On Mon, 04 Oct 2010 20:42:52 -0700, Hawke
wrote:



What I am saying is that the statistics I saw said that when it comes to
the amount of money spent on health care in a person's entire life
almost all of it is spent in the last year. I don't know what that has
to do with people who drop dead in their sixties or seventies without
spending much on health care. Or with people who spend a lot over the
years on health care either. All I know is that the lion's share of your
costs for health care will be spent in your last year. That's what the
statistics say. Of course not every case is like that but this is a
statistic so it disregards the outliers and gives the general picture.

Let's look at some actual statistics. 27.4% of Medicare spending is
attributable to last year of life expenditures.
http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi.../full/20/4/188

About 10% of Medicare beneficiaries account for 70% of program
spending,
http://www.thirteen.org/bid/sb-howmuch.html

but only about 5% of beneficiaries die each year.
http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi.../full/20/4/188

These actual statistics refute your generalization that
"the lion's share of your costs for health care will be spent in your
last year." and in fact suggest otherwise in general.