I'm kind of surprised this hasn't been discussed yet. At the last Republican/Tea Party debate, the moderator asked Ron Paul about what should happen to an employed, otherwise healthy, uninsured person that is stricken with an expensive illness (in this hypothetical question, the "illness" was a coma). The basic question is, "What do we do with such a situation?".

As much as I want to like Ron Paul, part of his response sums up why I can't. His answer is essentially that they guy probably SHOULD have had a policy but freedom allows him to not. I'm OK with that. I'm even probably OK if the answer was, "Well, he has no coverage and no money so he gets no treatment." Instead, Paul answers somewhat in between. "We never turned anyone away at the hospital I worked at. The churches took care of them."

Isn't his way of thinking exactly how we got here?




-AP

Life is hard - nobody argues that. Yet many people will never "pull themselves up by their bootstraps", often through factors completely beyond their control. We can't know, so who are we to decide?

Is it better to abandon truly deserving people at the cost of supporting "unworthy" individuals? Who am I to judge? Everybody deserves help. Professional caseworkers make these calls - not you and I.

Personally I would contribute to safety nets that improve the quality of life for those who really need it - even at the cost of some who may not seem to. It's not my business to punish the "unworthy", or protect the weak, or motivate whoever can be encouraged to make their life better on their own. This is each individual's prerogative.

Kaiser---In answer to the title question I say NO. Actually I would say [censored] no but it'll be censored....

How is it OK to believe in Survival of the fittest, and Nature knows best, in everything BUT us??

County hospitals can't refuse service for immediate aid, but that gimmie isn't extended to treatment of long winded diseases.

Government is run by trying to tax you into the poor house and then putting you on a program. In the end they'll get it all.....so be sure to wait until you are old to have fun.........when you no longer can and no longer could afford it either.

My response is to LIFE THREATENING illness or trauma. Poor folks trying to get a free Amberlamps ride to the ghetto can [censored] off.

OK, for those of you that feel we should not let the uninsured die, who gets to pay?

A woman at my wife's work just had surgery; hip replacement, and brain surgery....

She's 94...


hmmmm....

Working men and women.

Working men and women that have insurance? Isn't that what we have now? Those that think ahead and take preventitive steps pay for those that don't.

Legal citizens.

Yup.

So, the status quo? I thought that the majority of us believe that isn't working?

Sol Duc, if you pay for health care like you pay your bets, you really shouldn't participate in this thread.

I believe that what's not working is all the illegals and medicaid phucks that abuse the ER...and system as a whole.

Your question related specifically to "life threatening". That is far from "status quo"....more in the realm of "extenuating circumstances".

That was Hippy weak.

As a corollary to this conversation - My cremation services are available to anyone who needs them.



The idiocy of the status quo is that we deliver these "free" health services to the uninsured via the emergency room - the most expensive way possible to deliver health care.

I'm sure somebody thinks it's great.

I don't.

I'm a cold hearted POS, let him die.

Yes and we need to get rid of health insurance.

and as the PP group merrily enjoys the usual verbiage of incoherent thoughts the real question at the bottom of this pile of crap is ignored as always as ALL insurances, including the biggest rejector Medicaid, even reject many treatments. Oh yes almost forgot the question, where do you draw the line in medical treatment FOR ANYONE when the prognosis is that the disease is terminal or minimal chance of survival?

My wife's cancer treatments extended her life for a year which I cherished greatly. It also cost 250k or 20,800 a month for that year with a 10% chance that she could be cured. Double insured, million max on both sides you go for it but if you think this can continue or expand with medical technology your a bunch of hypocritical fools! So then the question is how in the hell do we all pay for it? Don't even start with the greedy corporation crap either as that is peanuts in this train wreck. The question at the bottom is ............ how do you establish a viable cost benefit ratio for medical treatment?

AP,

I think how we got here is by not having a national health care program. What I object to with Obamacare is that it forces everyone into the private health insurance system and lacks a government option. Critics said gov't. can't do anything efficiently, and that private enterprise can do it better. I tend to agree, but the way to prove that is to also include a gov't. option. If it's as bad as its critics claim it would be, no one would choose it unless they had no other option or simply declined to buy personal health insurance.

I favor having a national health care system, and I think Obamacare - as it's come to be called - was designed to fail.

Getting back to the specific question as it was asked to Ron Paul, the correct answer is to provide emergency service to the uninsured young man and then send him home to die in his coma. The reason is that the man knew what choice America made, i.e., requiring each person to purchase health insurance. The man made a conscious choice to not insure himself, essentially choosing to deny himself live-saving care should he some day need it. When that day arrived, we undermine the purpose and value of society if we avoid the uncomfortable fact that actions have consequences. While hard-hearted, society needs to act in a manner consistent with the principles it claims to have chosen (in this case buy the insurance or suffer the consequences). Of course it wouldn't have been PC popular except among the extremists for Ron Paul to answer that way. Had he done so, my respect for him would have increased significantly.

As a society we refuse to come to terms with those things we find uncomfortable. The undeniable truth is that we cannot save everyone - nobody's getting out of here alive. Further, we cannot even as a society afford to treat every citizen for every condition, yet we avoid the discomfort of addressing that. Take the 94 yr old woman for example. The hip replacement may be reasonable if she was otherwise healthy and mobile. Since she also required brain surgery, clearly she wasn't healthy, and since 94 is a pretty ripe old age, the benevolent death panel (the insurance companies in many cases) should have denied both treatments.

I've read a couple of times that over 90% of a person's lifetime medical expenses occur in the last 6 months of life - trying to postpone the inevitable. Those kinds of medical investments should not be borne by society altho the wealthy are free to try and spend their own fortunes trying to stay alive as long as they can.

An intelligent, benevolent, and rational society would craft a health care plan and system that IDs each medical condition and corresponding treatment and then prioritize them. Then decide how much people - individually and collectively via the national plan - are willing to spend on the nation's health care system. There are approximately 545 conditions and treatments; the money goes a finite distance down the list, and that becomes the limit of public health care. If you want coverage for more conditions, you buy it via private health insurance.

How does this work? Simple things (that prevent subsequent major disease and expense) are covered, like vaccinations, pre-natal care and a host of very treatable conditions and diseases that are likely to return the patient to a productive and rewarding life are all included. Less common and experimental and treatments that are not expected to result in patient recovery are low on that list and not covered. With those conditions the patient gets hospice and morphine and well wishes for the after-life if they believe in one. We can't do it all, and we shouldn't pretend that we can. Instead we create derogatory remarks about death panels while avoiding the rational discussion that we already have them and avoid pointing out that if one has the personal resources they can spend all they want on insurance and treatments that more likely than not will not change the outcome.

Sg