Quote:
Originally Posted by MMM
People that are struggling.
That's me, Clint.
Two years ago I paid less than half of what I pay today to give my family health insurance coverage. That's the price I pay for being self-employed. We have health issues, but they are considered "elective" by our insurance company because they are not life threatening. So what am I paying for? Please help me on that.
Literally and seriously, we are using a foreign country's government plan to deal with our medical issues.
What does that say about the state of American public health care?
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If you live in California, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, or Texas, pay visit to any major hospital's emergency room and take a look at the patients. Odds are that less than half of them speak English. And perhaps 3/4s of those patients will never pay a penny for their treatment. It will be written off as a loss by the hospital, and recouped from taxpayer money.
A US representative was rebuked some months ago when he yelled "You lie!" when Obama said his health care program would not pay for treatment for illegal aliens. It turns out that Obama did lie, though language was added to the bill which specifically said illegal aliens would not qualify, there is no provision for patients to provide proof of citizenship to qualify for treatments. Typical.
Ask your doctor how much his malpractice insurance is each year. You might be surprised to find that his premiums may be higher than his actual coverage. But of course, tort reform is not part of the current health care reform bill. A patient can sue for millions (and win) in malpractice cases, even if he were to earn less than $1,000,000 over his lifetime in his current profession. Who pays? The doctor? The hospital? The insurance company? Yes, they do, but the costs are then passed on to everyone else.
The cost for treating illegal aliens is staggering. In Florida, state costs are $165,000,000 per year, Georgia spends $210,000,000 per year, in California it's $1.45 billion, Virginia, $98,000,000 per year, Texas and New Mexico, $832,000,000, Minnesota, $35,000,000, etc. etc. The cost to the federal government is difficult to pin down. Is it any wonder why health care is so expensive?
If the people of America didn't have to pay for the medical treatment of 12,000,000 illegal aliens, perhaps enough money would be saved to pay for their own treatment.