What do you see happening to your healthcare costs in the next few years

[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by detbuch

Quote:
Originally Posted by detbuch
I'm not proposing a system. I'm proposing that the federal government significantly get out of health care. I'm proposing that the individual states create whatever regulations are needed, and that those regulations protect a free market in health care. Can you point out an example of what you think I propose doesn't work?

Pete F reply "Apparently, no country is foolish enough to try it.

It's not about a country trying it. "Countries" doing it are government controlled market models. Free market models of all sorts and categories, not just medical care, have not only been tried, they work better and are usually the first model which is then followed by various government attempts at regulating costs and just about everything else--which usually results in overall costs going up.

As far as free market surgical procedures go, Lasik and cosmetic surgery prices not only are far less costly than the highly government controlled health care procedures, they have gone down due to competition. And there are some private surgical and medical clinics that do not take Medicare or Medicaid, and who advertise prices which are far below standard hospital prices: http://kfor.com/2013/07/08/okc-hospi...prices-online/

And, as far as "country" or government run health care goes, Singapore and
Switzerland are probably the two best and they are far closer to free market than the others. The more market oriented health care is, the better and less costly it is.

Actually Switzerland's healthcare looks a lot like Obamacare, except the insurance company can't make a profit on it.

Swiss are required to purchase basic health insurance, which covers a range of treatments detailed in the Swiss Federal Law on Health Insurance (German: Krankenversicherungsgesetz (KVG); French: la loi fédérale sur l’assurance-maladie (LAMal); Italian: legge federale sull’assicurazione malattie (LAMal)). It is therefore the same throughout the country and avoids double standards in healthcare. Insurers are required to offer this basic insurance to everyone, regardless of age or medical condition. They are not allowed to make a profit off this basic insurance, but can on supplemental plans.[3]

The insured person pays the insurance premium for the basic plan up to 8% of their personal income. If a premium is higher than this, the government gives the insured person a cash subsidy to pay for any additional premium.[3]

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

Actually Switzerland's healthcare looks a lot like Obamacare, except the insurance company can't make a profit on it.

A huge difference. If the insurance companies were not allowed to make a profit, they, including AARP, would not have supported it, and it would not have passed.

Swiss are required to purchase basic health insurance, which covers a range of treatments detailed in the Swiss Federal Law on Health Insurance (German: Krankenversicherungsgesetz (KVG); French: la loi fédérale sur l’assurance-maladie (LAMal); Italian: legge federale sull’assicurazione malattie (LAMal)). It is therefore the same throughout the country and avoids double standards in healthcare. Insurers are required to offer this basic insurance to everyone, regardless of age or medical condition. They are not allowed to make a profit off this basic insurance, but can on supplemental plans.[3]

The insured person pays the insurance premium for the basic plan up to 8% of their personal income. If a premium is higher than this, the government gives the insured person a cash subsidy to pay for any additional premium.[3]

As I said--"as far as "country" or government run health care goes, Singapore and Switzerland are probably the two best and they are far closer to free market than the others. The more market oriented health care is, the better and less costly it is.

They are both highly market based plans which include a few government mandates which benefit the poor. The Swiss plan could work here without the buying mandate and some other minor changes--we are vastly different than Switzerland and Singapore (demographically, politically, culturally, immigration-wise, size of population and land to govern, constitutionally, etc.). Here are two articles of interest:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapot.../#637d799e7d74

http://www.forbes.com/sites/theapoth.../#a2878252e878

I posted above the Oklahoma surgery clinic (there are others including general care clinics) as an example of free market health care where prices are far lower than standard hospital prices for the same procedures. I also mentioned that other surgeries that are not supported by insurance or government subsidy such as Lasik and cosmetic surgery whose prices are way lower than insurance/government mandated procedures are and in which prices have even gone down due to market competition.

[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by detbuch

As I said--"as far as "country" or government run health care goes, Singapore and Switzerland are probably the two best and they are far closer to free market than the others. The more market oriented health care is, the better and less costly it is.

They are both highly market based plans which include a few government mandates which benefit the poor. The Swiss plan could work here without the buying mandate and some other minor changes--we are vastly different than Switzerland and Singapore (demographically, politically, culturally, immigration-wise, size of population and land to govern, constitutionally, etc.). Here are two articles of interest:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapot.../#637d799e7d74

http://www.forbes.com/sites/theapoth.../#a2878252e878

I posted above the Oklahoma surgery clinic (there are others including general care clinics) as an example of free market health care where prices are far lower than standard hospital prices for the same procedures. I also mentioned that other surgeries that are not supported by insurance or government subsidy such as Lasik and cosmetic surgery whose prices are way lower than insurance/government mandated procedures are and in which prices have even gone down due to market competition.

