Stonetoss comic on free speech.
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Free healthcare!
Oh, my surgery? It's next year. Until then I am crippled by pain. :D
Once I tried to explain to someone online that here in Europe you still pay for private medical care if you want the best or you want your care to happen at a reasonable time.
He told me it's still good and paying is just "last resort". You wait months when you are in debilitating pain.
The problems with public healthcare are rarely the amount of money they recieve, but rather what they do with it.
The endless bureaucracy and keeping an army of useless morons emplyed to pretend to manage something or other, while simultaneously never wanting to budget to improve the service are what causes issues. And throwing more money at that pit won't solve the problems.
Unironically, until the corona bullshit I was able to within a few hours always see a doctor and end up medicated for anything if I was willing to pay ridiculous fees. For reasonable cost, a few days.
Now its months upon months to maybe see someone, and I'm left wondering if that wasn't part of the plan.
Just pay more taxes on everything you do or own, that will solve it, I'm sure. /s
Of course, that's the solution to everything.
Education? Throw taxes into it until its better.
Poverty? Throw taxes at poor people and magically no more poor!
Any sufficiently high tax is indistinguishable from magic.
This is often the case, but I wonder how much it's blown out of proportion and how much it isn't. I'm Canadian, so we have our own similar system to Europe's - and it's not so bad if you just need to go to a clinic because you've got a flu, or you've got some ache or pain - especially if you have the time to show up early in the morning, you'll be seen almost instantly (and some clinics will let you schedule your visit online before hand too).
But, it's also as you say that sometimes you need a surgery, or to see an expert and it's like "Welp, 8 month wait for the expert, then 5 months for the surgery - here's some medication that'll help with the pain and try not to become addicted to it." Our hospital emergency room wait times are occasionally in the realm of decent? I had stones last year, had to go to the hospital a few times for it. Often I had a 4 hour wait in rather excruciating pain (even once they had diagnosed me previously, had it on record, knew what the situation was). And that 4 hour wait was "high priority" as well - I think the only higher level is if you're having heart attack level stuff go on. Probably should've thrown up in the hallway as opposed to outside, would've gotten faster treatment :)
You are correct. My sinus infection was no biggie, they checked me out and I was out of there.
Here specifically things like replacing a joint is fucking long, though. You know, grandma needs a hip joint replaced? Come back next year, bye. By then the other leg she uses to kind of make up for the bad one will also be fucked. Thanks.
My sister had that with her ankle. It got twisted, couldn't snap back into place and turns out, some of the ligaments were ripped a bit. She had to wait a few hours when you could see she was fucked. Then the doc called in a bunch of med students to see how to put it back in place, which he FAILED, but he kept trying to show the kiddos. By the time my sister was almost passing out she very firmly told him to fucking stop, because the issue felt like it was bigger than just snapping the ankle back in place.
You can see similar issues here in the US depending on the area and case. TL;DR, it's mostly due to government interference with the "market". There's so much government-regulation and union shit with hospitals that it's not really "private" health care anymore.
For example, 4-hour emergency room waits for "high priority" are entirely possible, but that's because emergency rooms are legally not allowed to turn people away, so many people (who have no intention of paying) use them for regular doctors visits; Or as my paramedic brother described to me, simply getting rides to a different part of town along with a free sandwich and hopefully some free painkillers.
You can sometimes get in for surgeries within a week, but in more high-demand areas it can become months (seems especially bad for gynecological stuff).
Let's be real, without some kind of disincentive for abuse (financial or otherwise), there will always be morons that go there for things like the sniffles.
I mean, he's right. Having the option of free healthcare is better than not having the option of free healthcare, especially when that free healthcare does get the job done in a timely fashion most of the time.
The most absurd thing in the US is going to the doctor just to get a prescription and having it cost you $100 just to breath the same air as them for 5 minutes. That straight up doesn't happen Europe, and you can usually get such an appointment on the same or next day, no problem.
Free Healthcare is a good thing. The reason the US won't do it is because Americans - even democrats - would freak the fuck out the second they got told stop being fat shits and stop eating heart attack and diabetes fuel.
They'd see the first signs of a sugar tax and go apeshit.
You think here people are healthier? There are taxes on junk food, and everything else (my 10-pound dog has a tax on her and it earns you nothing, I have to pay for medical care, vaccination, chip, everything).
But that doesn't change anything. People still eat like shit, it just costs more. People still don't go to regular checkups. They money procured through putting extra tax on crisps and soda are, in theory, for medical stuff, but you don't see any of that as it's lost in the budget.
