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Originally Posted by graciegirl
Amen.
Most people think the government running healthcare would equate to the same quality of healthcare that most Americans are used to and they are wrong. I have a pen pal (email) in The Netherlands that had to wait six months for her mastectomy. Meanwhile the cells are growing, growing, growing. My husband worked for the same company and endured some pretty horrible bosses because the insurance was excellent and our daughter had some serious health issues. I am so grateful to him and to the wonderful health care she had over the years, saving her life again and again. Socialistic medicine is not as good, in my view, especially for those whose life is in the balance. We could search for the best doctors and the insurance paid for them. All insurance is o.k. as long as you aren't fighting a deadly disease.
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Unfortunately, it's worse than that. Currently, there are about 900,000 practicing clinicians in the US; those are projected to shrink by as many as 250,000 over the next 5 years due to early retirement and alternative non patient care careers. Who is going to replace them? With a growing and aging population, demand will increase as supply shrinks. One of the main reasons for physician dissatisfaction is burdensome government regulation---and we all know what happens if the feds take over health care---just look at the VA.
When I applied to medical schools in 1979, there were 128,000 applicants for 17,000 seats overall; due to multiple applications, each school with 100-200 seats received 8-10,000 applications. You could randomly toss 90% in the trash and still have a great pool to choose from. Five years ago there were 23,000 applicants for the same 17,000 seats---choices have dwindled. Already, teaching hospitals cannot fill their positions with American graduates. At his rate, soon you can just walk in the front door and have a seat. It is no longer, if the left will pardon my foul language, "competitive" But then again, why bother with diplomas and licenses---just show your "participant" trophy. I'm sure we all would get that warm and fuzzy feeling when visiting a doctor who hangs a "Certificate of Participation" on their wall above their desk.
For the "grass is greener" crowd that idolizes European style health systems--just try living there--anyone who can afford to opt out of their system generally does so. It is fine for preventative care and routine minor illness, beyond that, make sure your affairs are in order.
And for those who believe the skewed and biased WHO rankings of world health care that places the US in 28th place and Luxembourg in 1st, consider this: We all know that when world leaders , royalty, and billionaires get sick, they flock to "Luxembourg"--not NY or Boston, right?