BS: Sicko

Subject: BS: Sicko
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 29 Dec 07 - 09:07 PM

I just watched this documentary by Michael Moore. I found it very thought provoking. As a Canadian with universal health care it is fearful to me that arseholes in our government could even consider "For Profit" systems that are used by our neighbours to the south. Every one of these bastards should be compelled to watch this film!
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/sicko/

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Dec 07 - 09:12 PM

I haven't seen the film yet, but it except for the extreme influence of insurance dollars on all campaigns, I can't figure why politicians would even factor "insurance" (legalized gambling for investors) into universal health care. "Health care" and "health insurance" are diametrically opposed issues, as far as I can tell.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Leadfingers
Date: 29 Dec 07 - 10:03 PM

The Scary thing for me , as a Brit , is the idea that Socialised Medecine is in some way the thin end of the wedge that leads to a Totalitarian State . In Britain , for all its faults , the N H S does mean that IF you dont feel well , you CAN go to a doctor and get a diagnosis without a lot of Form Filling and hoop jumping , though for some conditions in some areas the treatment may not be immediate , and NOT Have to worry about horrendous bills !

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Dec 07 - 10:20 PM

Don't know how that "it" crept in there. That remark should have read:

but except for the extreme influence of insurance dollars on all campaigns, I can't figure why politicians would even factor "insurance" (legalized gambling for investors) into universal health care. "Health care" and "health insurance" are diametrically opposed issues, as far as I can tell.

I'll add that the idea that companies would charge millions of individuals billions of dollars a year, the companies gambling that people won't get sick, the individuals gambling that if they get sick the insurance will cover their treatment, is a damned barbaric way of taking care of people's health. Because we all know who wins in the end in that formula.

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Janie
Date: 29 Dec 07 - 11:06 PM

Exactly, Maggie.

I haven't seen Sicko either. Have read assorted reviews and have seen clips. I want to see it, but understand it is as much propaganda as documentary, geared toward eliciting an emotional response. I am a proponent of socialized medicine, and suppose I should applaud if it results in shifting public opinion toward that end.

Janie

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Barry Finn
Date: 29 Dec 07 - 11:37 PM

It's not any any way shape or form of gambling for those that need coverage. Like me when I need medical, & I'm covered by medicare & by my wife's BlueCross/Blueshield, I know right off that that I'll be hit with a bill that neither insurance wants to cover & they both make me swim across Nantucket Sound before they'll pay even a portion of it.

Barry, whose become a long distance swimmer for fear of drowning by health care, they can't even wait to kill me

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Janie
Date: 30 Dec 07 - 12:34 AM

Barry, I think Stilly is saying that the insurance industry is gambling for the sake of profit.

Can't always trust the accuracy of my memory, but I think Blue Cross/Blue Shield was the very first medical insurance company.   If my memory serves me well, BC/BS came into being, not to insure that people were able to get medical care, but to insure that medical providers got paid for the services they rendered. At one time, all Blue Cross/Blue Shield organizations were non-profit. I think, but do not know, that some of them are still non-profit companies. (Non-profit does not, by the way, signify that a company is not in the business of making money.)

The goals of insuring that people have medical care and that providers get reimbursed are certainly interrelated, but the difference in emphasis matters. Most medical insurance companies in the USA are now for-profit, and are therefore engaged in the business of insuring their stockholders make money. There is much talk of cost containment regarding medical care. But it is not about containing costs. Insurance companies do not pay providers at rates that cover the over-all cost of services. They do contain the price they pay through contractual arrangements. The difference between what they pay and what it costs to provide services translates into 1. profits for the companies and shareholders, and 2. The hidden costs of providing urgent medical care to those who can not pay and are uninsured.

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Dec 07 - 01:38 AM

Barry, my point is, why are there insurance companies at all? Why are billions of dollars in profits being paid to companies? That money isn't actually helping people, it's going down a black hole. It isn't going toward durable goods, hospitals, physicians, it's lost in the black of a company balance sheet and being paid out, lost to investors. Why isn't good medical care free to everyone? If the profit was taken out of it the costs would go way down. It might actually be affordable for the feds or states to cover it.