Another thing is, companies make their products shittier to avoid tax. I don't drink energy drinks because I don't care for them, but since they introduced this tax energy drinks became lower in the very things that make them ENERGY drinks. They didn't become cheaper, no. Just shittier.
This did not stop ANYONE from eating certain things.
Our experiences are very different. Have you ever tried waiting a week with a tooth that hurt like fuck, even though you paid out of your high as fuck taxes for medical care?
My ex-coworker has to wait months with spinal issues that made him miss work because he couldn't get out of bed. My late grandpa was losing his sight and he would have had to wait months to deteriorate further if he didn't pay. A family member has hearth issues, her dad died of a heart attack. She could feel something was wrong. Her appointment for a full cardiology checkup? In a couple months.
I also work in a healthcare-adjacent field, both for private and government funded doctors. I do see the difference. Not saying all gov ones such, but if you need something elaborate, you WILL have to go to private because they government only provides the basics and that's it. They won't go fancy on your ass.
Unless they magically found more money, I guarantee that they'll eat less of it over time.
For most-of-most-people's lives, they will not need urgent prodcedures. People might bitch and moan about waiting times for certain things, but the reason those waiting times are there is because, shock, a free service is serving more people than a service that is often very expensive.
If you feel you can't wait for the free service and have the money to go private, great! Good for you! Do it! But there are vastly more people who either can wait, can't pay, or, more often than not, both.
I lived in the US for 4 years. In that brief time I spent more money on healthcare than I have in the 28 years I have been in the UK, despite that fact that I have spent 2 weeks in an NHS hospital hooked up to oxygen, and approximately 6 hours in American ones.
I'm sure you can prove the results of it. I can't see it, I don't see it on the shopping habits of anyone I know. I also don't see people's general health being better since the introduction of it.
Again, I am against a nanny state trying to punish people and basically soft ban things. Either leave us alone OR try proper banning and see the reactions.
There is proof of promiscuity being bad for you. I want to soft punish people for it. Same for using computers/pones too much. Coffee and tea? Makeup and plastic surgery! International travel can be dangerous too. Pets in general, especially dogs and among those certain breeds. Extreme sports.
Can we fuck with everyone please? Life is deadly after all.
First of all, "free" healthcare is NOT free. A huge chunk of every paycheck I get goes to the government as a tax. To me it absolutely fucking isn't free. Maybe it is free for the illegals and welfare queens, but I sure as hell pay for it, even though I am healthy at this point in my life.
Define urgent. A heart issue you know is there, but you don't know what it is exactly and how bad it is should be considered urgent. Things causing you debilitating pain, limiting your movement, stopping you from living a full life (working, doing shit in your free time, playing with your kids, driving, etc.) should be urgent.
And it isn't. Is that whining to you? Because have never had to experience it, your state deteriorating very fast while you still have weeks to your surgery or treatment.
Let me guess, it's not urgent if I'm not bleeding out right now.
I am not going to dig around in your pocket, but I sure as hell wouldn't expect US taxpayers to pay for my health issues. Just like I did not do it living in Sweden, when I needed dental care. It was a fuckton of money, but at the same time I wasn't a taxpaying Swedish citizen.
Like all commie ideas, "free" (taxpayer funded, government controlled) healthcare is only a positive if you are a zero-ambition pauper or an outright parasite who is looking to get as much as possible while contributing as little as possible.
I'm not a fan of medicare but its is a compromise I can live with. But like all compromises it is never enough for them. The commies keep try to expand it, and the allegedly small government republicans are for some reason out commieing the commie democrats on that front.
This is just absolute nonsense spouted by someone with zero experience of living in a country with universal healthcare.
A trip to the emergency room in the US can very easily run over $30,000. If that trip is caused by, say, a poisonous snake bite, you may be looking at over a $100,000. Long term hospital stays with needs for multiple operations and physical therapy can run over a million dollars.
You don't have to be 'zero-ambition pauper' or an 'outright parasite' to not be cool with the idea of never being able to buy a house because you accrued financially devastating medical debts in a car accident in your 20's.
If you want to talk about parasites, look at insurance companies. Literally no different to gamblers.
If we are going with "it works most of the time" that applies pretty well to the American system too. Those "broke and destitute" from medical bills people are rare cases and usually people who brought it on themselves (like those fat shits!) who I'd freak the fuck out if I had to waste tax money supporting. The rare upon rare case of freak accidents bankrupting are a problem, but all systems have cracks and usually these days are covered by GoFundMe esque charity. A tragedy, but utopia isn't available yet.