Try it when you have a heart attack feel free to test the “free” market with your life and financial well-being on the line
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

[scottw]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

Try it when you have a heart attack feel free to test the “free” market with your life and financial well-being on the line
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

this is why we can't have a rational discussion ....

[Pete F.]

I just read a very interesting viewpoint on this subject.

Matt Jones, I live in VA United States. I've lived in Thailand.
Updated Sep 26, 2017
Because America has now become less than a country; it’s currently a rat race. The idea of paying more tax to have another fellow human being covered is so out of place they can’t imagine it without wincing. Saying that other folks should take their own risk and for the poor to go die in the street, however, does not make an American flinch as many commentators do here. All things considered, Americans don’t deserve any more humane system than what they currently have. Like Gore Vidal said: American never learned. This is the least-christian Christian country. They have chosen it to be like this.

Even a developing country like Thailand has a universal coverage for everyone. I lived in Thailand for a long time before moving to America, and I have seen their healthcare system transformed into the envy of the developing world— they became the first country in Asia to eliminate HIV transmission from mother to child in 2016, showing the world that AIDS can be defeated in a few generations from now. How did a low middle income country like Thailand achieve this? - considering also that they have had many military coups over the years. I have pondered this puzzle and in the end the answer is quite simple: Thailand is a buddhist society and the mentality of people there is quite passionate toward the poor and the weak. The universal healthcare was introduced there as a populist program in 2002. Naturally, it was the poor who benefited from it the most. The program was initially criticized by the rich and the middle classes. But after having seen how it had saved many poor lives, nobody dared to say in public that the health scheme needed to be repealed. I think their Buddhist culture plays a great role in shaping the public consensus regarding the UHC. For the Thais, medicine is a profession based more on sacrifice and compassion; it’s not a business. Instead, every successive government, whether conservative or liberal, came and improved upon it - making it more efficient and better. Public research funds were earmarked each year to keep improving the health scheme.

For America’s Republican politicians, on the other hand, being Americans is all about “taking risk”, forming tight upper lip and working hard for oneself. So if you were born poor and sickly, then it’s too bad. If you get old and sick without enough saving, then you just fail in an American way. If you have this sort of heartless politics or a cankerous system of belief, something like a UHC will never happen. But what are the root causes of American failure in this regard?

America believes almost blindly in the market and in the market solution of its healthcare inadequacy. Too many Americans believes that private investments and businesses can do everything better than a government. Ironically, this reduces the role of politicians to mere pawns for private lobbyists. Politicians don’t run America; they run a PR service for the richest companies. Expensive healthcare is only one of the symptoms of this madness. Economists are employed to cook up evidence and reports in order to show that government can’t do a project as well as private companies could. The only goal is to keep the government from actually participating and providing important public services to the people.

America’s faith in the market is so blind that it is the only country in the world that passed a law prohibiting the government to negotiate the price with drug companies and healthcare providers. Thus, even though the government is a huge spender of healthcare, it cannot use that bargaining power to negotiate the price for American citizens. So much for America’s faith in the market. They’d say: “we will wait until someone finds a way to make it cheaper and more efficient.” So people are dying in anticipation of a right “market model”? Tragically, the only market-based incentive that the insurance companies have is to dump more and more expensive claim-dodging paperwork traps on their customers.

But there is no such thing as a market solution to health care — unlike other goods and services, patients cannot refuse to buy healthcare (or pay to see a doctor) because it’s too expensive and wait until it becomes cheap enough, or even safe enough; and healthcare consumers include children and people with no income, with no buying option. Human being cannot be reduced to mere consumers. We will go on believing that we are the richest country and the most technologically advanced country on earth. But our kids will die uninsured in the street.

If you look everywhere in America, public services and infrastructures are crumbling. Metro and subways in DC, New York and other big metropolises are almost not running anymore; and these are public transportation in some of the world’s richest cities. It’s an international scandal. New research says the American political system disfavors public transportation improvement projects because “it is seen as welfare”. It’s the same logic that led to mass privatization during the Thatcher regime in the UK: people deserve improved infrastructures only if private companies can make profits from them, otherwise, it’s socialism.

