National Health Insurance

[jbjbw]

The health insurance field is a mess. It is antiquated, terribly expensive to administer and impossible for the average American to have a clue as to what is truly happening with the billing of even minor medical procedures.
It is time for National Health Insurance.

[Dave~]

What is your definition of National Health Insurance? Do you have examples?

[jbjbw]

Do I smell a semantic trap? How about Canada or Great Britian for just 2.

[Dave~]

No semantic traps here. I was guessing that you might be talking about the UK or Canada, and I wanted to make sure.

I know a little about their National Health Insurance, but not a lot. I'd like to find out more about it, hence the question.

Is this what some people refer to as "Socialized Medicine"?

[Barcs]

I'm for it. I think it's about time we fix this problem. There are too many people who can't afford hospital costs and other things in case of emergency. I think that as long as somebody works at least 35 hours per week they should be entitled to medical benefits for them or their family.

[CrazyPaul]

Originally Posted by jbjbw

The health insurance field is a mess. It is antiquated, terribly expensive to administer and impossible for the average American to have a clue as to what is truly happening with the billing of even minor medical procedures.
It is time for National Health Insurance.

As if the government is going to do a better job?

People get denied treatment all the time from insurance. At least they can shop around, they can sue the insurance company and get treatment. If the govt does it, suing to get required medical care will be a difficult proposition.

How about we do away with "national health insurance" and institute "HEALTH CARE" instead.

[James Lewitzke]

Good points Paul.

Actually getting the treatment is a much better deal than being able to afford the treatment. (Not that being able to afford HC is bad, because it isn't, it's just that there'd be too much red tape on both sides of the aisle here.)

[Conspirasist]

Unless we can get rid of all this corruption in the white house
and the united states, there will never be a good health care
plan.

All americans think and care about is money.

Maybe we should go back to the barter and trade system.

I'd gladly give up 2 chickens to get a tooth pulled.

On a side note, i also heard cuba has a great national health care plan.

[danp8]

Originally Posted by Dave~

I know a little about their National Health Insurance, but not a lot. I'd like to find out more about it, hence the question.

in the UK, we don't have "national health insurance" - we have "National Insurance" though which works as a mandatory tax that is deducted from people's wages and goes towards paying for the NHS. There are varying degrees of National Insurance - from paying the standard £2.30 ($4.60) a week for low earners to paying up to 11% of your income if you earn between £105 and £770 per week.

National Insurance goes in the big pot that pays for pensions, the NHS and several other things. Essentially, the NHS is a free system at the point of care. If you break your arm or get ill and need to go to the doctors surgery, you simply turn up and you receive your treatment. No payment is involved at all (apart from taxes of course!)

On the whole, the system works well. While we Brits tend to spend a lot of time complaining about it (as we spend time complaining about most things), we'd be lost without it. The NHS has been around for over 50 years and all major political parties have it high on their agenda to sustain it and expand it.

Dan

[Conspirasist]

That doesn't sound to bad for 100% coverage.