Plus for every one of those I could find you someone who wasn't cared for properly by the free healthcare providers, either they had to wait too long, they weren't treated carefully enough (ignored, not everything done for them), complications coming from cutting corners, etc.
My mother's friend was pretty young when she got breast cancer. She could clearly feel a lump, but the doctor told her she is wasting time and money that could be used on people who "really have cancer".
Yeah, like you can list off clear advantages and disadvantages of both systems.
But so many Europeans just talk as if their system is clearly overwhelmingly superior while brushing away stories of its faults. Then turn around and take the rare American cases are proof that everyone is suffering under the "inferior" system.
Exactly! I can totally understand that I will never live in a 0% tax country, I don't even want that. But here in Europe we are taxed so much that it feels like I am not allowed to take responsibility for my own needs because "just hand in all your money and we totally promise we will get you shit".
Not everyone is like this, which again, I understand. But at the same time being taxed out of my arse to pay for services nowhere near as good as they are claimed to be is just laughable.
Like the other commenter saying junk food needs to be taxed so people can be healthy. That's just one step above banning things he considers unhealthy.
What I am more for is letting people make choices, but then making them have to deal with the consequences, instead of trying to save people from themselves with these soft bannings and such.
One of the first things any adult American learns is that the government "moves at the speed of government," operates at "good enough for government work," and is filled with tax-expensive, cushy "government benefits."
A day at the DMV and an hour watching road work or the post office will show everyone why those phrases exist. Yet people want to give them MORE MONEY and entrust them with even more of their lives, and expect this time it'll produce quality.
And yeah, taxing things to try and curb behavior is literally letting the government moralize your life. Which is all fun and games until they start taxing you for "being too slutty, so Plan B is 900$" or "we think coffee is bad for you, Starbucks is 30$ a cup now."
They never think of the precedents being set.
The funny thing about the US vs Europe healthcare debate is, depending on what figures you look at, it's argued that the US system actually costs the government more per capita than the alternative. I think that was particularly the case for comparing the US to the UK, at any rate.
I'd hardly say I was an expert, but iirc, that's the core tragedy of the American system. It costs them similar amounts in tax, and then there was still the potential for paying huge amounts of money for the actual service afterwards (as well as potentially getting into fights with the insurance agencies over what they will and won't actually pay out for).
The Amercian system essentially, as far as I understood it last time I tried to get to grips with it, had all the failings of the alternatives but none of the actual benefits you'd expect for regular people using the system or the government in general. Both ends effectively get squeezed to make the middle men fabulously wealthy.
Personally, I take that as support for a UK style NHS type path, but I did get into a very discussion with someone over at the Reddit on the topic. You'll forgive my shitty memory, but I think it might have been Gizortnik and he had a very different solution to the same situation that boiled down to forcing the insurance companies to really fight for people's business so as to naturally push down the ridiculously inflated prices of everything, (though I wouldn't attempt to really explain in any detail because I do not remember anywhere near clearly enough).
It's not free you retard. They pay through their taxes. Jesus christ I never thought I'd have to explain that on this board of all places.
No fucking shit, but the taxes paid by the average joe don't come anywhere close to what he'll be paying if there's anything seriously wrong with him for any length of time.
The horror stories of being saddled with obnoxious medical bills in the US are quite rare. They do pay less in the end generally over there but nowhere near as much as people make it out to be. They pay those exorbitant taxes their whole lives. All the time they were paying into it when they were completely healthy was for the time they went in and got "free" healthcare.
I read something like 90% of people in France have private coverage on top of the public system.
Public care is only for the bare essentials and emergencies. Regular ass insurance covers the rest.
The government should have zero control over healthcare. The FDA was particularly evil this time around. They prevented private companies from getting testing going in January, simply because they wanted to be in control. They still aren't permitting home test kits either, despite the fact that when I did the drive through test there was zero interaction between me and the employees after they threw the test kit in my window.
Fauci and the rest of the CDC/FDA leadership should be in jail for aiding the enemy with distribution of a bio weapon. Tanks in Thomas Commons!
We don't do orange jumpsuits and shackles in England, and this inaccuracy annoys me.
but you do the pinkie extension, bowler and monacle?
Honestly not sure I've ever seen someone wearing either. Not even ironically.
Pinkie Extension? Well, maybe. Sometimes you've just got to be classier, you know? :)
Always.
A guy that rednecky also doesn't live in a flat open plain like that either. That's a hill, swamp, or forest guy.
Brilliant