If you apply the same logic to public school, you’d instantly understand why it has become so bad. To get a decent education, American kids are forced to take huge loans and go to ultra-expensive private schools. If you want to be schooled, you have to be in debt. The wealth of this richest of countries never reached the public hands.

“Everybody is laughing at us”, Trump would say. And it’s true. Who wouldn’t like to laugh at this circus called America.

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

I just read a very interesting viewpoint on this subject.

Matt Jones, I live in VA United States. I've lived in Thailand.
Updated Sep 26, 2017
Because America has now become less than a country; it’s currently a rat race. The idea of paying more tax to have another fellow human being covered is so out of place they can’t imagine it without wincing. Saying that other folks should take their own risk and for the poor to go die in the street, however, does not make an American flinch as many commentators do here. All things considered, Americans don’t deserve any more humane system than what they currently have. Like Gore Vidal said: American never learned. This is the least-christian Christian country. They have chosen it to be like this.

Even a developing country like Thailand has a universal coverage for everyone. I lived in Thailand for a long time before moving to America, and I have seen their healthcare system transformed into the envy of the developing world— they became the first country in Asia to eliminate HIV transmission from mother to child in 2016, showing the world that AIDS can be defeated in a few generations from now. How did a low middle income country like Thailand achieve this? - considering also that they have had many military coups over the years. I have pondered this puzzle and in the end the answer is quite simple: Thailand is a buddhist society and the mentality of people there is quite passionate toward the poor and the weak. The universal healthcare was introduced there as a populist program in 2002. Naturally, it was the poor who benefited from it the most. The program was initially criticized by the rich and the middle classes. But after having seen how it had saved many poor lives, nobody dared to say in public that the health scheme needed to be repealed. I think their Buddhist culture plays a great role in shaping the public consensus regarding the UHC. For the Thais, medicine is a profession based more on sacrifice and compassion; it’s not a business. Instead, every successive government, whether conservative or liberal, came and improved upon it - making it more efficient and better. Public research funds were earmarked each year to keep improving the health scheme.

For America’s Republican politicians, on the other hand, being Americans is all about “taking risk”, forming tight upper lip and working hard for oneself. So if you were born poor and sickly, then it’s too bad. If you get old and sick without enough saving, then you just fail in an American way. If you have this sort of heartless politics or a cankerous system of belief, something like a UHC will never happen. But what are the root causes of American failure in this regard?

America believes almost blindly in the market and in the market solution of its healthcare inadequacy. Too many Americans believes that private investments and businesses can do everything better than a government. Ironically, this reduces the role of politicians to mere pawns for private lobbyists. Politicians don’t run America; they run a PR service for the richest companies. Expensive healthcare is only one of the symptoms of this madness. Economists are employed to cook up evidence and reports in order to show that government can’t do a project as well as private companies could. The only goal is to keep the government from actually participating and providing important public services to the people.

America’s faith in the market is so blind that it is the only country in the world that passed a law prohibiting the government to negotiate the price with drug companies and healthcare providers. Thus, even though the government is a huge spender of healthcare, it cannot use that bargaining power to negotiate the price for American citizens. So much for America’s faith in the market. They’d say: “we will wait until someone finds a way to make it cheaper and more efficient.” So people are dying in anticipation of a right “market model”? Tragically, the only market-based incentive that the insurance companies have is to dump more and more expensive claim-dodging paperwork traps on their customers.

But there is no such thing as a market solution to health care — unlike other goods and services, patients cannot refuse to buy healthcare (or pay to see a doctor) because it’s too expensive and wait until it becomes cheap enough, or even safe enough; and healthcare consumers include children and people with no income, with no buying option. Human being cannot be reduced to mere consumers. We will go on believing that we are the richest country and the most technologically advanced country on earth. But our kids will die uninsured in the street.

If you look everywhere in America, public services and infrastructures are crumbling. Metro and subways in DC, New York and other big metropolises are almost not running anymore; and these are public transportation in some of the world’s richest cities. It’s an international scandal. New research says the American political system disfavors public transportation improvement projects because “it is seen as welfare”. It’s the same logic that led to mass privatization during the Thatcher regime in the UK: people deserve improved infrastructures only if private companies can make profits from them, otherwise, it’s socialism.

