dsummersmi...@comcast.net wrote: > People on this list have argued for the advantages of a free market system > for health care and health care insurance. I have thought about it, and > decided to apply what we know from other markets that have considerable > less government intervention. > > For example, big screen TVs. If you have the money and want it enough, you > decide to buy it. If you don't have the money, you don't buy it. > > So, if a heart bypass will save someone's life, and they don't have the > cash to pay for it and the banks won't loan them the money, they die. If > someone cannot afford chemotherapy, they don't get it. Thus, they die. > > The closest thing we have to this in the US are those folks who don't have > health insurance and do not qualify for Medicare. We find that those among > this group are more likely to die if they have a first stage cancer than > someone with health insurance and a second stage cancer. And, this even > with the non-free market principal that hospitals must provide care if > death is imminent without care. > > Now, one might argue that privately bought insurance is the answer to this. > Well, normal insurance for someone with no history of health problems is > about 6500 per year for an individual and about 14k/year for a family > (paying for COBRA for my daughter who's between being covered by our health > care and health care from her first real job gives me the first number > pretty accurately). > > But, if one has risk, one has to get risk pool insurance. I own my own > business, and looked at private insurance vs. COBRA for our family. The > health insurance broker looked at our family and gave up...my wife had a > pre-existing condition, which meant he couldn't compete. My friend who is > also self-employed has a wife with diabetes. He has to pay in the 40k > range for basic, no frills insurance. > > If we extend this to eliminating Medicare, we will clearly see that as one > ages, one goes from the low risk to the high risk pool. Thus, older people > will find that they would have to pay 40k+ for insurance. > > For the vast majority of them, this will exceed the maximum amount of > income they could devote to insurance (assuming they ate and lived > somewhere cheap). Thus, they would not have insurance, and would be > looking at any serious treatment as too expensive. > > The result would be that a lot of people would die far sooner. John > Williams pointed out the absurdity of paying for very expensive surgery for > those in there late 80s, who are likely to die soon. I don't disagree with > that....the US system is just about the only one where that happens. But, > let’s say someone can have chemotherapy at 70, the cancer goes into > remission, and they live another 15 years. That's not absurd, IMHO. > > So, I'm curious. Do the advocates of switching to the only totally free > market health care system in the world, you know those who are not their > brothers keepers, think that we are morally obliged to go to a system that > will lower US life expectancy significantly (probably 5-10 years)? > > Dan M.
NO. That is an acceptable side effect for greater freedom and economic efficiency. Freedom isn't free. I think it would be very reasonable to have real free market health care. If that were our collective choice then emergency rooms would need to refuse care to heart attack patients who couldn't pay. There's nothing wrong with that except that it is politically impossible to implement. If we choose I also think there's nothing wrong with giving everyone reasonable health care and rationing access fairly through bureaucracy. I even have no problem with hybrid systems like they have in Australia, The Netherlands, and Germany. What is REALLY STUPID is having government coverage for some people, private health care for other people, and allowing those with private coverage (or rather lack of coverage) who can't pay to use the emergency room. _______________________________________________ http://mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
