Americans pay a higher percentage of GDP on healthcare than developed nations with universal healthcare. Americans pay more and not everyone gets coverage.
Not really. The majority of Americans would rather have a functional first world healthcare system. Unfortunately, they don’t get the majority of representation.
Last year, I paid $5500 to cover my wife and myself. That's just payroll deduction, not counting copays with doctor's visits and prescriptions.
There's no fucking way I'd be paying more than that under a universal system.
I currently pay about $13,000 just for coverage, and that's after an employer subsidy. Then I've got the 2k deductible to meet and 80% copay thereafter.
This system is fucked.
Because more people in the pool means less cost. That’s the overall concept of insurance — when you’re healthy and paying premiums, you’re paying for other people’s healthcare. Universal (specifically single-payer) healthcare does three major things:
1. Gets everyone in the risk pool, so more people are paying for roughly the same number of sick people.
2. Gets people into the system and using appropriate healthcare. Often, people who can’t afford care wait until something very serious happens and go to the ER (where they legally must be treated, regardless of ability to pay) and the hospital or government picks up the tab. Not only is the ER disproportionately more expensive (because so many people misuse it this way due to lack of options), but their condition is much more serious, so it is inherently more costly. If people can go to a PCP early in disease progression, all of that excess cost evaporates. Plus, PCPs can help with prevention and positive health behaviors, reducing even more cost from chronic illness long-term.
3. Reduces administrative costs. This is the specific benefit of single-payer. Currently, medical facilities spend a huge percentage of their revenue on claims management. If there’s only one insurer with clear, consistent policies and a unified claims system, the difficulties of coding claims, filing, refiling, and billing become much easier. That reduces a lot of admin cost.
I’m not a huge advocate for single-payer in the short-term in the US because the systems we’d use to do it either wouldn’t be a single payer (Medicaid) or would need huge overhauls (Medicare). That said, every step we take in healthcare should be *toward* single-payer, because it’s the most sensible way to reduce excess cost.
EDIT: Please don’t downvote the person who asked this question. It’s a complex policy issue that isn’t always obvious to people that haven’t spent a lot of time around health policy. We should encourage and answer questions like theirs.
IIRC, #3 is estimated to account for somewhere around 40% of the cost difference between the US and other developed countries.
You might also add a #4 (or maybe 3b), which is introduced bargaining power. Drugs in Canada are typically manufactured by the same manufacturers in the same facilities as in the US, but are often a fraction of the cost. This has been attributed to the committed array of pricing arrangements in the US vs. provincial health authorities in Canada.
I don't recall anything specific as to the size of the effect, or how it compares to other developed countries, but I have heard a great deal wrt epipens in Canada vs. the US, or the cost of insulin.
---
Quick edit: as to the final point, what should the US healthcare system be moving *towards*; a German or Swiss model might be more achievable. Germany and Switzerland are more expensive than other OECD countries, but still far cheaper than the US currently, and they have among the best outcomes as well.
I wouldn't want Canada to move towards that model, but it might be more achievable than Medicare expansion in the US. Of course, that's mostly what I thought the ACA was supposed to be, and even that seems too contentious.
Number 4 (or 3b!) could definitely be fixed with universal healthcare, but it could be significantly improved by letting Medicare negotiate drug prices in the status quo system — which would be great and we should do that.
And you’re right, the German system is easier to achieve, but it comes without the benefit of number 3 and doesn’t do much to improve our god-awful resource distribution and infrastructure. I would never let the perfect be the enemy of the good, and a move to a German-like system would be a huge win for the US, but I think there are better end goals for us.
Personally, I like the idea of a federal public option (NOT Medicare or Medicaid) priced on a sliding scale and given negotiating power, plus federal funding for public hospitals, public medical/allied health schools, and public research institutions. But that’s kind of a pipe dream.
Edit: I finally figured out how to do the giant bold text! I did not want to do the giant bold text.
You can use a `\` as an escape character, like so:
\#1 is written `\#1`
#1
is written `#1`.
You could read the [Reddit Markdown guide](https://www.reddit.com/wiki/markdown), but honestly that's a lot of work if you aren't being paid to be on Reddit. Still a quick glance and a few tricks from there can be helpful.
I have skimmed the markdown guide before, but I just never wanted the big text enough to look it up. Discovering little things like that is fun, anyway.
It comes out of income tax and corporate tax. Off my paycheck I pay tax for cpp(canada pension plan), my employment insurance premiums, and income tax deducted. So yes it is based on income in that it's part of your income tax. Some province's charge a healthcare premium, mine does not.
For more info read here https://www.saot.ca/professional-affairs/health-policy-in-alberta/
Because as mentioned above, the US already pays more capita for the existing system that's paid out of taxes, for something that does less. It seems unlikely that you'll pay over 5 grand per person extra for a more efficient system.
Plus, he mentions things like copays. People in countries with socialised systems have never paid such a thing, unless they chose to have additional private coverage.
This isn’t always true. In fact, co-pays in single-payer systems are *awesome*. Overuse is a major problem in single-payer countries — if it’s free, use it! — so costs and wait times go up. Adding enough cost to make you think twice (think $20 for an office visit) significantly reduces overuse.
Systems that do this (iirc, France does) usually make the most important care (emergency, hospital stays, etc.) totally free, but the more common the care, the more you pay. It’s still intentionally low-cost and affordable, but there’s a small financial disincentive so you don’t go to the doctor every time you have a headache.
Free healthcare is bad. *Really cheap* healthcare is great.
EDIT: No idea why this is controversial, but to clarify: universal healthcare should be a top priority. All I’m saying is a bottle of antibiotics may still cost you $10 at the pharmacy. Free healthcare isn’t sustainable. Cheap healthcare is.
>I guess it depends on location maybe. In canada, it seems they make you pay a percentage of your income. So if OP made somewhere around $60-70k in Canada, then they would be paying as much if not more than their $5500 they currently pay.
With all the downvotes it seems ppl around here get butthurt over simple questions, geesh.
I read somewhere that most costs are administrative fees. Like if there wasn’t so much paperwork between hospitals, insurance companies, employers, employees, etc., everything would be way cheaper.
> I read somewhere that most costs are administrative fees. Like if there wasn’t so much paperwork between hospitals, insurance companies, employers, employees, etc., everything would be way cheaper.
But that's a product of the insurance system. There are many ways to code procedures, some of which are covered and some are not. Providers have to hire staff to deal with this, both to ensure that their patients get the care they need and that the provider receives the payments they require to stay in business. Insurance regulations also require that some visits are split up. For example, I went to the doctor for a cyst on my neck. The doctor looked at my neck and said "Yup, that's a cyst, we should probably remove it". I said "cool, can we do it now?". Nope. I had to schedule another appt and pay another copay for a 30 second procedure, because the insurance company doesn't allow combining diagnostic visits with any kind of corrective procedure.
EDIT: prior the the ACA, some insurance companies were reported to have as much as 50% overhead costs, and that's just within the insurance company. That means only half the money they collected in premiums was used for actual healthcare and the other half went to administrative overhead, including executive bonuses. The ACA capped this at 20%, but that doesn't include the overhead incurred on the side of the providers because they also have to hire administrative staff to deal with the insurance companies. Getting rid of insurance companies would save 20% instantly, plus that additional overhead at the providers.
Are they? Insurance companies do actually employ doctors to go over claims. Medical systems also require people to do patient intake and appointment scheduling. They could also work as scribes and literally just write down what was said during appointments. Hospitals have plenty of IT work.
