That's not what the data showed. Doctor-run hospitals, before ACA disallowed new ones and restricted existing ones from expanding, had overall better patient outcomes than state run hospitals.
MRI scans, which could sometimes mean the difference between life-saving diagnoses, or a missed diagnosis, were cheaper and easier to come by in the U.S. because clinics could run a scanner at a profit and specialize in MRI scans. Locking them away under government rationing destroys the cycle of signal and response a market can bring. We've seen this in other countries where it is exceedingly difficult to get one when you need one.
That doesn't mean there aren't sensible cases for government-funded research. But looking at the current health system with massive government interventions already in place and saying the problem is not enough government intervention seems like a mistaken conclusion.
> We've seen this in other countries where it is exceedingly difficult to get one when you need one.
Well, I don’t know which country you refer to but it’s not the case in France and lots of European countries where healthcare is totally free.
Yes you have to wait months for a scheduled PET scan or an MRI but you also can have access to one as soon as you enter the hospital as long as the medical team think it may save your life. It’s just ressource planning. I know it because it saved my life twice and for 0.00€.
edit : Just to be clear, I’m not writing this as « US bashing » but to help you consider that free and effective healthcare is totally possible and that working models already exists around the world. Free healthcare IS a solved problem.
You do realize this doesn't work, right? Pharma "profit margins are very high", okay, but that means 10% (yes like everywhere there's that one company that does 30% for a while, averages however).
So 100% nationalizing them would change the cost of a $300,000 per year treatment to ... $270,000 per year. Nobody is waiting for that. Frankly even a 30% reduction, the top of the line, would not really matter to people.
The only thing separating medicine and the profit motive will do is stop the development of new drugs. There's no way in hell the government will invest even 10% of what the private sector invests in new drugs. That would be a 10000%+ budget increase for universities. It's not happening. So drug and treatment development will slow to a crawl. So is it better to die because no-one cares to look at you at all than to die because someone doesn't want to pay for your cure?
Apparently it is, according to responses here, but I truly don't understand why.
And if that's what you want to do, let people die, then why not just legislate that you can't buy coverage for diseases with <N cases per year? That would avoid all the inefficiency.
This. Medicine and the profit motive do not mix.
That's not what the data showed. Doctor-run hospitals, before ACA disallowed new ones and restricted existing ones from expanding, had overall better patient outcomes than state run hospitals.
MRI scans, which could sometimes mean the difference between life-saving diagnoses, or a missed diagnosis, were cheaper and easier to come by in the U.S. because clinics could run a scanner at a profit and specialize in MRI scans. Locking them away under government rationing destroys the cycle of signal and response a market can bring. We've seen this in other countries where it is exceedingly difficult to get one when you need one.
That doesn't mean there aren't sensible cases for government-funded research. But looking at the current health system with massive government interventions already in place and saying the problem is not enough government intervention seems like a mistaken conclusion.
> We've seen this in other countries where it is exceedingly difficult to get one when you need one.
Well, I don’t know which country you refer to but it’s not the case in France and lots of European countries where healthcare is totally free.
Yes you have to wait months for a scheduled PET scan or an MRI but you also can have access to one as soon as you enter the hospital as long as the medical team think it may save your life. It’s just ressource planning. I know it because it saved my life twice and for 0.00€.
edit : Just to be clear, I’m not writing this as « US bashing » but to help you consider that free and effective healthcare is totally possible and that working models already exists around the world. Free healthcare IS a solved problem.
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You do realize this doesn't work, right? Pharma "profit margins are very high", okay, but that means 10% (yes like everywhere there's that one company that does 30% for a while, averages however).
So 100% nationalizing them would change the cost of a $300,000 per year treatment to ... $270,000 per year. Nobody is waiting for that. Frankly even a 30% reduction, the top of the line, would not really matter to people.
The only thing separating medicine and the profit motive will do is stop the development of new drugs. There's no way in hell the government will invest even 10% of what the private sector invests in new drugs. That would be a 10000%+ budget increase for universities. It's not happening. So drug and treatment development will slow to a crawl. So is it better to die because no-one cares to look at you at all than to die because someone doesn't want to pay for your cure?
Apparently it is, according to responses here, but I truly don't understand why.
And if that's what you want to do, let people die, then why not just legislate that you can't buy coverage for diseases with <N cases per year? That would avoid all the inefficiency.