EFF Co-Founder Announces Benefit Concert to Pay His Medical Bills (twitter.com)

An anoymous Slashdot reader reports: "I was dead for about 8 mins. on Wed. eve," EFF co-founder John Perry Barlow posted last year on Facebook. "total cardiac arrest...sad to report, no Ascending Light." The cyber-rights activist told the San Francisco Chronicle that he had gone "down the tunnel of eternity and it turned out to be a cheap carnival ride." He paused for a moment. "Probably not cheap, though."

Yesterday Barlow posted a Twitter update announcing a big benefit concert in Mill Valley, California to help pay his mounting medical bills on Monday, October 24th. Performers will include Bob Weir (also of The Grateful Dead), Jerry Harrison (of The Talking Heads), Lukas Nelson, Members of The String Cheese Incident, Sean Lennon and Les Claypool, plus 85-year-old folk singer Ramblin' Jack Elliott, as well as "special guests."
Barlow's family describes the last 18 months as a "medical incarceration" with "a dizzying array of medical events and complications" that has depleted his savings and insurance benefits. They've also set up a site for donations from "his fellow innovators, artists, cowboys, and partners-in-crime, to help us provide the quality of care necessary for Barlow's recovery."

Comments

Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi there. I don't know much about the US health care system, but shouldn't the Affordable Care Act have fixed that? How can that happen, that he still has huge medical bills? Can somebody please explain?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[noelhenson]

"Affordable" in the Affordable Care Act is very much akin to "unlimited" in unlimited bandwidth in a mobile phone contract. It's not so much an adjective as it is a branding label.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[ColdWetDog]

The Affordable Care Act did a couple of things - dropped the 'pre existing condition' clause for private insurance (if you're sick, we aren't going to cover you, but you're certainly welcome to pay into the program in the event you get some other illness down the road - while you're still healthy enough to pay the premium), made insurers create lower (not low by any means) marginally useful insurance policies and tried to force everyone to get some sort of medical insurance. It also gave insurers the ability to lock in double digit profits for another decade. And gave me even more reasons to write run on sentences.

We don't know just what insurance he had (TFS implies that he had some) but if he had a standard commercial policy with a 1-2 million dollar limit, let me point out two interesting points:

- A year long illness can easily kick you into the million dollar club. A bad MI, a couple of weeks in the ICU, a couple more weeks in a step down unit, rehab, a few more procedures, a couple of expensive drugs and a host of billing errors and you're there. Hell, I'm an ER doc and I can run up $100,000 easy peasy. That's for the first couple of HOURS.
- MOST insurances have a 20% copay. Crappy ones don't drop the copay until you get to the quarter million dollar range although most have an out of pocket limit of at most $10,000 or so.

So, lets say he had 'OK' insurance. He's limited to $10K out of pocket plus an enormous number of 'little' expenses. Things that weren't covered, billing errors (did I mention that before>?), lost time, wages, home assistance, family issues .....

He's a lawyer, but probably not that kind of lawyer that has 20K sitting in his savings account.

Yeah, the money goes fast. The most popular thing at our local Elk's Club is drinking, the next most popular is various fund raisers for somebody or others medical bills.

USA! USA! USA!

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[MrKrillls]

The legislative process gutted The Affordable Care Act.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[geek]

The Affordable Care Act did a couple of things - dropped the 'pre existing condition' clause for private insurance (if you're sick, we aren't going to cover you, but you're certainly welcome to pay into the program in the event you get some other illness down the road - while you're still healthy enough to pay the premium), made insurers create lower (not low by any means) marginally useful insurance policies and tried to force everyone to get some sort of medical insurance. It also gave insurers the ability to lock in double digit profits for another decade. And gave me even more reasons to write run on sentences.

We don't know just what insurance he had (TFS implies that he had some) but if he had a standard commercial policy with a 1-2 million dollar limit, let me point out two interesting points:

- A year long illness can easily kick you into the million dollar club. A bad MI, a couple of weeks in the ICU, a couple more weeks in a step down unit, rehab, a few more procedures, a couple of expensive drugs and a host of billing errors and you're there. Hell, I'm an ER doc and I can run up $100,000 easy peasy. That's for the first couple of HOURS.
- MOST insurances have a 20% copay. Crappy ones don't drop the copay until you get to the quarter million dollar range although most have an out of pocket limit of at most $10,000 or so.