If you apply the same logic to public school, you’d instantly understand why it has become so bad. To get a decent education, American kids are forced to take huge loans and go to ultra-expensive private schools. If you want to be schooled, you have to be in debt. The wealth of this richest of countries never reached the public hands.

“Everybody is laughing at us”, Trump would say. And it’s true. Who wouldn’t like to laugh at this circus called America.

Matt Jones's mind is full of biased opinions and low in facts other than distorted notions posing as facts. And he doesn't seem to understand the role of government in supporting a free market rather than distorting it into a big government/business complex, which is what he actually criticizes as if that complex is a free market.

[Pete F.]

Hip replacement costs
• $6,757 in Spain
• $7,685 in South Africa
• $15,465 in New Zealand
• $16,335 in the United Kingdom
• $17,112 in Switzerland
• $19,484 in Australia
• $29,067 in the United States
As far as other providers in other countries, you can save more than enough to travel and stay for the recovery period in many places.
10 to 20K will put you up very nicely.
That won't help you if you have a heart attack here, will it?
That won't help people who need primary care and cannot afford to go.
When they end up in the emergency room for issues that could have been dealt with in the early stages by a primary care physician and the costs end up shifted because they cannot pay, who does that help?
In our current somewhat freemarket system (actually the closest to your dream among developed nations) healthcare certainly is not inexpensive, though it can be for a lucky person who never has insurance and never has a need to use it.

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

Hip replacement costs
• $6,757 in Spain
• $7,685 in South Africa
• $15,465 in New Zealand
• $16,335 in the United Kingdom
• $17,112 in Switzerland
• $19,484 in Australia
• $29,067 in the United States
As far as other providers in other countries, you can save more than enough to travel and stay for the recovery period in many places.
10 to 20K will put you up very nicely.
That won't help you if you have a heart attack here, will it?
That won't help people who need primary care and cannot afford to go.
When they end up in the emergency room for issues that could have been dealt with in the early stages by a primary care physician and the costs end up shifted because they cannot pay, who does that help?
In our current somewhat freemarket system (actually the closest to your dream among developed nations) healthcare certainly is not inexpensive, though it can be for a lucky person who never has insurance and never has a need to use it.

The Oklahoma clinic which is basically a free market model that I posted in this thread, in response to you, lists a hip replacement full out the door cost, including exams and hospital stay, at $15,499. That beats your Switzerland, UK, Australia costs, is comparable to New Zealand (but would be a lot more expensive there if you add the cost of getting and staying there--which also would raise the Switzerland, UK, and Australia costs more also) and would be competitive with your Spain and South Africa costs when you include travel to and staying in those countries as well. And it beats the hell out of US typical hospital costs that insurance and government would have to pay. The clinic accepts insurance. It has payment plans, and accepts credit cards.

[scottw]

Originally Posted by detbuch

The Oklahoma clinic which is basically a free market model that I posted in this thread, in response to you, lists a hip replacement full out the door cost, including exams and hospital stay, at $15,499. That beats your Switzerland, UK, Australia costs, is comparable to New Zealand (but would be a lot more expensive there if you add the cost of getting and staying there--which also would raise the Switzerland, UK, and Australia costs more also) and would be competitive with your Spain and South Africa costs when you include travel to and staying in those countries as well. And it beats the hell out of US typical hospital costs that insurance and government would have to pay. The clinic accepts insurance. It has payment plans, and accepts credit cards.

this can't be true...there is NO way that a free market hip is better....or cheaper...than a government hip....government does EVERYTHING better and cheaper and more efficiently

[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by detbuch

The Oklahoma clinic which is basically a free market model that I posted in this thread, in response to you, lists a hip replacement full out the door cost, including exams and hospital stay, at $15,499. That beats your Switzerland, UK, Australia costs, is comparable to New Zealand (but would be a lot more expensive there if you add the cost of getting and staying there--which also would raise the Switzerland, UK, and Australia costs more also) and would be competitive with your Spain and South Africa costs when you include travel to and staying in those countries as well. And it beats the hell out of US typical hospital costs that insurance and government would have to pay. The clinic accepts insurance. It has payment plans, and accepts credit cards.

IF this is a successful business model, why is it not repeated in other places?
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

IF this is a successful business model, why is it not repeated in other places?
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

I believe their are other clinics like this one which is completely owned by its doctors. There are also clinics modeled on this one that provide medical services other than surgery.

