guy at school's esophagus was torn away from his stomach

[sxr7171]

Originally posted by: Raj
thats scary,

I don't have insurance.

Seriously, get it. For a young person, it can be as little as $40 a month. Get a high deductible, to lower your costs. I mostly carry insurance for catastrophic coverage, if you get into an accident (god forbid) requiring $1 million of care then a $3000 deductible doesn't seem so bad.

 

[Eli]

Originally posted by: sxr7171

Originally posted by: Raj
thats scary,

I don't have insurance.

Seriously, get it. For a young person, it can be as little as $40 a month. Get a high deductible, to lower your costs. I mostly carry insurance for catastrophic coverage, if you get into an accident (god forbid) requiring $1 million of care then a $3000 deductible doesn't seem so bad.

Is it really that cheap? Does it depend on the state and its regulations, etc?

When I lost my job, the insurance company asked if I wanted to stay with it - at a cost of 125$ a month.

Like that was going to happen.. lol

 

[sxr7171]

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: sxr7171

Originally posted by: Raj
thats scary,

I don't have insurance.

Seriously, get it. For a young person, it can be as little as $40 a month. Get a high deductible, to lower your costs. I mostly carry insurance for catastrophic coverage, if you get into an accident (god forbid) requiring $1 million of care then a $3000 deductible doesn't seem so bad.

Is it really that cheap? Does it depend on the state and its regulations, etc?

When I lost my job, the insurance company asked if I wanted to stay with it - at a cost of 125$ a month.

Like that was going to happen.. lol

It depends on where you are. In places like NJ, CT and one more state where by law they cannot exclude pre-existing conditions your payment can be as high as $400 a month. In Ohio where I live I pay $40 a month for myself with a $2500 deductible and $2 million annual cap. When I got laid off in Ohio my Cobra payment would have been around $200 a month, but my company provided us with the absolute best healthcare plan I've seen. I don't think there was even a co-pay or deductible so $200 a month was probably very good for that kind of policy. I was employed within a month so I didn't need another policy. You have something like 90 days to backdate your policy (if I remember correctly - please check your Cobra documents or call your company's HR department). So if you get sick during those 90 days, you can call up and get signed on as long as you pay for those previous months. As a younger person, I think it is most important for us to focus on catastrophic coverage, since most of us do not make regular visits to the doctor, but we are at risk of getting into accidents.

I have to admit that depending on where you are and what type of policy you had that $125 a month might have been a good price. However, like I said earlier you might be able to find better pricing on a policy with a higher deductible in your state. One thing about Cobra, as I was told is that you cannot have the top of the line plan when you are employed and switch to a cheaper plan under Cobra when you are seperated. So you won't have the option to save money when you need it the most. It is hard, I'll won't deny that, but it is more essential than anything other than food, water and shelter IMHO.

I noticed that you are in Oregon. I checked at e-healthinsurance.com what the rate would be for someone who is 28 living in Portland. You can get insurance for as little as $47 dollars a month, the caveat being that your deductible will be $7500. I know this is a massive amount but when it's your life on the line you will be able to pay it eventually. In case you will be billed for the deductible after you have received your care, even if your situation becomes excrucitingly difficult the worst that will happen is that it will show up as $7500 that you defaulted on. At least you will have gotten the care that you need (up to $2 million).

I had a close friend recently develop testicular cancer (he's alright now) and I cannot imagine where he would be if he didn't have insurance. Even though his parents are well off and would (could) have paid his $90,000 hospital bill, having insurance really protected him. What if he needed a procedure that costs $500,000? Insurance would have covered it, but I don't know if his family could have covered it.

I think that seeing a doctor for little things like cuts and bruises is a luxury, but having coverage for catastrophic events is a necessity. For those of you who are students please check your policies. Many student policies cap out at a miserable $50,000 - $100,000. They usually provide free coverage for little office visits and the like, making the plan seem very good but most young people don't need regular office visits. We at the highest risk of being in a catastrophic event more than anything else, and most student policies will leave you hanging in such a situation. You can actually save money and get better coverage.


