Can I ask why the U.S. don't want an NHS?

[Fizzielove]

Why don't Americans want an NHS? I just don't get it? Can someone lease explain to this to me?

Americans will buy into the anything makes them feel superior to their fellow man and boosts their ego. They are slaves to large corporations and blinded by the 'dream' they are being sold.
Not all of us thankyou

It's not ineffective to have smears below the age of 25 now that sexual activity is starting much earlier. It also serves as an opportunity for unmarried women to have conversations regarding birth control. You still have areas which are very conservative and these appointments serve a very important function.

nooka I think it depends on the paediatrician. I've been impressed with the issues caught by preventative check ups for DS. The doctor get very involved when he saw my sons development come to a screeching halt and made calls to get him assessed ASAP by a program not normally covered by our insurance. He submitted paperwork for Aetna to treat the program that could take us the following week as in network because the delay of using their approved program would qualify as negligence in his professional opinion.

Oh, also, I like your public transportation and walkable communities. I will take those as well. And the NHS. And the British sense of humor is killer, I love it. But not the school thing. You can keep that. Too much pressure and not enough opportunity for redemption, imo.

Also, regarding this: "Americans will buy into the anything makes them feel superior to their fellow man and boosts their ego. They are slaves to large corporations and blinded by the 'dream' they are being sold."

I think that this is utterly untrue. We are skeptics to the core here in the US, are you kidding? And my opinion is not unusual, believe me, I am a dime a dozen.

People on dialysis in the US are always eligible for coverage of it via Medicare if they do not have private health insurance or once their private health insurance has paid for two years of treatment (I think that is the amount). No one dies of kidney failure due to lack of coverage. Someone up-thread gave that as an example. However, on the unfortunate flip side, dialysis is performed inappropriately in folks with end-stage dementia, etc.

The elephant in the room of this thread is race.

You can't talk about rich American people not wanting to subsidise poor American people without recognising the relationship between wealth and race.

Debating this without mentioning racism is playing tennis without the ball.

"Socialized" is not a concept I understand.

I think it means "owned/run by the community" or possibly "for the benefit of all"

So I suppose the fire service, police force, road system, coastguard and national parks are socialised, and so are many schools and universities. Is that considered a bad thing?

The elephant in the room of this thread is race.

No. It's alcohol and obesity. No one cares about who they're subsidising apart from how much it costs.

I don't know much about the US system, but my mum recently had a major op in a big London hospital. I was astonished by how good her care was - and has been since. But when she was on the critical care ward I kept thinking 'no wonder the NHS is running out of money'. She was one of the youngest people on the ward - there were a lot of very old, very frail people there who - to be blunt - needed a lot of care. The technology was astonishing - checking lab results at her bedside, all her records available digitally. That must be expensive. At some points there were more staff on the ward than patients - because the patients were so ill (it wasn't like that when she moved to a normal ward).

I just think of course, of course, we have to pay more towards our healthcare. We probably need to pay more every single year, to keep up with improvements in treatment and technology etc.
But I very firmly feel we should pay that in taxes not insurance.

Actually it's obesity and drug dependency. Alcohol issues are somewhat lower here from what I have seen as drugs are often cheaper and more accessible. Race has nothing to do with it.

PigletJohn-

I make that point to folks here all of the time when people object to "socialized" medicine. Police, fire dep't, libraries, schools, parks, all publicly supported and accessed.

And additionally, it makes me laugh when wealthy folks complain about people sponging off the government, when they benefit as well in terms of tax exemptions for interest paid on mortgages, social security income, etc.

Piglet - Oh I know, I know! My American PILs hate the idea of socialized medicine whilst seeing no irony in the fact that they spent their adult lives as government employees (with good healthcare) working for a school district and a fire department. Now retired, they of course make use of their social security income and medicare. I can't think of anything more "socialized" than social security and medicare FFS!

The elephant in the room of this thread is race.

WTF?? All the people that I have heard in America bitching about paying for the health insurance of the poor, not ONE has mentioned anything to do with race. Complete and utter bollocks - race has nothing to do with it IMO.

Edl members don't think they're racist either.

pitiless I don't agree with you on the tax exemptions being generous. If you are subject to AMT you pay a lot. It's business owners who get all sorts of exemptions because they hold their personal assets in their business. We have yet to be audited by the IRS because I do our taxes and I keep business and personal very separate. High income employees are paying lots of tax over here.

We make substantial contributions for our social security. It's not something just given. The only thing that needs adjusting with it is the income limit so full income is taxed.

Oh FFS. If you're going to turn this into a racist discussion, I'm out. It's so patently not a racist issue, and I can't be bothered to discuss it with someone that is determined to make it one.

This article is fascinating. An American who has used both systems and discusses the pros and cons.

