No you don't, yet you can't argue with the fact that 89% of people own one.

Those of you who feel health care is a right are misguided. I say this because no matter how much you may try, you cannot claim as a right something that you require another to provide for you.

As a medical technician, if you want my services you are going to pay me, and if you don't you certainly won't get them. I don't work for the mere enjoyment of my job, I work the money that it pays.

dmk

You are correct again, Sarge.Our problem, people; is not the cost of medical services; rather, who and how we should pay for these services. Elderly people on limited income simply cannot afford the costs of these services, whether on Medicare, HMO, or regular insurance.
Sarge is correct. Medical technicians; whether they be a doctor, nurse, aide, phlebotomist, or whatever else do not work for free. Their parents did not bust their rear ends putting them through medical school to work for free.
Again. Sarge has a great idea on mandatory health insurance, but it would have to be phased in by steps.Also, I think it needs to be coupled with a forced savings plan to help fund retirement.
I really get disheatened when I pass elderly people in the store who have to take items out of the shopping cart simply because they have no money to pay for them. Many of our parents grew up in an age where there was no such thing as 401K plans, ESOP plans, Roth IRA's, CD's, and other savings plans. I was very lucky; as a child my father spent 23 years in and retired from the Air Force. He purchased savings bonds with 20% of his pay religiously. No, he did not retire a Bill Gates or Warren Buffet. I learned much from him (My mother passed away from pancreatic cancer two years ago), and when I started working as a teenager back when CD's were the investment tool of choice for safety; and paying 10 to 11 %, I put half my money there. I also put money in some companies I had been studying back then and they have paid off handsomely over the years. One company has split its stock three times since then. I suffered a brain anuerysm three years ago, so now I'm disabled; but luckily I will never have to worry about money. I have set up my son to where he will never have to worry also.
All of this does not detract from the health crisis this country faces today. Sarge said it best; we need mandatory health insurance. I believe if we can properly implement such an idea; we can turn our attention to the other national problems we face. Thank you,Sarge; I hope many people take heed of your fine suggestion and get it to the ears of their politicians!

With so many politicians coming down on the side of universal health coverage, care must be taken with planning, and people need to know certain facts.

What these politicians and many Americans fail to understand is that there is a big difference between universal coverage and actual access to medical care.

Simply saying that people have health insurance is meaningless. Many countries provide "universal insurance" but deny critical procedures to patients who need them. Britain's Department of Health reported in 2006 that at any given time, nearly 900,000 Britons are waiting for admission to National Health Service hospitals, and shortages force the cancellation of more than 50,000 operations each year. In Sweden, the wait for heart surgery can be as long as 25 weeks, and the average wait for hip replacement surgery is more than a year. Many of these individuals suffer chronic pain, and judging by numbers, some will probably die awaiting treatment. In a 2005 ruling of the Canadian Supreme Court, Chief Justice Beverly mcLachlin wrote that "access to a waiting list is not access to healthcare."

A requirement for mandatory coverage, BY INDIVIDUALS, could be a very good thing as it would require even illegals to have coverage, everyone at 18 or 21 if not covered by parents anymore, would be required to have coverage, and rates could drop from competition by companies.

But that won't solve the health care costs. People need to shop for health care with dollars they can keep if they don't spend them, in order to use market forces to bring costs down. If you aren't going to spend 3,000 for an MRI, no matter what, the MRI folks might just lower their prices. If you won't have allergy testing done at $800 for a few blood tests, they might lower those costs. MSA's or Medical Savings Accounts are the best form to use to use market forces to bring down costs. You get to keep the money you refuse to spend each year, and you can save it for your retirement.

Do we really want access to waiting lists? Do the politicians running for office have any idea what we do really want?

Ask them the right questions. Insist on knowledgable answers.

