Socialist Medicine
Imagine a healthcare system where distant, faceless bureaucrats determine your choice of hospital, doctor and course of treatment (or even if you are eligible for any treatment at all). Where the availability of hospital beds, trained healthcare workers and medicines continually shrinks, while at the same time the cost burden on average citizens grows ever more onerous. Where hospitals close rather than open, where nurses and doctors are treated as labor expenses to be minimized rather than professionals to be cherished. A system groaning under the burden of a vast, ever-spreading institutionalized bureaucracy buried under mountains of pointless paperwork, restrictions and rules. This is the nightmare of Socialized Medicine, as presented to you by your elected representatives. This is the nightmare lived daily by Europeans and, especially, Canadians, who as we all know groan under the tyranny of Socialism run amok. Everyone knows America has The Best Healthcare System in the World ™.
Well, if you still haven’t quite figured out where I’m going with this yet: WAKE UP!
What I described is the US healthcare system. Face it people – the US healthcare system is “the best in the world” ONLY to politicians on the payroll of the drug and medical insurance companies. Our healthcare system is a National Embarrassment… no; DISGRACE. Government bureaucracies pale in comparison to the slime-filled rat’s nest of private insurance and HMO bureaucracies. Our healthcare cost per capita is higher than any other developed country, yet fully 15% of the citizens of the US have no health coverage at all – a number that is INCREASING. We are the only developed nation where the infant mortality rate is going UP, we are the only western nation to run out of flu vaccine. Many of the drugs that people use were developed here, the research funded by OUR tax dollars, yet we pay MORE for those drugs than the citizens of any other country.
Sure – some citizens get unbelievably good health care (but not you), some hospitals are the leading institutions of their kind in the world (but not the one you can go to), some doctors get filthy rich by being the best in their field (but not yours). If you are lucky enough to work at a company rich enough to afford it, you might just have decent medical coverage (are you sure? Have you read the fine print?). And every year they look at the pile of money they spent on your health insurance, and every year they ask themselves…
I am Canadian (proud to say – even more so now that the Canadian Supreme Court approved legislation allowing Gay marriage, but I digress…). I lived under real socialized medicine for 30 years. Yes - that very same socialized medicine American politicians point to with quivering fingers and trembling voice as the paradigm of Socialist Evil Incarnate. There is NOTHING that gets me more fired up than that bullshit. What the FUCK do US politicians know about Canadian healthcare? The only time they ever leave the country is when some business execs need to spend some “quality time” with them in some nice European restaurants or Asian shopping districts). More to the point, let’s not forget: THEY all get free Government funded healthcare coverage (for life!). Of course the US healthcare system is great…. for them. Which is interesting because the system they have is, well, socialized.
Let me explain how healthcare worked when I was a starving student in Canada. Pay close attention, this is very complex, something far too complex for US politicians to try to explain to their constituents:
1. You get sick.
2. You go to a Doctor. Any doctor, anywhere, any time.
3. Doctor cures you.
4. Doctor submits bill to Government.
5. Doctor gets paid.
Everybody who pays taxes contributes to healthcare costs. Nobody can opt out and everybody is covered. The person responsible for all this is elected by the voters. Prices are negotiated annually between the CMA (Canadian Medical Association) and Federal Health Dept. Everybody wins (but nobody wins too much), and more importantly, nobody loses. Americans get stealth fighters and “Democracy” in Iraq, Canadians get universal free healthcare.
This is why the Canadian healthcare system has some of the lowest costs in the world. This is why Canadians all got their flu vaccines. This is why Americans cross the border by the millions to buy their medicine from Canada. This is why my mother had her brain cancer cured without having to fill out a single form, pay a single nickel, or fight any bureaucrats.
Your elected representatives are perfectly happy to have the Government take care of their healthcare needs, but as for YOU…? Well, that would be Socialism, and we can’t have that, now can we?
Well, if you still haven’t quite figured out where I’m going with this yet: WAKE UP!
What I described is the US healthcare system. Face it people – the US healthcare system is “the best in the world” ONLY to politicians on the payroll of the drug and medical insurance companies. Our healthcare system is a National Embarrassment… no; DISGRACE. Government bureaucracies pale in comparison to the slime-filled rat’s nest of private insurance and HMO bureaucracies. Our healthcare cost per capita is higher than any other developed country, yet fully 15% of the citizens of the US have no health coverage at all – a number that is INCREASING. We are the only developed nation where the infant mortality rate is going UP, we are the only western nation to run out of flu vaccine. Many of the drugs that people use were developed here, the research funded by OUR tax dollars, yet we pay MORE for those drugs than the citizens of any other country.
Sure – some citizens get unbelievably good health care (but not you), some hospitals are the leading institutions of their kind in the world (but not the one you can go to), some doctors get filthy rich by being the best in their field (but not yours). If you are lucky enough to work at a company rich enough to afford it, you might just have decent medical coverage (are you sure? Have you read the fine print?). And every year they look at the pile of money they spent on your health insurance, and every year they ask themselves…
I am Canadian (proud to say – even more so now that the Canadian Supreme Court approved legislation allowing Gay marriage, but I digress…). I lived under real socialized medicine for 30 years. Yes - that very same socialized medicine American politicians point to with quivering fingers and trembling voice as the paradigm of Socialist Evil Incarnate. There is NOTHING that gets me more fired up than that bullshit. What the FUCK do US politicians know about Canadian healthcare? The only time they ever leave the country is when some business execs need to spend some “quality time” with them in some nice European restaurants or Asian shopping districts). More to the point, let’s not forget: THEY all get free Government funded healthcare coverage (for life!). Of course the US healthcare system is great…. for them. Which is interesting because the system they have is, well, socialized.
Let me explain how healthcare worked when I was a starving student in Canada. Pay close attention, this is very complex, something far too complex for US politicians to try to explain to their constituents:
1. You get sick.
2. You go to a Doctor. Any doctor, anywhere, any time.
3. Doctor cures you.
4. Doctor submits bill to Government.
5. Doctor gets paid.
Everybody who pays taxes contributes to healthcare costs. Nobody can opt out and everybody is covered. The person responsible for all this is elected by the voters. Prices are negotiated annually between the CMA (Canadian Medical Association) and Federal Health Dept. Everybody wins (but nobody wins too much), and more importantly, nobody loses. Americans get stealth fighters and “Democracy” in Iraq, Canadians get universal free healthcare.
This is why the Canadian healthcare system has some of the lowest costs in the world. This is why Canadians all got their flu vaccines. This is why Americans cross the border by the millions to buy their medicine from Canada. This is why my mother had her brain cancer cured without having to fill out a single form, pay a single nickel, or fight any bureaucrats.
Your elected representatives are perfectly happy to have the Government take care of their healthcare needs, but as for YOU…? Well, that would be Socialism, and we can’t have that, now can we?
posted by pkshuff at
12/09/2004 05:05:00 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:
When the individual has health care costs, the dollar amounts have meaning, even when it is in the millions of dollars. But a national healthcare program cost for the U.S. would make the cost meaningless. Kind of like the cost of war or space exploration. The currency of a country is smoke and mirrors.
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