He sums up British attitudes to NHS as 'This Rolls Royce isn't going fast enough.'

uk.businessinsider.com/an-american-uses-britain-nhs-2015-1?r=US&IR=T

I think it's fair to say that there is resistance in America to different forms of pooling resources and social support because some white Americans, particularly in certain parts of America resent their taxes being used to subsidise people they see as "other."

No, single payer health care is not an overtly racists issue, but race and its history informs everything in America. As the years go by, America becomes minority white and slowly, these old attitudes erode.

One problem in the US is many americans think they have something resembling a free market system, and a pinko commie NHS would be more expensive and have worse care.

The reality is that their system resembles a free market system about as much as the NHS does, but is overloaded with private interest. It's an absolute silly system to have your health care tied to your employer. it makes absolutely zero sense.

I've had a ride in an Air Ambulance, and a week in ITU, and quite a lot of repairs.

Anyone else in equal need might have had the same.

None of us would have needed to wonder how, or if, it would be paid for, or worried about being driven into bankruptcy. We could have occupied ourselves grumbling about the limited menu or the shabby waiting rooms.

I hear that the most common cause of personal bankruptcy in US is medical bills.

A National Health Service is by far the cheapest and most efficient way to provide healthcare, much more so than any government subsidised insurance program.

Senpai is right that it wouldn't work in the US because of government issues and general ideas/ideologies. But it is cheaper. Far cheaper than the German system, for example, which is what I think most people envisage when they imagine the UK with a health insurance system, God knows how they imagine that is going to be paid for with the British economy and general attitude towards taxes and healthcare!

I think the NHS is cheaper in part because they offer less care compared. Looking at the numbers the UK is below Canada, scandi countries, France and Germany.

Not saying that there isn't fat to be trimmed in the US but i think there should be more spent per capita in the UK on healthcare given the changing demographics and known extra costs of PFI. The U.S. system could be vastly improved by getting rid of so many lawyers which would reduce insurance costs for doctors. Also medical school is extremely expensive. You are looking at up to $500k in tuition alone to qualify. Add in another $15k for living costs and you are looking at a minimum of $620k to become a doctor. The high wages reflect that initial investment.

The reality is that their system resembles a free market system about as much as the NHS does, but is overloaded with private interest.

Very astute redstrawberry. This is absolutely true.

pipless
No one dies of kidney failure due to lack of coverage.
Yes they do.
Because the Medicare would not cover the anti rejection drugs that actually work so the new kidney is failing and the person will not get another
so they will slowly die
before they are 50

pigletjohn
I hear that the most common cause of personal bankruptcy in US is medical bills
and if not bankruptcy, decades of paying off debts
eg getting cancer having just given up work due to pregnancy and thus losing coverage ...

lightbulbon exactly. And I never would've appreciated this before living in America, especially during Obama's second election campaign and the long, messy slog to Obamacare starting up.

No one (in the public eye, at least) ever, ever says 'you don't deserve healthcare, because you're black'. But, holy shit, the loaded language used; the insinuations; the sly digs and deliberate encouragement of misconceptions.

The demonisation of black families 'on welfare' in the US is really similiar to the whole Conservative/Daily Fail rhetoric about 'scroungers' here in the UK, with our stories about single mothers with fifteen kids in million-pound council houses full of widescreen TVs, which are used to justify benefit cuts and fuel public repugnance.

Substitute that for stories about 'welfare queens', 'thug life', and people finding SNAP card (food stamps) receipts supposedly showing the previous customer (African American, of course) buying lobster and Remy on the hard-working tax-payer's dollar. The idea that everyone else should pay for these people hey, it's not racist, if you don't specifically mention race to get a free-ride on healthcare gives many right-wingers the shivers.

Race is definitely not the only, or even main, issue that makes 'socialised' US healthcare impossible all the other issues have been covered on this thread but it certainly bears mentioning.

Because that would be (gasp!) SOCIALISM, and almost all Americans think that (gasp!) SOCIALISM is intrinsically a bad thing. Some of them are reasonably left-wing, but they don't like being described as socialists, it's a dirty word there.

I've been on forums where Americans are discussing the possibility of something like an NHS and everyone thinks it sounds like a really good idea, until someone says, "but hang on a minute... that would be socialism!" And then they all either backtrack and say it doesn't sound such a good idea or try to find arguments to prove that it isn't socialism.

I've also seen an American online "friend" (who I'm rapidly losing patience with) criticise president Obama and her main insult is "he's a socialist". She makes it sound as if that in itself should be an instant bar to being President. I can't decide whether the hatred of socialism is caused by misunderstanding of what it actually means, a different balance between rich and poor, or the poor just not having the information to know that it would help them, or the means to speak out in support of it.