Think about it.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: folk1e
Date: 30 Dec 07 - 04:27 AM

No system is perfect!    But...
anybody who can justify a system whereby the total costs of providing medical care is met by a company(ies) who do it for proffit, will have a hard time explaining why it is :-

Cheaper for the recipient ....... they must pay the companies profit AND their medical costs (divided by the number in the system)!

Cheaper for the provider (hospital) ...... admin costs will occur to check they will get paid from the insurer or to extract payment from the recipient.

Cheaper for the insurer ..... hospitals will have an inbuilt tendancy to over medicate (to be safe) up to their full patient capacity.

Or am I missing the point here in NHS (for now) land?

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 30 Dec 07 - 07:20 AM

Yes, there is propaganda in the movie and sometimes it makes a point like the blunt end of a sledgehammer, but it is necessary to wake people up! An example is that he took 911 rescue workers who were denied health care by their insurance companies to Cuba. There they were welcomed and treated for free by Castro's "more caring" system.
The Bush administration tried to charge Moore in response for dealing with "The Great Demon Of The Caribbean." It appears that McCarthyism
is alive and well in the Bush administration.
There are lots of clips on YouTube including this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGStsbCRKk4

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Alice
Date: 30 Dec 07 - 03:14 PM

Didn't we already have a thread on Sicko?

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: TRUBRIT
Date: 30 Dec 07 - 08:54 PM

We did have a thread on Sicko -- but the topic is worth revisiting........the older I get, (which is happening with monotonous regularity....) the angrier I get about Health care - or lack thereof - in the US. The NHS is not perfect but , as Leadfingers pointed out -- if you are ill you can go to the doctor and not risk being bankrupt........now HOW can that not be a good thing.

I don't know about Sicko being propaganda, Janie -- from my experience of living in the UK and the US I thought it was darn accurate.

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Maryrrf
Date: 30 Dec 07 - 09:10 PM

I guess Sicko could be considered propaganda in the sense that it makes no effort to be objective, but I agree with Trubrit - it's pretty accurate. I'd be willing to bet that most of us in the United States know somebody who has 'fallen through the cracks', had to battle with their insurance company, got stuck with overwhelming bills because of a glitch with their referral or something of that nature, or that we know somebody who just plain can't afford to buy health insurance and is going without - always in fear that they will get sick and need treatment they can't pay for. So far, knock on wood, insurance has come through for me and my kids when we needed it, but I know plenty of people who have had serious issues and a couple who have nearly lost their houses. I also know people who have worked two jobs to pay off medical debts. And the whole issue of affordable insurance being tied to your employment is crazy - lose your job, lose your health insurance, get sick, and you're totally screwed. It's so easy to slip into a disaster. If all the other developed countries have a system that makes decent health care available to its citizens - why can't we???

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 30 Dec 07 - 09:28 PM

I admire greatly the intelligence of the American people in their technical ability (man on the moon etc.) but am confounded by the stupidity of their health care system. Sorry, "care" should not have been part of the previous sentence.
I have very close family ties to the USA and I know them to be a very caring people. I just can't understand the defense of the corporate sacred cow. Why would anyone wish to defend the health insurance corporate agenda? Why is socialism such a bogyman? As a Canadian I see political arseholes like Stephan Harper point to American health care delivery as an improvement to our own system. We have a think tank of right wing idiots called "The Fraser Institute" that regularly advocates changing to an American based system. If Michael Moore can not change the American system, at least I pray to God that he will help keep the corporate bastards out of ours!

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Janie
Date: 30 Dec 07 - 10:31 PM

Socialism is a very dirty word in the USA - so much so that few will call those elements that we do have of socialism by that name.   

I have worked for a number of years in public mental health (which is now being disastrously privatized).   Somewhere in the neighborhood of 80% of the adults we serve have no insurance, Medicaid or Medicare.   Daily I observe the effects of lack of medical care, and/or the catastrophic financial impact of huge medical bills.    I used to think language such as "decadent capitalism," was a bit over the top. I can bear witness to what has happened over the past 25 to 30 years as wealth and power have become ever more concentrated and more and more "average Joes" come to see themselves as disempowered and disenfranchised. They figure -"Why vote?" Even if the guy I vote for wins, he's not going to look after me, He is going to look after the Big Money interests.   Naw, I been burned too many times. Why bother." Sadly, that Average Joe is largely right. We have reached the sad state of affairs in terms of our National government where money is the only thing that talks. And the Big Guys are good at it. They do a great job of manipulating public opinion. Divide and Conquer strategies are working really well.

