kane

There are many more reasons why medical care in this country is so expensive and.

Here are a few (in no specific order):

1. medicine is drastically overpriced. Pharmaceutical companies have our leaders in their pockets and can charge whatever they want. If you are sick, you will pay the price and they know that.

2. Many people avoid preventive doctor visits. What I mean by this is simple. If someone has insurance and they are getting sick they go to the doctor. The doctor sees them, diagnosis them and gives them some antibiotics and away they go. In a few days all is fine and it cost around $200 or less for the whole thing (only a small portion of which is paid by the patient.) If they don't have insurance they wait, hope for the best and eventually end up in an emergency room where they get a full work up to make sure they don't have pneumonia or something like that. They miss a couple of days of work now and have about $1500+ tab. If they don't pay it, it gets passed on. This happens every day because millions either have no coverage or are under-covered and the cost ends up passed on to the hospitals and doctors out there so they have to charge more. This is why when you go to the hospital they charge you $30 for little plastic pitcher of water and $10 for a couple of aspirin. They overbill those with insurance to pay for those that don't have it.

3. We are a nation of unhealthy people. More and more of us are getting fat and getting diabetes and getting other illnesses like high blood pressure and things that go along with that. I'm not blaming any one person, I have struggled with weight my whole life and work hard to try to eat right. It is just a reality. The more out of shape and generally unhealthy we are the more it will cost down the road.

4. Doctors get sued so much they have to pay outrageous prices for insurance. This cost is passed along to the patients.

5. We are getting older. The baby boomers are starting to retire and I read the other day that one of the fastest growing businesses in the country elderly care. This will continue over the next 10 years. The older this generation gets the more they rely on heathcare and medicines to keep them going.

6. People don't die. The social security program was created under the idea that people will die. Back when it started life expectancy wasn't nearly what it is today. You might retire, get social security and within 5-7 years you were dead. Now people are living well into their mid and late 70's and draw social security for 15+ years. Many of them are of poor health and 30 years ago wouldn't have lived as long, but modern medicine helps them keep going. This is also expensive. When you add in that many baby boomers were one worker households it means that a guy got married and had a wife and kids and he worked and she stayed home. So he retires and even if he dies, she gets his social security so it continues to get paid out to someone that never paid into it. I'm not saying they should stop this practice, just pointing out that with longer life expectancy and paying for two people even though only one actually paid in it becomes a drag on the system.

My point in all of this is that you shouldn't just wave the socialist flag and say that is our problem. We have many different issues with the healthcare industry and you might even argue that one of them is that the market has been allowed to run wild and raise costs as they see fit and now we are all paying for it.