SiCKO

[steer]

this new film by Michael Moore. Once again, it's against Bush and his policies. He's liberal through and through. But, but, but.. it does make some good points, lookin at Great Britain and Canada's health plans.

what's everybody's view point on Universal Health Care?

[steer]

the title is wrong.. I have no idea why ALI showed up in front of Sicko?

[aphrodite4ever]

I think everyone should have access to health care without going hundres sometimes thousands in debt over it.

[imported_elp6n]

The state of our health care system is a disaster.
Folks with insurance work their rears off and can't afford the copays and deductibles so they do without (or they work with no insurance and earn "too much" for assistance), and those abusing Medicaid go the ER for free if they're constipated, have a head ache, or are just plain bored.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18674951/

Report: U.S. health care expensive, inefficient
America ranks last among six countries on key measures, group finds

WASHINGTON - Americans get the poorest health care and yet pay the most compared to five other rich countries, according to a report released on Tuesday.

Germany, Britain, Australia, New Zealand and Canada all provide better care for less money, the Commonwealth Fund report found.

"The U.S. health care system ranks last compared with five other nations on measures of quality, access, efficiency, equity, and outcomes,"? the non-profit group, which studies health care issues, said in a statement.

Canada rates second worst out of the six overall. Germany scored highest, followed by Britain, Australia and New Zealand.

"The United States is not getting value for the money that is spent on health care,"? Commonwealth Fund president Karen Davis said in a telephone interview.

The group has consistently found that the United States, the only one of the six nations that does not provide universal health care, scores more poorly than the others on many measures of health care.

Congress, President George W. Bush, many employers and insurers have all agreed in recent months to overhaul the U.S. health care system "? an uncoordinated conglomeration of employer-funded care, private health insurance and government programs.

The current system leaves about 45 million people with no insurance at all, according to U.S. government estimates from 2005, and many studies have shown most of these people do not receive preventive services that not only keep them healthier, but reduce long-term costs.

Davis said the fund's researchers looked at hard data for the report.

"It is pretty indisputable that we spend twice what other countries spend on average,"? she said.

Per-capita health spending in the United States in 2004 was $6,102, twice that of Germany, which spent $3,005. Canada spent $3,165, New Zealand $2,083 and Australia $2,876, while Britain spent $2,546 per person.

Key measures
"We focus primarily on measures that are sensitive to medical care making a difference "? infant mortality and healthy lives at age 60,"? Davis said. "Those are pretty key measures, like how long you live and whether you are going to die before age 75."?

Measures of other aspects of care such as cataract surgery or hip replacements are harder to come by, she said.

They also looked at convenience and again found the United States lacking "? with a few exceptions.

"We include measures such as waiting more than four months for elective, non-emergency surgery. The United States doesn't do as well as Germany but it does a lot better than the other countries on waiting time for surgery,"? Davis said.

"We looked at the time it takes to get in to see your own doctor ... (or) once you go to the emergency room do you sit there for more than two hours, and truthfully, we don't do well on those measures,"? Davis said.

According to the report, 61 percent of U.S. patients said it was somewhat or very difficult to get care on nights or weekends, compared with 25 percent to 59 percent in other countries.

"The area where the U.S. health care system performs best is preventive care, an area that has been monitored closely for over a decade by managed care plans,"? the report reads.

The United States had the fewest patients "? 84 percent "? reporting that they have a regular doctor.

And U.S. doctors are the least wired, with the lowest percentage using electronic medical records or receiving electronic updates on recommended treatments.

---------------
I had recently read another article, that I can't find at the moment, about how women are punished when it comes to health insurance, simply because of their "plumbing."

[namaste1]

Our health care system is in shambles. People who are working two or three jobs are without insurance. Medicare Part D is a joke and if this is not fixed we all have a disaster facing us. Eventually it will be the very wealthy who can afford health care and good luck to the rest of the population. There are people who work every day and cant afford to see a doctor. Can you tell I am pro universal health care?

[SunTzu]

As bad as the health care system is now , God help us all if we let the government take it over .

[imported_elp6n]

To sum it up:
We (the middle class taxpaying bunch) can't win

[MikeJones]

Half the time doctors act like they are in to big of a hurry to even listen to ya. Then you get the bill.