Also keep in mind that e-healthinsurance.com is just a reseller of insurance just like any local insurance agent. You will get the same (or sometimes better) rates by going to your local insurance agent and you will have a local "go to" person. Don't deny yourself medical care.

 

[ctcsoft]

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: PingSpike
Remember, the United States has the best health care system in the world and all others pale in comparison. Unless you're poor, then you're welcome to die on the street like everyone else in a third world country.

Sad, but true.

It cannot continue in this direction. Healthcare must be for those who are sick, not those who have money.

I sincerely hope this changes drastically in the decades to come.

Only if Kerry gets elected. Pres d!ckhead Bush could care less.

 

[dangereuxjeux]

Wow, Dissipate. First of all, this is not the "academic world," so that whole issue is thrown out the window. In the real world, when you make bonehead naive comments, you will get called on it. It is wholely appropriate in this case to analyze you, because given the utter fantasy that is your agument, one has to seriously question your point of view and life experience.

You basically said that poor people were allowed to have children, in the past, and in other countries, but not now, in the U.S. You are applying some strange sort of pseudo-economic logic to something which is entirely inappropriate. Secondly, there is a fatal flaw in your logic, because you are only basing your assumption on the accessibility of healthcare (it's available now, but not then), when it is not available to everyone, especially poor workers whose employers provide no insurance. Those people in the past took no greater risk than do those now unable to afford insurance, and yet, if they hadn't, none of us would be around today.

Yes, parents should be responsible and able to provide for their children. No, this does not include laying down sort of rule system like you have. More importantly, the healthcare system in this country possesses a great number of flaws (not saying that any other country has perfect healthcare, by any means) that are far more relevant than any sort of pompous decree you might make about who is fit to raise a family.

 

[Amused]

Originally posted by: jmoe782

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: PingSpike
Remember, the United States has the best health care system in the world and all others pale in comparison. Unless you're poor, then you're welcome to die on the street like everyone else in a third world country.

Sad, but true.

It cannot continue in this direction. Healthcare must be for those who are sick, not those who have money.

I sincerely hope this changes drastically in the decades to come.

Only if Kerry gets elected. Pres d!ckhead Bush could care less.

I think Ayn Rand adressed issues like these best when she said:

"If some men are entitled by right to the products of the work of others, it means that those others are deprived of rights and condemned to slave labor."

And,

"Poverty is not a mortgage on the labor of others - misfortune is not a mortgage on achievement - failure is not a mortgage on success - suffering is not a claim check, and its relief is not the goal of existence - man is not a sacrificial animal on anyone's altar nor for anyone's cause - life is not one huge hospital."

Heathcare cannot be a right or entitlement. You cannot entitle someone to the labor of another and keep individual freedom and liberties.

The basis of the US is individual liberty. Not individual security.

I can guarantee that none of the Founding Fathers ever intended healthcare to be a right of entitlement.

Something else to think about... Healthcare was much more affordable before Medicare and Medicaid.

Finally, to address the original post, no one is dying in the streets due to involuntary lack of healthcare.

 

[Zebo]

Yaya amused if you went to public school, use a public library or drive on the roads or a million other things you stole too. Can't escape redistribution or collectivism/


Good moring BTW.

Thats you want less of it I can appreciate, but this chick is off her rocker using words like slavery and thief which seems very inflamitory and naive. In a society, which has a government, redistribution or collectivism is manditory ...find one that does'nt. The whole purpose of a governemnt, is when pops get too big they are needed for law and order by civilzed masses. To give this law and order it costs money. How we get there is the differences between the parties, and fortunatly in these united states is decided democratically. But no matter what it's all redistribution and a collective effort. Pick your poison but you're not Robinson Crusoe.

 

[silverpig]

<-- Glad to live in Canada

 

[Zebo]

Originally posted by: silverpig
<-- Glad to live in Canada

What were you have to wait 3 months to see a doctor?

 

[OS]

Originally posted by: Zebo
Yaya amused if you went to public school, use a public library or drive on the roads or a million other things you stole too. Can't escape redistribution or collectivism/


Good moring BTW.