The main problem in expanding this model is government. Many states require proof that there is a need to establish a medical facility if an entrepreneur wants to do so. The boards that determine that are staffed by administrators of current hospitals (who pour in donations to political campaigns and are crony benefactors of government regulations) and who are not, understandably, friendly to competitors who provide services at fractions of fees that crony capital hospitals do.

Apparently, Oklahoma doesn't have that requirement. And it does have other clinics, as I mentioned, who provide other, general, medical services other than surgery. The surgery clinic gets patients from other states and Canada who have found out about it.

[Pete F.]

So it would seem based on this clinic, that your opinion is that horizontal and vertical integration is not a viable method of reducing costs and providing better service. Most businesses would disagree with that, sounds like health care is special.

[scottw]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

So it would seem based on this clinic, that your opinion is that horizontal and vertical integration is not a viable method of reducing costs and providing better service. Most businesses would disagree with that, sounds like health care is special.

now you sound like Spence....

[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by scottw

now you sound like Spence....

I'll just add that to the whole list of critical thinking you've exhibited in this thread.

[scottw]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

I'll just add that to the whole list of critical thinking you've exhibited in this thread.

cool...thanks for keeping track...that's a Spencism too! "critical thinking"

[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by scottw

cool...thanks for keeping track...that's a Spencism too! "critical thinking"

I think it came way before Spence and the internet. I think this paragraph is quite applicable.
The earliest documentation of critical thinking are the teachings of Socrates recorded by Plato. Socrates established the fact that one cannot depend upon those in "authority" to have sound knowledge and insight. He demonstrated that persons may have power and high position and yet be deeply confused and irrational. He established the importance of asking deep questions that probe profoundly into thinking before we accept ideas as worthy of belief.

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

So it would seem based on this clinic, that your opinion is that horizontal and vertical integration is not a viable method of reducing costs and providing better service. Most businesses would disagree with that,

On what basis do you assume that that is my opinion?

If you want larger, corporate business entities, horizontal and vertical integration strategies can reduce costs, but not necessarily better service. Nor is it a given that the savings in cost will be reflected in lower prices. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Co. was very successful using those strategies, so much so that it drove out competitors and delivered high quality product at low prices to the consumers. But Big Government thought that was unfair so preferred to crony-up with his failing competitors and bust up his monopoly. That crony capitalist move saved those that couldn't compete with Rockefeller, and drove up prices.

What we have in U.S. Health Care is a corporatist model using vertical and horizontal integration AS WELL AS a crony symbiotic relation with government. However, rather than passing on any savings those strategies garner it, the Health Care cartel actually uses the destruction of competition those models afford it to RAISE prices to the consumer. Especially when the consumer is represented by third party insurance or government payers. The corporatist model might actually work for it AND THE CONSUMER if the government would stay out of market competition and if that competition led to a giant health care corporation or two or three, and the government let them monopolize health care. Given what the government did to Standard Oil, it is doubtful that the government would let an unfettered, unregulated health care corporation monopoly to exist. Especially since government control is more of a goal than lower, competitive, free market prices.

And the cartel can use government regulatory power to eliminate free market competition, which leads to lots more money for all the willing participants . . . including the government bureaucracy--at the expense of the consumer.

A mostly unregulated corporate health care market along with, as well, mostly unregulated, free market, insurance companies (which would not be rescued from failure by government bailout) could lead to far lower prices, a la Standard Oil.

But I thought you didn't like corporatism. That you bemoaned the disappearance of small business and of the middle class. The Oklahoma City Surgery Clinic is a small business model that I thought you would like. It is not afraid of competition. It doesn't try to stifle it with horizontal and vertical integration in order to monopolize its product. In fact, its mission is that others will copy its model throughout the U.S. There are, BTW, other such clinics in other states including Virginia, New York, and California. Dismantling the ACA and having an actually free market insurance system would help to blossom free market clinics to compete with the American Hospital cartel.

sounds like health care is special.

Making it "special" makes it expensive. Marketing it like most everything else, including necessities such as food and shelter, would lead to affordable prices in the coming years.