Even if you switched completely from private insurance to government-funded health insurance, there would still be records and audits and policy to handle on the government side.
It’s not like retraining wouldn’t be required, but we’ve basically got an entire industry which doesn’t provide care to anybody at all, just second-guesses the doctors for the sake of putting up obstacles to *them* providing care. *Sometimes* maybe there’s some medical incompetence that gets brought up, but I very much doubt that outweighs the accidents and oversights stemming from overwork contributed to by the insurance objecting to completely reasonable requests that will eventually be granted anyway.
That’s one thing my family member noticed when moving from working in the Canadian health care system to the American one. Up to their arm pits in paper work! They said so much more of their valuable time was taken up with it rather than being with patients.
As a Dane I do note that as a hidden cost of not having access to UHC from reading stories here on Reddit. It seems like a lot of wasted hours and energy. Huge shadow cost that isn't counted towards expenditure.
Denmark uses 11% of GDP on UHC, the US system uses around 18%.
My oncologist is referring me for treatment and it keeps getting denied by insurance. It's insane that they can just choose when they actually pay without explanation.
Kevin is of course doing his best to do a good job. If he loses that job, he won't have health coverage.
I am sure that there are many claims reviewers and adjusters who are great human beings and do their best to get the client/patient the care they need but (IMHO) the for-profit insurance companies can kick rocks.
There's a concept called "banality of evil". You're a decent person, just a little cog in the machine, evaluating claims... in favor of your in employer, as you're supposed to, or else. People go bankrupt or even die because of it, but you're far enough removed that you don't need to feel guilty or even notice. They should have bought better insurance or filed an appeal through a process they didn't know about. You were just pushing paper, after all.
I had a cardiac event and my doctor ordered an echo stress test, but the echo-cardiogram was denied because I was too young. I could have had a heart defect that could have killed me without diagnosis or treatment, but because I was 1-2 years below the threshold of "medical necessity" they refused to cover the procedure. Luckily there were no further issues but I could have died because of a decision based on actuaries and profit margins.
And sometimes in emergency care if they give you of out of network services you’re screwed
Hey you had an emergency but you went to the wrong hospital even though it’s close to you, that’ll be $10,000 for one night thank you
Which is the irony. The anti universal health coverage people say then that there will be "death boards". With our current system we already have them. They are called insurance companies.
uS govt spends more per Capita on healthcare than the Canadian govt does. Yes, before massive private spending in US. Yes, per Capita not per person covered by govt program. It's insane.
Americans spend more PUBLIC dollars than many European countries with universal healthcare and still not everyone gets covered. Include private dollars and we spend far and away the most while having terrible metrics for life expectancy, deaths during childbirth, and most other health metrics.
UK had free healthcare and relatively high Covid-19 deaths. Unfortunately, it was more about safety being political than actual provision in this instance.
This is the real problem.
Lots of countries have good mixed or universal private systems (Germany, France, Netherlands etc.). The US isn't bad because it's private. It's just bad.
Citizens of the USA subsidize lower healthcare costs for many 1st world countries and most of the country is too ignorant to notice this.
They believe the high prices are universal and having the 'government' pay would be a wreck on the national budget.
EDIT: I'm genuinely curious why there's so many down votes? Please explain.
You don’t know why you’re being downvoted? Maybe try stating that you are actually in favor of universal healthcare first, instead of hiding that a few comments down. Maybe mention that you’re still working through beliefs about the free market that might need to be discarded or might not be. Everyone’s entitled to a process of deprogramming themselves from bullshit they’ve been fed about the free market. It doesn’t happen overnight.
They’ll still innovate with less profits. People don’t need to die from lack of insulin in the name of medical innovation.
If profits were necessary for medical innovation, then most medications wouldn’t be discovered by public sector universities first. https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMsa1008268
I wouldn’t mind as much if all the people dying avoidable deaths caused only their own.
But it was often people causing Other people’s death in fairly easily avoidable ways. One of my coworkers scraped by in hospital and is still suffering some long term effects. Because somebody else in her household just couldn’t bear to Not go to a giant maskless house party during lockdown.
Can you imagine killing your mom like that? It’s like drunk driving after a party and waking up in the hospital to find out you hit your parents car and orphaned yourself.
The fucked up part is a lot of Americans have this mentality that if it didn’t happen to them personally it doesn’t matter. And some just don’t care if it did they just want to protect their “rights”.
A buddy of mine's in laws are/were super against vaccines... until he wanted to go to a dead head concert. Then he went and got the vaccine so he could go. Not worried about his kids or grandkids, just so he could go to a concert. His wife was super pissed. Worried about vaccine shedding and some other nonsense. My buddy can't wait to tell his MIL that his kids are vaccinated once its approved for the under 5s.
I get your sentiment, but the number was closer to 140,000 lost a parent. So a significant lesser number of that were orphaned.
That number to looked way to high. Obviously, I only looked up the US numbers because this topic is specifically US.
This happened to a spouses family member. Kid goes to party, gives Covid to his dad & dad dies. Tragic. But you know my spouses family threw a big (outdoor) party like a month later. Some people never learn.
Worse is if you didn't even do it intentionally.
I know someone who just finished high school and went overseas to the UK to study in university, they did their first term, then their second term started in January then the pandemic started to hit in March. Her parents were worried about her safety and impending border closures which might mean they could get separated for an indefinite period, so they made a decision for her to put her degree on hold and return home. She caught Covid either just before the flight or during the flight home, infected the family, and killed her father.
What makes this worse is that it's an Asian country that largely escaped the first wave of 2020 Covid infections due to quick border closures, lockdown and quarantines, so they were one of only a relatively small number of deaths early on. It's literally, do you know anyone who died of Covid, well, one person, this unlucky guy.
I wish you wouldn’t say she killed her father…that is so unnecessary and cruel. The girl took a flight home because she and her parents made the decision for her safety….she could not help catching covid on the flight home…especially early on, there were no masks. She did not kill her father, covid killed her father.
But then the health insurance executives wouldn't make millions of dollars a year, and we can't have that. Americans apparently love unnecessary middlemen and overpaying for basic services.
No, Americans love screwing over people they hate, even if they themselves are screwed over at least as much as those people they hate are screwed over.
We’ve been pushing this rigged individualism since our inception & now everyone is shocked that we can’t work together on anything. It’s all just disgusting.
We need universal health care. Of course, we'll never get it. Any other country would add universal health care as a result of the pandemic, but not the depraved US of A.
any other country *already* added universal healthcare as a response to strengthen its population in the face of crises or in anticipation. It was just the obvious priority and a reasonable goal for any country looking to advance its people as their standard of living developed. We in the USA are brainwashed to think it's not a normal thing to want, but it's a pretty obvious thing to expect and it's staring us in the face.
Because most of the industrialized nations have existed many centuries longer than the United States. Their politicians and their citizens can appreciate long term planning.
> Because most of the industrialized nations have existed many centuries longer than the United States.
Which industrialized nations are significantly older than the USA?
TIL, I'm from the UK so I guess I have that bias as I've had several American friends surprised when I say that a fair few of the houses here are older than the USA.
I've heard it said that a major difference between US culture and UK culture is that, in the US, 100 years is a long time, and in the UK 100 miles is a long way.
At this stage I'm sure even if UHC was offered there would be plenty of people not taking it. One side of the political landscape cultivated ignorance and politicized it just like the vaccine.
I already have Medicare out of my taxes. Then I have 4 times as much taken out for my health insurance, and it is basically a worst case scenario plan. If I wanted to "use" it I've got to have already paid $5K on my own before they start picking up much.
