DGDevin wrote:
Morris Dovey wrote:

Need I point out that that solution STILL leaves you paying for Joe
- just via a different path :-).

There's a difference worth noting: you wouldn't only be paying for
Joe's stitches, but also for all the clerical overhead needed for the
government to process the medical and accounting information.

Guess who pays /those/ bills....

Who pays for the 20% administrative overhead the insurance companies
absorb today? Health insurance administration in Canada absorbs 6%,
it's 4% in France and an astonishingly efficient 1.5% in Taiwan. What
baffles me is why so many folks are apparently content paying an
extra 20% for insurance that goes to executive salaries and marketing
campaigns and so on while being horrified at the thought of the
supposedly greater inefficiency govt. would bring to the process. The
insurance companies have been getting away with murder--refusing
customers with pre-existing conditions, finding excuses to drop
customers who paid their premiums for years but now need treatment,
raising their rates far ahead of inflation, not to mention absorbing
a fifth of the money they take in for "administration." We're being
screwed six ways from Sunday *now* by the industry--are we just
supposed to bend over and smile forever, paying more than any other
nation on earth for health care while coming in 13th among wealthy
nations in life expectancy and infant mortality? My usual instinct
is to suspect that govt. can usually makes things worse, but when it
comes to health care we need to do something different, it can't go
on like it is now because we simply can't afford it.

But you said it yourself: "...so many folks are apparently content..." If so
many are content (85% by the last measure), why take a chance on screwing it
up?

The Senate plan will be introduced tomorrow (Wednesday). It will contain a
mandatory insurance provision that will require as much as 17% of a family's
income (roughly equivalent to doubling their rent). This manadatory
provision is necessary in order to pay for the new coverages.

Of course those who can't afford the required insurance premium will have
its value subsidized by the government (they really do think we can't use
numbers).

And who, besides the president, says we can't afford it? I suggest the
difference between 16% health premium and a 30% tax rate in the U.S. is
better than 0% health premium and a 50-70% tax rate as in the UK, France,
Canada, and other countries held up as exemplars.

Life expectancy and infant mortality are flawed metrics for the efficacy of
a health-care delivery system. First, many people in this country die from
things totally removed from the medical universe: traffic accidents,
gang-related shootings, executions, terrorism, suicides. When a drunk drives
into a bridge support at 100 mph, neither the best nor cheapest medical
system in the world will do any good. (Consider also Princess Diana.)

A better metric is life expectancy for five years AFTER diagnosis of an
extreme disease. In virtually ALL cases, the U.S. leads the world. For
example, after a diagnosis of chronic heart failure, the rate of survival
for five years is:

U.S. - 96%
Canada - 86%
U.K. - 55%

Similar numbers obtain for breast, prostate, and indeed, all cancers.

Also, many deaths are attributable to social factors beyond the influence of
the medical system. The survey you quote (in which the U.S. ranks 13th) also
ranks South Africa as, like, third from the bottom! South Africa has the
best medical system in Africa - it was the home of the first heart
transplant, for crying out loud! South Africa also has the highest incidence
of AIDS, about which even the best medical system can do almost nothing.

Infant mortality is another bad hat. When a severely premature infant is
born in the U.S., we move heaven and earth to save its life. Many,
unfortunately, expire after heroic measures add only a day or two to the
infant's life. In France, NO measures are taken for an infant whose birth
weight is less than about 1.5kg. Virtually ALL these deaths are recorded as
"stillborn."