Hank,
If an elderly family member perished because they were denied treatment due to rationing based on age . . . the doctor/bureaucrat responsible would not be long for this world.
Yes they would be long for this world, for one reason. You would never meet the bureaucrat who decided your elderly family member needed to die. You
would however become rather livid with your nurses, who did not have a hand in the decision. While those of us on this board would never shoot up a hospital, I can see rationing causing a LOT of anger, and more than a few people might take it out on us grunts.
I have no sympathy for illegal aliens, but since we ARE a humane nation, we ought to provide emergency treatment - and as soon as the illegal is stable enough to travel, back home he goes.
I am with you at Emergency. I say give everyone emergency Tx, because you don't know who should get it or not. Sure, some who cannot pay get service they don't deserve, but you cannot wait. HOWEVER, once I find out a pt is illegal, I say we send them back. Pull the plugs, everything. If they die immediately, I do not care. The only exception, would be if Mexico (or country of origin) agreed to pay their bills. I would take the time to determine where the bill goes, give them a brief chance to accept, and then provide services. If the country of origin, family, whoever refuses to pay, pull the plug.
Iain,
I doubt one person here thinks 'social abortions' should be paid for by any form of government program, doubt many would support fertility treatment, and that includes me - fertility treatment is expensive, and if I want kids I'll have to use it, and I'll pay.
Over here we pay for more than just elective abortions. Some states go so far as to provide sex change operations for certain people.
Wood,
And a parent who can afford this takes the baby there. A parent who cannot, uses the ER.
Did you miss that part of my post, or just ignore it because it was inconvenient?
Did you ignore my point? Even Mike is trying to help you here. EMERGENCY Room. Not, I am poor and want something Room. EMERGENCY. Would it be nice if every child had access to the same care the POTUS gets? Sure. It is a nice utopian dream. I cannot afford a 5000 acre mansion with my own gun ranges. I go without. If a family has made poor decisions, and cannot afford the office visit, they need to re-evaluate priorities. Do they buy cigarettes, alcohol, cable TV (or sat), cell phones, other luxuries? Yes, they do. I am not guessing either. It is easy to tell, when they have a cell phone dangling from their ear at the same time they tell you they fish a cigarette out while telling you how bad it is that their cable is out because of the storm and that office visits are so expensive. A parent who cannot afford an office visit should not go to the ER, unless it is an honest and factual EMERGENCY.
You're right - the mother should work and pay for the child herself. And to ensure that, we'll take punitive measures against the child - like refusing to provide care.
Brilliant.
So, to fulfill your bleeding hearts wish, we should enslave nurses to provide free care.
BrilliantRemember, TANSTAAFL. If they don't pay, we eat the cost. When you do something without compensation, you are a slave. Nice to see someone in modern day America supports slavery.
An absurd statement - babies die, so we're justified in refusing care if a parent cannot pay or chooses a less than ideal care delivery system.
The point, which went over your head, was that you cannot save everyone. Don't cry about how since someone died, we should socialize medicine to save someone else. It is a dream. Babies die. They are weak. If you are worried, take them to a physician, PNP, or FNP. Let them check the kid over. Maybe it will help. If they cannot afford it, tough. But stop wasting my time with your pitiful strawman that if we let them take non-emergency cases to the ER, things will be oh so much better.
She's not being provided with care, the child is. Duh.
And if the mother does not pay, we are slaves to the child. Duh.
Colds are a colloquialism for unidentified upper-respiratory illnesses. You don't know what it is, for sure, until a doctor looks - particularly with infants and children. Hence the desire for care.
Buzz! No, we are sorry, that is incorrect and your ignorance and laziness to use the dictionary is showing. Perhaps you will believe the dictionary, if not me, Hmm?
http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/common+cold Like I said. A virus.
Marvin,
A big part of the problem is access.
If I manage to do something stupid on Friday night, nearest time spot to see my PCP is around Wednesday the next week. This is with pretty good insurance. Luckily, there are non-emergency clinics that take my insurance around this area, but that isn't true everywhere. When I was in College Station, no one took the insurance my parents had (large HMO) and the only affordable treatment regardless of type was through the local ER. Stupid? Yep, but that's how it worked out.
If you get dumb Friday night, and it is an emergency, that is what the ER is for. If it is not an emergency, it should keep till the following Wednesday. Of course, you could always show the initiative, to either provide for yourself with different insurance, or bite the bullet and pay full cost. Of course, leeching off Mommy and Daddy and then complaining about your free lunch seems to be your preferred route. If the laws were set up better, you wouldn't have the option to show initiative, you would be punished for failing to show it.
Wood,
Ideally, yes.
No, not ideally. ALWAYS. Operating Rooms are not supposed to be lunchrooms, lounges, or sex parlors. They are for operating. ERs are not for convenience. They are not because you made bad decisions and are too much of a lazy worm to go to/have a PCP. They are for emergencies.
Why is that? Do they 'choose' to wait for hours on end and receive a multi-thousand dollar bills that will cause them much grief to pay or get out of paying?
Why would they do that?
Would you make up your mind. Earlier you state they go to the ER because they cannot afford office visits, but now they go there in spite of the high cost? My inconsistent and BS alarms are going nuts.
Yes, because this option doesn't, at all, ignore why so many people turn to the ER. We wouldn't want to get into a sticky issue like that.
Here, pay attention, the clue train is on its way.
People make bad decisions and will continue to do so because they are coddled. Start turning people away, and letting stupidity actually hurt and they will realize they need to make better choices in life, or else they get to suffer. Make it easy to leech, people will leech. You are making it easy to leech.
What does it cost to visit a family doctor for the "sniffles" without health insurance? Or a pediatrician? It is not thousands.
Mech,
Significantly less. Around here, I can get a full fledged visit for $50. We also have multiple walk-in centers (slightly more expensive) that are open 6 days a week with wide hours. If you even put forth a modest amount of effort, you WILL get access to health care. Only the true slime of humanity cannot find a way to earn and pay for their own access one honest way or another.
Wood,
$125+, assuming there are no other services required except for seeing the doctor. (Of course, how many people without insurance have a 'family doctor' in the first place?)
Which is not thousands, but it is a significant amount of money for many young parents. (Many young people in general, actually.)
The reliance on ERs is obviously not a good thing. It's a primary cause of the ridiculous percentage of GDP spent on healthcare in the US - people either wait too long to see someone and costs blow up, or people rely on ERs for care in general (and the cost gets written off down the road, or they go into deep debt to pay it off).
The solution is not to simply refuse care to the ill, particularly infants and children. Not that basic medical ethics would allow this anyway.
$125 is a bit high, but fine, hell, lets knock it up to 200. If people had to pay 200 a visit, are they going to waste time on the sniffles, or will they learn what to watch for themselves so they can observe for what actually needs a visit? My Mother was smart enough to do that. When I went to the physician (and we never had health insurance), it was because I needed to go. Here is the positive side though. At 200 a visit, people would go less. Physicians would make less (fewer customers), and lower prices to get people to come in more often. Capitalism is your friend.
You almost had something in your second paragraph. Costs are so high,
because people are not being made to pay for what they take. You want to see costs lowered? Make people pay for their own services. Smart people will see the wisdom in buying insurance, and taking care of themselves. Darwin will hopefully weed the rest out, as we should stop helping those who don't help themselves.
Your infants and children line is emotional tear jerking. My ethics do not at all compel me to enslave myself to someone else's children. Pay me for my services, or find yourself some other sap who will provide you with health care at a slave's wages.
