Subject:
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Re: A question for my Canadian pals
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Wed, 6 Oct 2004 21:53:55 GMT
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Viewed:
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1409 times
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Dave Schuler wrote:
> If he can afford to have it. Do you accept that some people, through
> no fault of their own, truly and literally cannot afford health
> insurance?
Ok, here's a question on this one. If we truly believe that society owes
everyone healthcare, do we include global society? Do we owe the billions of
people in India and China the same standard of healthcare that is being
demanded for universal health care in the US? And how much health care do we
guarantee? If we truly owe everyone in society the same healthcare, I'm
affraid we wouldn't have any time or money for hobbies.
And who makes the decisions? I think healthcare is an infinite sink. We
could ALWAYS spend more for more benefit. Who makes the decisions when to
give up? With socialized medicine without any private option, you will have
to have cold hard bureaucracy making the decisions as to who lives and who
dies. Do you really want that?
These are hard questions, but I think we really need to start answering
them. Every year, it seems there are more and more cases of huge amounts of
money being spent to keep folks alive who have almost no measureable quality
of life. And there are folks who demand that we spare no expense in keeping
them alive. If we really were to accept those demands, we would spare NO
effort on health care improvements. We would spend no time and money on
hobbies. I see almost no one in the world who has actually stepped up to
this challenge, so obviously at some level I think everyone does accept that
there must be limits, that, to be blunt, there must be health care
rationing.
I think we also can NOT prevent people from spending their own money to get
care better than whatever the common system provides. So how do we make that
fair?
Now I am open to being convinced that there may be room for a government run
safety net, paid for by taxes, that covers a very tiny number of people who
have just plain fallen through the cracks. Of course I would point out that
no current government program succeeds in this area. Outside of that, I
would prefer to see market forces drive the system. And I'm confident that
charity works (look at how much money was raised after 9/11).
Frank
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: A question for my Canadian pals
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| (...) Well, for millennia we've lived under a system that allocates resources to the economically or militarily powerful, so naturally there's a huge inequity re: who "owns" the resources. If we can fix that inequity, then we can address the others. (...) (20 years ago, 7-Oct-04, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
| | | Re: A question for my Canadian pals
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| (...) It's an interesting point you make about owing healthcare to the world, especially right now with the shortage of the flu virus vaccinations happening. Ontario, where I live, used to provide free flu virus shots to anyone that walked into a (...) (20 years ago, 16-Oct-04, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: A question for my Canadian pals
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| (...) Sure! Here's one example, but there are many: The computer you're using is descended from publicly funded technology for which you have not paid but from which you are reaping the benefit; this is income redistribution that favors you. The (...) (20 years ago, 6-Oct-04, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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