So, lets say he had 'OK' insurance. He's limited to $10K out of pocket plus an enormous number of 'little' expenses. Things that weren't covered, billing errors (did I mention that before>?), lost time, wages, home assistance, family issues .....

He's a lawyer, but probably not that kind of lawyer that has 20K sitting in his savings account.

Yeah, the money goes fast. The most popular thing at our local Elk's Club is drinking, the next most popular is various fund raisers for somebody or others medical bills.

USA! USA! USA!

So maybe lead the charge as an ER Doc to bring those costs down? 100,000$ for a few hours? That's criminal, nothing on Earth can possibly cost that much without someone committing a crime. The fact is hospitals charge the fuck out of everything they can. I've never seen people so rich as hospital administrators. They know they have everyone by the balls and don't care because the ones their billing are to sick to do anything about it.

People bitch about Martin Shkrelli but he's got nothing on the hospital admins I've met.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[fahrbot-bot]

"Affordable" in the Affordable Care Act is very much akin to "unlimited" in unlimited bandwidth in a mobile phone contract. It's not so much an adjective as it is a branding label.

Still. Every insurance plan has an out-of-pocket maximum and the law prevents life-time limits on benefits. While it's possible for deductibles and out-of-pocket maximums to be quite high, I'm dubious about the claim, "depleted his savings and insurance benefits" -- unless he's not good at managing his own money. To be fair, the summary did say this happened over 18 months, so there could be some cost build up due to his case exceeding a calendar year and the deductible and out-of-pocket fees being reset (I don't know if it works that way for a continuing treatment).

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[ColdWetDog]

Just gotta love Slashdot's editing function.....

Just to expand - if you have insurance covered by your employer than if you exceed the policy limits, somebody has paid for re insurance so that will kick in.
Sometimes. Not every policy has a backup if you exceed the limit.

There is nothing more confusing and contradictory than American healthcare. Statistics is a walk in the park compared to understanding the morass we've gotten ourselves into.

And won't ever be able to get ourselves out of. But that is another series of whines and complaints.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly right. The anti-competitiveness of hospital, drug, and doctor prices in the USA is the problem.

Nobody else gets away with charging these prices without disclosing them up front. (Try that with car repairs)

Nobody else gets away with charging different prices based on how you pay. (Try that with car repairs)

Nobody else gets away with forcing you to buy 'protection' from the racket. (aka health insurance)

Nobody else gets away with doing it under duress.

They are criminals!

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[ColdWetDog]

Yep, criminal and insane but nothing I can do about it. My particular charges are pretty modest, maybe $1000 or so for a couple of hours of work. But that helicopter gets expensive, the nice cardiac team has six highly paid professionals tending to it in three shifts 24 x 7, not to mention the suite costs several million dollars itself. ICU beds typically run several thousand per day. There are drugs that are three figures per dose.

I'd be the first to complain about the costs. I'm the one who gets yelled at in the supermarket, not the hospital CFO.

It's a fucking mess.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just FYI, in the United States we put the dollar sign before the amount

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

That was my first thought as well. Perhaps someone didn't follow the mandate to buy insurance?

However, a trip to wikipedia indicates he was born October 3, 1947 (age 69) so would be eligible for Medicare if he worked at a regular job for just a few years of his life in the U.S. So, I'm now quite confused as a government program like Medicare surely couldn't have a bad outcome like this -- simply not possible.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Then, there are the people not covered under insurance, like the anesthesiologist, who charge thousands an hour.

The ironic thing, this is -only- a US problem. Every other country has a sane system, where a sickness won't destroy their nest egg.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

You highlight one of the problems: too much complexity. Nobody should have to worry about "deductibles" or "calendar years" or any of that shit.

Covered or not covered should be it. The USA needs socialised medicine, but it will never get it because all Americans are greedy little fuckers who only love money.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[dangle]

Sorry, posting to undo bad mod.

Anyone have a manual for this trackpad?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[BarbaraHudson]

"Affordable" in the Affordable Care Act is very much akin to "unlimited" in unlimited bandwidth in a mobile phone contract. It's not so much an adjective as it is a branding label.

