To be really shocked by the Panorama show Poor America

[MrsHeffley]

I just can't believe that Americans don't care how their poor get literally no healthcare or help at all ie no job no food,home,benefits or healthcare what so ever.

I love America and we have American family but dp and I were appalled and totally shocked.

All those families living in drains and tent cities,schools sending kids home with food and worst of all zero healthcare and all those hundreds of desperate people queuing up in cars on the off chance of free medical care,the girl whose mum ate rats.....

The complete utter lack of hope.I just don't get how such a rich country can justify in all these years not voting in free healthcare for the poor at the very least.

www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/9081988/NHS-patients-will-pay-under-health-bill.html

tries again

ok that works.

"I think it's worth mentioning that half of all Americans are in favour of the Obama health care reforms. Many Americans are completely frustrated by the conservative point of view just like people on this thread."

Tribbles - this is absolutely true. I live in the US, and I have yet to meet someone who is opposed. How do you think Obamacare got passed in the first place? That said, I live in Massachusetts, which is possibly the most liberal state. Honestly, there are tons of Americans out there who are upset at the inequality - just look at the Occupy movement. The reason nothing happens is because there is an equal number of conservatives.

Sorry, but I just feel like I have to defend Americans who do have a sensible view about this - this includes all of my family and friends here.

www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2087784/Welfare-Reform-Bill-Where-national-conscience.html

And when THE DAILY MAIL prints an article pointing out some aspects of the welfare reform bill are unfair, then you can guarantee they are unfair.

The Massachusetts case is interesting because the Governor who forced that through was one Mitt Romney
who now he is running for the Republican Nomination is backtracking from his own actions left right and centre.

Cup the divisions within the US are something that people here do not really "get". In any county in the UK there will be a wide range of political views.
For lots of reasons, the US has become much more politically segregated - so that those on the northern coasts and those in the bible belt have no understanding of what makes each other tick

Medicaid paid for my sister's dialysis. She could not get a job as she was on dialysis three days a week.
Medicaid paid for her transplant.
It will not pay the $26,000 a year for her anti rejection drugs.
So she is sick and getting sicker and cannot get a job despite having a degree etc .

This thread is why I love Mumsnet.

Dh and I watched this as I said upthread and we had so many questions that weren't answered in the programme - all explored/ecplained/answered/discussed here.

As you were...

I'm from, and still in the US, and moving to the UK this summer with my British husband.

The top 1% own 99% of the wealth.

While I am lucky that I have great healthcare because of my job, most of this country doesn't.

I would absolutely elect to have a NHS, but it is true, most Americans are hesitant of a socialized system, they are set in their ways and are very much
"white Republican men" that believe capitalism will save all.

It won't. Just watch and see the US in 10 years from now. Unless you have a good sum of money, your education is abysmal (worse than OFSTED satisfactory) your healthcare is non existent, your food is all grown with GMO's, you are pumped with medications (which you have to pay for) to get better, your taxes are huge (for what you get), the roads and infrastructure are pathetic, and the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave is the most racist, elitist, segregated "modern" country around.

The middle class in dissolving in the US.

With all that said, I will miss it, because it's my home. I do, however, applaud the UK for the NHS.

Finding a place in a state school for my 3 kids who missed the Reception cohort. Now that's a nightmare that you guys could use some improvement on. 30 in a class, that's a little high, especially in primary. I teach in secondary, I never have a class more than 24.

Here (US) they have to make a space for you at school no matter what. Max 25 kids in a class. Hopefully, you have the money to live in a nice district to get into a great school. But, that's the thinking. If you work hard, you can make it and get it.

Looking forward to seeing this show. Sounds cool!

I can well believe that there are vast swathes of the US where Obama care is looked on as the devil's work. I recall when George W. Bush was running for president, living in a very liberal, Democrat-voting town in a Democratic state and thinking it was self evident that Al Gore would win, until I went on a cross country trip that took me through Missouri, Kansas and Colorado. I saw an unbelievable number of 'W' bumper stickers and huge 'W' billboards -- I hadn't realised up to then how much appeal the Dubya nickname had and the attraction of the finger in the eye of 'liberalism' that it signified, to many, many people.

It is very true that the US is a culturally and politically fragmented country, with large sections of the population completely unable to imagine where the other section is coming from.

Another aspect of the health insurance debate, that you never hear of in the US, is the plight of women married to abusive but employed men, maybe with small children and working either part time or staying home with the children. Thanks to no fault divorce, in many states women generally lose entitlement to the health insurance their H carries upon divorce (the children will normally remain covered). Women making the decision to be sahms or working pt (usually pt work means no employer-paid insurance) leave themselves extremely vulnerable to ending up with no health insurance in the event of a divorce. It is a major issue I encountered on an American forum I used to post on -- women stuck with husbands who were abusive or who were serial cheaters because they had a chronic health condition, or staying because they would lose their home (in no fault divorce states the marital home must usually be sold to pay off the mortgage) and the children would then have to move school to a rotten school district. The whole set up is nicely organised to maximise the freedom and pursuit of happiness of the male head of household.

