U.S. Healthcare

If you study history, you'll discover that republicans and democrats have more or less traded philosophies since the time of the second world war.
As for univeral health care, we have the best health care in the world and people from other countries still flock here to avail themselves of it. Countries with univeral health care, or socialized medicine if you want to use the real name instead of the recently made up progressive name, are a disaster. England and Canada come to mind first. People wait a ridiculously long time to receive health care and the quality is not up to par. That's not what I want here. It's a total myth that there are milions of people in this country who cannot and do not receive health care. Just visit any hospital emergeny waiting room.

Sorry to burst your patriotic bubble, but we're 37th:

http://www.photius.com/rankings/healthranks.html

That's behind all these "socialist medicine" countries, like England (18th) and Canada (30th), as well as France (1st), Italy, Spain, Japan, Greece and Ireland.

But take heart, we're still ahead of Cuba, Mexico and Venezuela.

stockingfull wrote:Sorry to burst your patriotic bubble, but we're 37th:

http://www.photius.com/rankings/healthranks.html

That's behind all these "socialist medicine" countries, like England (18th) and Canada (30th), as well as France (1st), Italy, Spain, Japan, Greece and Ireland.

But take heart, we're still ahead of Cuba, Mexico and Venezuela.

The World Health Report is an agency of the United Nations you know the guys that allowed Syria to sit on its Security Council, Syria gives refuge to the terrorist group Hezbollah that was responsible for the murder of more than 250 U.S. Marines in Beirut. The U.N. made Libya the head of the Human Rights Commission, Libya has no freedom of the press, no freedom of speech and no religious freedom. Please, vet your sources.

Thanks SPC, you beat me to it. But Stockingfull, the next time you need healthcare, by all means go to Costa Rica, they're ranked 36th. I wondered about your forum name but I'm starting to get a feel for what your stocking is full of.

stockingfull wrote:Sorry to burst your patriotic bubble, but we're 37th:

http://www.photius.com/rankings/healthranks.html

That's behind all these "socialist medicine" countries, like England (18th) and Canada (30th), as well as France (1st), Italy, Spain, Japan, Greece and Ireland.

But take heart, we're still ahead of Cuba, Mexico and Venezuela.

If socialized medicine is so good, why do Canadiens flock to the US to recieve heathcare they can't get in a timely fashion in their own country? You have a better chance of having a heart attack than seeing a doctor for your heart condition up there.

Well I've heard about the ridiculous waits in England to see doctor, not hours but weeks. You need to read behind the lines, here's from the link at the top of the page about 10 paragraphs down that stockingfull provided:

http://www.photius.com/rankings/who_wor ... ranks.html

In designing the framework for health system performance, WHO broke new methodological ground, employing a technique not previously used for health systems. It compares each country’s system to what the experts estimate to be the upper limit of what can be done with the level of resources available in that country

You'll note Columbia is ranked way above the US in that list, do you really think you're going to get better health care in Columbia?

The U.S was probably listed as number one in resources, if the effectiveness of that extra spending is not realized then the ranking of course is going to drop. Doesn't necessarily mean the healthcare is worse and in fact the healthcare in the US could be the best using that criteria... e.g you break a leg in Columbia there is good chance you're going to get great health care but if you get shot multiple times good luck because they don't have the trauma centers to handle it.

Detroit is number one in handguns deaths in the US. Baltimore is number two. It's only because we have better hospitals. Before the progressives get all excited, these are drug gang shootings over turf and "respect."

Oh, that's right, just because we set up the U.N. and it's on our soil (or what was our soil), it's completely unreliable because it's actually a representative organization which doesn't toe the line for us on every issue.

