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British people guess how much US healthcare costs
- Thread starter Ottaro
- Start date
But America is great? They hate us because we're free, clearly.
I'm doing my best to try and move away from this stupid place.
50 bucks for a Tylenol during my back surgery. Btw I didn't actually receive the Tylenol and since it was a major spinal surgery I'm not sure a Tylenol would actually get the job done...
I'm a uk expat and probably 90% of Americans believe absolutely ludicrous counterintuitive things about foreign healthcare. The most oft repeated one is especially absurd:
in Europe if you break your legs in a car wreck you have to go on a waitlist (FALSE) and if you have to visit your doctor you sometimes can't see anyone for days (TRUE but also true in the US).
I have one of the best healthcare plans in America but it still costs me a ton of money and yes when I broke some toes earlier this year I had to figure out where to go and what treatments made sense to save money on out of pocket or deductibles.
a couple of years ago I chopped off the top of my finger and when I got to the ER they still made me fill out paperwork before triage even though I was literally pumping blood through towels.
it's insane. The two biggest issues are the absolutely parasitic insertion of an insurance middleman and the astonishing fact that the government signed legislation to prevent itself from being able to negotiate market rates on medicines and services. Literally passed a law mandating that it get ripped off by greedy companies.
there's loads of other weird shit like patents getting extended so that something as simple as a tiny tube of acyclovir cold sore ointment costs upwards of twenty bucks - but the same medication costs a couple of bucks for five times as much in Mexico.
On this forum you'll occasionally find people defending specific aspects of it but they almost always work in those industries.
most people are mad about it but the sheer hysteria on our news when a politician makes even milquetoast suggestions on something as simple as Medicare for all is something to behold. Serious "liberal"news anchors repeating healthcare industry lies as facts.
That's rough, I'm sorry to hear that. It isn't right. As someone that has had a number of ambulance trips thanks to anxiety the past few years, I can't imagine having to worry about finances in each case and how that would spiral more than it already did. It's fallen back this year thankfully, and I hope the same for yourself and that your son's health issues placate as best they can. Genuine well-wishes for 2020.
Until it's too late then you get bankrupt because poor people couldn't afford to do a neccessary check up
As an American, it was literally cheaper to spend $1000 on a plane ticket to Italy, €150 for a ferry ticket from Bari to Durres, and then $65 cash for a tooth extraction, x-ray, fillings, and medication in Albania.
My dentist here would've charged about $1500 for all of that
My dentist here would've charged about $1500 for all of that
I don't even think the powers that be understand the contradiction inherent in this either. A quote about the last rope under capitalism comes to mind.
I had an Aunt years ago who worked as a nurse in Missouri. The things she told me people were charged for like tissues and bandages and the cost of that alone if you were in the hospital for a week made me sick to my stomach.
Did a google image search of "childbirth cost USA" this was one of the results
Insanity
Insanity
The idea that America is the greatest country is flat out laughable.
But the US indoctrinates people as soon as they go into education and reinforce the American exceptionalism lie at every turn in the media.
Is this something they're actually planning on doing?
Because there should be some South Korea style riots if the UK healthcare system gets sold off to American profiteering corporations.
I don't understand how this works in practice. E.g. if a woman from a low-income or poverty background goes to the maternity ward to have her baby, does she get a 10.000 $ bill afterwards? How is she supposed to pay that, and what if she can't? Are there hospitals where you can have your baby for free or a smaller fee?
Then you see how much the US pays per head and thank Christ that it isn't us.
Corbyn showed some documents the tories have been trying to bury showing trade deal negotiations between the US and the UK. The NHS was a big part of it.
If I would want to find out what percentage of Germans don't like free Healthcare, I wouldn't even know how to Google that.
Yup, very nearly lost all my savings because of medical costs. I got it sorted and I am very thankful but if I was unable to get the help I would be fucked.
Yup they've been selling off the departments "we can do without" for a while now and the documents referred to above suggest an acceleration in this pretty soon
You're pretty much expected to ask for a smaller bill and they'll accommodate you, it's so stupid. Most people don't end up being charged the full amount, as for what happens if what's left can't be paid, I'm not sure, probably some goes to collections and some is forgiven.
If i weren't moving out of the country in July then my only option would be to declare bankruptcy due to my medical bills. At age 26. American dreammmmmmmmmmmmmm baybay. at least i have the FREEDOM that those poor souls in Britain surely don't. $40,000 in debt in my 20's YASSSS home of the FREE
we're all too sick to riot on account of the lack of affordable medical care
What if you're shot in the street and someone else calls? Do they take you to hospital and then thrust the bill in your face as soon as you're stable?