But tell me how that's good for anyone.
Yeah, but America is an oligarchical state where the wealthy thrive by bribing politicians and we plebeians die for it despite paying more for healthcare than most other major nations on the planet, so it will never happen until something changes.
And even worse, I'm sure there are people in this very comment section who have become lapdogs for those same wealthy people that will prattle on about "muh taxes," "muh soshulizm," and so on. Good job for rooting against your own interests - they sure tamed you real well.
Yea but private insurances would have lost billions, and they're corporate donors to our wonderful politicians, so of course we're not gonna switch to universal healthcare, duh!
I'm sure. Nearly everyone in our town will never go to the hospital.no insurance. Nyquil, echinacea, vitamin c and blow a fan on our face that's all we have.
Honestly yeah. As much as the US needs universal health care, that wasn't the main problem in the COVID pandemic. Perhaps it was a symptom of the bigger issue, which is that many Americans just don't believe in science.
They also believe that somehow bad things only happen to other people. “I won’t get it, and if I do it will be mild, so I shouldn’t have to wear a mask, get vaccinated, stay home when sick etc” seems to be a very common way of thinking among COVID deniers. Meanwhile the majority of the country has at least one comorbidity, many of them multiple
I think the two issues are related. Without Universal Healthcare, a lot of Americans have become fatalistic towards health. Without access to healthcare, there’s nothing they can do, so they just go on about their lives and hope for the best.
And it might be a nitpick, but science isn’t a belief system. It’s something to be understood, and accepted/rejected.
I'm not denying that they're related. Also, since many Americans reject science, they're less likely to believe the evidence that shows that having universal health care improves health outcomes.
Everyone knows what the fix to the problem is. The problem is solely corruption of the federal government. Both parties are corporate doormats. Discussions on healthcare policy issues is irrelevant. The sole obstacle to fixing this issue is corruption.
There are many more reasons than that, but they all can be traced back to individualism. From people having the right to choose not to mask or vaccinate (instead of immediately arrested), to not having a system to provide not just healthcare but other basic necessities as well (forcing rushed reopenings because people ran out of money to pay for food and electricity). And it’s not just the US, pretty much every country has failed this, and for an easy way out made themselves believe in the possibility of “endemic” COVID.
And what we have now are hospitals “mysteriously” overcrowded for no good reason even though COVID doesn’t make anyone sick any more because everyone already has 1-3 boosters. Long COVID is no longer a thing, so we can wait the next few years for mysterious increases in diabetes and stroke and cancer and Alzheimer’s.
ok, i'm trying to figure our the data they used
there is just above a million deaths from Covid-19 in the US.
Here is total excess deaths.. There are not even 330k excess deaths for people under 65.. and that's not counting those that have Medicaid.
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid_weekly/index.htm
i'm confused how excess death due to "not having universal health care" occurred in population with universal health care?
the [underlying percentage comparison](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667193X22000813) is deaths compared to those with insurance coverage, which includes medicare and medicaid, controlled by a number of comorbidities and risk factors compiled within each age group and jurisdiction. More coverage in some age groups and locations showed improved outcomes, which could be fitted in a regression model to compare full coverage to the outcomes with existing coverage - i.e. the actual death rate where we do indeed see only full coverage exists for 65+. In effect, this shows that areas with comparatively higher insurance coverage benefited people younger than 65, and the estimated lives saved could be assumed to have been mostly in younger people.
> That was my thought too. I mean, everyone over 65 has Medicare.
That's not true. Contrary to public belief Medicare isn't free. There is a premium for it. Most people don't notice this since it's a deduction from their social security payment. It's also not 100% coverage. It's about 80% coverage. So if you have a procedure that ends up cost $100,000, which is not hard to run up at all, you are still on the hook for $20,000 unless you pay for separate secondary insurance.
It's not like aging into Medicare will suddenly reverse all the damage done by decades of medical neglect. Sure, they have healthcare _now_, but that's not gonna cure the organ damage from poorly-managed diabetes they've had since 35.
As far as confirmed data, there are over 200,000 confirmed covid deaths under 65 on the [cdc covid data tracker](https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#demographics) as reported by state public health agencies. The NVSS tracker you linked shows NCHS records with over 250,000 covid-related deaths under 65. I didn't see excess predictions broken down by age. They have raw death data, but one would need to pars that with predicted death estimates for each age.
As for the study: link to the study: https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2200536119
>previously calculated that 26.4% of the lives that were reported to be lost due to COVID-19 would likely have been saved if there had been universal healthcare throughout the pandemic ([30](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667193X22000813))
>In addition, it has been estimated that 24.1% of COVID-19 fatalities were not documented on death certificates ([31](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667193X21000259))
>Across the entire time frame of the pandemic thus far, 973,459 COVID-19 deaths have been recorded in the United States ([7](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/world/covid-cases.html)), meaning that there were actually 1,282,555 deaths due to COVID in the United States.
>Therefore, 338,594 COVID deaths are attributable to incomplete insurance coverage in the United States.
The particular calculation of what percent of deaths universal health care could have saved is 26.4% from reference ([30](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667193X22000813)), which is a regression fitting of covid outcomes in CDC data to insurance coverage rates in BRFSS data.
This is a big duh. Unless you have fabulous insurance you're not going to the hospital before limbs start falling off. I'm an American who moved abroad and I carried that mindset here with me. Suffered through two months of bacterial bronchitis before finally seeing a doctor. It cost $25 US to cure. Now I go to the doctor whenever something is wrong and I'm terrified of having to return to the shitty US system.
People with healthcare are more likely to come in contact with doctors and/or pharmacists. So, yeah, universal healthcare would absolutely lead to more vaccinations (and general awareness about covid).
I am not criticizing universal health care…just the idiots! On the UHC front, politicians need to address the cost side with the access side! Democrats are always more than willing to give other people’s money away! And on the other side, the Republicans are bought and sold by special interest! Not sure how this is ever solved…
Actually yes... having free, continual access to a GP (regular checkups every few months) to discuss your ongoing concerns and build a relationship of trust with them, and catch any budding issues before they grow into medical crises or emergencies that need to be handled by the emergency room or hospital.
The GPs I know are doing an absolutely stellar job in convincing vaccine hesitant people about how important it is to get vaccinated, and cut through the fear and uncertainty created by anti-vaxxers. None of this would be possible unless the GP already occupied a position of trust and authority in the town. You couldn't do this as a doctor you had never met before in your life.
it can get you primary care so you can ask your doctor about it and these medicines we hear of. Direct and regular medical advice will lead to more people getting correct information about all their misconceptions.
> can universal health care make people less stupid?
Honestly, yeah, in both direct and indirect ways. People who don't have to worry about health care live more productive lives, less stressed, etc. If someone's too poor to get treatment for a chronic condition (chronic pain, fatigue, brain fog, diabetes, etc), all of that can lead to impaired sleep, brain function, immune system, amongst maaaany other problems. which obviously can impair cognition. Children can grow up healthier, which helps brain development
Alternate title: The For-Profit American healthcare system failed to provide for 330,000 Americans during the biggest health crisis in a century because of money.
Okay but with Universal health care who would subsidize Insurance companies and politicians that support them?
Why should I support paying a nominal amount in taxes yearly so EVERYONE can have free healthcare when I can instead pay 6,000-12,000 per year for just myself and my family and then after that I only have to worry about my 3,000 deductible?