Very good point; Vharlow. We have to take on this responsibility ourselves and not wait for the government to do it for us. The numbers you quote should spur people onto action. Governmental control can only lead to a shortage of the specialists in the medical field. Aound Chicago last year; we had the unfortunate case of that city passing an ordinance restricting the amount of money a registered nurse may make. So what happened? There is an acute shortage of nurses in Chicago hospitals. Apply that scenario to doctors and you can only end up on the wrong side of the numbers game Vharlow has pointed out.
Garysher, your meaning is well; but just ask any elderly person on a HMO plan about the restrictions and waiting time. You won't like the answer you receive. Doctors do not like the idea of having some $8 an hour receptionist telling them that the procedure (or medicine) the doctor has reccomended is not within the scope of the HMO's guidelines. This is the reason many physicians refuse to accept HMO's.
I don't understand your point on waiting lists. I believe if you need a procedure that your doctor reccomends; you should get that procedure- period. Now, the good thing about HMO's is that most- if not all will accept pre-existing conditions. This is why our elderly take on the plans. I do like Vharlow's suggestion of the HSA. These are very good tools for offsetting medical expenses; although I think you may be obliged to spend the money from year to year- many do not allow you to carry the saved amount over to the next year.

I don't know what you know about COBRA? What started out as something great for those that lost jobs, through no fault of their own (COBRA) is an expensive Nightmare. I know of no one that can afford it! No one can pay for it with a months worth of un-employment benefit's. COBRA, is the entire full cost of your previous insurance, plus 2% of something. You can lower it, by taking less, but that is usually what you need it for? In recent years, it is such a farce.

One thing insurance need not cost so much (in the first place) Our insurance companies like the Pharmacies mostly rule the Health care Industry. Plus COBRA like any insurance can deny you with any condition? (I always thought that was what insurance was about, insuring what the consumer needs) If you have had Cancer and are cancer free for 5 years, never expect to get cancer insurance again! (At least none you can afford for a middle class income family)

I would agree, but it does not work that way. Have any condition and you will get a rider that won't pay for any condition you have, and in most cases any condition you had, even though it is over! Insurance companies cherry pick who and what they will cover, plain and simple.

You can work all your life, and carry insurance, but have a catastrafic event happen and when they have paid for that, and you live they write you out of it. If you die all that much better for them. (They don't/won't pay if they determine you just might get it again.

I agree there! I was hit by a hit skip driver. Just sitting waiting for the traffic so I could enter. Of course my insurance paid to get my car fixed, but (MY) rates went up. I was infuriated, but told because my insurance had to pay, and no one else, I pay the penalty?
I did fight them on this and finally after a year and a half they lowered them again. (My driving record was clean, no accidents, no tickets in all my decades of driving.) yet was penalized because of a hit skip?

IMO, and I am now working with a group of Nurses and Doctors for a responsiple (single Payer system) Some other states are doing the same and yes problems have occured, but for the most part, it is working quite well.
No health care is free! Not even Medicaide. It is paid by our taxes, yet the people on medicaide never even pay a co-pay.

The U.S. spends twice as much as other industrialized nations on health care, $7,129 per capita. Yet our system performs poorly in comparison and still leaves 46 million without health coverage and millions more inadequately covered.
This is because private insurance bureaucracy and paperwork consume one-third (31 percent) of every health care dollar. Streamlining payment though a single nonprofit payer would save more than $350 billion per year, enough to provide comprehensive, high-quality coverage for all Americans.
Click here to learn more about single-payer national health insurance
Physicians for a National Health Program - Health Care is a Human Right
Just some more food for thought!
JB06

I have read your link; but mostly what I see is rhetoric. We all want access to the best medical care possible , at the lowest cost possible.Ninety percent of this link just reiterates that. Unfortunately; as most American citizens do not have hundreds of thousands of dollars in bank accounts; insurance is necessary. What your physiciansdo not say is the fact that they work for money. (More than what most Americans make) I've yet to see any proposal to limit doctor's fees for service; and doubt that I ever will. Doctors would be up in arms over any such suggested legislation. Their stated scruples would suddenly disappear.
I think the real problem is not doctor salaries or medical costs. It's how they are to be paid that is what America needs to address. Again; I agree with Sgtdmski- mandatory health insurance seems to be the best way for our society to try to keep some costs in check.

knot_e_lady wrote:But you do have the right "to drive or own a car", unless you are an artificial person.