Quote:
Originally Posted by amorak
Americans as a populace spend $7,290 per person out of their own pocket for health care every year, but only live 78 years on average
Canadians spend $3,895 per person in mostly extra tax dollars and live 81 years on average.
I don't understand the opposition to a Canadian-style system in America - A graph like this accurately shows you that:
1) Regardless of where the money is coming from, be it your own pocket or in the form of increased taxes, you are paying twice what a Canadian pays
2) We pay near half of what an American does, on average, for healthcare, and we live 3 years longer. The macro-level test of a healthcare system is average life expectancy.
If I was American, be it Republican, Democract, or Hillbilly, I would want a social medicine program - It makes fiscal sense and it makes moral sense.
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The difference is "you" dont get better care but that on average everyone gets slightly better care.
In Canada you go in to a centralized clinic location, wait a few hours to see the doctor that is working today say you have a tweaked back they tell you nothing they can do and just to get some rest. At most he prescribes some Tylenol 4 which you have to go to a different location to find a pharmacy and pay for it. And that is after waiting X hours to see the doctor.
In the US, you go to a clinic which is much closer to where you are, pay $135US and a doctor gives to a cortizone and morphine shot and you are out of the doctors office within 45 minutes total. 35 of those minutes are you grilling the doctor of the safety of the cortizone and morphine shot because your doctor in Canada never once suggested that after 10+ times of going to one yet in the US where you are on vacation that is the first thing he suggests.
And what do you know, for free you get the type of service you would expect with the price tag of free. And with $135 you get something completly different that actually solves your immediate problem and you wonder what everyone on American TV bitches about.