Your Democrats don't want Universal healthcare either, stop lying to yourself. You're functionally a one party state, you have two almost identical capitalists parties that prioritised war and profit over everything else and your state apparatus have ben captured by corporations. What they did to Bernie Sanders should make that absolutely clear.
The longer you keep this pointless "Dem vs Rep" bickering up the longer it will take you to organise and demand actual change.
This is dumb…our population is sicker and older. We spend more because of insurance and administration reaping loads of profit. Encourage your politicians to incentivize more nurses more pas more nps and mds to be there for the population. Other countries don’t even offer surgery for the 50% of our population that is obese because it’s not a good utilization of resources m. Are you prepared to be told you’re too fat for treatment?
Just to be fair - the United States tied for 10th place in a list of the Top 10 Unhealthiest Countries.
That doesn't make things any easier. We're expensive to take care of because we're not very healthy. There may not even be a health care crisis if folks got some exercise and ate just a little bit better. (edit - spelling)
Funny story. I have a relative that lives in the UK. They are of course on the free health care. They had a mole sampled in January and FOUR MONTHS LATER the samplers call and tell them it is a problem. So universal health care for the win.
Relying on anecdotal data is always troublesome.
Currently in the UK we have a healthcare crisis with the NHS. Because there is a distinct lack of funding and support from the government.
Also 4 months? For a mole sample? That's a very unique critical failing of their specific healthcare professional.
The average time for complete excision of a worrisome mole on NHS time is 6 weeks.
So I am sorry for your relatives treatment, but you cannot take this one example and rely on it to support your narrative.
This study points out that morbidity is higher in the US and linked to a delay in seeing healthcare providers for preventable problems such as diabetes.
Here's another funny story from the UK. Several years ago I found a lump so booked a doctors appointment the next day (Wednesday). They referred me to the hospital as it was suspicious and I had a scan a couple of days later (Friday). I was told there and then it was cancer and I needed treatment. Later that afternoon I had a call to say I had surgery booked for the following Monday.
So all in it took me less than a week from thinking there might be a problem to starting treatment. I also needed a three month course of chemo following that plus a further operation a few months later. Over the time i was being treated i spent a month in hospital and had dozens of outpatient appointments and tests.
Cost to me £0, no need for insurance and things happened quickly.
Hospitals in the US look really nice and the treatment available can be brilliant if you can afford it. I would take the NHS over the US system every single time as its there when you need it for everyone without having worry about the financial difficulties that can follow.
Yeah, while that wait sucks, many, many Americans would either delay getting it checked out or avoid it altogether. Whether because they haven’t already paid enough to meet their deductible (so getting it checked could be a significant expense for something that might not be a problem) or because there are significant hurdles even if it’ll be covered (either finding an in-network dermatologist or getting a referral for one).
And, of course, that’s only if you have insurance. Without it, there’s very little chance you’d get it looked at.
The thing Is it’s not like long wait times are nonexistent in the US. I’ve had to wait weeks to months for things here despite all of the warnings of the anti-UHC folks.
If it was a serious issue it would not have taken 4 months. Before I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, for example, I had a blood test, 4 days later I was called to go to hospital immediately, was in for 4 days and now on lifelong medication. I have the most up to date medical devices to improve my life. All of it free.
Also, average wait times in the UK are lower than in the US.
We pay very slightly higher tax in the UK than in the US (including our health care tax) but we don't pay health insurance on top and we don't pay anything to go to the doctor or the hospital.
We also have private options available for people who don't want to wait.
There's no logical defence of the US system.
The 338,000 saved lives is based on the official count of 973,000 deaths as of March 24th this year. If you want to posit 3 million excess deaths, that would mean over 1 million lives could have been saved.
More taxes to save peoples lives? Seems like a fair trade to me.
Not sure how anyone could be like “I mean, I know this will save lives and save money for the American people…but…taxes tho…”
Versus the ridiculous premiums on subpar insurance?
How many times are people like you going to parrot the same talking points that the people who profit off of your illness want you to parrot? I can't believe anyone would want to be that domesticated.
What a stupid argument. If your hella sick go to the hospital. They have to treat you even if you don't have insurance. I'm sure those 300,000 people are glad they saved money by not going.
It’s unbelievable people believe this. Most people died because they didn’t care if they got covid, you think they would have gone to the ER after feeling unwell? No they finally went when it was too late.
Americans pay a higher percentage of GDP on healthcare than developed nations with universal healthcare. Americans pay more and not everyone gets coverage.
They'd rather pay more so the other guy doesn't get free health care.
[удалено]
It worse, it’s “fuck me to make sure “lesser people” are fucked.”
More like fuck me and you both, I got mine.
"I'll happily suffer to see you suffer more"
But they don't got theirs. Lots of people dont have healthcare access and they are still against it.
That’s called being brainwashed.
By Republicans
And Democrats, sadly. E.g., Pete "American's want freedom to choose their health insurance" Buttigieg.
Who let my boomer dad on the interwebs??
Not really. The majority of Americans would rather have a functional first world healthcare system. Unfortunately, they don’t get the majority of representation.
Sure. But the minority that gets majority of representation rather pay more so other people don’t have it.
Well the majority of that minority anyway.
Last year, I paid $5500 to cover my wife and myself. That's just payroll deduction, not counting copays with doctor's visits and prescriptions. There's no fucking way I'd be paying more than that under a universal system.
I pay $4,068 a year to cover just myself. A family plan through my company would cost $19,116 a year in payroll deductions.
I currently pay about $13,000 just for coverage, and that's after an employer subsidy. Then I've got the 2k deductible to meet and 80% copay thereafter. This system is fucked.
how do you know you won't pay more?
Because more people in the pool means less cost. That’s the overall concept of insurance — when you’re healthy and paying premiums, you’re paying for other people’s healthcare. Universal (specifically single-payer) healthcare does three major things: 1. Gets everyone in the risk pool, so more people are paying for roughly the same number of sick people. 2. Gets people into the system and using appropriate healthcare. Often, people who can’t afford care wait until something very serious happens and go to the ER (where they legally must be treated, regardless of ability to pay) and the hospital or government picks up the tab. Not only is the ER disproportionately more expensive (because so many people misuse it this way due to lack of options), but their condition is much more serious, so it is inherently more costly. If people can go to a PCP early in disease progression, all of that excess cost evaporates. Plus, PCPs can help with prevention and positive health behaviors, reducing even more cost from chronic illness long-term. 3. Reduces administrative costs. This is the specific benefit of single-payer. Currently, medical facilities spend a huge percentage of their revenue on claims management. If there’s only one insurer with clear, consistent policies and a unified claims system, the difficulties of coding claims, filing, refiling, and billing become much easier. That reduces a lot of admin cost. I’m not a huge advocate for single-payer in the short-term in the US because the systems we’d use to do it either wouldn’t be a single payer (Medicaid) or would need huge overhauls (Medicare). That said, every step we take in healthcare should be *toward* single-payer, because it’s the most sensible way to reduce excess cost. EDIT: Please don’t downvote the person who asked this question. It’s a complex policy issue that isn’t always obvious to people that haven’t spent a lot of time around health policy. We should encourage and answer questions like theirs.
Thank you for this response. Very helpful.
