Health Care: What do we really need?
Jul 10th, 2009 by Timothy Pancoast
So, when it comes to health care, what do we really need?
As patients we need good health. When we don’t have good health we need timely and correct treatment and medication for whatever has gone wrong. If treatment for what ails us is not currently available then we would like to see research and development conducted so that it can be made available in the future. All of this is provided by a variety of doctors, physician’s assistants, nurses, pharmacists, EMTs, and other medical professionals which I may have failed to mention.
What do these medical professionals need?
They need a safe work environment, and just compensation for their services. They also need proper training, facilities, equipment, medical supplies, and support staff to accomplish their job.
In America we need a health care system that provides those needs for as many people as possible.
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The current system is not perfect in meeting the needs mentioned above. It is costly, brings in a lot of extra baggage, and is inefficient. With a combination of government, and private insurance as well as personal payment covering health care costs it can become a mess. The medical system does not have to be as chaotic as the ER during a crisis. However, it seems to have reached and surpassed that point in many areas.
Currently America has more of a problem with the payment of health care than the health care itself, but that can and is changing. If I am sick or injured I might have to question how I am going to pay for the treatment, but I know that I will be treated. Depending on what policies are instituted that situation may change. I may find myself knowing that any medical treatment I receive is paid for, but wondering when and if I will be treated. I prefer the first situation to the latter. A new system that leaves Americans in the future wondering if they will receive treatment that was readily available in the past will have failed. Any health care policy that comes out of Congress or the White House needs to be examined in that light.
Are the current proposals for health care reform answering the right questions? I am not convinced that they are. What do you think?
I agree with your thinking. Nobody wants a system that’s not an improvement. We all want something better. The problem is not the medical professionals who serve us, but the manner in which our insurance money is collected then paid out. Way to many Wall Street middlemen taking big cuts of our insurance dollars for doing nothing but handling the money. There’s just no reason for so much confusion red tape and profiteering when all we are doing is pooling money and issuing checks. I notice Canada now has a very conservative Prime Minister. Voters in Canada would laugh him out of office if he proposed switching from Canada’s National System to the mess we have. Same goes for every democracy with single payer. Regardless of the Wall Street propaganda we get saying not for profit insurance systems are bad for business, voters all over the world vote to keep it.
Thanks Think123,
I believe a lot of people agree with you about the insurance process. I may not have stated it clearly in my post but in general I do too. The one group that was notably not represented at all in Rep. Castle’s “Listening Session” about health care was the insurance industry. It is clear he doesn’t think they can or should be included in the reform process. That also makes it pretty clear which direction he is headed on health care.
I am not sure if voters all over the world vote specificaly to keep health care. I don’t think that many of them ever see a ballot proposal, let alone have a chance to vote to keep it. I wouldn’t be all that supprised if many of them did though. It is very hard to convince a person to start paying for something they think they have been getting for free. However, it does and will continue to happen for people who end up coming face to face with the gross flaws in government health care.
To wrap things up, perhaps, if as you have identified the problem is with the insurance industry, we should be discussing insurance or payment reform rather than health care reform. Lets not confuse the two. When we do that we loose sight of the real purpose of health care. In health care health is the objective, not money. Money is a tool or vehicle to make it happen. It is my opinon that right now many of the people in Washington aren’t concerned about people getting health care. They are concerned about people getting money.
Take a look.
http://delawarerepublican.wordpress.com/drtv/
We have many issues videos on Health Care, I look forward to your comments.
Full disclosure, my oldest son is an Medical Doctor. I want him to have a great career.
Mike Protack
TP says: “In America we need a health care system that provides those needs for as many people as possible.”
No, Tim, for ALL the people!
And it does not involve reinventing the wheel. All other developed countries have worked out healthcare systems that are successes. And we have our own Medicare too.
Think 123 is correct, that our system of health insurance is flawed in that it milks money from the system and provides inadequate healthcare in many cases. Moreover, many of our healthcare professionals are making a fortune due to overcharging for services, as noted by much lower charges, even for Americans, in other countries, in India as one example. Finally, medical malpractice settlements are often excessive.
So we know the problems, what are we waiting for to solve them with appropriate legislation? Answer: Powerful special interest lobbyists continue to rule Congress.
