An Up Close and Personal Taste of Socialized Medicine

And from the Daily Mail:

How doctors lie on death certificates to hide the true scale of the toll from hospital infections

Devolution has created four different NHS systems – and England is ‘poor relation’

I guess I should have taken a little more time to clarify re: WRMC. I know the care there is top-notch. But my point was, that hospital is being run by a government entity with (presumably) some sort of budget it is required to stay within. As a result, some of the facilities were in a deplorable state. And this with a (relatively speaking) small “customer base” of military patients. Now, take the governmentally mandated budget with a exponentially larger “customer base” (every American and all the illegals, too), and many things that are taken care of in private hospitals and clinics today (like janitorial staffing) will be cut or eliminated. And that is just one thing that will be cut. I know I don’t want to go to a dirty hospital…

I’m going to take a minute to go find the piece David Asman of Fox News Channel wrote after his wife suffered a stroke while they were vacationing in London and post the link after I do (as well as links to those UK Daily Mail articles I mentioned (I think on this thread?).

I will even accept that part of my taxes will go to help Rusty and his friends on the left go to the clinic for their care.

Nor do you want an HMO to make that decision. The government is the lesser of two evils

Everybody here has had to deal with people in both the private sector as well as government agencies for various services. Which are the more helpful and willing to go the extra mile? I’d say those in the private sector, by a long shot. Ever try to get a government bureaucrat to give information or help that is not on their approved list/job description? The best you will ever get is “call this number”, if you are lucky. Never do you get “let me look into that for you.” The private sector is not perfect but if I feel I’ve been mistreated by a private company, I can and do take my business elsewhere. What option do we have with govt. agencies?

On January 7th, 2008 at 12:16 pm, Rusty said:

Nor do you want an HMO to make that decision. The government is the lesser of two evils.

Fact is that only physicians and patients can make healthcare decisions. Financial intermediaries, such as HMOs, can make decisions about what they are contractually obligated to reimburse beneficiaries. That’s a financial decision, not a medical decision.

Having established that, I’d rather deal with a financial intermediary that has to compete for my business rather than with a monolithic, monopolistic government agency staffed by civil servants.

Go figure.

Nor do you want an HMO to make that decision. The government is the lesser of two evils.

The problem with this statement is that the HMO is a product you purchase. Don’t like the product, don’t purchase it and find one that has the coverage you like.

I was working in the Long Term Care setting (Nursing Home) and saw first hand patients abused because of bureaucrats demanding effective treatments be halted to meet government guidelines. The last person on earth I want involved in deciding what medical treatment I want is a government bureaucrat.

I’m not talking about government expense. I’m talking about personal expense. It’s apples and oranges

Rusty, where do you think the government gets its money? Unlike apples and oranges it all comes from the same place, the citizens. All government expenditures are in the end a personal expense for those that pay taxes.