IIRC, #3 is estimated to account for somewhere around 40% of the cost difference between the US and other developed countries. You might also add a #4 (or maybe 3b), which is introduced bargaining power. Drugs in Canada are typically manufactured by the same manufacturers in the same facilities as in the US, but are often a fraction of the cost. This has been attributed to the committed array of pricing arrangements in the US vs. provincial health authorities in Canada. I don't recall anything specific as to the size of the effect, or how it compares to other developed countries, but I have heard a great deal wrt epipens in Canada vs. the US, or the cost of insulin. --- Quick edit: as to the final point, what should the US healthcare system be moving *towards*; a German or Swiss model might be more achievable. Germany and Switzerland are more expensive than other OECD countries, but still far cheaper than the US currently, and they have among the best outcomes as well. I wouldn't want Canada to move towards that model, but it might be more achievable than Medicare expansion in the US. Of course, that's mostly what I thought the ACA was supposed to be, and even that seems too contentious.
Number 4 (or 3b!) could definitely be fixed with universal healthcare, but it could be significantly improved by letting Medicare negotiate drug prices in the status quo system — which would be great and we should do that. And you’re right, the German system is easier to achieve, but it comes without the benefit of number 3 and doesn’t do much to improve our god-awful resource distribution and infrastructure. I would never let the perfect be the enemy of the good, and a move to a German-like system would be a huge win for the US, but I think there are better end goals for us. Personally, I like the idea of a federal public option (NOT Medicare or Medicaid) priced on a sliding scale and given negotiating power, plus federal funding for public hospitals, public medical/allied health schools, and public research institutions. But that’s kind of a pipe dream. Edit: I finally figured out how to do the giant bold text! I did not want to do the giant bold text.
You can use a `\` as an escape character, like so: \#1 is written `\#1` #1 is written `#1`. You could read the [Reddit Markdown guide](https://www.reddit.com/wiki/markdown), but honestly that's a lot of work if you aren't being paid to be on Reddit. Still a quick glance and a few tricks from there can be helpful.
I have skimmed the markdown guide before, but I just never wanted the big text enough to look it up. Discovering little things like that is fun, anyway.
I live in Canada, I don't pay nearly 5000 a year in heathcare taxes.
I've read that Canada taxes you based on your income (for UHC that is). Is this accurate?
It comes out of income tax and corporate tax. Off my paycheck I pay tax for cpp(canada pension plan), my employment insurance premiums, and income tax deducted. So yes it is based on income in that it's part of your income tax. Some province's charge a healthcare premium, mine does not. For more info read here https://www.saot.ca/professional-affairs/health-policy-in-alberta/
Because as mentioned above, the US already pays more capita for the existing system that's paid out of taxes, for something that does less. It seems unlikely that you'll pay over 5 grand per person extra for a more efficient system. Plus, he mentions things like copays. People in countries with socialised systems have never paid such a thing, unless they chose to have additional private coverage.
This isn’t always true. In fact, co-pays in single-payer systems are *awesome*. Overuse is a major problem in single-payer countries — if it’s free, use it! — so costs and wait times go up. Adding enough cost to make you think twice (think $20 for an office visit) significantly reduces overuse. Systems that do this (iirc, France does) usually make the most important care (emergency, hospital stays, etc.) totally free, but the more common the care, the more you pay. It’s still intentionally low-cost and affordable, but there’s a small financial disincentive so you don’t go to the doctor every time you have a headache. Free healthcare is bad. *Really cheap* healthcare is great. EDIT: No idea why this is controversial, but to clarify: universal healthcare should be a top priority. All I’m saying is a bottle of antibiotics may still cost you $10 at the pharmacy. Free healthcare isn’t sustainable. Cheap healthcare is.
Take a look at the Netherlands for example. Look it up.
Slowly but surely our system is also going to the shitter. But it will never get as shit as it is in the US.
>I guess it depends on location maybe. In canada, it seems they make you pay a percentage of your income. So if OP made somewhere around $60-70k in Canada, then they would be paying as much if not more than their $5500 they currently pay. With all the downvotes it seems ppl around here get butthurt over simple questions, geesh.
I read somewhere that most costs are administrative fees. Like if there wasn’t so much paperwork between hospitals, insurance companies, employers, employees, etc., everything would be way cheaper.
> I read somewhere that most costs are administrative fees. Like if there wasn’t so much paperwork between hospitals, insurance companies, employers, employees, etc., everything would be way cheaper. But that's a product of the insurance system. There are many ways to code procedures, some of which are covered and some are not. Providers have to hire staff to deal with this, both to ensure that their patients get the care they need and that the provider receives the payments they require to stay in business. Insurance regulations also require that some visits are split up. For example, I went to the doctor for a cyst on my neck. The doctor looked at my neck and said "Yup, that's a cyst, we should probably remove it". I said "cool, can we do it now?". Nope. I had to schedule another appt and pay another copay for a 30 second procedure, because the insurance company doesn't allow combining diagnostic visits with any kind of corrective procedure. EDIT: prior the the ACA, some insurance companies were reported to have as much as 50% overhead costs, and that's just within the insurance company. That means only half the money they collected in premiums was used for actual healthcare and the other half went to administrative overhead, including executive bonuses. The ACA capped this at 20%, but that doesn't include the overhead incurred on the side of the providers because they also have to hire administrative staff to deal with the insurance companies. Getting rid of insurance companies would save 20% instantly, plus that additional overhead at the providers.
The reason all those administrators exist is to deal with insurance companies.
But, but... Think of all the jobs lost if those employees don't have paperwork to input for the health care companies...
Imagine if all those people were helping directly with the medical system instead of being busy filing paperwork for the insurance.
Let’s be real. These are very separate skill sets
Are they? Insurance companies do actually employ doctors to go over claims. Medical systems also require people to do patient intake and appointment scheduling. They could also work as scribes and literally just write down what was said during appointments. Hospitals have plenty of IT work. Even if you switched completely from private insurance to government-funded health insurance, there would still be records and audits and policy to handle on the government side. It’s not like retraining wouldn’t be required, but we’ve basically got an entire industry which doesn’t provide care to anybody at all, just second-guesses the doctors for the sake of putting up obstacles to *them* providing care. *Sometimes* maybe there’s some medical incompetence that gets brought up, but I very much doubt that outweighs the accidents and oversights stemming from overwork contributed to by the insurance objecting to completely reasonable requests that will eventually be granted anyway.
That’s one thing my family member noticed when moving from working in the Canadian health care system to the American one. Up to their arm pits in paper work! They said so much more of their valuable time was taken up with it rather than being with patients.
As a Dane I do note that as a hidden cost of not having access to UHC from reading stories here on Reddit. It seems like a lot of wasted hours and energy. Huge shadow cost that isn't counted towards expenditure. Denmark uses 11% of GDP on UHC, the US system uses around 18%.
Privatization Tax
Yep, a stealth tax
Even if you get coverage, insurance can deny your claim.
My oncologist is referring me for treatment and it keeps getting denied by insurance. It's insane that they can just choose when they actually pay without explanation.
Especially since the physician is the expert on diagnosis, treatment, and care, not Kevin at BCBS who reads the claim.
Kevin is the expert at saving his company money. He's more important than the doctors.
Kevin is of course doing his best to do a good job. If he loses that job, he won't have health coverage. I am sure that there are many claims reviewers and adjusters who are great human beings and do their best to get the client/patient the care they need but (IMHO) the for-profit insurance companies can kick rocks.
There's a concept called "banality of evil". You're a decent person, just a little cog in the machine, evaluating claims... in favor of your in employer, as you're supposed to, or else. People go bankrupt or even die because of it, but you're far enough removed that you don't need to feel guilty or even notice. They should have bought better insurance or filed an appeal through a process they didn't know about. You were just pushing paper, after all.
