Some misconceptions about universal health care?
I’ve read many misconceptions about universal healthcare. No, it’s not perfect, yes sometimes there are waits. But here are some misconceptions and the facts.
MYTH:It takes weeks to months to go see a gp.
Fact: Walk in clinics are everywhere for most of them an appointment is not nessecary. it doesn’t take weeks or months at the most a few hours. I’ve never waited longer than 5 minutes.
MYTH: You can’t decide what doctor you want to see.
FACT: You can go see any doctor you wish.
MYTH: The doctors aren’t as good.
FACT: They go through intense medical training.
MYTH: There are no medical advancements done in countries with universal healthcare.
FACT: Canada is the county that invented the pacemaker, discovered insulin for dietbedies, we were the first ones to start practicing chemotherepy on cancer patients, Canada was the first country to practice heart surgery by a robot , the ones who invented the electric wheelchair, we discovered the DNA gene for cystic fibrosis…
Those are just a few advancements from one country who has universal healthcare. There are thousands more from other countries as well.
MYTH: You must wait years for every surgery
FACT: Not true, I’ve known plenty of people including myself that got surgeries that were needed in just a few months. Although there are longer waits on hip replacements. (At least in Canada.)
MYTH: It’s too expensive
FACT: The number one cause of bankruptcy in the US is from medical care.
So now that we cleared those up what is so terrible about it?
scottsdalehigh64: I would tend to disagree with your comment about American medical rsearch. Although your country does a lot of wonderful things on research and development, I would suggest you look at the size of your population. For the size of your population I would say you’re probably on par with a lot of countries with socialized healthcare.
Canada was the first country to use a robot to reduce strokes in a common cardiac disorder. Canada was the first to use an artificial kidney machine, we discovered the chemotherapy drugs vinca alkaloids, we did the worlds first liver transplant, we were the first ones to finish the human genome map and we were the world’s first robotic-assisted left atrial appendage ligation.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. Plus the UofA might have the cure for alheimers and other forms of dimensia.
Midnightmoons: I can understand that.
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Robotic Sweeper
I believe that the reason many people are so upset about this “universal health care,” is that it is ONE MORE thing that government is controlling! It may be on the whole, a good program for ill people needing care, but why do we look to the federal government to make these decisions for us?
Medical care, like all other consumer products and services, should dictate its own prices. What should be governed, if anything, should be caps on medical lawsuits. If doctors didn’t have to pay outrageous malpractice insurance, then their prices wouldn’t be so high for their services. Then, in turn, the general public would not need insurance to see the doctor. It costs $75 to see my physician for about 8 MINUTES. Even with my insurance co-pay, it is $25! Who in the world charges this kind of money to talk with you for EIGHT MINUTES! They charge this much so they can pay their own insurance!
That, and that alone, is what needs to be fixed. Our insurance companies are filthy rich.
You know, I ddin’t even touch on prescription ADDICTION, and I don’t mean to painkillers. If people would take care of their HEALTH, then, on the whole, we wouldn’t have so much illness. And people have so much faith in medicine, that they abandon LIFESTYLE.
Android Service
What you have to understand about Americans is that they’re idiots. They think we can’t afford this but they don’t realize that ten percent of our military budget for one year could fund universal health care for five years. Our military wastes so much money it’s disgusting. People should’ve listened to Eisenhower when he warned against building an industrial military complex, but they didn’t. Now we’re screwed.
PS. Have you ever watched one of those documentaries where military officers and R&D guys talk about future wars and the battlefields of tommorow. They still plan for things as if we’re in WWII. Peace is not even a thought that enters their brains (it would cost them funding).
Robotic Vacuum Cleaner
As an American who nearly went bankrupt because of my late wife’s medical expenses, I can agree with you completely.
The notion that the marketplace will solve the problem of medical care in the U.S. is completely wrong. The marketplace is a good means of distribution of goods and services that people want. However, it is a very bad system when it comes to what people need, especially health care.
The American health care system is carrying a monkey on its back: the insurance industry. The monkey is the size of Godzilla. The health insurance business thrives on clients who have money but are otherwise well. The industry does its best to weed out those who need health care. There is a growing scandal in California because two of the largest health insurance plans, including Blue Cross, were retroactively canceling insurance policies for expensive patients saying that the patients had pre-existing conditions that were not revealed in the insurance application.
This is not a humane or cost effective means of providing health care. Other nations with which America compares itself, e.g., Canada, Western Europe, all have health care systems that have better public health statistics, e.g., life expectancy and infant mortality, and these nations do it for far less money per patient. Why are we so far behind?
Some people make the point that the U.S. has the best health research in the world. I suspect that it is true. Nevertheless, there is a vast gulf between basic medical research and the delivery of health care to people. We may be great at the research, but we are miserable at the delivery.
Yay for Canada! However, please stop sending your ice hockey players down here, displacing our American players. We may have to build a fence along the border to prevent massive unemployment in the ice hockey industry.
Healthcare Robot
The problem is that it means raising taxes. Our gov (the US) misuses our tax money already to such a huge degree that no one trusts this money would actually go where it is supposed to. That would put us in a worse position than we are now.