[burton2019]

CNN) -- Michael Moore's "Sicko," which opened nationwide Friday, is filled with horror stories of people who are deprived of medical service because they can't afford it or haven't been able to navigate the murky waters of managed care in the United States.

It compares American health care with the universal coverage systems in Canada, France, the United Kingdom and Cuba.

Moore covers a lot of ground. Our team investigated some of the claims put forth in his film. We found that his numbers were mostly right, but his arguments could use a little more context. As we dug deep to uncover the numbers, we found surprisingly few inaccuracies in the film. In fact, most pundits or health-care experts we spoke to spent more time on errors of omission rather than disputing the actual claims in the film.

Whether it's dollars spent, group coverage or Medicaid income cutoffs, health care goes hand in hand with numbers. Moore opens his film by giving these statistics, "Fifty million uninsured Americans ... 18,000 people die because they are uninsured." (Review: "Sicko" a tonic despite flaws)

For the most part, that's true. The latest numbers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say 43.6 million, or about 15 percent of Americans, were uninsured in 2006. For the past five years, the overall count has fluctuated between 41 million and 44 million people. According to the Institute of Medicine, 18,000 people do die each year mainly because they are less likely to receive screening and preventive care for chronic diseases.

Moore says that the U.S. spends more of its gross domestic product on health care than any other country.

Again, that's true. The United States spends more than 15 percent of its GDP on health care -- no other nation even comes close to that number. France spends about 11 percent, and Canadians spend 10 percent.

Like Moore, we also found that more money does not equal better care. Both the French and Canadian systems rank in the Top 10 of the world's best health-care systems, according to the World Health Organization. The United States comes in at No. 37. The rankings are based on general health of the population, access, patient satisfaction and how the care's paid for.

So, if Americans are paying so much and they're not getting as good or as much care, where is all the money going? "Overhead for most private health insurance plans range between 10 percent to 30 percent," says Deloitte health-care analyst Paul Keckley. Overhead includes profit and administrative costs.

"Compare that to Medicare, which only has an overhead rate of 1 percent. Medicare is an extremely efficient health-care delivery system," says Mark Meaney, a health-care ethicist for the National Institute for Patient Rights.

Moore spends about half his film detailing the wonders and the benefits of the government-funded universal health-care systems in Canada, France, Cuba and the United Kingdom. He shows calm, content people in waiting rooms and people getting care in hospitals hassle free. People laugh and smile as he asks about billing departments and cost of stay.

Not surprisingly, it's not that simple. In most other countries, there are quotas and planned waiting times. Everyone does have access to basic levels of care. That care plan is formulated by teams of government physicians and officials who determine what's to be included in the universal basic coverage and how a specific condition is treated. If you want treatment outside of that standard plan, then you have to pay for it yourself.

"In most developed health systems in the world, 15 percent to 20 percent of the population buys medical services outside of the system of care run by the government. They do it through supplemental insurance, or they buy services out of pocket," Keckley says.

The people who pay more tend to be in the upper income or have special, more complicated conditions.

Moore focuses on the private insurance companies and makes no mention of the U.S. government-funded health-care systems such as Medicare, Medicaid, the State Children's Health Insurance Program and the Veterans Affairs health-care systems. About 50 percent of all health-care dollars spent in the United States flows through these government systems.

"Sicko" also ignores a handful of good things about the American system. Believe it or not, the United States does rank highest in the patient satisfaction category. Americans do have shorter wait times than everyone but Germans when it comes to nonemergency elective surgery such as hip replacements, cataract removal or knee repair.

That's no surprise given the number of U.S. specialists. In U.S. medical schools, students training to become primary-care physicians have dwindled to 10 percent. The overwhelming majority choose far more profitable specialties in the medical field. In other countries, more than one out of three aspiring doctors chooses primary care in part because there's less of an income gap with specialists. In those nations, becoming a specialist means making 30 percent more than a primary-care physician. In the United States, the gap is around 300 percent, according to Keckley.

As Americans continue to spend $2 trillion a year on health care, everyone agrees on one point: Things need to change, and it will take more than a movie to figure out how to get there.