[Stossel] Sick in America

I posted this a couple weeks ago without trying to rile people up.

I know andymoon agreed with it, for the most part. It explains quite well why we can't just give it away.

 

If he were stating that Obama was not born in the USA, then yes.

However, while Stossel has spouted some idiotic things in the past, there is no record of him, to my knowledge, espousing idiotic stuff regarding Obama's birth.

 

I didn't watch this entire series, as I do not have the time right now, but I do know that in one of Stossel's books, he posits that the open medical industry in the US has created more cutting edge medicine and drugs due to profit taking.

I think he even gives examples of how many new procedures/drugs that the US generates compared to countries with a govermnent medical program. Something like almost all new medical drug advances, including cancer treatments and vaccines (not just talking about Viagra), come from the US, and countries like Australia that have universal health care and price ceilings on drugs produce almost nothing.

Its an interesting theory, and I know that many European countries advance medical care, but I wonder at the veracity of his theory.

 

I'm not sure it's just a theory - I think it's pretty well accepted by most people. But the problem is that, in effect, the US consumer is subsidizing the rest of the world's health care. That's a big part of the benefit of importing prescription drugs - it forces the companies to spread the cost of development to the entire world.

It system has worked as long as the consumer could afford the insurance. But we're increasingly moving to the point where the consumer can't afford the medicine anymore - so what's the point of medical advances if people can't use them?

 

People: I know it is 40 minutes long, but:

Watch. THEN post.

Quit with the "I think it's about..." nonsense.

 

I watched it and agree that Sicko probably has plenty of distortions of the truth, but it doesn't change the fact that the healthcare industry desperately needs reform.

 

Yeah this has been discussed before, it's a sham argument. 6 of the 10 largest pharmaceutical companies are located in Europe, home of the dreaded socialists - I guess the non-US ones like Glaxo, Roche, Bayer, etc just sell baking soda packaged as a wonder drug.

Holding australia out as an example is particulary disingenous - Australia doesn't produced cars either, but it's not because of fuel taxes.

 

Agreed. But people have to be responsible for a portion. We can't just give everything away. That creates a whole new problem.

I've said this before. We should all get catastrophic coverage from the Gov't. But I think there should be a fairly high deductible. And I'll let the Gov't figure out what that would be, but I don't think a $5,000 deductible is out of line. Maybe even 10k. If you would not want to have that exposure, you could pay for health insurance covering that amount.

If you are destitute and in need of coverage, you would have to prove it, but the indigent would have the same Ben Taub stuff up to that 10k. ie. for the small stuff.

 

It doesn't hurt that the NIH provides about a third of the medical research dollars in the US (and that doesn't include other government--federal, state, and local--funding sources).

 

The problem is we are subsidizing the rest of the world. I think it is time we stopped doing that.

 

If you're saying that health care reform will limit development and new technology, then that's a pretty good reason to oppose it.

The obviosu response to your question is that, over time, medical advances become cheaper.

 

Stossel ignores that government money funded most of the research that led to most the modern advancements in medicine.

 

Yep, living in the heart of biotech and innovative pharma, and knowing a lot of people in the biz, I can say with confidence the money goes like this:

* NIH (e.g. one science wing of evil socialist gov'ment) funds breakthrough at university.
* professor creates start-up or joins existing pharma as paid advisor
* VC money comes in to bring drug to market, demanding maximal
profit
* expensive drug gets to market, makes as much $ as possible before patent expires and market share lost to generics.

You should see the B-plan competitions at any entrepreneurship program these days: always some science person, usually a pharmacology type or computer type, taking the prize. And it's always gov'ment grant money that got them to the point of having something marketable.

One of the things the stimulus plan got right was putting more money into NSF and NIH (at least temporarily), but at the same time, they put nothing into undergrad. higher ed... so we'll have to keep importing students from abroad to run the research programs.

 

What is the value in new technology that nobody can afford, or worse, new technology that is undertaken at the expense of more beneficial things?

If I can save 100,000 people with $100,000 worth of plain-old fashioned antibiotics - but yet, had to forego spending $100,000 worth of research in developing a new treatment for a rare genetic disorder that affects 1,000 of those people - please tell me from what standpoint (ethical/medical/moral/economic) the latter is a better use of money than the former?

Further, the belief that pharmaceutical research is going to grind to a halt under a government run health care plan is absolutely ludicrous. A business that becomes less profitable doesn't just disappear.

 

No - it spreads the cost around the world. If a pill costs $5 in Europe and $50 here, and we can now import it for $5, the company will have to raise prices to be more standardized worldwide, to say $15 in the US and Europe. If Europe doesn't accept that, they just won't get the meds.

Except it's not true. Health care costs have shown no signs at all of slowing down - in fact, they are accelerating. If you can't afford insurance, it doesn't matter what kind of sophisticated treatments are available.

 

LOL @ Michael Moore!

 

and I leave you with this....


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have a great weekend freaks

 

^^
All made in Australia.