I grew up in the US healthcare system and have paid it multiple tens of thousands of dollars. I spent around a decade also working in Healthcare IT. I now live in a country with a much more sane system (Japan). Not perfect, but not the shitshow that is the greedy US system.
this post was submitted on 19 Feb 2024
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Everytime, I read a horror story about US healthcare, I am like can't be the norm, it should be a made up clickbait article based on an exception
Please US friends, tell me you have a decent coverage.
Moreover, everytime I read about before insurance prices it doesn't compute. How can an US doctor charge like 10 times the prices on our side of the pond ?
It is the norm. I worked with a man who had seizeres and no health insurance. The first time he was introduced to me he said "Hi, I'm Tony. Listen, I have seizures. If I have one, DO NOT call an ambulance, no matter what. I can't afford it." He told us even if it looked like he was dying, to just let him go because he could never afford the bills if he lived.
This wasn't some crappy part time job, this was my first big girl real job after graduating college. Like welcome to adulthood, you might have to helplessly watch your coworker die at your place of employment!
No, it's not clickbait, sorry :/ I just paid $800 for a mole removal ontop of my $150 monthly bill and premiums. Emergency care is scary expensive, and for the love of God don't use an ambulance.
How can an US doctor charge like 10 times the prices on our side of the pond ?
There's an unspoken assumption that when doctors quote a price, the insurance companies will widdle that down to a fraction of that amount when they pay out, so if a procedure actually costs $X.00, doctors will bill the insurance for $X * Y, so insurance actually ends up paying what it actually costs.
The side effect is that we pay co-pays or deductibles or non-100% coverage amounts based on what insurance was billed, not what the procedure actually cost. It's actually cheaper in some cases (especially with regards to medications) to not use insurance because then, we'll get billed what it actually cost, not the grossly inflated amount, and if our coverage is only, say, 50% for a given procedure, or if we have a co-pay on medication, we end up paying less. Meanwhile we're still paying the insurance companies for the coverage we're not taking advantage of. The whole system is fucked beyond belief. We know it, we just can't do anything about it.
"Vote for the politicians who want to fix it!" only works if they actually do want to fix it, and will follow through if elected.
I pay about $220 every two weeks for my HSA “High Deductible” Plan. Twisted my ankle pretty bad last November and after a visit to the urgent care, 3 visits to a podiatrist including 2 x-rays, and the.a boot and a support wrap that were purchased with the HSA, my funds in it are now depleted and put my $600 bill on a payment plan. My wife had some extra dental visits that resulted in a root canal that wiped most of it.
I have no idea how we’re gonna pay if we have something else come up.
I make 2x the median income in my area. But between the bills, $600(!) credit card payment, student loans from 10 years ago that just don’t want to go away, I feel I’d have to find some way to add another multiplier to my income. And that’s not including worrying about my 16yo car or my wife’s 10yo one. Was hoping my promotion last year would have gave me enough leeway to replace mine, but too much debt.
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Sadly I feel like it's always the same thing when hearing about america's problems: people will make a great fuss about it, lots of tweets, TV interviews and such, but nothing will came out of it. Repeat every x months. That's what I have observed about the gun handling situation, the 6 January insurrection, the opioid crisis, the rise in poverty, housing crisis, and the healthcare system. Seems like the whole world is staring at the US like WTF is happening, and america is just like "yeah, I'll be angry today and do something about it tomorrow" Anyway, just my 2 cents, send thoughts and prayers
I just feel bad for y'all. Most Americans I've met are at least nice people who probably deserve healthcare.
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@catch22
If we want to go on vacation, it is strongly recommended to check the insurance not only in the USA but also when traveling to Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand or Cyprus.
According to an article in a consumer magazine, it is strongly recommended to negotiate if you have to pay bills yourself. In most cases, the costs can be massively reduced. There are also said to be specialized companies that take over negotiations, some of which are also used by insurance companies.
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When i hear these stories i think im so grateful to not be born in such a horrible country. A country that can not look after its own isnt a country i want to be in
I think "That's the US health care system for you" or "Yep, that checks out".
It makes me think that the US is as weird and dumb as current state of most Europe.
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Honestly? The real feeling I get from this is being scared for the future. I do know that there are powerful forces seeing a business opportunity in that status quo that can be exported. And you can see the impetus towards eroding the safety nets here following marching orders from the far right, anarchocapitalist mothership all throughout the world. In some of the countries I've lived in there is already a push towards this model, just moderated by the existence of some sort of universal health care. Sure, even the bare minimum of public service care takes a TON of the edge off. Those ER bills are what some of my friends in those places paid for, say, having major surgery or good care while having a baby... but it's a slippery slope.
My wife needed her gall bladder out last year the most expensive part of the whole week-long ordeal was paying for parking at the hospital. She has private medical insurance through her work, but needing to deal with the paperwork and all that from the hospital wasn't worth the effort.
The fact that people have to choose between bankruptcy or dying of preventable illness is kinda like school shootings: the fact that you tolerate this at all - let alone having a major party campaign on "these things are actually good and you should be happy about them" - is pretty much proof that all of you are completely insane.
Two main benefits/"public goods" from having your lives in a societal arrangement:
- Having an educated population allows overall advancements that wouldn't be possible where education standards are low. If the protestant dogma of "work hard and you'll get salvation" was still prevalent in all groups we'd still be chiseling stones as that is real manly work. Intellectuality is still mostly frowned upon in the US. The whole purpose is to work less and enjoy living as the benefit of having basic needs solved for. Access to free education has plenty of positive externalities that we aren't even able to quantify. Would the US still be engrossed in its culture wars or other wars?
- Having a healthy population allows a sense of group and care for a country. Belonging to a country should mean that your fellow countrymen have your back in time of need. Father time comes for us all. How unpatriotic it is that people proudly wave their flags whilst letting their own fellow countrymen die from preventable causes or having to face choices such as living longer and getting bankrupt or let sickness fester until perishing. Not having free healthcare from an outside perspective is as unpatriotic as you could get.
The US seems a prime example of too much emphasis on GDP and limited focus on quality of life. I'd rather be homeless in Cuba than in the US albeit all wealth and quality of life indicators are better in the US.