Still. Every insurance plan has an out-of-pocket maximum and the law prevents life-time limits on benefits. While it's possible for deductibles and out-of-pocket maximums to be quite high, I'm dubious about the claim, "depleted his savings and insurance benefits" -- unless he's not good at managing his own money. To be fair, the summary did say this happened over 18 months, so there could be some cost build up due to his case exceeding a calendar year and the deductible and out-of-pocket fees being reset (I don't know if it works that way for a continuing treatment).

Universal single-payer health plans don't (for the most part) have deductibles and out-of-pocket expenses.My first encounter with an out-of-pocket expense was last week - $5 for a DVD with a copy of my dental x-rays. First time in 60 years. I've literally spent months in hospitals, had a bunch of operations, dozens of treatments, and there's never been a co-pay or a deductible. The only time I ever saw even a copy of any bill was when Workman's Compensation sent me a copy of the bill they paid for one workplace accident tht required surgery - and that was strictly advisory - big notice saying "DO NOT PAY THIS!".

As for the universal drug plan, the maximum amount is $87.16. It's $0 for children under 18 (or 25 if they're attending classes), welfare recipients, and people receiving at least 94% of the old age guaranteed income supplement.

Your "Affordable Care Act" is not affordable, same as your "Transportation Safety Administration" screeners are useless because you don't need protection from a family-sized tube of tooth paste - they catch that, but they miss 95% of weapons and wasting more than half a billion on machines that have a lower success rate than dogs.

It doesn't have to be this way. Thank both parties for being in the hip pocket of the insurance companies.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[HornWumpus]

Nobody pays the $100k.

Insurance and government pay a small % of bill amount. So hospitals charge a high % to offset the fact they know they will get stiffed.

It's just fiction.

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

The "Affordable Care Act" is just a tax.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[sjames]

It's kinda like hollywood accounting where no movie produced in the last 100 years made a dime, yet they keep making them for some reason.

That's why you never see a simple plan like we pay 80% and that's that. YTou see we pay 80% of 70% of the bill after x amount but below y amount provided this that and the other condition are met within x time but not more than y time so long as it happens because of z, but not on alternate Tuesdays or during the gibbous moon on Friday.

One dirty trick is that the out of pocket maximum only counts particular treatments they cover. If the non-doctor at the insurance company decides you didn't need something expensive (or that it was necessary but done by the wrong doctor), you're screwed.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

A man once said: Having money isn't everything. Not having it is. This is the OP's dilemma.

You highlight one of the problems: too much complexity. Nobody should have to worry about "deductibles" or "calendar years" or any of that shit.

Covered or not covered should be it. The USA needs socialised medicine, but it will never get it because all Americans are greedy little fuckers who only love money.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[alvinrod]

Socialized medicine doesn't somehow equate to free and unlimited health care. We could spend 100% of GDP on health care and people would still eventually get to a point where there's nothing that can be done. I won't outright object to a single-payer tax supported medical system, but it's pretty obvious that we'd need to put some rules into place as it's not financially viable to provide the unlimited care that people are capable of consuming.

The most obvious are that taxpayers shouldn't be forced to subsidize the consequences if your unhealthy lifestyle. If you smoke and get lung cancer, tough shit. Drink and ruin your liver, same deal. Obesity related medical issues are your own responsibility as well. Also, mandatory requirement that if you want to use the system, you're automatically an organ donor. Throw in some tax deductions (or alternatively just higher taxes for anyone who wouldn't get the "deduction") for people who generally try to stay in reasonable health and it's a reasonable system.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[sjames]

In America, we put the dollar sign before EVERYTHING else.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

what country are you in?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[BarbaraHudson]

The one that Trump just said has a "catastrophic" health care plan. What he fails to note is that many Canadians are lured to fake promises of cures by for-profit organizations. It's sad to see someone raise $50k - $100k to go down to the US, come back announcing that their cancer is cured, and then die of cancer. They could be hit with the same scam for a lot cheaper just by going to Mexico.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

except that non-smokers and non-drinkers also get lung and liver disease, so how do you know that the lung and liver problems are secondary to life style and not just bad luck?

