Billionaire sees massive problem caused by aging, and here's my question
 

Can you give some (non-political) ideas on how to solve this problem?

I'll start the discussion with this suggestion: One idea might be called "tough love". No more useless medical procedures for lifestyle diseases such as heart bypass operations for coronary artery disease. This is a huge expense and is only one of many. Hundreds of billions of dollars are spent every year for diseases that are caused by poor lifestyle choices.

By not doing heart bypass operations for many people with clogged arteries, you'll solve the aging population "problem" by sentencing them die within a couple of weeks. Very efficient method.

Birth rate is the other factor involved. Obviously the baby boomer parents reproduced much more and faster than now.

Does anyone really think the media, Hollywood and Washington are going to campaign for young people to have more babies so there are once again 6 working taxpayers supporting each SS and medicare beneficiary, instead of 2???

I certainly don't think so.

VPL: Perhaps I misunderstand your post but are you advocating death panels?

Do you really believe a heart bypass is a useless medical procedure?

Perhaps you accidentally omitted a key phrase when you keyboarded your post?

Personal Best Regards:

Soylent green seems to work pretty good...

Do you really think people will choose to die if heart bypass operations are no longer provided by Medicare? Currently, Medicare pays for Dr. Dean Ornish's lifestyle program to reverse coronary artery disease. They pay for it because it works. And the cost is only a small fraction of what it costs for bypass surgery. But it's not well known and it's not widely available across the U.S.

Some serious welfare reform and doing away with many, many ineffective, costly and wasteful programs such as Head Start would allow for tax money to be spent on (actually returned to) those who need and deserve it such as productive folks who worked hard for many, many years, paid their taxes, and now look forward to enjoying a retirement they have earned, complete with adequate medical care.

Well, that's another subject, in my opinion. There were so called "death panels" long before anyone started calling them death panels. Only it was done by hospitals. If an older person wanted an operation, they had to prove to the hospital, through testing, that they had a good chance for a favorable outcome. This is because hospitals didn't want too many failed operations on their record.

What I'm advocating is a choice where the patient's life is in his own hands. Call it personal responsibility if you like. And Medicare can help by paying for classes to teach people how to accomplish a favorable lifestyle outcome.

Not the way things are now, no. The way it is now people depend on bypass procedures to save them from themselves. But we can't afford that anymore.

I don't claim to have all the answers, I'm just trying my best to start people thinking.

Best regards back to you.

Many people do not have TIME to do the "lifestyle program" when they're in the ER having, or are about to have, a heart attack.

How would "they" determine whether you lead a healthy lifestyle? Many people have diseases that are hereditary, or just happen. Some bodies naturally make more cholesterol than others, people wtih healthy lifestyles get cancer. Who decides what the guidelines are? And I don't know whether people who haven't made good choices to start with would be good candidates for reform. How many people with lung diseases, or COPD, etc., continue to smoke?

Bypass operations certainly not useless
 

As one who had five bypasses about five years ago, I wouldn't call this a useless medical procedure. I have two younger brothers and both had similar medical procedures. Of course, none have lived a perfect lifestyle but I can say all three of us were above the average.

VP, the Billionaire you reference, who is he/she. Could he/she be wrong? :ho:

Stan Druckenmiller
Stan Druckenmiller Sees

I am 77- had heart triple by pass at 66.At the time was quite slim, ran 20mi plus a week, played golf, private pilot. did not drink alcohol , never smoked. My disease is hereditary. Would you proposing that I should have had a death sentence??

Hmmmmmmmmmmmn!

Let us not forget that this "person" is a BILLIONAIRE!

Which, of course, means he/she will advocate this for you and I but can go anywhere with that kind of wealth and have these procedures.

Do as I say and not as I do !!!!

Yes! That is what he is saying. OP refuses to believe any disease cannot be prevented or cured with anything other than plants. And any disease you get is your fault. It's a narrow-minded, uninformed view in my opinion.

We had a friend just like you, Challenger, whose body produced so much cholesterol he had a heart attack in his 30s despite being a runner & non smoker. This was before the benefits of statins. He was reduced to eating 0 cholesterol in his diet, and his body still manufactured high rates of cholesterol. he's alive today (67) andis able to eat more naturally thanks to statins.

That's very true as that's how things work currently. But what about the stories of people waiting on a gurney with chest pains. They often keep them waiting until a bed is available and plan to do testing the following day. Someone told that story not to long ago. Was that person in danger of dying in the hospital hallway? No, I don't think so. They can give medication and stabilize the person until such time as testing can be done to see exactly what's going on. If the person came in with a heart attack in progress it might be a different story. I'm not making any judgment on that at this time.

I don't consider myself an expert and I don't claim to have all the answers, I'm just going by what I have heard and read.