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> The fact that providers can perform services on you without telling you up-front what the price will be is the problem. Of course. In an unregulated for-prof
by pan69 7y ago
> The fact that providers can perform services on you without telling you up-front what the price will be is the problem.
Of course. In an unregulated for-profit health care system that is definitely the problem and the way we got there was because of; if there are multiple vendors then prices will automatically go down.
I'm not anti-capitalism. It just doesn't work for certain parts of society but it seems that in the US everything needs to be capitalised and the government clearly doesn't want to regulate this industry.
- javagram 7y agoThis article itself is about someone who is on Medicare (government-run health insurance) getting a surprise bill because the hospital has mis-assigned his procedure to the wrong category to allow them to run up the bill. FTA: “In a feeble attempt to ameliorate the problem, Congress passed the Notice Act in 2015, which requires hospitals to inform patients of the implications of their observation status within 36 hours after observation services have been initiated. In other words, hospitals must advise patients of their observation status only after they have already incurred the expense of surgery and hospitalization.” This type of thing seems like the most immediate problem. It makes no sense that the price can be raised 36 hours after a procedure has already begun. How is anyone supposed to negotiate that properly? Just saying, I don’t think “capitalism” is necessarily the boogeyman here. The government itself is failing to negotiate properly with the providers when running its socialist healthcare system in this instance. (And non-government payers will run into the same problems, getting unfair bills that couldn’t be anticipated or negotiated before agreeing to the service)