If you work in a coal mine and have lung problems are you also discarded to die?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[greenfruitsalad]

> If you smoke and get lung cancer, tough shit. Drink and ruin your liver, same deal. Obesity related medical issues are your own responsibility as well.

this used to be my opinion until i learned that the cigarette tax in UK brings in so much money it can more than cover the cost of the necessary healthcare for smokers. alcohol is taxed similarly.

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Medicare doesn't protect you from private scams and con artists.

Or even just incompetent billing. My mother got billed for an ambulance ride she never took.

They tried to argue with me about it until I showed them a still from the security video of me taking her into the house.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[guruevi]

Although it is oft repeated (e.g. During the debates by Clinton) that the ACA "fixed" being uninsurable or having a cap on out of pocket costs it is incorrect. There is a cap on your deductible (~10k/year) but you're still on the hook for 10-40% of the cost once your deductible is met. Sure the ACA assures that everyone has insurance but "the poor" and now even the middle class still can't go to the doctor because 10k out of pocket per year is pretty much unaffordable.

Off course the unpoor (people intentionally making less than 20k/year) still get Medicare as they did before that pays 100% of the bill but a lot of Medicare and free medical aid beneficiaries (20-40k income) have now been shifted (or should I say shafted) by private insurance.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Dozens of countries have solved the problems in the second paragraph by taxing unhealthy shit higher to offset healthcare costs and through encouraging people to volunteer organ donation by educating them loudly on the good you can do after death. The better countries also heavily regulate advertising of unhealthy things, funding healthy eating and exercise programmes and providing preventative healthcare. In these places, the libertarian "anyone should be able to persuade anyone into becoming addicted to anything" is considered a crude first approximation to a working society. Unfortunately, the US is still quite close to that attitude, which is fundamentalist to the point of religious (as an ex Eastern European, reminds me of Soviet Marxism, except the "god" is the Invisible Hand instead of dialectical materialism).

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Same thing here in Canada. If you want to do something that's bad for go ahead but the government will tax you.

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Three cheers for regressive taxes, cause fuck poor people, right?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[barc0001]

> I won't outright object to a single-payer tax supported medical system, but it's pretty obvious that we'd need to put some rules into place as it's not financially viable to provide the unlimited care that people are capable of consuming.

And yet countries like Canada where I live have a lower healthcare spend per capita, we have a longer life expectancy, and nobody here goes bankrupt from medical conditions. The problem in the US isn't that the people will "consume too much healthcare", the problem is you have a system built where several levels of companies have their hands out to gouge as much as they can. In the US the hospitals and the insurance companies negotiate prices for everything and with several companies in the mix everyone wants (and gets) their piece. In Canada, we have a single payer system where the government runs a board of doctors who determine what a procedure should cost and that is what a doctor or hospital will be paid for that procedure or visit. Period.

>The most obvious are that taxpayers shouldn't be forced to subsidize the consequences if your unhealthy lifestyle.

Hello slippery slope. What's an unhealthy lifestyle? Obesity sure, same with smoking and drinking. But what about other things? Play football, hockey, basketball? Go skydiving, rock climbing, biking or kayaking? Skiing? Construction? All of those activities and more can lead to very expensive injuries. If premiums go up for unhealthy lifestyles, why not risky ones too? Hell for that matter what about using a car, driver or passenger? Statistically the average person will be in 2.7 significant car accidents in their lifetime. So really if you use vehicles it's not a matter of if, but when you will become a burden to your healthcare provider. Better bump those peoples' premiums too....

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that the patient still ends up paying their 10-to-20 percent of the fictional huge number.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

My dad was unconscious and had to be rushed by ambulance to the hospital. He had medicare and some supplemental insurance as well. After he got out and my mom and I started going over the bills, I noticed they charged $2,000 USD for JUST the ambulance ride to the hospital.

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[ArylAkamov]

What out of pocket maximum?

The plan my parents have, for example, has an extremely high deductable along with the fine print stating that even if you get injured and pay the deductable, you're still on the hook for 30â... of the medical bill.

They also don't cover a number of other necessary things. $350 a month doesn't get you fuck all.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[jedidiah]

It doesn't really matter. Unless you're living paycheck to paycheck with no savings or credit, it really shouldn't be a problem. This is not the kind of guy we should be throwing a pity party for.