I wonder if it would be quite so if we had a parliamentary system.

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Alice
Date: 31 Dec 07 - 07:01 PM

politicians looking after the big insurance companies...
that is why I support John Edwards' campaign, to hopefully put the brakes on the power insurance companies have.

My son and I are among those who have "fallen through the cracks".

Alice

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: TRUBRIT
Date: 01 Jan 08 - 01:39 AM

So many of us (almosr) have -- John Edwards would get y vote (f I had one.....)

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: topical tom
Date: 01 Jan 08 - 12:14 PM

I have not yet seen the film but I fully intend to do so.A friend has highly recommended it and I have thoroughly enjoyed Michael Moore's other movies.Would that there were more such movie-makers out there.

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: GUEST,pattyClink
Date: 01 Jan 08 - 01:10 PM

The film is not so much propaganda as 'un-brainwashing'. In the USA we have all been raised thinking it is normal to pay the doctor for care, which made perfect sense back when that amounted to an occasional $10 or a chicken.   Over the years we have all gotten used to onerous insurance premiums, sky-high deductibles, gouge-priced drugs, and medical care getting more and more expensive, to the point it is killing some of us.   But still we think we need a 'free-market'. We don't really have a free market, we have a corporate-welfare state, but most of us still think we have 'the greatest medical system on earth'.   

So the film, in a very good-natured way, tries to undo the deepseated brainwashing, and to do that it explores the whole concept of how the rest of the world handles the care vs. money relationship. If you're already on board with socializing medicine, no need to see the picture. If you think 'socialized medicine' would be awful, and have never pondered the fact that public schools are not pay-to-play, then rent the dvd and learn some things.

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: TRUBRIT
Date: 01 Jan 08 - 02:31 PM

Guest PattyClink -- you are absolutely spot on. Unbrainwashing is a wonderful term for it.

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Maryrrf
Date: 01 Jan 08 - 07:24 PM

I may have mentioned this before, but I sometimes post (mostly lurk) on a "Frugal Living" forum. A lot of the people on the forum seem to be in VERY reduced circumstances - barely making it. Somebody posted that they were very congested and had been suffering from bronchitis, and they were afraid they were going into pneumonia. But they had no insurance and couldn't afford to go to the doctor, so did anybody have any home remedies? Several people posted suggestions ranging from chicken soup to inhaling steam, extra rest, lots of fluids, etc. I posted something along the lines of "It's a shame that in a country such as ours, which SHOULD have the resources to provide health care to its citizens, someone should not be able to go to the doctor and take care of a potentially serious medical condition, because there is no affordable way for the to do it."

The only reactions I got, from these people who for the most part couldn't afford to go to the doctor or buy medical insurance, was "we wouldn't want to live in a country that had socialized medicine!" and "The countries that have socialized medicine have very high taxes and the medical care is terrible, we wouldn't want that here". And the moderators chastized me for making political statements on the forum.

So I shut up then. Truly a large part of the American public is brainwashed!

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: Alice
Date: 01 Jan 08 - 07:43 PM

I agree, Mary. They are the ones who listen to Rush Limbaugh.

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: GUEST,pattyClink
Date: 02 Jan 08 - 10:57 AM

Graph which sums up the situation we find ourselves in:

The Cost of A Long Life

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: bobad
Date: 02 Jan 08 - 11:05 AM

it's interesting to see the contrast between the US and Cuba on that graph.

Subject: RE: BS: Sicko
From: TRUBRIT
Date: 02 Jan 08 - 10:00 PM

Yes it is interesting. But so very interesting are the reactions to maryrrf's comments on the frugal living website -- I just don't understand why people are so afraid of the concept of socialized medicine? OF COURSE THE TAXES ARE HIGHER IN COUNTRIES WITH SOCIALIZED MEDICINE ..... but you don't have to worry about writing that huge check for medical insurance every month. And the good news is, unlike with the huge check for medical insurance, under socialized medicine everything is covered until you get well or you die. Forgive me for stating the obvious but how can this not be a good thing?