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The RCT you cite examines the effects of "wealth shocks" (read: unexpected winnings) in a population of Swedish lottery winners on mortality and health care uti
by facetube 10y ago
The RCT you cite examines the effects of "wealth shocks" (read: unexpected winnings) in a population of Swedish lottery winners on mortality and health care utilization, in a country that already has access to taxpayer-funded universal health care. The state pays 97% of all medical costs there [1]. Using this to support your claim borders on intellectual dishonesty IMO.
Re: Medicaid, it's difficult to find high-quality health care in the US as a Medicaid patient, mostly because practices are free to turn you away simply because you're a Medicaid patient. "We don't take Medicaid". That's it. One of the major academic health systems here (in Oregon) systematically directed all Medicaid and Medicare patients to a single low-resource clinic across town by policy, citing inadequate reimbursement rates. The result is long wait times and inadequate care.
[1] Glenngard, A., Hjalte, F., Svennson, M., Anell, A., & Bankauskaite, V. (2005). Health Systems in Transition: Sweden. WHO Regional Office for Europe, 2005
- yummyfajitas 10y agoThe state provides health care, yet there are still disparities between rich and poor. This confirms my second and third studies which show health care doesn't help. This study also shows that (as postulated by folks down thread) that money doesn't change health behaviors. That's the point - health disparities are mostly not caused by either health care or wealth. They are caused by something else (e.g.diet, exercise, genetics).
- facetube 10y agoThe US absolutely does not have a universal health care system; roughly 33 million remain uninsured, and a large number of those who are insured do not have adequate savings to pay their high deductible (which can be as high as $6,000 per person per year in-network, and twice that out of network).
- yummyfajitas 10y agoRead all three studies. Rand and Oregon show more health care doesn't improve health. Sweden shows more money doesn't. What, exactly, are you disputing here?
- facetube 10y agoThe Sweden study absolutely does not show that, and I've explained why elsewhere in the thread. The mere fact that something is an RCT does not make it instantly generalizable to all populations, no matter how many times you repeat the claim. You'd need to at least control for pre-intervention access to care and study a US population to even get close to what you're claiming.
- yummyfajitas 10y agoWhat's the mechanism by which you think wealth increases health? It's not getting more healthcare, since if it were Oregon should have increased health. If it's buying non-medical things, what is the relevance of Sweden's UHC?
- facetube 10y agoYou've made numerous unacknowledged factual and logical errors already, and appear to not understand the limits of the RCTs you're citing. I don't see any value in continuing this discussion. Have a great day.
- facetube 10y agoHere, I'll give you another comment to downvote: your original claim that was supposedly backed by the Swedish RCT was "giving poor people money does not improve health". You've now reversed the direction of causation. Money could easily improve health outcomes without completely eliminating disparities between rich and poor. Your conclusion does not logically follow from your claims.