Posted on 11/06/2009 7:20:04 AM PST by SeekAndFind
I have have a Canadian friend who keeps telling me that Canada's healthcare system is better because it caters to ANYONE regardless of pre-existing condition.
In other words, the Canadian system has a safety net for people ( who through no fault of their own ) were born unhealthy ( asthma, diabetes, etc. ).
In the USA, people who have these conditions cannot be insured because they are a drain on insurance companies and most of them are not poor enough to qualify for medicaid. The result is it drains the family's budget and makes the middle class actually poorer.
Since people with pre-existing condition are un-insurable, how are they going to cope ?
Let's say you were a conservative politician running for national office and were asked this question about how people with pre-existing conditions can best be helped, how would you respond ?
Since FR is a discussion thread, I'd like to hear your suggestions on how to solve this problem ( SERIOUS ANSWERS ONLY PLEASE, wisecracks and one liners not welcome ).
Thanks all
COBRA = Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of some year in the 1980s
I am open to suggestions, but I can say what are not solutions:
Forcing earners to pay for their misfortune.
It sickens me to hear about unfortunte poor families who bear a child with a serious inherited disease, and they proceed to have three or four more with the certain knowledge that "government" will care for them.
Forcing insurance companies to cover those unfortunates at the same rates paid by others with no pre-existing conditions. That is no longer insurance; that's welfare.
Not having a system which insists of paying a fair share, and a verifiable means to prevent fraud in its application; if a hard working family spends 30% of their earnings on health related issues (and relinquishes discretionary expenditures to make it possible), we should insist that the welfare recipients do the same. A 300-pound person with five kids, living entirely on welfare, with 4 cell phones MP3 players, big screen TV, driving an Escalade, must be expected to do the same.
In short why are some citizens more equal than others? Why is less demanded of them?
And the direct, well documented result of that is long waits for critical care, diagnoses and life-saving treatments, additional deaths and significant numbers desperately traveling to the U.S. to save their lives.
That's reality. Soon coming to a state near you.
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