Thats you want less of it I can appreciate, but this chick is off her rocker using words like slavery and thief which seems very inflamitory and naive. In a society, which has a government, redistribution or collectivism is manditory ...find one that does'nt. The whole purpose of a governemnt, is when pops get too big they are needed for law and order by civilzed masses. To give this law and order it costs money. How we get there is the differences between the parties, and fortunatly in these united states is decided democratically. But no matter what it's all redistribution and a collective effort. Pick your poison but you're not Robinson Crusoe.

pwn3d. What next, we get bitching how the founding fathers didn't intend for income tax to exist?

 

[Amused]

Originally posted by: Zebo
Yaya amused if you went to public school, use a public library or drive on the roads or a million other things you stole too. Can't escape redistribution or collectivism/


Good moring BTW.

Thats you want less of it I can appreciate, but this chick is off her rocker using words like slavery and thief which seems very inflamitory and naive. In a society, which has a government, redistribution or collectivism is manditory ...find one that does'nt. The whole purpose of a governemnt, is when pops get too big they are needed for law and order by civilzed masses. To give this law and order it costs money. How we get there is the differences between the parties, and fortunatly in these united states is decided democratically. But no matter what it's all redistribution and a collective effort. Pick your poison but you're not Robinson Crusoe.

While I oppose public education, the roads are paid for by a use tax (gas taxes). And I've not used a library. I buy my books.

There are some uses for public works. Health care is not one of them.

And maybe you should read Ayn Rand before making ignorant judgements such a "Naive." She grew up in, and witnessed full collectivism first hand... the USSR. She did not oppose government. She was far from an anarchist. On the contrary, she knew that a strong government must exist to protect individual rights.

A couple more quotes:

"...a society without an organized government would be at the mercy of the first criminal who came along and who would precipitate it into the chaos of gang warfare."

"The end does not justify the means. No one's rights can be secured by the violation of the rights of others."

"When ?the common good? of a society is regarded as something apart from and superior to the individual good of its members, it means that the good of some men takes precedence over the good of others, with those others consigned to the status of sacrificial animals."

 

[Amused]

Originally posted by: OS

Originally posted by: Zebo
Yaya amused if you went to public school, use a public library or drive on the roads or a million other things you stole too. Can't escape redistribution or collectivism/


Good moring BTW.

Thats you want less of it I can appreciate, but this chick is off her rocker using words like slavery and thief which seems very inflamitory and naive. In a society, which has a government, redistribution or collectivism is manditory ...find one that does'nt. The whole purpose of a governemnt, is when pops get too big they are needed for law and order by civilzed masses. To give this law and order it costs money. How we get there is the differences between the parties, and fortunatly in these united states is decided democratically. But no matter what it's all redistribution and a collective effort. Pick your poison but you're not Robinson Crusoe.

pwn3d. What next, we get bitching how the founding fathers didn't intend for income tax to exist?

How am I owned? By him presenting other instances of socialist programs that I oppose?

Try again...

 

[mattg1981]

poor kid

 

[silverpig]

Originally posted by: Zebo

Originally posted by: silverpig
<-- Glad to live in Canada

What were you have to wait 3 months to see a doctor?

I've never had to wait... Hell, I can see a doctor without even making an appointment. The long waits are for the "there are only 3 guys in the country who know about this stuff" kind of specialists.

 

[LordMorpheus]

Originally posted by: buyer262000

Originally posted by: LordMorpheus

Originally posted by: Dacalo
Medicine has become a fvcking business, not service.

One of many reasons why I didn't persue medicine.

Would you take a job in which you perfrom lengthy and stressful operations on people for no money?

I don't get this doctor-bashing. The people we should get pissed at are the damn malpractice lawyers, and the malpractice insurance people. The insurance companies have to jack their rates sky high due to these jackhole lawyers, who contribute absolutely nothing to society, suing a doctor because an operation hurt.

The doctors and hospitals, in turn, have to crank their rates sky high to pay for insurance to protect from a devi - i mean, lawyer suing them out of existance. They CAN'T AFFORD to treat people and not ever see any money. It pisses me off when I see people whining about doctors being money grubbers when a malpractice attorney is driving a 7-series.

