RE: [Futurework] RE: End of a dream?

[Harry Pollard]

Arthur,   As usual, let me excuse my tardiness.   This county hospital treatment is not just for emergencies – it happens during regular treatment with little expense spared.   This excellent service is for the poor.  If you have (for example) a bank account with more than $1,700 you are unlikely to get this service unless you pay for it.   As I said elsewhere, the cost of medical treatment is blamed, but perhaps their weekly family visit to the Dodgers is the culprit. Or the high cost of a home, whether house or apartment might be cause.   I made sure that my health insurance was paid because with five children it was nothing less than mandatory.   However, a more important problem surfaces with high cost treatments. Obviously, an insurance system that wants to keep down costs is wary about allowing treatments with possible astronomical expenses.   Private schemes make sure they are not bankrupted by catastrophes. But, so do national health schemes. They bring in a quiet system of rationing. Now and again, a hospital is caught up in a case like that of the recent young American woman. She should have been allowed to die a decade or more ago, so the services and space could be used perhaps to save a number of other unfortunates.   It’s an open secret that doctors in this position are likely to ‘help’ the patient to a premature natural death.   As the Canadian system moves toward bankruptcy, or at least poor service, they will have to ration more and more to keep the system afloat and working properly. As it is, the insurance that Canadians buy so they can pay for bypasses and suchlike in American hospitals seems to indicate that rationing by insufficient service is already in place.   My own insurance system – Kaiser Permanente hospitals – annually send us a moderately large booklet in which is spelled out exactly what they can do and can’t do.   Two years ago, they made a decision that they will no longer pay for proprietary medicines – expenses that can be an enormous drain on health plan resources – though I think there is a limit for the patient to pay, whereupon Kaiser shares the cost somehow.   Some proprietaries we get cheaper by reason of special deals Kaiser has made (their 5-6 million members give them some buying power). The asthma spray I use twice a day costs me about $57 for two, which packet lasts me 100 days - all Kaiser prescriptions are based on 100 day intervals.   I checked at Costco and their presumably cheapest price is $75 for one. Yet, I had some extra coughing and my doctor suggested another spray to add. It cost me $92 for 30 days at Kaiser. I only tried it once. It didn’t seem to do much and $1,000 a year is a bit steep.   A little free trade in drugs along with a free domestic market would help Americans enormously. Yet, Bush is entrapped by the hugely profitable drug companies and when (probably) Byden becomes our next President, I don’t expect any change.   An afterthought about the British NHS. Some 2,000-3,000 people a year died from asthma in the UK. My oral spray is a treatment – it goes into the lungs and treats the asthma. It’s no good for a sudden attack (which fortunately I don’t get). Another spray is used to open up the air passages to relieve things.   I’ve used a treatment spray for 20 years or so, changing to this latest one about 5 years ago. Three or four years ago, the British NHS made a change in their policy for asthma patients. They started using a “treatment spray” similar to the one that I use.   Apparently, asthma patients were prescribed relievers such as we can buy off the shelves at the pharmacy. Sprays that did not treat the asthma but instead opened up the passages for relief – as does Vick’s Vapor Rub for example. No wonder people died from asthma in the UK.   Harry   ********************************* Henry George School of Social Science of Los Angeles Box 655  Tujunga  CA 91042 818 352-4141 *********************************     From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Cordell, Arthur: ECOM Sent: Sunday, June 12, 2005 3:12 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; Ed Weick; futurework@fes.uwaterloo.ca Subject: RE: [Futurework] RE: End of a dream?         Harry said,   In our county system, which is where people go who have no health insurance, a patient in trouble was admitted one evening and given an antibiotic IV. Next morning, he had the works - Cat scan, Ultrasound, MRI, and X-Ray to begin his treatment  - and an operation.   Arthur asks,   Does this only apply to emergencies? If not, if this is available to all, then why is lack of health care insurance the leading cause of bankruptcy in the US?    ------------------------------------     Arthur,   As always, Ed's little essay was excellent.   But don't be despondent about the "dream".   As I have mentioned before, all health services are subject to rationing and perhaps a triage system.   When the British NHS began, in an excess of socialist enthusiasm, it even supplied wigs - beg pardon toupees - to the citizens.   Under any system, the demands are always going to exceed supply. If by law they are required to satisfy every demand - trouble will began.   With regard to Ed's remark about the long wait for specialists, the Brits made specialization a high paying job. This produced a large number of specialists but probably (still) long lines at the GPs.   In our county system, which is where people go who have no health insurance, a patient in trouble was admitted one evening and given an antibiotic IV. Next morning, he had the works - Cat scan, Ultrasound, MRI, and X-Ray to begin his treatment  - and an operation.   Cost?   Nothing.   Yet, we don't have a Canadian or British Health system.   When he was released several days later, he was given a large bag of prescriptions and several appointment dates.   Now, if you are out on the Canadian prairies, or in the middle of our deserts, I can imagine treatment being less available. Also, I'm sure in the depths of our urban ghettos, hospitals overburdened with knife and gun shot emergencies are unable to give such immediate and costly treatment.   However, it can be found in the US.   Harry   ******************************* Henry George School of Social Science of Los Angeles Box 655  Tujunga  CA 91042 818 352-4141 *******************************

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