You have an out of pocket limit for the year. After that, stuff should be free. If that's not the case, then how did he manage that?

This is a non-trivial issue.

My medical bills probably make his look puny. I have been sicker over a longer period of time. I probably have been in the hospital more. I have been on very expensive drugs.

This nonsense is no excuse for socialized medicine.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[jedidiah]

You're missing zeroes. The actual leading edge cancer treatments are terribly expensive. They also represent an improvement in the state of the art. They've managed patients where everything else failed.

That's assuming you weren't just talking about some shaman or some other form of quackery.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[jedidiah]

Before Obamacare, there were catastrophic plans that were "you pay, then we pay". They were nice and simple and fairly cheap. Obamacare banned them. Dems also seem hell bent on banning health savings accounts too.

As far as disagreements about treatments go, you can appeal.

Try doing that with a government beaurocracy.

Which reminds me... don't even get me started on the US disability system. Or Medicare. Or Medicaid.

We need to fix the half-assed attempts at socialized medicine we already have before creating new ones (or expanding them).

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[jedidiah]

> - A year long illness can easily kick you into the million dollar club. A bad MI, a couple of weeks in the ICU, a couple more weeks in a step down unit, rehab, a few more procedures, a couple of expensive drugs and a host of billing errors and you're there. Hell, I'm an ER doc and I can run up $100,000 easy peasy.

Bullshit.

I've had a 2 year long illness and I'm nowhere near a million yet.

What liberals don't want to tell you is that those billing numbers for hospital procedures are BULLSHIT. Private insurance only pays a 3rd of that at most. Labs and diagnostic procedures pay even less. So when you see something in the media that says some procedure costs X, it's probably safe to divide that by 3.

If you are going to drag the "niggling bits" in then you have to drag those in when you are making your comparison to Canada, or the UK, or Finland.

Being out of work is usually worse than your medical bills.

A 10K out of pocket limit is also crap. It amazes me what kind of health insurance nightmares come out of blue states.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Kjella]

The most obvious are that taxpayers shouldn't be forced to subsidize the consequences if your unhealthy lifestyle. If you smoke and get lung cancer, tough shit. Drink and ruin your liver, same deal. Obesity related medical issues are your own responsibility as well. Also, mandatory requirement that if you want to use the system, you're automatically an organ donor. Throw in some tax deductions (or alternatively just higher taxes for anyone who wouldn't get the "deduction") for people who generally try to stay in reasonable health and it's a reasonable system.

At this point I think it would be wise to point out that everybody dies sometime, somehow and old people tend to have a lot of medical problems. Most people dying from "lifestyle diseases" make it through most their taxable income years, if you drop dead from cardiac arrest at 60 you're still probably cheaper than a fitness freak that goes down fighting at 90 after a decade of deteriorating health going in and out of hospital. And to put it bluntly, very often it doesn't matter how or when it's a matter of whether there's something to be done. I've heard stories of apparently healthy people going to bed and simply not waking up, game over. Very cheap, very easy just issue the death certificate and move on. Others are caught in critical condition and spend days or weeks on the brink of death. There's a huge, huge variation that means the risk and payout won't correlate well no matter what you do.

The other part is, do you really want a society counting the number of beers and smoke and BMI and any risky or stupid activity you do? Orwell would love it, but no just no. I think you should realized that the main reason it won't get crazy abused is that being sick and injured is not fun and generally painful and uncomfortable. And you will spend a lot of time waiting in line unless you're in critical need and in general, you just don't cut yourself to get a free band-aid. Not when it's only going to be put on a bleed wound, it's not like you can keep them and sell them. Now benefits, there's a lot of fraud with disability benefits, a little with some highly regulated drugs that are monitored carefully... but healthcare in general? People are there because they need it, not because they want to.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

We need to fix the half-assed attempts at socialized medicine we already have before creating new ones (or expanding them).

You're right. They could be consolidated and offered to everyone.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[barc0001]

> You have inferior care that gets people killed.

Holy shit, it's a real in the flesh idiot who has bought the US healthcare astroturf hook line and sinker. You don't live here, you don't use our system and yet you feel comfortable slinging bullshit like that around?

> You have arbitrary limits on expensive care that are a death sentence.