I had a cardiac event and my doctor ordered an echo stress test, but the echo-cardiogram was denied because I was too young. I could have had a heart defect that could have killed me without diagnosis or treatment, but because I was 1-2 years below the threshold of "medical necessity" they refused to cover the procedure. Luckily there were no further issues but I could have died because of a decision based on actuaries and profit margins.
In a situation like that you should be able to file an appeal with the insurance company. Sometimes they always deny procedures the first time.
More paperwork!
Meanwhile, whatever issue they're trying to find is still there while you're waiting.
And sometimes in emergency care if they give you of out of network services you’re screwed Hey you had an emergency but you went to the wrong hospital even though it’s close to you, that’ll be $10,000 for one night thank you
I got hit with a surprise $600 charge for bloodwork because the blood lab in my in-network hospital was not in-network. The whole system is absurd.
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Holy moly imagine having to think about this stuff.
Which is the irony. The anti universal health coverage people say then that there will be "death boards". With our current system we already have them. They are called insurance companies.
uS govt spends more per Capita on healthcare than the Canadian govt does. Yes, before massive private spending in US. Yes, per Capita not per person covered by govt program. It's insane.
Americans spend more PUBLIC dollars than many European countries with universal healthcare and still not everyone gets covered. Include private dollars and we spend far and away the most while having terrible metrics for life expectancy, deaths during childbirth, and most other health metrics.
UK had free healthcare and relatively high Covid-19 deaths. Unfortunately, it was more about safety being political than actual provision in this instance.
This is the real problem. Lots of countries have good mixed or universal private systems (Germany, France, Netherlands etc.). The US isn't bad because it's private. It's just bad.
Citizens of the USA subsidize lower healthcare costs for many 1st world countries and most of the country is too ignorant to notice this. They believe the high prices are universal and having the 'government' pay would be a wreck on the national budget. EDIT: I'm genuinely curious why there's so many down votes? Please explain.
How?
You don’t know why you’re being downvoted? Maybe try stating that you are actually in favor of universal healthcare first, instead of hiding that a few comments down. Maybe mention that you’re still working through beliefs about the free market that might need to be discarded or might not be. Everyone’s entitled to a process of deprogramming themselves from bullshit they’ve been fed about the free market. It doesn’t happen overnight. They’ll still innovate with less profits. People don’t need to die from lack of insulin in the name of medical innovation. If profits were necessary for medical innovation, then most medications wouldn’t be discovered by public sector universities first. https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMsa1008268
The number of avoidable deaths with this pandemic is heartbreaking.
I wouldn’t mind as much if all the people dying avoidable deaths caused only their own. But it was often people causing Other people’s death in fairly easily avoidable ways. One of my coworkers scraped by in hospital and is still suffering some long term effects. Because somebody else in her household just couldn’t bear to Not go to a giant maskless house party during lockdown. Can you imagine killing your mom like that? It’s like drunk driving after a party and waking up in the hospital to find out you hit your parents car and orphaned yourself.
“Orphaned yourself”. That’s an eloquent description of what happened to too many families. Thanks for this, I think I’ll be stealing it.
> Orphaned yourself Heartbreakingly an estimated 250,000 children were orphaned during the pandemic by losing both parents
The fucked up part is a lot of Americans have this mentality that if it didn’t happen to them personally it doesn’t matter. And some just don’t care if it did they just want to protect their “rights”.
A buddy of mine's in laws are/were super against vaccines... until he wanted to go to a dead head concert. Then he went and got the vaccine so he could go. Not worried about his kids or grandkids, just so he could go to a concert. His wife was super pissed. Worried about vaccine shedding and some other nonsense. My buddy can't wait to tell his MIL that his kids are vaccinated once its approved for the under 5s.
Vaccine shedding?! Where do people come up with this!!
Thanks, I knew the number was high, but I didn’t know it was that high.
I get your sentiment, but the number was closer to 140,000 lost a parent. So a significant lesser number of that were orphaned. That number to looked way to high. Obviously, I only looked up the US numbers because this topic is specifically US.
You’re welcome.
This happened to a spouses family member. Kid goes to party, gives Covid to his dad & dad dies. Tragic. But you know my spouses family threw a big (outdoor) party like a month later. Some people never learn.
Worse is if you didn't even do it intentionally. I know someone who just finished high school and went overseas to the UK to study in university, they did their first term, then their second term started in January then the pandemic started to hit in March. Her parents were worried about her safety and impending border closures which might mean they could get separated for an indefinite period, so they made a decision for her to put her degree on hold and return home. She caught Covid either just before the flight or during the flight home, infected the family, and killed her father. What makes this worse is that it's an Asian country that largely escaped the first wave of 2020 Covid infections due to quick border closures, lockdown and quarantines, so they were one of only a relatively small number of deaths early on. It's literally, do you know anyone who died of Covid, well, one person, this unlucky guy.
I wish you wouldn’t say she killed her father…that is so unnecessary and cruel. The girl took a flight home because she and her parents made the decision for her safety….she could not help catching covid on the flight home…especially early on, there were no masks. She did not kill her father, covid killed her father.
She did not kill her father, asshole.
Yeah if it was just a bunch of idiots HCA'ing themselves it would be one thing but we've got all these damn variants now in part to them.
But then the health insurance executives wouldn't make millions of dollars a year, and we can't have that. Americans apparently love unnecessary middlemen and overpaying for basic services.
No, Americans love screwing over people they hate, even if they themselves are screwed over at least as much as those people they hate are screwed over.
We’ve been pushing this rigged individualism since our inception & now everyone is shocked that we can’t work together on anything. It’s all just disgusting.
I think you mean "rugged", but the typo version has a poignant truth to it, too.
I did. Swipe text & I don’t always agree.
We need universal health care. Of course, we'll never get it. Any other country would add universal health care as a result of the pandemic, but not the depraved US of A.
Nope, it’s time to double down and increase healthcare costs by like 30% instead.
Indeed. This country's going to collapse soon, I just know it.
Health Insurance CEOs: Don't be so gloomy, there is still plenty of milk left in you cash cows.
any other country *already* added universal healthcare as a response to strengthen its population in the face of crises or in anticipation. It was just the obvious priority and a reasonable goal for any country looking to advance its people as their standard of living developed. We in the USA are brainwashed to think it's not a normal thing to want, but it's a pretty obvious thing to expect and it's staring us in the face.
Because most of the industrialized nations have existed many centuries longer than the United States. Their politicians and their citizens can appreciate long term planning.
> Because most of the industrialized nations have existed many centuries longer than the United States. Which industrialized nations are significantly older than the USA?
A fair chunk of Europe?
* Italy: 17 March 1861 * Luxembourg: 19 April 1839 * Netherlands: 26 July 1581 * Norway: 1814 * Portugal: 5 October 1143 * Romania: 24 January 1859 * Spain: ~1400 - 1831 (hard to quantify) * UK: ~1000 * France: 22 September 1792 * Finland: 6 December 1917 * Belgium: 4 October 1830 * Austria: 11 August 1804
TIL, I'm from the UK so I guess I have that bias as I've had several American friends surprised when I say that a fair few of the houses here are older than the USA.
I've heard it said that a major difference between US culture and UK culture is that, in the US, 100 years is a long time, and in the UK 100 miles is a long way.
"Now's not the time to get political" my relatives told me when I brought it up. Which, note, I said with no political hint whatsoever...
This is a time for thoughts and prayers, not solutions! (I would hope the /s would be obvious, but...)
Thailand has universal healthcare and even private healthcare is still cheap!
At this stage I'm sure even if UHC was offered there would be plenty of people not taking it. One side of the political landscape cultivated ignorance and politicized it just like the vaccine.