This kid should have been treated. But I don't blame the doctors. I blame the malpractice lawyers, the insurance companies, and the healthcare system, in that order.

You would not need lawyers if the doctors would admit their mistakes and compensate fairly for them to begin with.

Doctors ' for the most part ' are money grubbing. You'd be amazed at the difference in treatment you get if you are a 'cash' patient.

We need a national health care system, like *gasp* Canada, Brazil, or many other places. You ask if I were a doctor, would I want to do long and stressful operations for no compensation? Doctors by the thousands did just that in the early history of country. Frontier doctors patched people up and worked long hours and were happy to have the support of the community, what payment they could get, and anything in trade for their services. Also the doctors did not turn thier patients over to the collection agencies when they paid what they could every month to them.

You, sir, are full of crap.

If I read it right, your argument goes something like this: Doctors don't need to get paid, because back during the frontier days, they worked for free and were happy.

Do you have any idea what medschool costs. You realize doctors are so educated that they would (had they a degree in business, or *gasp* law, instead) all be making six figures (at least) if they wanted to. That they take a paycut to do medicine instead says a lot for them.

You also realize if a patient doesn't pay, in many cases the doctor doesn't get paid, right? If i went through medschool I would damn well expect to get paid! Its a job: you save their lives, and somebody gives you money! Now, throw malpractice lawyers in there. Now you operate on someone who doesn't pay you, and then, because it hurt, they sue you for basically all you are worth. Now you are pissed off. What about insurance: In order to keep these rabid lawyers from your troat, you hire someone to pay them for you. Too bad the cost of insurance makes it near impossible to break even without charging huge sums of cash for operations. Lets talk about the healthcare system, and about changing it. Maybe some tort reform. Maybe we will just drag every last malpractice lawyer out and shoot them. Then you realize that lawyers, for all praticle purpose, run this country and are here to stay, sucking contributing individuals like doctors and patients dry and giving absolutely nothing back.

Let me refine that. I know many good lawyers. I know no good malpractice lawyers.


Here is an absolutely heartwarming story for you. My uncle (handsurgeon. 14 years of school. Was making less than 60K/year until recently, when he decided enough was enough and got the hell out of chicago (really bad healthcare there. state insurance like medicade rarely pays up. Malpractice lawyers infest the city. It like a zombie movie: they surround hospitals!) told me this story. So in this little rural town in missouri, there lived two OBG/YN's. The only two for hundreds of miles. Also in this town there lived a b!tch of a malpractice lawyer, who liked to sue the doctors when women giving birth felt pain, or saw blood, and sh!t of this nature. Now, this b!tch of a lawyer gets knocked up. Ha! tables are turned! The doctors refuse the treat her, and she is forced to drive hundreds of miles for all her check ups and to finally deliver the poor, poor baby that will be brought up in her house.

Now doesn't that story just fill you with love? A warm feeling? I know it does that for me.

Anyone who is in school for at least 8 years or whatever it takes to become a doctor, and then does useful work (like saving lives) deserves a hefty paycheck. This isn't communism. Anyone who spends a long time in school so that they can exploit the legal system and find legal ways to rob contributing individuals of millions of dollers deserves an 18" shell in their face.

 

[Turin39789]

I think I must have been dead for the past two years, because I have not had health insurance and it is as necessary to my survival as food and water

 

[sxr7171]

For those who have less than half the requisite number of neurons that a normal human being has, it should be understood that health insurance is necessary for those who aspire to long term survival. I'm quite sure that those with anywhere close to a normal count of neurons, could figure that out considering the context of the statement.

In any case, people who make such brave statements as to suggest that they shouldn't care about providing themselves with healthcare pepper their stories with tears when the inevitible need for such healthcare arises. It is at this point that they need to beg for a handout when their life is at stake and it is at this point that they feel that society should place a value on their life which they themselves weren't bothered to do.