We don't no. But do look into US healthcare providers' lifetime limits and until the ACA those "preexisting conditions".

> You don't develop the interesting new treatments.

Horse. Shit. Insulin, Rhogam, the Salk polio vaccine trial, T - cells, AIDS medications, the ebola vaccine, etc.

You should really educate yourself. You're kind of an embarrassment.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[BarbaraHudson]

Then why are you commenting on what is predominantly a US site?

Fuck off, Canuck dyke.

All butt-hurt because you don't want to hear the truth about how the Affordable Care Act is the worst health-care plan in the western world, and that even Cuba has free health care for everyone?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[BarbaraHudson]

The phonies won't be able to con people into paying millions, because the suckers that fall for these sorts of scams don't have millions.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[thegarbz]

it's not financially viable to provide the unlimited care that people are capable of consuming

So we're back to fuck it and let them die if they are expensive?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[thegarbz]

Hi random internet person. The WHO who isn't some random person on a forum rank Canada 7 nations ahead of the USA in its global rankings. These include first and foremost the quality of life (ability to live, ability to live well, and ability to receive healthcare).

So... You're talking out of your arse.

Thanks. That is all.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[St.Creed]

There are several areas in which the USA provides world class care. To the rich. In most areas, it's rather depressing to look at the figures though.

Here is the summary from a report by The Commonwealth Fund, which was set up to improve healthcare in the USA in 1918: US healthcare from a global perspective

Highlights:
- High U.S. health care spending due to greater use of medical technology, health care prices
- U.S. spends more on health care than other high-income countries but has worse outcomes
- Health care spending as % of gross GDP, USA vs Canada: 17.1% versus 10.7% (2013)

Some causes:
"Data published by the International Federation of Health Plans suggest that hospital and physician prices for procedures were highest in the U.S. in 2013.10 The average price of bypass surgery was $75,345 in the U.S. This is more than $30,000 higher than in the second-highest country, Australia, where the procedure costs $42,130. According to the same data source, MRI and CT scans were also most expensive in the U.S. While these pricing data are subject to significant methodological limitations, they illustrate a pattern of significantly higher prices in many areas of U.S. health care.

Other studies have observed high U.S. prices for pharmaceuticals. A 2013 investigation by Kanavos and colleagues created a cross-national price index for a basket of widely used in-patent pharmaceuticals. In 2010, all countries studied had lower prices than the U.S. In Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom, prices were about 50 percent lower.11"

But perhaps, if you pay more, you get more?

"On several measures of population health, Americans had worse outcomes than their international peers. "

Okay, but we know a lot of Americans have been smoking more than other folks, and are more... big-boned. Right?

"The Institute of Medicine found that poorer health in the U.S. was not simply the result of economic, social, or racial and ethnic disadvantages—even well-off, nonsmoking, nonobese Americans appear in worse health than their counterparts abroad."

But cancer care is top notch in the USA.

"One area where the U.S. appeared to have comparatively good health outcomes was cancer care. Other research based on survival rates also suggests that U.S. cancer care is above average, though these studies are disputed on methodological grounds."

However: "The opposite trend appears for ischemic heart disease, where the U.S. had among the highest mortality rates in 2013—128 per 100,000 population compared with 95 in the median OECD country."

To summarize: if you state that Canada has inferior care (imploying that it goes across the board), despite research suggesting the opposite is true, I'd like to see citations.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[mysidia]

so there could be some cost build up due to his case exceeding a calendar year

Insurers need to be prohibited from resetting deductibles for further treatments required for a condition that
has arisen just because a calendar year has hit.

Or, for insurance liability purposes: law should be changed to make sure insurers always liable to pay for all ongoing treatment
at least as much as if the bill was made on the date which the condition was diagnosed (Even if the insurance has been
cancelled since then; the coverage is for the date the loss or damage began, and the treatment is the repair.), so long as the
condition has been suffered continuously, and gets re-diagnosed once per year on a regular checkup.

Think about how ridiculous that would be.....
$5999 medical bill for a condition that arises in December... next month starts a new calendar year;
$5999 more in costs for treatment of the same condition, out of pocket maximum of $6000 never reached.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

And no one else is required to provide services to you when you walk off the street and ask.