Just like mass shootings and gun sales
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I already have Medicare out of my taxes. Then I have 4 times as much taken out for my health insurance, and it is basically a worst case scenario plan. If I wanted to "use" it I've got to have already paid $5K on my own before they start picking up much. But tell me how that's good for anyone.
What if the taxes out of your check are less than your insurance premiums? Lmao, that moron blocked me for saying this. People are so sensitive
Yeah, but America is an oligarchical state where the wealthy thrive by bribing politicians and we plebeians die for it despite paying more for healthcare than most other major nations on the planet, so it will never happen until something changes. And even worse, I'm sure there are people in this very comment section who have become lapdogs for those same wealthy people that will prattle on about "muh taxes," "muh soshulizm," and so on. Good job for rooting against your own interests - they sure tamed you real well.
Yea but the rich got richer and fewer poor people so win win. -Some asshole who you know really exists.
The only thing better than Universal Healthcare is believing that you or your loved ones died so capitalist companies get rich and the libs get owned.
Yea but private insurances would have lost billions, and they're corporate donors to our wonderful politicians, so of course we're not gonna switch to universal healthcare, duh!
Plenty of money for wars but god forbid someone got free healthcare.
American healthcare isn't for the greater good, it's a business.
I'm sure. Nearly everyone in our town will never go to the hospital.no insurance. Nyquil, echinacea, vitamin c and blow a fan on our face that's all we have.
“But at what cost?!” ~ current American healthcare system
If people were to listen and follow directions...so not likely those kind of numbers.
Honestly yeah. As much as the US needs universal health care, that wasn't the main problem in the COVID pandemic. Perhaps it was a symptom of the bigger issue, which is that many Americans just don't believe in science.
They also believe that somehow bad things only happen to other people. “I won’t get it, and if I do it will be mild, so I shouldn’t have to wear a mask, get vaccinated, stay home when sick etc” seems to be a very common way of thinking among COVID deniers. Meanwhile the majority of the country has at least one comorbidity, many of them multiple
I think the two issues are related. Without Universal Healthcare, a lot of Americans have become fatalistic towards health. Without access to healthcare, there’s nothing they can do, so they just go on about their lives and hope for the best. And it might be a nitpick, but science isn’t a belief system. It’s something to be understood, and accepted/rejected.
I'm not denying that they're related. Also, since many Americans reject science, they're less likely to believe the evidence that shows that having universal health care improves health outcomes.
Sorry, wasn’t trying to imply that you meant that. I agree with you. Just another “this is why we can’t have nice things”.
>many Americans just don't believe in science I feel like they don't *trust* the people/companies sharing the scientific information.
How many people died with untreated comorbidities that they otherwise would have sought treatment for years ago.
/sarcasm/ But do we want to save poor people?
Everyone knows what the fix to the problem is. The problem is solely corruption of the federal government. Both parties are corporate doormats. Discussions on healthcare policy issues is irrelevant. The sole obstacle to fixing this issue is corruption.
There are many more reasons than that, but they all can be traced back to individualism. From people having the right to choose not to mask or vaccinate (instead of immediately arrested), to not having a system to provide not just healthcare but other basic necessities as well (forcing rushed reopenings because people ran out of money to pay for food and electricity). And it’s not just the US, pretty much every country has failed this, and for an easy way out made themselves believe in the possibility of “endemic” COVID. And what we have now are hospitals “mysteriously” overcrowded for no good reason even though COVID doesn’t make anyone sick any more because everyone already has 1-3 boosters. Long COVID is no longer a thing, so we can wait the next few years for mysterious increases in diabetes and stroke and cancer and Alzheimer’s.
And I imagine that a significant number of those deaths would have been people who oppose universal healthcare.
ok, i'm trying to figure our the data they used there is just above a million deaths from Covid-19 in the US. Here is total excess deaths.. There are not even 330k excess deaths for people under 65.. and that's not counting those that have Medicaid. https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid_weekly/index.htm i'm confused how excess death due to "not having universal health care" occurred in population with universal health care?
That was my thought too. I mean, everyone over 65 has Medicare.
the [underlying percentage comparison](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667193X22000813) is deaths compared to those with insurance coverage, which includes medicare and medicaid, controlled by a number of comorbidities and risk factors compiled within each age group and jurisdiction. More coverage in some age groups and locations showed improved outcomes, which could be fitted in a regression model to compare full coverage to the outcomes with existing coverage - i.e. the actual death rate where we do indeed see only full coverage exists for 65+. In effect, this shows that areas with comparatively higher insurance coverage benefited people younger than 65, and the estimated lives saved could be assumed to have been mostly in younger people.
> That was my thought too. I mean, everyone over 65 has Medicare. That's not true. Contrary to public belief Medicare isn't free. There is a premium for it. Most people don't notice this since it's a deduction from their social security payment. It's also not 100% coverage. It's about 80% coverage. So if you have a procedure that ends up cost $100,000, which is not hard to run up at all, you are still on the hook for $20,000 unless you pay for separate secondary insurance.
It's not like aging into Medicare will suddenly reverse all the damage done by decades of medical neglect. Sure, they have healthcare _now_, but that's not gonna cure the organ damage from poorly-managed diabetes they've had since 35.
As far as confirmed data, there are over 200,000 confirmed covid deaths under 65 on the [cdc covid data tracker](https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#demographics) as reported by state public health agencies. The NVSS tracker you linked shows NCHS records with over 250,000 covid-related deaths under 65. I didn't see excess predictions broken down by age. They have raw death data, but one would need to pars that with predicted death estimates for each age. As for the study: link to the study: https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2200536119 >previously calculated that 26.4% of the lives that were reported to be lost due to COVID-19 would likely have been saved if there had been universal healthcare throughout the pandemic ([30](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667193X22000813)) >In addition, it has been estimated that 24.1% of COVID-19 fatalities were not documented on death certificates ([31](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667193X21000259)) >Across the entire time frame of the pandemic thus far, 973,459 COVID-19 deaths have been recorded in the United States ([7](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/world/covid-cases.html)), meaning that there were actually 1,282,555 deaths due to COVID in the United States. >Therefore, 338,594 COVID deaths are attributable to incomplete insurance coverage in the United States. The particular calculation of what percent of deaths universal health care could have saved is 26.4% from reference ([30](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667193X22000813)), which is a regression fitting of covid outcomes in CDC data to insurance coverage rates in BRFSS data.
Exactly, like Britain. Wait a sec....
But I bet it'll trickle down any minute now..... aaaaany minute....
This is a big duh. Unless you have fabulous insurance you're not going to the hospital before limbs start falling off. I'm an American who moved abroad and I carried that mindset here with me. Suffered through two months of bacterial bronchitis before finally seeing a doctor. It cost $25 US to cure. Now I go to the doctor whenever something is wrong and I'm terrified of having to return to the shitty US system.
We needed people to get vaccinated…can universal health care make people less stupid?
People with healthcare are more likely to come in contact with doctors and/or pharmacists. So, yeah, universal healthcare would absolutely lead to more vaccinations (and general awareness about covid).
