Comments on: Open System Health Care

By: Stef

Stef — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 19:10:34 +0000

I guess we will agree to disagree. The idea of competition and a free enterprise system are not applicable to healthcare. It just doesnt make sense to me.

By: alaina

alaina — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 05:12:44 +0000

this concept was debated on npr earlier this week. i wish i remember which show.
i am wholeheartedly behind reform and am actually intrigued by this idea. at the same time, it isn’t just big health money behind these things. my family owns a few small pharmacies and medical supply outlets and that is their livelihood. they aren’t rich. they do well by their customers. this sort of change would destroy their livelihood.
i’m a strong believer in a good pharmacist/patient relationship. a good pharmacist/medical supplier teaches the patient how to use their medicine/equipment in ways that amazon will never be able to do. i’m biased, obviously.
and so i have to be concerned at a personal level, regardless of my cognitive and emotional knowledge that the health care system is very sick.
the idea is simple, but the change and how it is carried out is hugely complicated by the fact that this system employs millions of people.
i suppose i tend to think that the inflation of health care costs is in the insurance industry, the overuse of medical procedures to line pockets or to avoid lawsuits, and so on.

By: [Daily Feature] An Open Health Care System by @mclanea- SDBloggers - San Diego Blog Community

Sat, 05 Sep 2009 00:58:05 +0000

[...] clipped from adammclane.com [...]

By: adam mclane

adam mclane — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 18:40:39 +0000

Ah, here we go to the extremes. I mean seriously? Did you even read the post? You think in the current system we allow that? Do you think that by simply cutting out 4-5 layers of mark-up you’re going to bypass say… the FDA? Yeah, don’t be silly. Don’t believe the crazy stuff on either ends of the spectrum.

There’s no such thing as “death boards” or whatever wackiness the right comes up with. And there’s no socialism on the far left. (More than the socialist state we’ve had for more than 70 years in America.)

By allowing consumers to buy from FDA approved manufacturers directly… you take a lot of the artificial inflation out of the system.

Maybe this idea is too simple for people?

By: Stef

Stef — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 18:30:44 +0000

We’ve done it in every industry so why not health care? Do two wrongs make a right?

Really? Turn health care into consumerism? What happens when your $800 knee that was made by a child in India being paid $1 a day infects your leg because its bad quality and made in a plant with no safety standards? It doesnt sound smart to me. And purchasing drugs from who-knows-where? Maybe its the Canadian in me, but the American view of health care is so strange.

The Canadian system isnt perfect, but its better than the American one. And no American media will tell you that because there is so much money in the American system.
Check it out.

By: Kevin Brangwynne

Kevin Brangwynne — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 16:29:52 +0000

Ahh, cutting out middle men, competition and the free enterprise system…Seems like it’s worked before! I like it!

By: Matt Cleaver

Matt Cleaver — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 15:33:16 +0000

Oh, and something else. This was sort of (although and not near of an extreme scale) what Health Savings Accounts were supposed to do. It increased the amount of out-of-pocket expense so that people would shop around for the better deal. Didn’t really work out that way. And I’m not sure where HSAs stand in the current reform efforts, but in theory they are a great idea, they just need to be utilized by more people to take effect.

By: Matt Cleaver

Matt Cleaver — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 15:29:16 +0000

I like it!

I actually just scheduled a post on the healthcare debate a few minutes ago, although I don’t come up with any good ideas like this.

I’m going to go back and edit my post to link to this one.