[wdmso]

Just went on this site you see on TV GOOD RX my insurance is not covering a med my wife takes 40mg doxycline they want to change her to the generic called oracea its 1825.00 for 90 day supply with out insurance the non generic is guess what 1825.00 for a 90 day supply

in Canada the price for 100 pills of tetracycline is under $50. this is a 50-year-old antibiotic

2013 According to a U.S. House committee investigating price hikes in several generic drugs, the average wholesale price of 500 tablets in October 2013 was $20. Seven months later, the average wholesale price for the same amount was $1,849, an increase of more than 8,000 per cent.

just another example of big business fleecing of America

[Pete F.]

You can get them in Canada
1700+ is a good price for driving and staying over a night
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

[wdmso]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

You can get them in Canada
1700+ is a good price for driving and staying over a night
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

fortunately I belong to one of those public sector the unions who account for only 10% of the work force the the right loves to hate mostly because I have better benefits AKA Health insurance ...

I felt bad for those with out insurance before the ACA was passed and now since Trump isn't do a thing now and this is only one 50 year old drug.. But I honestly had no idea of the real costs I should say the price gouging and profit taking of the industry as a whole... is a crime

it Just re enforces my believe health care is a right not a choice ... its not a choice that The wealthiest 1 percent of American households own 40 percent of the country's wealth... But its not in the constitution thats the rights argument .... yep they will die with their guns because they cant pay to live longer to use them.... ironic

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by wdmso

fortunately I belong to one of those public sector the unions who account for only 10% of the work force the the right loves to hate mostly because I have better benefits AKA Health insurance ...

You are wrong about why the "right" thinks Public sector unions are a bad idea. Ironically, the "right" agrees with the "left's" biggest icon, FDR, on why it is a bad idea. This has been discussed a few times on this forum, but you seem to have a tin ear to anything that contradicts your Marxist orientation. Your narrow mind-in-the-Progressive bubble can only believe that the "right" loves to hate, rather than understand where it's coming from.

I felt bad for those with out insurance before the ACA was passed and now since Trump isn't do a thing now and this is only one 50 year old drug.. But I honestly had no idea of the real costs I should say the price gouging and profit taking of the industry as a whole... is a crime

That's what happens when the free market is strangled by crony regulation.

it Just re enforces my believe health care is a right not a choice

What does this mean? A right to what? Someone else's labor? We all have the right to our neighbor's labor? This could be an enlightening discussion--if you care to have it. I doubt that you do.

... its not a choice that The wealthiest 1 percent of American households own 40 percent of the country's wealth... But its not in the constitution thats the rights argument .... yep they will die with their guns because they cant pay to live longer to use them.... ironic

That is a messy stream of consciousness lacking in reasoned choice of words and thought. In other words, incoherent.

[JohnR]

Originally Posted by wdmso

Just went on this site you see on TV GOOD RX my insurance is not covering a med my wife takes 40mg doxycline they want to change her to the generic called oracea its 1825.00 for 90 day supply with out insurance the non generic is guess what 1825.00 for a 90 day supply

in Canada the price for 100 pills of tetracycline is under $50. this is a 50-year-old antibiotic

2013 According to a U.S. House committee investigating price hikes in several generic drugs, the average wholesale price of 500 tablets in October 2013 was $20. Seven months later, the average wholesale price for the same amount was $1,849, an increase of more than 8,000 per cent.

just another example of big business fleecing of America

So - let's apple to apples here.

You state Doxycline generic Oracea $1800 for 3 month supply yet you compare it to Tretracycline, a different drug, in 100 pills for $50.

Doxycline is kindasorta Oracea but not Tretracycline and a 90 day supply usually does not equate to 100 pills. This is a Word Salad.

What is the equivalent of Oracea, 90 Day Supply, in Canada? Still probably a lot cheaper in Canada. It is also a lot cheaper as a pet medication (not saying or insinuating anything mean - purely open discussion). So yes, Big Pharma is gouging here under the top cover of Congress.

This is normally where I would ask where this is Trump's Fault but he wasn't pres in 2013. Congress and both parties have been screwing this up for a while now.

[DZ]

IMO in today's society you should be able to purchase most non-controlled medications anywhere you choose. Of course it would be "caveat emptor".

[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by JohnR

What is the equivalent of Oracea, 90 Day Supply, in Canada? Still probably a lot cheaper in Canada. It is also a lot cheaper as a pet medication (not saying or insinuating anything mean - purely open discussion). So yes, Big Pharma is gouging here under the top cover of Congress.

This is normally where I would ask where this is Trump's Fault but he wasn't pres in 2013. Congress and both parties have been screwing this up for a while now.