That's pretty gross if so.
Primarily because half the country thinks the way healthcare works currently is fine or even good.
Then the other hold-up is your healthcare 90% of the time is tied to your job, so if you go off on a rioting adventure and miss a shift or two of work because you got arrested, you lose your job and consequently your insurance. Not to mention that if you get injured by a cop while rioting, that's gonna be expensive to get patched up.
Basically capitalism has made people complacent.
A trip to an ER is $2531 and the total service is $3390 for 8 stitches on my right pinky finger
$1191 for a 10 second doctor to tell me not to get my finger wet.
It's cheaper to not have ACA to pay my bill.
I keep sayings this. It's about profiting people who're suffering. There shouldn't be a market for this.
$1191 for a 10 second doctor to tell me not to get my finger wet.
It's cheaper to not have ACA to pay my bill.
I keep sayings this. It's about profiting people who're suffering. There shouldn't be a market for this.
I had an ER visit earlier this year and I kept waiting for a big ass bill to show up. Thankfully, my job has really good insurance, but it really shouldn't depend on that.
A woman in that position would presumably be on Medicaid, which would act like a normal insurance company and take on the bill.
I mean, yeah? No one thinks it's free doctors and medical supplies pulled from the aether. The amount paid in taxes in the NHS are absolutely incomparable to the heinous prices and debts in the American health system. Even as an American, when I lived in Massachusetts, the big increase in taxes felt like a fucking steal for the social and healthcare benefits I got. While I lived there, I had a panic attack and got hospitalized. I would have owed thousands and thousands for a fucking panic attack if that same thing happened in Virginia where I live now.
wHaT if I LIkE mY CuRRenT InsURanCe
Depends on the state, too though... some of the states I've lived in have STUPID strict requirements for what makes you impoverished as a single person living alone.
some hospitals will do the bare minimum to help get you stabilized and then refuse to do anymore because you have no way to pay.
OP
OP
You've never actually stepped foot in a
That's fucked up because they put you into a collection agency if you can't pay back the hospital.
Do Americans have generic Tylenol? Their prices for that stuff are outrageous whenever I've had to get some on holiday. In the U.K. I can get like a pack of 36 or so for 50cents.
Yes, this is a common occurrence. It's pretty easy to find stories of people being chased out of a hospital with a massive bill when they're still recovering.
Most of us have never known anything different
But yeah it's terrible and honestly it feels like there's very little that we can do about it as regular citizens
My dad had a heart attack and needed open heart surgery and if we didn't have insurance the cost would have been over $100,000.
Half the country is made up of uneducated misinformed morons who think everything is fine as it is.
My 13 year old son was born prematurely. The bill was over $200,000. 13 years ago. Things are worse now.
There are a lot of US posters on this supposedly left-wing forum who defend this monstrous system. I don't understand it. It's actually an indictment of how shit Americans are at caring about anyone but the well-off.
Imagine if about 40% of your population thought Scrooge was a visionary, and the system was slanted to value their opinions more.
Yayyy Americaaaa
Yes that is exactly what happens. When I was in high school I got into a bad car wreck and was loaded into an ambulance before I could really understand what was going on.
When my dad got to the hospital he had to fill out the insurance and billing information before he was allowed to see me.
Doctors arent really the ones who decide this kind of stuff, afaik it's the hospital board members and admiinistrators that run hospitals like businesses
Damn.
Have a friend who screwed up his knee and needed arthroscopic surgery to get ACL reconstruction.
He was working some contract gig and had no comprehensive coverage during an accident, and he got hit with a $17,000 bill (procedure only, not including any medication or therapy).
He's been yoked to the decision to go into bankruptcy for nearly a decade.
Heaven forbid there's a major problem and you need to be admitted for an extended period of time.
My grandfather was admitted to an ICU ward for about 12 days before he succumbed to organ failure and passed on.
The bill for his end of life care was damn near $200,000. Mercifully, being a long-tenured military veteran afforded him good coverage, but the sticker shock is still there.
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I saw an elderly woman trip and fall on some stairs (about 6, to a tiled floor) at a Burger King food court few years back. We called the ambulance immediately and the woman literally spent her last minutes on Earth moaning in pain, and begging us not to call an ambulance because she couldn't afford it. It got there about 10 minutes after she stopped breathing anyway and I knew deep down they were likely going to bill her survivors one way or another. I felt guilty for thinking that while they carted her off.
Yes, but we're not complacent. We're captive.