[geeks] now Health Care

[Phil Stracchino]

Jonathan C. Patschke wrote:
> In the last six years I've been to a regular doctor once for an ankle
> injury.  I've been to the ER twice: once at the behest of my girlfriend
> because I had a bad bout with the flu, and once because I'd gotten an
> inner ear infection that hurt badly enough to feel like something Much
> Worse at the time.

That.  There are basically two things I've been to a doctor for in the 
last twenty years:  injuries or related post-injury issues, and 
respiratory infections.  (And one could argue that the latter could be 
classed under the former, since the odds are pretty good that my 
susceptibility to respiratory infections is at least partly attributable 
to smoke-inhalation damage from a fire when I was 18 months old.)

There's been a few other random events, like the one-off migraine two 
years ago that had me dizzy, disoriented and vomiting.  But they're rare 
exceptions.  With the exception of post-injury issues, I see a doctor 
maybe once or twice a year.

>> the new ma healthcare laws are aimed at this.  everyone has to have
>> coverage, but the state doesn't provide it.  it is progressively
>> subsidized for lower incomes, 100% if you make <$15k or so.  the goal
>> is that this preventive care will be cheaper than emergency room care.
> 
> Why not require people to stop buying crap food, smoking, and drinking,
> instead?  I mean, so long as we're going to say that it's "okay" for the
> government to put guns to peoples heads and demand that they do
> something[0], they might as well force them to do the right things.
> 
>> would you rather stop smoking or get lung cancer?
> 
> Anyone dumb enough (and anti-social enough) to smoke cigarettes, knowing
> full-well what the result will be, deserves the expected outcome.  If
> you can spend the money on the smokes, you can damn well spend that
> money on cessation assistance instead.

I've never been able to understand why anyone starts smoking in the 
first place.  It's surely gotta take a lot of peer pressure to overcome 
the sheer discomfort of sticking a tube of smoldering leaves in your 
mouth and inhaling the smoke.  I get a scratchy throat just from being 
in the same room with a smoker.

(And frankly, most smokers *stink*.  I can think of few worse turnoffs 
than going to kiss a girl and realizing at six inches that she smells 
like an ashtray.)


-- 
   Phil Stracchino, CDK#2     DoD#299792458     ICBM: 43.5607, -71.355
   alaric at caerllewys.net   alaric at metrocast.net   phil at co.ordinate.org
          Renaissance Man, Unix ronin, Perl hacker, Free Stater
                  It's not the years, it's the mileage.