Big Pharma's lobbyists rewrote the regs for congress
Eliminated the ability of drug companies to have sales reps wine and dine prescribers, Hint while this purportedly made it so the doctors didn't push certain drugs it actually saved the companies money.
They dumped the money saved into those stupid adds pushing drugs and raised prices since Congress made it so they could not negotiate pricing.

[Pete F.]

From The Grumpy Economist
https://johnhcochrane.blogspot.com/
Single payer sympathy?
A July 30 2018 Op-Ed in the Wall Street Journal, titled "The tax and spend health care solution"
Why is paying for health care such a mess in America? Why is it so hard to fix? Cross-subsidies are the original sin. The government wants to subsidize health care for poor people, chronically sick people, and people who have money but choose to spend less of it on health care than officials find sufficient. These are worthy goals, easily achieved in a completely free-market system by raising taxes and then subsidizing health care or insurance, at market prices, for people the government wishes to help.
But lawmakers do not want to be seen taxing and spending, so they hide transfers in cross-subsidies. They require emergency rooms to treat everyone who comes along, and then hospitals must overcharge everybody else. Medicare and Medicaid do not pay the full amount their services cost. Hospitals then overcharge private insurance and the few remaining cash customers.
Overcharging paying customers and providing free care in an emergency room is economically equivalent to a tax on emergency-room services that funds subsidies for others. But the effective tax and expenditure of a forced cross-subsidy do not show up on the federal budget.
Over the long term, cross-subsidies are far more inefficient than forthright taxing and spending. If the hospital is going to overcharge private insurance and paying customers to cross-subsidize the poor, the uninsured, Medicare, Medicaid and, increasingly, victims of limited exchange policies, then the hospital must be protected from competition. If competitors can come in and offer services to the paying customers, the scheme unravels.
No competition means no pressure to innovate for better service and lower costs. .....
...

As usual, I have to wait 30 days to post the whole thing. It synthesizes some of my earlier blog posts (here here here) on how cross subsidies are worse than straightforward, on budget, taxing and spending.

Let me here admit to one of the implications of this view. Single payer might not be so bad -- it might not be as bad as the current Medicare, Medicaid, Obamacare, VA, etc. mess.

But before you quote that, let's be careful to define what we mean by "single payer," which has become a mantra and litmus test on the left. There is a huge difference between "there is a single payer that everyone can use," and "there is a single payer that everyone must use."

Most on the left promise the former and mean the latter. Not only is there some sort of single easy to access health care and insurance scheme for poor or unfortunate people, but you and I are forbidden to escape it, to have private doctors, private hospitals, or private insurance outside the scheme. Doctors are forbidden to have private cash paying customers. That truly is a nightmare, and will mean the allocation of good medical care by connections and bribes.

But a single provider than anyone in trouble can use, supported by taxes, not cross-subsidized by restrictions on your and my health care -- not underpaying in a private system and forcing that system to overcharge others -- while allowing a vibrant completely competitive free market in private health care on top of that, is not such a terrible idea, and follows from my Op-Ed. A single bureaucracy that hands out vouchers, pays full market costs, or pays partially but allows doctors to charge whatever they want on top of that would work. A VA like system of public hospitals and clinics would work too. Like public schools, or public restrooms, you can use them, but you don't have to; you're free to spend your money on better options if you like, and people are free to start businesses to serve you. And no cross-subisides.

Whether we restrict provision with income and other tests, and thus introduce another marginal disincentive to work, or give everyone access and count on most working people to choose a better product, I leave for another day. It would always be an inefficient bureaucratic problem, but it might not be the nightmare of anti-competitive inefficiency of the current system.

[detbuch]

[spence]

Wow, that's some hard hitting investigative journalism. They should have consulted with Veritas, could have helped with production quality.

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by spence

Wow, that's some hard hitting investigative journalism. They should have consulted with Veritas, could have helped with production quality.

Wow, you're lack of actual substantive criticism supports, by default, Crowder's humorous "investigative journalism." Well done.

[Pete F.]

Trailer Park Boys go to the doctor
Apparently you’ve never been to an American emergency room on a weekend with a non critical health issue
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

Trailer Park Boys go to the doctor
Apparently you’ve never been to an American emergency room on a weekend with a non critical health issue
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

Yes, I have. Canada is supposed to be better. Apparently not. I never experienced any of the things these guys went through.