 

[Dissipate]

Originally posted by: Amused

Originally posted by: jmoe782

Originally posted by: Eli

Originally posted by: PingSpike
Remember, the United States has the best health care system in the world and all others pale in comparison. Unless you're poor, then you're welcome to die on the street like everyone else in a third world country.

Sad, but true.

It cannot continue in this direction. Healthcare must be for those who are sick, not those who have money.

I sincerely hope this changes drastically in the decades to come.

Only if Kerry gets elected. Pres d!ckhead Bush could care less.

I think Ayn Rand adressed issues like these best when she said:

"If some men are entitled by right to the products of the work of others, it means that those others are deprived of rights and condemned to slave labor."

And,

"Poverty is not a mortgage on the labor of others - misfortune is not a mortgage on achievement - failure is not a mortgage on success - suffering is not a claim check, and its relief is not the goal of existence - man is not a sacrificial animal on anyone's altar nor for anyone's cause - life is not one huge hospital."

Heathcare cannot be a right or entitlement. You cannot entitle someone to the labor of another and keep individual freedom and liberties.

The basis of the US is individual liberty. Not individual security.

I can guarantee that none of the Founding Fathers ever intended healthcare to be a right of entitlement.

Something else to think about... Healthcare was much more affordable before Medicare and Medicaid.

Finally, to address the original post, no one is dying in the streets due to involuntary lack of healthcare.

Amused, I agree with you wholehartedly but you fail to realize something. As long as people continue to use these as their common currency collectivism will flourish. Collectivism skyrocketed after the government got everyone to accept its money as common currency. So, arguing against collectivism is a pretty moot point in my opinion, especially if your wallet is stuffed with FRNs. For a more in depth discussion of this concept go here..

 

[iliopsoas]

Lots of bullsh*t in this thread.

This guy sounds like he has a case of Mallory-Weiss tear, as someone previously pointed out. A Mallory-Weiss tear results from repeated vomiting or retching. It is only a partial tear of the lining of the area where the esophagus connects to the stomach. It is not a complete tear so you don't have stomach contents spilling into the thoracic cavity. The main treatment is to reduce the vomiting or retching. In most instances, only supportive care is needed.

As for access to medical care, no one can be turned away from an ER. If you are ill and show up at the local ER, they will have to treat you. Also most county hospitals will have some type of financial assistance or will write off your medical bill altogether if you qualify.

 

[OS]

Originally posted by: LordMorpheus
You, sir, are full of crap.

If I read it right, your argument goes something like this: Doctors don't need to get paid, because back during the frontier days, they worked for free and were happy.

Do you have any idea what medschool costs. You realize doctors are so educated that they would (had they a degree in business, or *gasp* law, instead) all be making six figures (at least) if they wanted to. That they take a paycut to do medicine instead says a lot for them.

You also realize if a patient doesn't pay, in many cases the doctor doesn't get paid, right? If i went through medschool I would damn well expect to get paid! Its a job: you save their lives, and somebody gives you money! Now, throw malpractice lawyers in there. Now you operate on someone who doesn't pay you, and then, because it hurt, they sue you for basically all you are worth. Now you are pissed off. What about insurance: In order to keep these rabid lawyers from your troat, you hire someone to pay them for you. Too bad the cost of insurance makes it near impossible to break even without charging huge sums of cash for operations. Lets talk about the healthcare system, and about changing it. Maybe some tort reform. Maybe we will just drag every last malpractice lawyer out and shoot them. Then you realize that lawyers, for all praticle purpose, run this country and are here to stay, sucking contributing individuals like doctors and patients dry and giving absolutely nothing back.

Let me refine that. I know many good lawyers. I know no good malpractice lawyers.

Here is an absolutely heartwarming story for you. My uncle (handsurgeon. 14 years of school. Was making less than 60K/year until recently, when he decided enough was enough and got the hell out of chicago (really bad healthcare there. state insurance like medicade rarely pays up. Malpractice lawyers infest the city. It like a zombie movie: they surround hospitals!) told me this story. So in this little rural town in missouri, there lived two OBG/YN's. The only two for hundreds of miles. Also in this town there lived a b!tch of a malpractice lawyer, who liked to sue the doctors when women giving birth felt pain, or saw blood, and sh!t of this nature. Now, this b!tch of a lawyer gets knocked up. Ha! tables are turned! The doctors refuse the treat her, and she is forced to drive hundreds of miles for all her check ups and to finally deliver the poor, poor baby that will be brought up in her house.