But it's funny; you guys are so smart and well-informed on this subject but you haven't yet enlightened us with a link to a "reliable" source backing up your positions, which your favorite newspaper, the New York Times, calls a "delusion":

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/12/opinion/12sun1.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Produce an unbiased rating or back off on all the bluster, boyz. 'Cause you clearly have been drinking too much of the healthcare industry's Kool-Aid and, as George Carlin says, "it's bullsh!t, and it's bad for ya."

stockingfull wrote:enlightened us with a link to a "reliable" source backing up your positions

Name one of my positions & I'll back it up but it won't matter your guy was swiftboated & your hatred is clouding your reasoning. I understand.

spc wrote:

stockingfull wrote:enlightened us with a link to a "reliable" source backing up your positions

Name one of my positions & I'll back it up but it won't matter your guy was swiftboated & your hatred is clouding your reasoning. I understand.

Nice try. OK, health care was the one I named.

coalkirk wrote:Detroit is number one in handguns deaths in the US. Baltimore is number two. It's only because we have better hospitals. Before the progressives get all excited, these are drug gang shootings over turf and "respect."

You sure it isn't because there aren't enough handguns there so these people can "defend" themselves?

stockingfull wrote:Nice try. OK, health care was the one I named.

I never said on this forum that the US has the best health care in the world, but I do think it. Big difference. If I or anyone in my family gets sick I am going to World Health Report's country #37 & I think you would too. See, I don't know about other countries health care systems, don't need to, & I'm not going to depend on michael moore or the nyt to fill me in. If you would like clarification on any more of my positions I'll be glade help. Like I said your hatred is clouding your reasoning.

stockingfull wrote:But it's funny; you guys are so smart and well-informed on this subject but you haven't yet enlightened us with a link to a "reliable" source backing up your positions, which your favorite newspaper, the New York Times, calls a "delusion":

The post I quoted is from the WHO itself, I don't see how it can get any more reliable than that. My interpretation of that you're not getting an accurate picture as to overall comparison. If the country you live in only has band-aids and they are the best band-aiders in the world they would rank higher than the U.S. If you have a different interpretation I'd love to here it.

Here's another interesting quote from that article:

Responsiveness: The nations with the most responsive health systems are the United States, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Denmark, Germany, Japan, Canada, Norway, Netherlands and Sweden. The reason these are all advanced industrial nations is that a number of the elements of responsiveness depend strongly on the availability of resources. In addition, many of these countries were the first to begin addressing the responsiveness of their health systems to people’s needs.

That's an interesting quote don't you think? We can only assume that other no-industrial nations have also ranked in other parts of there study. e.g my analogy about the band-aids.

And further down:

Fairness of financial contribution: When WHO measured the fairness of financial contribution to health systems, countries lined up differently. The measurement is based on the fraction of a household’s capacity to spend (income minus food expenditure) that goes on health care (including tax payments, social insurance, private insurance and out of pocket payments). Colombia was the top-rated country in this category, followed by Luxembourg, Belgium, Djibouti, Denmark, Ireland, Germany, Norway, Japan and Finland.

Columbia may be the first place on the earth as far as the cost of healthcare goes but that doesn't mean they have the best healthcare. Would you go to to Columbia to for healthcare? I don't think there is single person in this entire country that would.

I'll give you another example of a poor comparison I often see, you frequently see mortality rates for newborns mentioned. The issue here is that many of these newborns would have never survived the pregnancy or the birth id they were in other countries, very weak and very sick babies are often birthed in the U.S. simply because they have the technology and expertise to do it. These babies often die after birth which of course is going to drive the death rate up.

The fact is when some important dude from any one of those countries on that list needs specialized healthcare where does he go ? He come here because he can afford it....

Where'd my post go?

Nevermind, I have yet to see any compilation which purports to be an objective analysis and rates us the "best healthcare in the world."

Has anybody got any such comparison?

stockingfull wrote:Nevermind, I have yet to see any compilation which purports to be an objective analysis and rates us the "best healthcare in the world."

Has anybody got any such comparison?

I have ... the US is about 14 from the bottom ... not good! I'll see if I can find it once again.