under investigation for 
racketeering at one point--the FBI came and interviewed my GP in regard 
to their tactics.

=Nadine=