scrubbedexpat099

I had a friend who moved to Holland and had their first child in Holland, now he had a good view of it but as far as I could tell it had a major Insurance aspect, he was working for a Uni, and I have never quite understood the for profit aspect, everybody who works in the system wants a wage, even with the NHS most of the suppliers are for profit companies, who makes the beds, who makes the medicines, who builds the Hospitals.

I was involved in PFI, now that was a scam, very evident at the time.

NHS has the Post Code lottery and of course rations care, every system does, how can they not?

tom169

Not to forget that if you need to go in long term care / retirement home in the UK they will still try drain your assets to cover the cost.

scrubbedexpat099

Is there anywhere which provides long term care that is not means tested?

dc koop

Same here.

mrken30

I hear OMG stories about the US system, I guess maybe they don't get as much publicity. One large hospital I am involved with has an OMG incident on average every 41 days.

morpeth

Not just Trump, the Republican party offers no better alternative to the ACA, and like the Democrats afraid to address to real issue of out of control medical costs. How many Americans benefitted from having coverage for pre-existing conditions ? Trump jumped on the anti-ACA bandwagon for political expediency, while established Republican politicians for years have complained about the ACA without offering a better alternative.

dawntrump

the US health care system revolves around insurance companies, so it's based on profit-taking corporations.

A better system would divorce itself from the insurance companies. With government running the show, there might be slightly lower quality care, but bureaucrats would put things out to bid, and compel doctors/hospitals/pharma to bring their prices down.

yellowroom

really? You can't work out how it works when an organisation pays their bills but has a policy of not making a profit/surplus? Really?

scrubbedexpat099

I worked for a Construction company that built roads, hospitals etc. Now admittedly at the time it was not making much of a profit, did not realise it was morally wrong.

scrubbedexpat091

That happened to me in the early 00's. Insurance said they would cover an inpatient treatment option, then once I was discharged the insurance company decided they were not actually going to cover it.

Ended up going bankrupt from it, was the only option.

The system we have in Canada may have it's faults and issues, but at least you won't come out of hospital with massive debt and bills for the most part.

mrken30

I don't think it has much to do with morals, more to do with taxes. Non-profits don't pay taxes. One of the differences between a crdit union and a bank.

It happen to me too, but luckily it was just a $600 procedure.

SultanOfSwing

Need I remind you the plural of anecdote is not data?

Giantaxe

Indeed, every system rations care by some means. Which is what makes the premise of a thread entitled "The reality of government controlled healthcare" a little silly.

dc koop

There has to be some government involvement in any health care plan unless it's a general belief that abuse for profit cannot and does not exist.

I think it's about time that the government also got involved with the big drug companies

morpeth

The drug companies do seem to make outrageous profits on some drugs, and in particular selling in US market. On the other hand the return on capital of large drug companies doesn't appear that much different than other companies overall.

Government regulation of hospitals and their fees perhaps would go further to reduce overall costs. Why not regulate similar to utilities- a reasonable profit but oversight on fees ? Maybe also have doctors set aside a certain percentage of their hours for those without private insurance, and for that matter accept the cost of increased Medicare by reducing the qualifying age to 60.