HUNT: U.S. health care more broken than we thought
March 7, 2013 at 7:40 am in The Daily Republic
“Bitter Pill: Why Medical Bills Are Killing Us” is a serious, exhaustively reported piece about the scam the U.S. health-care system has become.
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This is definitely an accurate article. I took my wife to Avera QOP (a non-profit) for a migraine, we were there for one hour in which time they took her vitals and gave her a shot. We were billed $2100.
I do the same blood work every month,
Avera QOP $1950
Sanford (for profit) $550
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Mole sliced off: $6500.00 at Altru. Should have tied a string around it and yanked after a couple days.
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I just read that for skin tags you can use iodine to get rid of them…three drops on a cotton ball three times a day. I doubt it works for birth marks or moles but I just thought I would mention it.
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My son should’ve tried that, thanks!
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Did anyone see that Time magazine special issue? 34 page article on this issue. Companies,hospitals make a ton of money. Doctors not so much and who pays? Please, tell me again why socialized medicine is so bad?
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It was the best thing I have ever read in Time mag. Everybody should read it.
The one question it didn’t touch on is how impossible it really is for people to “self-insure” or have medical savings accounts. If you get charged the “chargemaster” prices, how can anybody pay their bills directly at those prices? Medicare for everybody is the answer, I think.
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Realist, you indicated “Medicare for everyone is the answer, I think.” I am in favor of a single payor system. The next logical question is who pays? Medicare as it currently exists is grossly underfunded. The average recipient receives more than $250,000 in benefits than they ever pay into the Medicare system. That unfunded liability will be many times greater once everyone is switched from private insurance coverage to Medicare. Currently the unfunded liability is paid entirely by the one-half of this country that pays income tax. Assuming Medicare continues to be at least partially funded through payroll taxes, if you have a family of five do you pay for your own children or do they get a free ride from those who pay income tax? If your spouse chooses not to work, does your spouse get a free ride or does the working spouse contribute more. As noted earlier in this post, I am all for a single payor system as I believe that insurance companies only add to the cost of providing medical care. But, I also think that the cost of medical care should be allocated on an individual basis through payroll taxes (or self-employment tax) that adequately reflect each person’s reasonable share of the liability. It is actually very easy to establish rate tables based both on risk factors and family size (it is already being done by private insurance carriers). The problem is that people who currently do not pay income tax are going to be screaming “murder” when they are required to pay a proportional share of the cost of their coverage. On the other hand, single people who maintain healthy habits and are unlikely to create excess burden on the medical system would love a system that rewards their lifestyle habits. Right now Medicare works great for people who don’t have an income tax liability because they pay a nominal amount of tax and receive benefits far in excess of what they contributed. In contrast, income tax rates for people who pay income tax have to be increased to pay for the underfunding and the Affordable Healthcare Act imposes a Medicare surcharge on high earners. Expanding Medicare to everyone without modifying the funding is simply a redistribution of income from people who pay income tax to those who do not pay income tax. Obviously a pure proportional allocation is too draconian for lower income earners and it would be necessary to have some adjustment, but a complete shift of the entire burden to income taxpayers isn’t just either. There was an interesting statement from the head of the Congressional Budget Office this week that continuing on the current spending path will require significant tax increases not just on high income earners but on the middle class as well; to think otherwise is delusional.
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http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/02/11/171713240/need-a-price-for-a-hip-operation-good-luck-with-that
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Amazing. That doctors don’t know how much the procedures they implement cost is unbelievable. Can you even imagine going in to have your car worked on and the mechanic can’t tell you what it’s going to cost. Naturally, there will be a range of prices, depending on what they find when they get into it, but the arrogance of the medical establishment is astounding.
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