Can someone point me to a Free Market Healthcare System that works?

Whether free-market healthcare exists or not, it cannot be rightly defined as a "SYSTEM".

 

When you go to the hospital do you order your own tests, procedures, xrays and medication?

You aren't even the customer when you're a patient.. your attending physician is the customer.

 

My statement was merely addressing the semantic inaccuracy of referring to free-market ANYTHING as a "SYSTEM", since that would carry with it the implication of being uniformly regulated.

 

I didn't call it a system.

 

You quoted me. . . . Relax, we're on the same side.

 

Are you aware of the additional regulation of healthcare? Are you aware of the increased lawsuits by ambulance chasers in America? I see their adds on TV all the time. Are you aware insurance companies cannot compete across state lines like auto insurance?

 

Ambulance chasers? Medical malpractice is not driven by ambulance chasers. .. and medical litigation is NOT the cause of spiraling healthcare costs. Every state has a different medical mal insurance structure.

Competing across state lines is a silly notion and won't make a bit of difference. That's more of Trump's ignorance.

We have been practicing defensive medicine in the US for 40 years now.. and the PPOs and HMOs contributed to that because Americans rarely had the same physician for 25 years. But all that was an effort to stop rising costs.

The way to fix healthcare is single family-private delivery and do away with the VA.

Obamacare has increased the number of Americans who have healthcare but it is still flawed because of the insurance companies.

 

Nothing stopping any for profit medical services provider, like a hospital, from offering services directly to the public. If someone has the money to pay for those services they can purchase them directly. That is how medical tourism works. The hospitals and doctors overseas are all for-profit and they take in private patients without insurance all the time. Apparently you have no faith in capitalism.

 

Lawyers that take out TV ads to promote everyone to climb on board class action lawsuits are "ambulance chasers".

 

Class action suits are not the same as medical malpractice suits against physicians and I have worked both sides in defense of physicians and proving fault in physicians.

 

Most hospitalizations are not elective. You can't shop for a deal when you are lying under a bus or when your appendix bursts.

 

Agreed!

I was talking about the hypothetical situation with elective surgery such as a knee or hip replacement.

Mea culpa for not being explicit when I made my post.

 

Patients really are NOT the customer at the hospital. They don't order tests, xrays, MRIs, procedures or medications. The attending physician is the customer... elective or non elective.

 

That's what happens when the government get's involved. All they had to do was pass legislation that requires pre-existing conditions to be covered. That was the only concern and the reason why government healthcare was even a thought. If people think insurance companies was scamming people, the government is right there with them. They are tied in with insurance companies, stock market, bonds, unfunded liabilities, etc, of course they want to control it. What gets me, is how people think, "we can insure an unsure thing". Infinite ways to die, yet there is not infinite remedies. People have become to caught up in the world of entertainment, they care more of their appearance (bling, bling), than they do of saving money for a rainy day. So they ask and rely on others to protect them, insure them things will be ok. As if those who they ask have some sort of control on things.

It is getting to the point where we will all soon be in one big line, doing the same thing every day, day in and day out (you can actually see it now). I can tell anybody what they must do for the month. Because we all must do it. An assembly line of people that does what their government tells them, and if they step out of line, then it's time for the cells. We work specifically for a system that was designed for the upper one percent. And we bring reasons to the table of how it could be better for the poor and middle class. Yet nothing ever changes, we keep complaining but nothing ever changes. What's terrible, is we keep falling for it. And to the point where the problem is party affiliated, and we divide to the point of anger and hatred. All so the upper one percent (from both sides) can continue the system they have set up for themselves.

 

Your rant does not address any of the actual issues.

 

That's because your issues can not be solved (they can, but only by you). Let me guess, you think healthcare is going to be solved. Hey let's put our healthcare in the hands of those who cannot stay out of debt. What a great idea! Put it in the hands of those who commit genocide, theft, rape, damn you people are brilliant. So easily manipulated. Can people not see they want absolute control over everything?

 

VA healthcare is the most expensive in the country.. more than private or Medicare ...

What do insurance companies contribute to healthcare?

 

They can have control over healthcare. What we have now sucks

 

It's an area that will always suck. People really think that they will eventually be able to go to the doc, and get rid of whatever it is that ills them. No, it's always going to be expensive, it's always going to be unwanted, and it's always going to be a burden. After-all, something bad happened to be there in the first place. Might as well have patient doctor confidentiality, and the ability to shop from state to state, to improve competition and reasons for others becoming physicians. It's getting to the point where nobody is going to want to become a doctor (burden is to high), especially if the way they go about it is dictated (business and financial reasons).

It's a problem that will never be solved to satisfaction. How can it be, when sickness and injury is a burden to begin with?

 

As the very point of this thread says.....who on planet earth is using that model now successfully?

People in single payer countries LOVE their system so much you can rarely even find ONE politician running on a platform to go back to a for profit model. In fact....find me one.

 

Seems like a rhetorical question, and I mean no offense I just may not be understanding you fully. One is not going to get healthcare without insurance. Unless they are multi-millionaires or more. You think insurance companies don't have data they can collect, that shows them where to invest? This has been around since the credit card! It is only now, where it is open to the public where we also can see where to invest, by what it is people most purchase. And for that I apologize, for I am merely guessing that credit cards like Visa, can be accessed by the public to show what is most purchased. No personal information required, just a list of what is most purchased. If we cannot, then it's safe to say there is a monopoly with just credit cards, let alone insurance and healthcare. Government will not do anything to healthcare if it doesn't profit for them. You think they care about somebody they don't know?

 

Is the government supposed to profit? Private physicians and corporate or non profit hospitals all pay taxes.

Medicare for everyone will reduce costs..

 

And it may very well indeed. But if it does, the government will not allow it. They are not there for you, they are there for themselves.

If the government is suppose to profit, we are in very big trouble. With bonds and unfunded liabilities National debt is around 120 trillion. Yeah with that kind of money, I could start a government to. Only mine would work. It seems you don't know what I mean by profit. You see the government passes legislation in a way that is easy to steal (illegally profit) from such gigantic programs, such as medicare, social security, and so on. They just reach in and grab it. I mean people who are 40 years old today, will be extremely lucky to see their social security. Because the government not only get their grubby little hands on it, but they also use it for other government programs, that they also can't seem to function properly.
Just one big cluster()()()().

 

Nonsense. Single Payer, private delivery has NOTHING to do with social security.