Obama and many Dems are poised to work this out to the benefit of the American people. Single payer may be too great a step all at once. However, having a public option like our government workers already have, should be made available to anyone who wants it. For those who cannot afford it, their premiums should be lowered accordingly, such that every single American is covered.
If passed, this will enable healthcare costs to discontinue growing at the rates we’ve seen for decades, in excess of inflation, which will then contribute to an overall improvement in our economy, which we need desperately at this point in time.
Let us say NO to the special interest lobbyists, and YES to our legislators who are trying to work out the details!
Thanks for the link Mike. You have a lot of information there. I watched one of the videos and it was fairly long with a lot of information showing an in depth understanding of the medical industry.
Perry, I believe that socialized medicine attempts, to provide most of those needs to all the people. However, the success in those attempts is limited.
My initial post was about the questions that a health care system needs to answer. I did not plan on focusing on specific flaws, but I will respond to the points made. In general I don’t think I dissagree with you on the flaws in our current system. We are simply prefer different ways to fix those problems. Additionally, I would like to see most of these problems addressed individually, rather than as part of a massive package.
First problem – Milking Money from the system. The people who choose to do so will find methods to milk money from any system. The solution is to find out what those methods are and create policies and preventative measures against them. As perpetrators are caught they should be prosecuted according to those policies.
Second problem – Inadequate healthcare in many cases. Unfortunatly this is a problem with every health care system I am aware of. The inadequacies may vary from system to system but they are always there. Some of them include being placed on a waiting list, being denied treatment due to age or other conditions, a lack of modern medical equipment, unsanitary facilities, medical professionals with insufficent training or materials, and so on.
Third problem – Health care professionals overcharging for services. Very true in some cases. Even doctors can be scammers. For those situations I would refer you to my comments on problem number one. As far as prices generally being higher in America than in other places I believe that if it is a problem it is an issue of all business and not health care specifically. I just saw an article about which cities have the most expensive fast food. Prices in one location are often higher than in another because of increased costs of doing business in that location. Did you know that America consistantly ranks among the top two nations for the highest corporate tax rates? Of course taxes are not the only thing that drive up costs in one area compared to another, there are a lot of other factors.
Fourth problem – Excessive lawsuits. I totally agree. Tort reform is one of the major issues that I want to see reformed related to health care. We don’t need to wait for the rest of the health care reform package to address this issue. Over the top malpractice lawsuits are a major contributor to the issue of America having higer prices for health care than other countries. Lets get them under control fast so that we can see a reduction in medical costs right away.
I must be frank that I don’t trust President Obama, or any of the other politicians in Washington any more than I trust the lobbyist that you say still control the place. In spite of Mike Caslte’s listening tour I don’t think either group is really listening to me. I am not even sure they have my well being in mind when the work out this legislation. I am afraid that I’m going to have to say NO to special interests, and NO to legislators. At least until they start saying YES to me.
Thank you for acknowleging, though indirectly that a single payer system is the ultimate goal of the government option. Some people still won’t do that.
Well there are several other things I could say but this comment is already growing longer than I like so I will close it by saying that there are a lot of things that can be done to lower health care costs. The government is not the only option, and we can debate and impliment some of those options much faster than the massive overhaul that Congress and the President are working on.
Timothy says: “Second problem – Inadequate healthcare in many cases. Unfortunatly this is a problem with every health care system I am aware of. The inadequacies may vary from system to system but they are always there. Some of them include being placed on a waiting list, being denied treatment due to age or other conditions, a lack of modern medical equipment, unsanitary facilities, medical professionals with insufficent training or materials, and so on.”
Timothy, we are in agreement with the deficiencies of our healthcare systems and others, in a general sense.
I cannot help, however, to go back to the fact that ours is the most expensive per capita with among the worst outcome, leaving 48 million uninsured. So we agree, something has to be done, a lot has to be done, and 100% coverage while delivering the best healthcare possible ought to be our goal.
In my view, healthcare is not just an obligation, it is a basic human right which we, the richest nation on earth, must honor for our own!
Timothy,
The advanced democracies (except us) continue to vote in favor of cradle to grave simple efficient non profit single payer health insurance, because it works great and they like it. The ultimate proof is the vote of approval generation after generation.
For some reason my GOP is enchanted with the idea of letting Wall Street manage our insurance premium money. A system where just two CEO’s were found to skim off over $1 billion for compensation.
