The 35-37 stat was from a discussion we had on gay marriage a while back. It referred to a study in a Canadian city as to the longevity of gay men and the loss in years of life due to AIDS.
Oh, here we go, the city was Vancouver and the study published in the International Journal of Epidemiology:
Upshot: mean life expectancy for gay males was 34 years, given 3% of the male population was gay.
I bet the median is lower than 34 years.
Those are pretty freaking horrific numbers. We're talking "sub-Sarahan Africa with a genocidal revolution" sorts of average lifespans.
So what if the costs go up care to explain how you imagine they won't go up?
cool you write the check
and there are quite a few legal issues that arise. ones that can be be addressed in a civil unions context.
civil unions would also allow couples who chose not to get married to qualify for benifits wether they are gay or hetero
You first.. how will they go up in any real sense? You first brought up the cost issue and if I'm supposed to refute something I need to know what it is.
Hokay, time to add some light to the heat. Or at least some data.
For those who think that it would cost nothing, dollar-wise, for insurance to cover the "partner" of a homosexual employees at a company, you fail basic arithmetic. Those folks, even if they had similar illness & mortality rates, would end up costing somebody more money, because they use dollars to cover their health care. TANSTAAFL...or TANSTAAFHC to be more specific.
Thing is, there are studies showing that homosexual males have an incredibly high mortality rate and use of health care during their peak earning years. This is relative to heterosexual males.
To give an idea, the following study shows just how significant the difference is:
http://ije.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/reprint/26/3/657.pdfSummary:Vancouver, BC, Canada had X number of male HIV deaths over a period of time. Due to various factors, the homosexual population could not be accurately estimated as one percentage, so three estimates were used, high (95), med (6%) and low (3%). These three models were used to determine homosexual male mortality rates and loss in life expectancy due to HIV (see note 1).
Take a good, long, look at Tables ! & 2 and Tables 1 & 2. They are sobering tally a huge loss of life...and increased health care costs sooner, rather than later.
Life Expect Loss due to HIV
Gay and bisexual men
3% of population 34 (0.70) 21.3 (0.90)
6% of population 42.6 (0.50) 12.7 (0.70)
9% of population 46.3 (0.40) 9 (0.60)
All men 54.3 (0.10) 1 (0.20)
(Std err for each value in parenthesis)
If you think it would cost fellow employees on the same insurance plan a big, fat, nuthin', I think the data says otherwise. The data shows that while men are in their prime earning years, homosexual males are in a big hurry to fall ill and die. Not only is the enterprise denied their skill and labor, it has to pay out big bucks for life-saving & extending treatments. I would bet that in addition to health care costs, that we can toss in disability for them.
Note 1: HIV is not the only thing that drives down homosexual life expectancy. There are large correlations between homosexuality and other risky behaviors.
