3 ms·

Healthcare is not pizza. The top level comment gave a perfect example why. Preventative care is cheaper than emergency care. When everyone (including the une

Healthcare is not pizza. The top level comment gave a perfect example why. Preventative care is cheaper than emergency care. When everyone (including the unemployed) can get preventative care, total costs go down. That unemployed person with no insurance still gets emergency care. The hospital doesn't turn them away to die in the street. They don't pay the bill. They go into bankruptcy instead. The hospital makes it up on all the paying customers (the insured). Your $10k is already paying for the ones who don't have insurance. Medicine is already socialized! Now, if we can acknowledge that, can we do the fiscally responsible thing and make sure everyone can get preventative medicine?

conanbatt 7y ago
> Preventative care is cheaper than emergency care A trope without rigour. The health community is even putting into question the value of yearly checkups (i.e. https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/a-checkup-for-the-checkup-do-you-really-need-a-yearly-physical-201510238473 https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/a-checkup-for-the-checku...). It's not "flipping a switch". > When everyone (including the unemployed) can get preventative care, total costs go down. This is one side of the coin: when everyone goes to the doctor on a cold, total costs go way up. Its an economic problem, it requires economic solutions. Private insurance, for all its bad rep, has very strong incentives to have proper utilization. More so than government: when a patient gets hospitalized, insurance loses money. Govt never loses money! > Your $10k is already paying for the ones who don't have insurance. Medicine is already socialized! No need to change it then...
- mgkimsal 7y ago
  >Private insurance, for all its bad rep, has very strong incentives to have proper utilization. More so than government: when a patient gets hospitalized, insurance loses money. "when a patient gets hospitalized, insurance loses money...." and the patient gets the treatment they need. you seem to have forgotten that part. "Proper utilization", in a private sense, is the same as "maximize shareholder value". Anything that damages shareholder value is not "proper". Sick people have very strong incentive to want treatment. HEALTHY people have very strong incentive to want treatment for sick people. Private insurance has very strong incentive to take in as much money and pay out as little as possible.
  - conanbatt 7y ago
    > and the patient gets the treatment they need. you seem to have forgotten that part. > "Proper utilization", in a private sense, is the same as "maximize shareholder value". Access - Quality - Cost. Somebody has to make a choice. If what you care about is unabated and unrestricted access, get ready to pay more than what you pay today.

conanbatt 7y ago

> Preventative care is cheaper than emergency care A trope without rigour. The health community is even putting into question the value of yearly checkups (i.e. https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/a-checkup-for-the-checkup-do-you-really-need-a-yearly-physical-201510238473 https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/a-checkup-for-the-checku...). It's not "flipping a switch". > When everyone (including the unemployed) can get preventative care, total costs go down. This is one side of the coin: when everyone goes to the doctor on a cold, total costs go way up. Its an economic problem, it requires economic solutions. Private insurance, for all its bad rep, has very strong incentives to have proper utilization. More so than government: when a patient gets hospitalized, insurance loses money. Govt never loses money! > Your $10k is already paying for the ones who don't have insurance. Medicine is already socialized! No need to change it then...

mgkimsal 7y ago
>Private insurance, for all its bad rep, has very strong incentives to have proper utilization. More so than government: when a patient gets hospitalized, insurance loses money. "when a patient gets hospitalized, insurance loses money...." and the patient gets the treatment they need. you seem to have forgotten that part. "Proper utilization", in a private sense, is the same as "maximize shareholder value". Anything that damages shareholder value is not "proper". Sick people have very strong incentive to want treatment. HEALTHY people have very strong incentive to want treatment for sick people. Private insurance has very strong incentive to take in as much money and pay out as little as possible.
- conanbatt 7y ago
  > and the patient gets the treatment they need. you seem to have forgotten that part. > "Proper utilization", in a private sense, is the same as "maximize shareholder value". Access - Quality - Cost. Somebody has to make a choice. If what you care about is unabated and unrestricted access, get ready to pay more than what you pay today.