It’s a perverted application of Capitalism. Free market forces shoehorned onto a life or death commodity service that people are compelled to utilize. Adam Smith would roll knowing a service as compulsory as health insurance was abandoned to the destructive force of Capitalist greed. Free markets are great for hamburgers and cell phones. Not so good when a medical emergency forces you to go to the hospital. Would we let market forces control any other mission critical services like policing or fire fighting? Is getting your family rescued from a burning house a right or a privilege? Same for health care.
Your observation that voters in other countries don’t get specific ballot choices about national insurnance is probably right. The reason is no politician would back a proposal to go from non-profit to for-profit health insurance.
Finally, you say people don’t want to give up something they think they get for “free”. Most people understand nothing is free. Voters in advanced democracies understand major public infrastructure services like highways and health insurance are paid for with tax dollars. They vote to keep national health care not because they think it’s “free”, the vote for it because it works great, just like national highways.
Perry, perhaps I was being too much of a realist in my initial post. I agree that the ultimate goal should be that every America have all of the needs I listed in my initial post met. My statement about achieving that for “as many people as possible” is a recognition of the fact that 100% perfection in achieving such goals doesn’t happen in an imperfect world. From what I have seen, the countries that come closest to providing health care payment coverage to all of their people also have waiting lines, and even limits to what care they will provide to which person. The advancement of medical research often slows down under such systems as well. Basically the closer a government comes to paying for everyones health care the less they are able to provide or the longer it takes them to provide it. Even the article you showed me about health care in the Netherlands, I believe it was, aknowledged some of these drawbacks, though they managed it better than most.
About that 48 million uninsured, I have seen some breakdowns of that figure. Keep in mind that among the 48 million are people that don’t want insurance. Some breakdowns show the number of uninsured that need insurance at around 8 million. I am sure we will dissagree about the statistics, but I have to point out that the 48 million number is missleading. I am also not convinced that mandating health insurance for everyone, whether private or public, is the best solution. I have some thoughts about how to increase peoples ability to pay for health care without giving more power to the insurers, but I want to work my idea out more before I post about it.
Think123, I will agree that there has been a gross perversion of the free market system. However, your charaterisation about how Adam Smith would react is a bit off. He would more likely be scratching his head at how we came up with such a concept of health insurance and why it was neccessary. He would also be blown out of his mind by the medical advancements that have been made, and the thought that people weren’t dying left and right from things like small pox and cholera, or having pollio cripple them.
My hope is that rather than follow the rest of the world into a system with a different set of flaws, that America will work harder and create a better way of helping people meet their medical needs. If we show the world a better way then perhaps some of those nations will start to vote against government health care.
Timothy: “From what I have seen, the countries that come closest to providing health care payment coverage to all of their people also have waiting lines, and even limits to what care they will provide to which person.”
This may be true, but either the public option approach or the single payer approach will cut medical costs, because both provide the necessity for providers to cut costs and charges. So I think the trade-off you mention is worth it, better than what we have now.
Anecdotally, I know some folks from England and from Finland who have spent a year or more here, who speak highly of their government healthcare systems compared to our system. So I am convinced that we can find a suitable model out there there upon which to base our new system. It might take a few iterations through Congress to get us on a better track. At least now we have to start, while the Dems have the political capital to get something positive done, because we all know where the Republicans are on this issue.
One of the primary goals of this reform process is to get the cost of health care down to managable levels. There is a whole shopping list of steps we can take to do that, none of which involve the further socialization of our health care system. Why are they being put on the back burner or even ignored?
Turning to government health care or even just a “government option” will do less than hoped to aid our problems if some of the other underlying issues are not adressed. In fact if we turn to those options without fixing issues like tort reform we may reach an actual health care crisis, rather than a health insurance crisis. If physicians are still subject to the same extreme level of malpractic lawsuits, yet their income is further limited by the rates the government sets for those on its roles, we will start to run into a shortage of medical professionals even faster than we are now.
I already know several people who are becoming nurses and physician’s assistants, not because they aren’t capable of becoming doctors, but because they don’t want to deal with the immense liability issues that doctors face. Malpractice lawsuits are a big selling point for many people that choose the P.A. route over becoming a doctor. It will only grow if aspiring physicians are faced with the same level of risk but promised less reward. That is just one of the problems that a government take over or “option” will not nessecerily fix.