Now doesn't that story just fill you with love? A warm feeling? I know it does that for me.

Anyone who is in school for at least 8 years or whatever it takes to become a doctor, and then does useful work (like saving lives) deserves a hefty paycheck. This isn't communism. Anyone who spends a long time in school so that they can exploit the legal system and find legal ways to rob contributing individuals of millions of dollers deserves an 18" shell in their face.

What a heart warming story.

I don't know if it's just me, but it seems like being a doctor for the money now is a bad idea. The pay doesn't seem as good any more.

 

[Zebo]

Food for thought:

Simple scenario. You're walking past a body of water -- swimming pool, boat dock, lake, doesn't really matter. What does matter is that the body of water exists next to land you neither own nor control.

There in the water, thrashing about, is someone in over their head who can't swim. In other words, they're drowning. Ready at hand is some suitably sturdy pole you can extend to them, or maybe it's one of those rings you see from time to time.

First question. Do you have a legal duty to rescue that person, assuming that you have the means, and that you will incur no substantial risk to yourself by doing so?

You don't need to scratch your head over that one. I will give you the answer. It's "no." You have no such duty. You can whistle right on past that joker, never spend a day in jail, and never pay a dollar in damages.

But that isn't the real question, is it? The real question is, what is a proper assessment of the character of our "indifferent pedestrian." That's what he is, you know. He is "indifferent to human suffering." What do we think about him. Is he . . .

1. The highest expression of noble humanity?

Or

2. A morally bankrupt piece of sh1t?

Let's add a fact. Suppose our drowning man is able to keep his head above water long enough to talk to our passer by. Does our assessment of the "indifferent pedestrian" improve, if the "indifferent pedestrian" says, "I'll save you for a dollar." Would that offer make him,

1. The same morally bankrupt piece of sh1t?

or

2. A chump, since he could probably get the drowning man to pay a lot more for this service?



I'm sure you see where this is going.

What is the moral difference between leaving a man to drown, and leaving him to starve?
What is the moral difference between leaving a man to drown, and leaving him to die prematurly from preventable health issues?
Should the poor/working poor who simply can't afford (can't swim) the premiums be told, "Sorry can't save you, you do have enough money, get you sick ass to work and earn it."
Are we morally bankrupt as a society because we are "indifferent pededtrians" to our weakest members?


Paraphased from here

 

[Murphy Durphy]

Originally posted by: Zebo
2. A chump, since he could probably get the drowning man to pay a lot more for this service?
Paraphased from here

LOL. Good way to start this morning.

 

[Amused]

Originally posted by: Zebo
Food for thought:

Simple scenario. You're walking past a body of water -- swimming pool, boat dock, lake, doesn't really matter. What does matter is that the body of water exists next to land you neither own nor control.

There in the water, thrashing about, is someone in over their head who can't swim. In other words, they're drowning. Ready at hand is some suitably sturdy pole you can extend to them, or maybe it's one of those rings you see from time to time.

First question. Do you have a legal duty to rescue that person, assuming that you have the means, and that you will incur no substantial risk to yourself by doing so?

You don't need to scratch your head over that one. I will give you the answer. It's "no." You have no such duty. You can whistle right on past that joker, never spend a day in jail, and never pay a dollar in damages.

But that isn't the real question, is it? The real question is, what is a proper assessment of the character of our "indifferent pedestrian." That's what he is, you know. He is "indifferent to human suffering." What do we think about him. Is he . . .

1. The highest expression of noble humanity?

Or

2. A morally bankrupt piece of sh1t?

Let's add a fact. Suppose our drowning man is able to keep his head above water long enough to talk to our passer by. Does our assessment of the "indifferent pedestrian" improve, if the "indifferent pedestrian" says, "I'll save you for a dollar." Would that offer make him,

1. The same morally bankrupt piece of sh1t?

or

2. A chump, since he could probably get the drowning man to pay a lot more for this service?



I'm sure you see where this is going.

