I’m much more cynical than you with regard to your postscript. Sure, initially you’ll still be able to buy whatever care you want. But how long before the usual suspects start carping about the “unfairness” of a “two-tiered” system? It’s all part of the plan. They’ll get a foot in the door with whatever is politically doable, then use that as a base for expanding on the margins.

tom

Your wife and I are both from the workers paradise. Lucky for me, I spent years in and out of Soviet hospitals. Even though I was just a child and an ambulance was called and arrived because my asthma caused me to stop breathing entirely, the technicians refused to give me an adrenaline shot or take me to the hospital until a bribe was paid. Doctors refused to perform procedures until a bribe was paid. Thank God Russia removed the profit motive from medicine, eh? And the only reason I had access to good doctors and hospitals where the toilets didn’t regularly overflow (covering the floor with an inch of water and feces) is because my family was connected. Still, that wasn’t enough to scare up enough LOCAL anesthesia to numb me for the entirety of my adenoidectomy when I was 4 years old.

My great aunt was a GYN. She mostly performed surgery under conditions that make 19th century military field hospitals seem downright cushy and sanitary. Is it any wonder, then, that Russians mainly relied on folk medicine like peeing on everything? Stye in your eye? Urine compress. Burned your finger? Pee on it. Western doctors were horrified when they were able to visit after the collapse.

Fortunately, we are unlikely to have a system that bans Americans from spending their own money on things the plan will not buy…

It’s getting more likely every day.

My wife grew up in the Worker’s Paradise, where her standard of living as the second level director of a large grade school was well below my leanest period as I worked my way through college.

A couple years ago when her uncle experianced some form of breathing difficulties, he was denied an ambulance because they said he was too old. This was in Russia, where you might know someone who has a car, however you don’t have one available to you to just drive to the hospital yourself. A relative who was a retired nurse went to help him out.

After her first examination, my wife’s American dentist claimed he would lose his licence if he did work like he found. She wanted to know if she must bring gloves and a towel to her first American gynocolagist visit, because in Russia if you don’t you get bare hands and sit your bare but directly on the same examining table as half the town (very sanitary).

Why limit our goal to socialized healthcare when we could set our sights all the way to witch doctor?

True — but I thought the infamous breast cancer patient would have been forced to pay for *all* her medical care re: her breast cancer, not just the additional treatment.

in other words, sure, pay the $$$ for your drug, and also get a bill for all the other services rendered.

I’ve been searching for references that show the restrictions on patients and providers re: Medicare (e.g., what happens if you try to pay your doctor for proceedures that aren’t covered by Medicare).

Do you have those handy?

Thanks.

The new helthcare program will not limit access to AIDS medications, because that would arose political forces that are friends of the left and the New Healthcare. Instead, they will limit access to drugs like Lucentis that don’t have a wide, politically active base. The analysis will consider how old these people are and how much they “contribute to society”, and will decide that the only need one eye, at most to avoid becoming a drain on society.

The whole goal of this leftist/green shared vision is to get rid of a LOT of people who do not/cannot contribute the way they want them to. They started with banning DDT, “to deal with all those little brown people” (I think that is a direct quote). Eventually they will come after you and me, as well.