Sameyeam, when you move over here, it will be a programme, not a show!

mathanxiety yes, the divorce thing is so true. My ex-husband took my DD off his insurance (he had family coverage on his, while mine was single coverage, as it was cheaper through his work) without warning during our divorce. We only found out when I took her in for emergency treatment with the HMO and was told that her eligibility was non-existent. Thankfully, the paediatrician treated her anyway, as she was very ill (pneumonia and asthma kicking off horribly). We had to drag him into court on an emergency basis to force him to put her back on the insurance. My works insurance wouldn't put her on my coverage until the divorce was final. Cost me a fortune for the extra legal stuff. But talk about terrifying to have her so ill and be told she had no coverage.

Thats a good point mathanxiety, about many women being forced to stay in abusive relationships simply out of fear of losing health insurance.

The main point we need to remember regarding the attempted stealth privatising of the NHS is this:

It is not morally sound to turn healthcare into a profit making enterprise.
Some things just should not be a business, and healthcare is one of them.
One of the problems with the bill is that it is going to transform doctors into service providers, rather than advocates for their patients.

Obviously budgets have to be managed, but as far as the doctors are concerned, the type of treatment they reccomend for their patients should not be coloured by anything other than what is best for the patient.

The whole bollicks about "choice" is laughable.
Americans have no real choice what treatment they get, or who treats them.
A huge faceless Insurance company decides that, and the insurance company is playing a numbers game.As others have said, once you reach your limit, it's game over for you.
Also, the Insurance company loves nothing more than to catch you out with small print and "pre-existing conditions" and refuse to pay at all, leaving you potentially homeless and bankrupt.

We do take personal responsibilty for our healthcare, with our taxes, and I would not actually mind paying a few pence more in the pound for a specific NHS tax, so that everybody can have the actual treatment they need, the best there is, rather than what the budget will or won't allow.

We are talking about our children, and our parents lives here, and as someone who watched a parent die in an NHS hospital I can only imagine how much worse that would have been if we had then been hit with a bill for £10000.

Still, all makes work for the lawyers, doesn't it? And insurance paperpushers?

I think Michael Moore's Sicko gave 30% as the proportion of their time an average US doctor spends dealing with insurance companies.

Here we're being told that sacking NHS managers and giving their responsibilities to GPs will allow GPs to focus on their patients more. Uhuh.

Here's Sicko available on DVD, for anyone who's interested.

It's in Moore's inimitable style, and you may feel he simplifies things or is slightly rose-tinted in his view of say, UK pharmacies. But overall it's very informative and well worth the watch.

"You think you've just slipped through the gaps. But actually the insurance company created those gaps, and then swept you through them," is a line which has haunted me.

This Gov contradicts themselves though.
One minute GPs can be trusted to oversee these huge budgets.
The next minute they are saying that GPs CANT be trusted to decide whether a patient is ill enough to get ESA or whether their care and mobility needs warrant DLA. That is decided by ATOS.
So it seems to me that our Government wants it both ways.

IUseTooMuchKitchenRoll---
Thanks for the British English correction. Much appreciated. Programme...with an extra m and e. I like you Brits. Married one too!
Mathanxiety---
Right on!

I love how Americans are so polite

Anyone that was shocked must live in a deep black hole of wilfull ignorance.

Behold the future of this country if you don't FIGHT.

I cannot afford air fares to go to Ameerica and see their misfirtune for myself in reality. Watching the bit of Panarama which shows just how bad it is out there did shock me! Not being able to afford air fares makes me ignorant? Pot, kettle. Hully?

Too true Hully

We would see no drop in taxes-same tax levels, added private healthcare premiums, and a continued degradation of public services.

I see insurance companies weedle their way out of claims in the vet world every week-and sickenly it's by using the same tactics they use in human medicine in the US. They are not in it to help people-but to make a lot of money. And you do that by collecting premiums and not paying out, what ever the human cost.

I have a relative i occasionally talk to in the USA. Belongs to the second kmost violent mafia family (blood relative) in the States. He tells me more than what is shown on BBC news!

I find this difficult because I am SO allergic to the very idea of the US system; I've worked in the NHS for about half my working life and hope to spend the rest working within it. I trust the government, any government, more than I would any insurance company and I can't see that changing.

But i do think it's important to understand why people who disagree feel the way they do, and I do think there's a difference between not caring about people and not wanting the state to decide how healthcare is run. Every American I've ever met appears caring and generous, volunteering is a way of life over there in a structural way that it doesn't seem to be here, and it's also true as I understand it that for the genuinely destitute, it's actually possible to get top-notch care in America. The ones in trouble are the working poor and the struggling middle class.

This is where I believe the British chip on the shoulder really works for us - we all prefer to feel we're poorer than our neighbours, and therefore a system that helps the working poor sounds like it's for our benefit, whereas Americans seem to want to feel they are one step away from being upper middle class, so a system that helps the working poor sounds like one that isn't for them.

Goingfor Goal

You have to see it for yourself in real life in America actual?

Never heard of telly? Newspapers? Radio? Keeping oneself informed?

It's hardly been the world's best-kept secret.

Deliberately misunderstanding [posts does not make you trhe better person, just a lill tip!

Of course i knew this problem existed!

"Americans seem to want to feel they are one step away from being upper middle class"

Y y y. Someone explained to me that this is why poor Americans vote for tax cuts for the ultra rich. The American Dream (TM) is that you will yourself be ultra rich one day. So you vote to benefit what you aspire to be, not what you currently are.

Kind of "fake it till you make it" writ huge.