Loco, I know you're probably missing this, but in canada, at veryleast, if your doctor ordered a steroidal injection, you'd get it, andthe government would NOT have a say in how many you got.
I knowthis can be incredibly difficult to grasp but the NHS is just onesystem, and it's not like a canadian system, nor is it even what obama's proposing.
There's no denial of care in Canada based on age, income, gender, or what have you. Infact, I'd daresay the elderly often get priority care.
Just the same, there'sprobably more going on behind the scenes in the NHS thing on steroidal shots for joint issues. It may be like antibiotics, where overprescribing is an issue. Steroids are a delightful fast fix, but theymay mask an underlying cause of the joint issues in the first place andI don't think they were intended for long term repeated use. ( they're not used that way here). They have side effects. Instead of steriod shots for my recurrent tendonitis in my knees, I'm more likely to bereferred to physiotherapy ( at a clinic of my choosing!) or for nonsurgical/non invasive care first.
Some doctors are fond of the fast fix, and they may be over prescribing the shots, and so the NHS is right to look at this.
Youremain utterly convinced that health care in the US will be strictly rationed and controlled, but ignore that the insurers are essentially acting as gatekeepers purely for profit.
I don't know what the taxation is like in the US, but we in canada are NOT taxed out the ass,as you'd believe, but it does cover that all inclusive no questions asked care.
We have cheaper drugs not because your drug companies were forced into selling them to us cheap, but by negotiating wholesale bulk contracts. We all know what wholesale means, right?
I've never been denied a treatment even when I fell slightly outside thebounds of criteria for it. My doctor and I were the ONLY people to determine my care decisions, the government at no point has ever told me what I may or may not have.
And here's the delightful bit:I can never, ever, be cut off, not due to job loss or pre existing.That means we have few, if any medical bankruptcies, better prenatal care and that key standard, a lower infant mortality rate.
WHat does sicken me, and heavens I can't even grasp it, is the cry from the right that "everyone else but them will abuse it, and so and so group doesn't deserve it"
Red Cross, Doctors without Borders, and others, would beg to differ. Health careis a human right, a key factor in human dignity. It isnt something that should be profit driven. But this is OK! in the US to some becausethey'd rather say "well if everyone has health care, everyone else but me will abuse it and no one will work hard."
Which just makes methink there's a lot on the right who are more concerned with their own pocket than the greater good, and dare say, throwing in dashes ofracism ( the illegals!) and the poor bashing ( the welfare recipients!)
How the hell is anyone to be able to work to get off welfare if they've fallen under the bus of "pre existing/too poor for insurance/or simply been denied.?" I know too many people who are working two, three jobs, no health care, or nothing they can access because their insurer says "no."
As it is, Canada's economy may have taken a recent hit like everyone else's but we're in better shape for a faster recovery. We have a fairly low unemployment rate.
I speak assomeone who was once, gasp! on welfare. Call me a flipping bleedingheart but I've walked in the shoes of someone who on welfare, once youget THAT stink on you, it can be hard to get off welfare.
Buthad I to also tackle medical care costs on top of getting off welfare,I'd still be there because LO! i have a pre existing condition.
( mind you it certainly seems the insurers in the US now consider "being born" a pre existing.)
What I haven't heard from the right other than "oh no, what about MY pockets! what about MEEEEEEE" is how you'd actually fix the situationto cover the 15 % without insurance, the rising costs OF insurance, the recissions, the denials of claims that seem to be increasing, thepeople who have insurance that they cannot afford to use, and a charity medical care system that's designed to make you go begging at the worsttime of your life.
At least in canada, I am not reduced to begging for care.
Soforgive me, I think the republicans are not seeing the human toll alack of care in the US is causing, and frankly, only worried aboutthemselves, because I haven't heard otherwise, here or on other forums.
I've got US horror stories in a 100 to 1 ratio compared to canada or the NHS.
The human toll is gruesome and a mile long.
And while the canadian system occasionally errors, it's NOTHING like the trainwreck of misery I'm hearing in the US.
Or believe what you like, certain in the knowledge it can't ever happen to YOU. ( oh, but it can.)
One of the repubs replies: YOU'RE MEAN so I won't bother reading. ( meanwhile she salivates over the latest republican blowhard pundit like a squealy girl at a Jonas Brother's concert. It's all too much dancing on someone's grave for me. Heh. I'm A mean Librul!
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