What is the moral difference between leaving a man to drown, and leaving him to starve?
What is the moral difference between leaving a man to drown, and leaving him to die prematurly from preventable health issues?
Should the poor/working poor who simply can't afford (can't swim) the premiums be told, "Sorry can't save you, you do have enough money, get you sick ass to work and earn it."
Are we morally bankrupt as a society because we are "indifferent pededtrians" to our weakest members?


Paraphased from here

Socialism is not charity. Charity is not socialism.

Those who say they are the same are either ignorant, quite deluded, or intentionally dishonest.

In your case, I vote for a mix of ignorance and dishonesty (you seem sane to me). You want to promote socialism by appealing to empathy (ignorant) and guilt (dishonest).

My reply to the "you're a greedy, selfish bastard" argument for socialism would be, "want to match charitable donations in a given year?" I give 10-20% of my income to charities, and my business also gives generously.

Before Medicaid/Medicare, the poor had access to health care through various charities... and EVERYONE'S healthcare was cheaper... MUCH cheaper. Before LBJ's failed "Great Society" plan, no one was starving in the streets or dying of curable diseases because of a lack of health care.

 

[PingSpike]

Originally posted by: Zebo
Food for thought:

Simple scenario. You're walking past a body of water -- swimming pool, boat dock, lake, doesn't really matter. What does matter is that the body of water exists next to land you neither own nor control.

There in the water, thrashing about, is someone in over their head who can't swim. In other words, they're drowning. Ready at hand is some suitably sturdy pole you can extend to them, or maybe it's one of those rings you see from time to time.

First question. Do you have a legal duty to rescue that person, assuming that you have the means, and that you will incur no substantial risk to yourself by doing so?

You don't need to scratch your head over that one. I will give you the answer. It's "no." You have no such duty. You can whistle right on past that joker, never spend a day in jail, and never pay a dollar in damages.

But that isn't the real question, is it? The real question is, what is a proper assessment of the character of our "indifferent pedestrian." That's what he is, you know. He is "indifferent to human suffering." What do we think about him. Is he . . .

1. The highest expression of noble humanity?

Or

2. A morally bankrupt piece of sh1t?

Let's add a fact. Suppose our drowning man is able to keep his head above water long enough to talk to our passer by. Does our assessment of the "indifferent pedestrian" improve, if the "indifferent pedestrian" says, "I'll save you for a dollar." Would that offer make him,

1. The same morally bankrupt piece of sh1t?

or

2. A chump, since he could probably get the drowning man to pay a lot more for this service?



I'm sure you see where this is going.

What is the moral difference between leaving a man to drown, and leaving him to starve?
What is the moral difference between leaving a man to drown, and leaving him to die prematurly from preventable health issues?
Should the poor/working poor who simply can't afford (can't swim) the premiums be told, "Sorry can't save you, you do have enough money, get you sick ass to work and earn it."
Are we morally bankrupt as a society because we are "indifferent pededtrians" to our weakest members?


Paraphased from here

LOL, I assumed this was going to end with "The pedestrian saves the man with a pole, but bonks him on the head in the process by accident. The drowning man sues him for all he is worth for saving his life. Moral of the story: never help anyone."

 

[sxr7171]

Originally posted by: iliopsoas
Lots of bullsh*t in this thread.

This guy sounds like he has a case of Mallory-Weiss tear, as someone previously pointed out. A Mallory-Weiss tear results from repeated vomiting or retching. It is only a partial tear of the lining of the area where the esophagus connects to the stomach. It is not a complete tear so you don't have stomach contents spilling into the thoracic cavity. The main treatment is to reduce the vomiting or retching. In most instances, only supportive care is needed.

As for access to medical care, no one can be turned away from an ER. If you are ill and show up at the local ER, they will have to treat you. Also most county hospitals will have some type of financial assistance or will write off your medical bill altogether if you qualify.

Tell someone who is diagnosed with cancer that.