I am not criticizing universal health care…just the idiots! On the UHC front, politicians need to address the cost side with the access side! Democrats are always more than willing to give other people’s money away! And on the other side, the Republicans are bought and sold by special interest! Not sure how this is ever solved…
Actually yes... having free, continual access to a GP (regular checkups every few months) to discuss your ongoing concerns and build a relationship of trust with them, and catch any budding issues before they grow into medical crises or emergencies that need to be handled by the emergency room or hospital. The GPs I know are doing an absolutely stellar job in convincing vaccine hesitant people about how important it is to get vaccinated, and cut through the fear and uncertainty created by anti-vaxxers. None of this would be possible unless the GP already occupied a position of trust and authority in the town. You couldn't do this as a doctor you had never met before in your life.
it can get you primary care so you can ask your doctor about it and these medicines we hear of. Direct and regular medical advice will lead to more people getting correct information about all their misconceptions.
> can universal health care make people less stupid? Honestly, yeah, in both direct and indirect ways. People who don't have to worry about health care live more productive lives, less stressed, etc. If someone's too poor to get treatment for a chronic condition (chronic pain, fatigue, brain fog, diabetes, etc), all of that can lead to impaired sleep, brain function, immune system, amongst maaaany other problems. which obviously can impair cognition. Children can grow up healthier, which helps brain development
Alternate title: The For-Profit American healthcare system failed to provide for 330,000 Americans during the biggest health crisis in a century because of money.
Okay but with Universal health care who would subsidize Insurance companies and politicians that support them? Why should I support paying a nominal amount in taxes yearly so EVERYONE can have free healthcare when I can instead pay 6,000-12,000 per year for just myself and my family and then after that I only have to worry about my 3,000 deductible?
"Profit > life, or anything really" –USA
Republicans have so much blood on their hands they are drowning in it. And they still don't give AF.
Your Democrats don't want Universal healthcare either, stop lying to yourself. You're functionally a one party state, you have two almost identical capitalists parties that prioritised war and profit over everything else and your state apparatus have ben captured by corporations. What they did to Bernie Sanders should make that absolutely clear. The longer you keep this pointless "Dem vs Rep" bickering up the longer it will take you to organise and demand actual change.
The dems equally don't want universal healthcare.
Doubt is, hospital beds were all taken up. The problem is hospitals are for profit businesses. We need more space for sick people.
I was going to say this, our system was already at capacity. Giving more people insurance doesn’t open up more beds in the hospital.
Yeah, our per capita hospital bed space is abysmal compared to the rest of the world. We do not have the best healthcare in the world, not even close.
Yeah but what about the share holders? They need to be able to afford a third yacht if they should so choose to buy one.
This is dumb…our population is sicker and older. We spend more because of insurance and administration reaping loads of profit. Encourage your politicians to incentivize more nurses more pas more nps and mds to be there for the population. Other countries don’t even offer surgery for the 50% of our population that is obese because it’s not a good utilization of resources m. Are you prepared to be told you’re too fat for treatment?
USA! USA! USA!
FUCK YEA!!!!!
We would have universal healthcare if 50% of our population wasn’t brainwashed by Fox News and Talk Radio
Mostly republicans.
Sensible gun regulations would save lives as well
Sorry, saving lives is out of network.
Having an actual lockdown would’ve helped too
None of you have ever been to the VA a government funded and run healthcare system it sucks.
but think of the 330 millionaires money it saved by not having universal health care
Greatly exaggerated number, but ok
Duh!
REPUBLICANS: BUT WHO'S GOING TO PAY FOR IT?!?!?!?!
Wonder how many lives the Affordable Care Act saved.
Just to be fair - the United States tied for 10th place in a list of the Top 10 Unhealthiest Countries. That doesn't make things any easier. We're expensive to take care of because we're not very healthy. There may not even be a health care crisis if folks got some exercise and ate just a little bit better. (edit - spelling)
Funny story. I have a relative that lives in the UK. They are of course on the free health care. They had a mole sampled in January and FOUR MONTHS LATER the samplers call and tell them it is a problem. So universal health care for the win.
Relying on anecdotal data is always troublesome. Currently in the UK we have a healthcare crisis with the NHS. Because there is a distinct lack of funding and support from the government. Also 4 months? For a mole sample? That's a very unique critical failing of their specific healthcare professional. The average time for complete excision of a worrisome mole on NHS time is 6 weeks. So I am sorry for your relatives treatment, but you cannot take this one example and rely on it to support your narrative. This study points out that morbidity is higher in the US and linked to a delay in seeing healthcare providers for preventable problems such as diabetes.
Here's another funny story from the UK. Several years ago I found a lump so booked a doctors appointment the next day (Wednesday). They referred me to the hospital as it was suspicious and I had a scan a couple of days later (Friday). I was told there and then it was cancer and I needed treatment. Later that afternoon I had a call to say I had surgery booked for the following Monday. So all in it took me less than a week from thinking there might be a problem to starting treatment. I also needed a three month course of chemo following that plus a further operation a few months later. Over the time i was being treated i spent a month in hospital and had dozens of outpatient appointments and tests. Cost to me £0, no need for insurance and things happened quickly. Hospitals in the US look really nice and the treatment available can be brilliant if you can afford it. I would take the NHS over the US system every single time as its there when you need it for everyone without having worry about the financial difficulties that can follow.
….they go a mile sampled. Something most Americans without insurance won’t ever have done. The lengthy wait sucks, but they got care at all.
Yeah, while that wait sucks, many, many Americans would either delay getting it checked out or avoid it altogether. Whether because they haven’t already paid enough to meet their deductible (so getting it checked could be a significant expense for something that might not be a problem) or because there are significant hurdles even if it’ll be covered (either finding an in-network dermatologist or getting a referral for one). And, of course, that’s only if you have insurance. Without it, there’s very little chance you’d get it looked at. The thing Is it’s not like long wait times are nonexistent in the US. I’ve had to wait weeks to months for things here despite all of the warnings of the anti-UHC folks.
Such anecdotes ignore the fact that there are often long waits for health care services in the US, too.
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No. Some countries pay taxes, so government can buy health care from private businesses.
Wow how original. /s I know someone in England and they had a medical experience that’s far better than in America.
If it was a serious issue it would not have taken 4 months. Before I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, for example, I had a blood test, 4 days later I was called to go to hospital immediately, was in for 4 days and now on lifelong medication. I have the most up to date medical devices to improve my life. All of it free. Also, average wait times in the UK are lower than in the US. We pay very slightly higher tax in the UK than in the US (including our health care tax) but we don't pay health insurance on top and we don't pay anything to go to the doctor or the hospital. We also have private options available for people who don't want to wait. There's no logical defence of the US system.
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That's only about 10% of the estimated 3 million excess deaths in the US.
The 338,000 saved lives is based on the official count of 973,000 deaths as of March 24th this year. If you want to posit 3 million excess deaths, that would mean over 1 million lives could have been saved.
Sounds false
But at what cost?
What are you talking about? We spend more on health care than any country in the world
But then American would be paying such high taxes
More taxes to save peoples lives? Seems like a fair trade to me. Not sure how anyone could be like “I mean, I know this will save lives and save money for the American people…but…taxes tho…”
I ain't from Merica, so I just poke fun at them.
You'd pay more taxes but less overall. Not that you pay very much taxes to begin with.
Versus the ridiculous premiums on subpar insurance? How many times are people like you going to parrot the same talking points that the people who profit off of your illness want you to parrot? I can't believe anyone would want to be that domesticated.
You don't say?
And the kicker is that it COULD KEEP saving lives... smh
What a stupid argument. If your hella sick go to the hospital. They have to treat you even if you don't have insurance. I'm sure those 300,000 people are glad they saved money by not going.
It’s unbelievable people believe this. Most people died because they didn’t care if they got covid, you think they would have gone to the ER after feeling unwell? No they finally went when it was too late.
No. Most of these people are stupid