Finally, I question the wisdom of handing our health care system over to the government to fix untill the government has fixed itself. Once the government has cleaned out its own waste, inefficiencies, and missmanagement issues, then it might be able to make a reasonable case for its abilty to fix those of the private sector. There are claims that the government is in the process of clearing out its waste and corruption, but government is notorious for merely shifting the problems around rather than fixing them. Therefore, I will wait for results, rather than just claims.
Timothy, I appreciate where you are coming from, I hear those concerns over and over from those who oppose extending a medicare like system to all Americans. I hope you understand that each and every one of the concerns you raise are things we in the reform movement want to avoid. The idea is a radical change that makes things much simpler and much better. That is what we are all shooting for.
The Kaiser Family Foundation says less than 1% of our healthcare dollars go to malpractice suits. Malpractice is not adequately policed by the private sector Medical Associations. It’s almost like the Catholic Church. Bad doctors go from one state to the other with not much to stop them. Medical negligence is one of the leading causes of death. It makes no sense to relax the pressure malpractice lawsuits put on the medical establishment. Arbitration and other reforms have reduced the number of lawsuits going to trial. In the overall scheme of things tort reform is not a significant factor in what ails our system.
Regarding the competence of our Government. The do real well with the FCC FAA FDA. They have created miracles with the GPS mapping satellites not to mention the incredible communications satellite network for cell phones and all. The United States has one of the best run public sectors in the world. We can be proud of what we do. I have no doubt our Government is capable of managing a very cool insurance pool like Medicare only better.
Think123, I seriously question the Kaiser Family Foundation’s claim. If you could provide a link to the details behind it I would appreciate it. But does that 1% include the added cost to their liability insurance? Does it include actual dollars paid out in lawsuits, settlements, and legal fees? Basically what is it made up of? Also what are they including in the make up of health care dollars?
Tort reform would be a significant cure to what ails this country. I would like to see accross the board tort reform, not just in the medical community. Please bear in mind that tort reform is not tort elimination. Bad doctors deserve to pay a penalty under the law, however we are subjecting all doctors to a nightmare of legal uncertainty.
I’ll be honest, the three examples you give provide usefull services and generally do their job. However, none of them are models of exemplary government. Even the FDA with its recent Cheerios flap, leaves me scratching my head and wondering what is wrong with our government. I am sure our govenment is capable of a lot of things. Individual citizens and private enterprise are also capable of a lot of things. May the best side win. If not may God have mercy on us, because we will need it.
Tim,
Sorry, you can google that if you like, I wrote a piece about five years ago in the NJ, did a lot of research and came up with that figure. Point being – even if you got rid of all malpractice suits – health insurance costs would not change. Most malpractice never gets to court. More and more is arbitrated, settled in creative ways. The root problem is medical negligence and malpractice, lack of professional disciplinary action. Malpractice lawsuits are a symptom. We need stiff protection from bad doctors as well as drunk drivers.
Regarding what our Government does good or bad, when you say “may the best side win” – it sounds like government and private sector are competing. I see public sector and private sector in a synergistic relationship. Public sector infrastructure enables private sector prosperity. Like the way government GPS and highways revolutionized productivity in the delivery of goods and services in the private sector.
It has only been in recent years with the rise of Rush Limbaugh goofball conservatism that our GOP has got into this thing about the government being the enemy of the private sector. That tax is government taking our money and giving it to others. That we can spend our money better than government. (What does that even mean?) You and me can build our own highways? I have always been a conservative Republican. One of the things killing us is this hostile blind eye towards the public sector private sector synergy.
It looks like David posted a link so I am going to take a look at it to see what I can find out about the details of the statistic you cited.
It doesn’t matter when people started identifying the struggle between public and private. I was still in grade school when Rush started his radio efforts. The fact is the struggle has been going on and government has an unfair advantage when it chooses to get involved and the people let it. You see when the government goes into business it doesn’t have to make a profit to stay in business. It can even experience severe losses year after year and keep going, because it has another source of revenue. In a fight against a bottomless pit, or a black hole who wins?
The hostile eye is merited because the government has a greedy eye that is always looking at the private sector. Currently that eye is focused on the health care industry.