[Sean]

Okay, I'll bite. It'll have to be a two-parter though...

Originally Posted by IsiliRunite

Before I post my little thing...

Sorry, but that made me giggle like a small child. Just wanted to establish my immaturity right off the bat. Now onto the grown-up talk....

Originally Posted by IsiliRunite

If this definition is in-line with all of yours', there are a few problems I have with Universal Health Care.

It's not necessarily, but I think we can still discuss the philosophical merits of universal healthcare.

Originally Posted by IsiliRunite

First and foremost, I do not believe that health care is a fundamental human right. I understand that health care is an important part of being alive, and that life is a fundamental human right. While these views seem somewhat contradictory, putting health care in line with other crucial-for-life resources such as food, water, and shelter reveals that health care does not warrant a federal government bureau to ensure its availability to all humans...

I believe the contradiction here outweighs the qualifiers you provide. First and foremost, yes it is a blatant contradiction in that preserving our basic human right to life requires that we are able to have regular physicals, and treatment for injuries and illnesses.

But secondly, the comparisons you give are actually incomparable to the subject at hand. While I agree that food, water and shelter are obvious necessities, and that we should be looking for solutions to these problems as well, I disagree that they are in any way appropriate to use as arguments against universal health care. So let's take them one at a time.

Food vs health care. You can get a meal that will fill you up for less than $5 virtually anywhere in the country. There is no medical procedure or exam that, uninsured, will be even remotely as affordable. Or to put it another way, a hungry person can get a meal by scrounging up change, begging, going to a soup kitchen, etc to end their hunger for the moment. Certainly not desirable, but definitely doable. Contrast that with an uninsured person who discovers, for example, that they need hernia surgery - this happened to me shortly after I left college and before I was qualified to join the union. With the help of a very kind employee at the doctor's office, I was able to haggle the price of the surgery/anesthesia/hospital costs down to $10,000. That pretty much wiped out everything I had managed to save up until that point in my life. Someone who wasn't fortunate enough to have $10,000 on hand could be facing choices such as enormous debt, or even death from an untreated hernia. And even though I had the money and paid it immediately, I still had to deal with a collection agency being sicked on me by the anesthesiologist because the surgeon hadn't forwarded his share of the payment on to him, and it took me months of stress to resolve. I would've preferred the challenge of finding a meal.

Water vs universal health care. I don't know about where you live, but I know of countless public places around L.A. where there are water fountains that anyone can use for free. Nothing comparable for medical treatments though.

Shelter vs health care. I'd basically say that the same argument applies here as with the food issue. And again, I'm not arguing that malnourishment and lack of shelter aren't problems. I'm only saying that they're problems which can be solved by an individual far more readily than an unchecked illness or injury. Which leads us to your next point...

Originally Posted by IsiliRunite

Combating the overpriced nature of health care using government money, as opposed to an individual combining the over-time and upon-treatment bills, does not actually lower prices but merely means everyone's pockets get fucked over a little bit instead of the ill minority citizens getting impaled with bills and the totally healthy being totally unaffected. Sure, HMO's have salaries to pay for their employees and they are the obvious middle man in health care. A federal bureau to collect taxes and redistribute the funds to hospitals also has employees to pay, as well (to my understanding, a lot of the money collected by the IRS is used to fund IRS operations). As to which one is more efficient, HMO or Government, I am not sure. If cost is the issue, perhaps a better way to reduce the cost of medical coverage is to limit frivolous law-suits against doctors and increase the efficiency of a currently existing government agency: the FDA.

Basically, you acknowledge the problem of the high cost of health care, but offer no realistic solution. I'm all for limiting frivolous lawsuits, believe me. But the high cost of health care is not simply, or even largely, due to lawsuits (sorry, but I think you need to use safari to open the link). It's due to a variety of primarily social and economic factors which, yes, should absolutely be reigned in. However, that still won't solve the problem. Most information you find on soaring health care costs talks about how they've really shot up since the year 2000, and the example I gave of my hernia surgery happened back in 1993, when treatment was far more "affordable". So even if we get costs down, they will still be out of reach for the vast majority of the uninsured.

Originally Posted by IsiliRunite

One of the illusions that is being created in this thread is that without universal health care many people in emergency situations will die. The federal government already requires anyone who enters a hospital under emergency circumstances will receive coverage. If federal paperwork is added pre-treatment as it is in certain countries, hospital wait-times may be longer than they are today. Of course there are circumstances that a few hours will not make or break, such as cancer, but the inconvenience may still exist if universal health care is not put into effect while taking this concern into account.

What you're ignoring here is the difference in quality of health care between those who have good insurance, those who have the bare minimum, and those who are uninsured. Simply put, the treatments, techniques and equipment made available to you directly correlates with how good your coverage is, or how much you can afford to pay. So while you may get "treated" as a poor, uninsured person, you will likely get the bare minimum treatment, which very likely won't solve a serious illness as much as it will temporarily ease the problem. Ultimately, this can very well lead to death, or a life of pain and discomfort that could otherwise be eased or even eliminated.

Originally Posted by IsiliRunite

While universal health care does provide coverage for those who genuinely cannot afford health care under their own abilities, universal health care also removes some cause-effect accountability in the individual. When the group (Nation) is footing the bill, it is not impossible to conceive of a citizen who does not take monetary costs associated with unhealthy lifestyle choices as seriously as he would if he were solely responsible for coverage through HMO monthly bills and upon-treatment bills.

I agree, but the problem is that this is already happening, and is already what's playing a huge part in driving costs of health care up. So again, I agree that it's a problem we need to solve, but it isn't an argument against universal health care in my opinion. It's simply a consideration that must be addressed in the implementation of a universal system.

Originally Posted by IsiliRunite

Another potential problem associated with universal health care could occur when coverage is given to individuals who do not pay taxes; if the group pool of money is to avoid any one member of the group being severely affected by bills, what is the point of covering those who have not committed to the group?

Again, I'm not sure that just presenting challenges in making it feasible is reason enough to say it shouldn't happen. I agree that this example needs to be considered and dealt with, but I don't see why that means we shouldn't even try.