Fact Check AHCA...

Like Krauthammer siad, It'll be hard to take away the entitlements of Obamacare.

Cheers

Yep.

I'm waiting for the politicians to continue this route and ignore actuarial tables so that I can buy a few million dollars of life insurance at the same price as a thirty-year-old >:-} ...Jim Thompson

-- | James E.Thompson | mens | | Analog Innovations | et | | Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus | | STV, Queen Creek, AZ 85142 Skype: skypeanalog | | | Voice:(480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat | | E-mail Icon at

Thinking outside the box... producing elegant solutions.

"It is not in doing what you like, but in liking what you do that is the secret of happiness." -James Barrie

All I can say about that is I am glad to be living in a country with public health care.

It is indeed nice to be part of a country where the general public is considered of value and as such have universal health coverage.

John Vancouver, BC, Canada

Is that why _large_numbers_ of Canadians flee to the US for major medical issues/surgeries?

Not to mention clogging our (Arizona) roads and restaurants in the Winter ;-) ...Jim Thompson

The US government already spends almost twice what Canada spends on healthcare per capita for its citizens.

Large numbers? Define large numbers...I do hear that your folks south of the 49th often go to Mexico for their surgeries...

Too many of your guys/gals come up here for skiing! Too damn many, hogging the slopes!

John ;-#)#

Elective surgeries (e.g. plastic boob jobs) and some dental.

The population of Yuma, AZ, DOUBLES in the Winter, when Canadians add more than 100K... but it's good for the economy, bad for how weenie slow they drive ;-) ...Jim Thompson

Ah, see here:

There is a book about that phenomenon (Snow Birds) in Arizona:

John ;-#)#

My value to whom? Do they own me? I want my freedom to be valued.

Besides boob jobs they go for treatments and drugs that our over-protective FDA hasn't approved yet.

No, your value as a human being.

You are free to use the medical coverage or not as you so wish. Why you would not want to get health care is beyond me though.

Are we not raised to care for our neighbours? Christians say Love Thy Neighbour, and doesn't that mean to take care of them as you would want to be taken care of? If someone falls down would you not help pick them up?

Costs are covered by the provinces population either through taxes, or (in BC) by paying monthly premiums, or a combination of both.

It isn't perfect, no human endeavour is, but it works a damn sight better than some countries I could name...

John

Last time I checked the figures, about the same proportion of Canadians come south as Americans *go* south. IIRC, I saw a study (from your gummit) citing ~50K visits to US for healthcare (elective procedures because the wait was often ~3 months north of the border). Assuming our population to be 10X yours, this would translate to 500K heading to Mexico. (I didn't count other places like Panama).

Add to that the number of Americans going north or south for Rx's and the number probably doubles.

Add in dental care and it increases, yet again (e.g., gold crowns being 25% of the US cost once you head south).

Of course, if a greater portion of the US population lived as close to the southern border as MOST Canadians do to the US border, the numbers would undoubtedly be higher (not economical to fly from Chicago to Mexico just for a medical procedure -- esp if the length of stay is unknown at the time the flight is booked).

Most winter visitors, here, are Americans from the Midwest. I know of exactly one couple from BC that winters here. Many dozen from the midwest (by "here" I mean in my neighborhood)

Does this "news" source of yours have any existence outside of Right Wing Nirvana?

Yeah freedom, wait, what? You want the freedom to not have healthcare?

USA!... USA!... USA!...

The really great thing about rolling back the ACA is that people in the US now have a taste of universal healthcare and they won't want to let go of that. So by prying it out of their hands and making it much less affordable, Congress is paving a path to true universal health care as other countries have it.

I don't know if the AHCA bill will pass or not, but certainly it won't pass in its present form. The question is whether it restricts healthcare enough that people essentially have a revolt and toss the present government out and get a new one that has the vision and the backbone to provide a true universal healthcare system in the US that is about providing healthcare and not providing income for the medical industry.

Amen! The passing of the new unheathcare bill through the House shows how rabid the electorate and elected have become. But the bottom line is the people have a taste of what it is like to not be denied healthcare and they won't want to let go of that. It is very unlikely to get through the Senate without significant changes. We will see if the Senate has the guts to gut healthcare in the US.

Friday evening and I need a topic drifting rant.

Does it really matter what the Republicans promise? It didn't seem to matter what Prez Obama promised in order to get AHA passed. His administration broke promises and fabricated lies sufficient to produce the current health care system which only vaguely resembles what was promised and codified. Your premiums will not rise and you can keep your health plan, were the mantras I recall. Repeat them often enough and the GUM (great unwashed masses) will eventually believe you.

Now, it's the Republicans turn. I expect to see more of the same lies, claims, distortions, and broken promises. The program names might be slightly different, the claims about the same, and the promises impressive, all allegedly leading to a Republican paradise of universal healthcare at affordable prices. When the congressional cigar smoke clears and the rhetoric dies down, the AHCA will probably have the same problems as the AHA.

Here's my view of what needs to be addressed in both systems:

1. The AHA added about 20 million previously uninsured new recipients to the healthcare system who never paid a penny into the system. If we're going to have universal health care, these people must become part of the system. How to pay for their care is the question.
2. The AHA could probably support an expensive medical establishment and a greedy medical insurance industry, but not both at the same time. If you want genuine affordable health care, one of these has to go. Obviously, the medical sector is more important than the insurance sector, so you can guess which one should be axed.
3. Both systems only work if healthy people pay into it. In effect, it's universal health care paid for by a universal tax attached. The AHA did that by forcing everyone to purchase health insurance, and fining them if they didn't pay, even if they didn't want or need health insurance. I haven't seen how the AHCA plans to solve the same problem.

There are probably other important problems worth fixing, but those are the ones that bug me.

Townhall certainly has a better fact rating than CNN.

Don't tell me you've moved to the "Dark Side" ?>:-} ...Jim Thompson

-- | James E.Thompson | mens | | Analog Innovations | et | | Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus | | STV, Queen Creek, AZ 85142 Skype: skypeanalog | | | Voice:(480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat | | E-mail Icon at

Thinking outside the box... producing elegant solutions.

"It is not in doing what you like, but in liking what you do that is the secret of happiness." -James Barrie