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clintjm (Offline)
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Join Date: Aug 2009
03-23-2010, 06:59 PM

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nyororin View Post
I prefer to stay out of any of these debates when the subject is something I can`t really say I am a part of (have lived outside the US so long that I can`t say I know what is really going on there...) but I have to comment on this one.

We have two close family friends with cancer. One caught early, and one a couple steps from palliative care.

Japan has never been a 100% coverage system. It has always been percentage based. The base prices for care are relatively low (particularly medication) but even if your care is mostly covered and you only pay so many percent... This adds up. Cancer is long term. Care IS covered, but multiple medications and paying a percentage of countless expensive treatments adds up. This is where additional services come in.


It`s not a matter of "not being covered". It`s a matter of covering those last percent and offering specialty services. Aflac is big when it comes to life insurance and life support service (additional medical unemployment payments, etc) - both things that aren`t and should not be covered by health insurance. They also offer things like house keeping and childcare services as part of their insurance plans.

Rather than medical insurance, it tends to be comfort insurance. If you`re diagnosed with cancer, you get a huge flat payment. If you have an operation, you get a flat payment. If you are told you only have so many months left, they give you huge monthly payments until the end...
While you CAN use the money for medical care, you could also use it to go out and party. There is no connection between the payout and the cost of your care.

I don`t know anyone who is suffering with medical bills, etc, in Japan. My son has received care that would have cost millions out of pocket in the US... With very very little direct cost to us.
On the other hand, I don`t know anyone in my own family who has decent health insurance in the US.... And have a number of horror stories I could tell. "Having" insurance in the US seems to be quite a bit different than actually being able to "use" that insurance.
I also know of a number of people who had to seriously change their lifestyles to afford medical care for their children with similar issues as my own son - selling houses, getting a second job, etc.
Aflac:
It is similar to cancer policies like AARP in the US.
My point was that things such as reconstructive surgery as a result of cancer
are covered by most plans in the US, but not covered by the National Health Insurance plans of Japan. That is where the supplemental insurance such as AFLAC comes in. Like you say, sort of comfort insurance in case of such a medical disaster.

Like others here, you speak to the point that you don't know of anyone personally with medical bills in the entire country of Japan, as if it makes it a fact that anyone is in this situation. However you speak in your first paragraph of Cancer treatment bills adding up. And this is the heart of the issues in the US, people going bankrupt because of a "medical disaster" such as Cancer.


The argument continues to be in the US, 10-15% of Americans can't afford a gold plated plan so they just don't buy any at all. Some just gamble because they are young and will pay out of pocket for their annual checkup. If they can't afford even the smallest plan, there is Medicaid, but this never get mentioned. There are some instances where insurance companies drop a person who has been paying their premium but didn't disclose a previous condition or drops them for some reason. Make no mistake this dropping someone on a whim is something that was wrong and something that this Bill does fix.

Now we have the problem of people simply paying the fee not to have insurance, then when they get sick, get an expensive gold plated plan because they can't be denied for a previous condition, have the insurance pay the over priced cost of health care, and then drop the plan once they are well. This is fine, the patient gets the treatment, the cost of the health care is paid. The problem is the insurance company eventually goes under because they can't sustain this in the long run; which is exactly what the government wants in this case, to grow.

Health care costs are the issue. This bill doesn't address these issues. Instead it is using the situation to crush private industry and grow government and get more control.

You mention life style changes: If the family in question didn't have a policy to take care of such a disaster because they couldn't afford it, why would they have be mortgaging house(s) to begin with? If a person had a policy and it was canceled illegally, it could be fought in the courts, though that is also a timely and expensive process.

This is at the heart of the argument.
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