Medical bills are far too large, but you should be fair in your criticism. If you make it into an emergency room, treatment is guaranteed yet their payment is not.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Either you pay for it, or someone is working for free.

See how that works? People think it is somehow wrong to charge for essential goods and services, since people would die without them. But if the workers who provide said goods/services don't get paid, they are slaves.

We sweep that under the rug through taxes. We just extract more money from everybody's pay checks (primarily the middle class) to cover the costs. So the service providers aren't working for free, everyone ELSE is spending some of their normal work day, essentially unpaid.

It sucks either way...but...life requires labor so what are you going to do?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[aaarrrgggh]

And it is pretty easy to end up in a situation where the specialist you need to see is not in your network. Even for fairly common (I hate to use the word trivial) problems you can quickly be out $10k; I had an appendicitis (non ruptured) that was billed as $40k for 36h in the hospital, and was still nearly $11k out of pocket... with very good insurance!

It always amazes me when people chose plans that effectively have no out of pocket maximum, although I did have catastrophic insurance only until I was about 35 myself (well pre-ACA).

That reminds me... Tuesday I get to deal with health insurance renewals for the company...

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Absolutely, ACA is a steaming load of carp. I know people that
have gone through stuff like this - they've learned how much isn't
covered. And it's going to get worse (unless Trump fixes it) after
Hussan leaves office. Remember that single-payer plan he promised
before he got elected the first time? We're definitely getting it, but
it's single-payment instead of single-payer. Here's how it will work.
You get a procedure. Insurance pays $$. You have complications.
Insurance pays additional $$ to resolve it. After the "ACA" fix is in,
complication are no longer covered. Period. End of sentence (unless
you're in Congress, then sky's the limit for any medical cost).

CAP === 'vacuum'

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[Zontar The Mindless]

Um, you do realise you're talking about booze and cigarettes, right? Not exactly necessities of life, and nobody's talking about forcing anyone to buy them, are they?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[amiga3D]

Not really. I know a family member who ran up over 100 grand in medical bills. He recovered and found out he was to live. He ended up filing bankruptcy and all that debt magically disappeared. This is what usually happens to ridiculous bills but hey! They get to write that off on their taxes. The amount his insurance company paid was probably sufficient for the actual costs but this way they get to dodge the tax man.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

From the HHS website:

Lifetime & Annual Limits

The Affordable Care Act prohibits health plans from putting annual or lifetime dollar limits on most benefits you receive.

Lifetime Limits
Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, lifetime limits on most benefits are prohibited in any health plan or insurance policy. Previously, many plans set a lifetime limit — a dollar limit on what they would spend for your covered benefits during the entire time you were enrolled in that plan. You were required to pay the cost of all care exceeding those limits.

Annual Limits
The Affordable Care Act bans annual dollar limits that all job-related plans and individual health insurance plans can put on most covered health benefits. Before the health care law, many health plans set an annual limit — a dollar limit on their yearly spending for your covered benefits. You were required to pay the cost of all care exceeding those limits.

So the point remains - there are no annual or lifetime limits allowed by law.

What this suggests is that Barlow is pursuing medically questionable treatments that insurance won't cover, and is asking everybody to pay for his experimental medical journey. Good luck to him, but I'm having trouble mustering a lot of sympathy for his financial straits.

I've just helped get my mother in law (who recently immigrated from Russia) a health care plan... I've been eyeballs-deep in health plan fine print, and there are very reasonable out-of-pocket annual limits on all of these plans, so I'm not exactly sure how he's managing to financially ruin himself, when my mother in law (who is a retired office worker on a ~250 dollar per month russian pension) can get health care that offers her something like a 5k yearly out of pocket maximum. For a lawyer, 5k yearly should not mean financial ruin. My wife and I have decent IT jobs, and support our two kids plus her parents, and 5k yearly wouldn't be ruin for us.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[guruevi]

Well, let me know how one will afford that "out of pocket max" of ~$14k/year + $15k/year for the 'average' insurance cost = $29k in health care costs alone and then you still have to pay several thousands in Medicare (the thing that one time was supposed to be used to pay for 'universal health care'), Social Security and other taxes.

My premiums have risen to ~$1.5k/month for a family (we were promised ~$400 after ACA) and both my deductible (before 1.5k, now 5k) and out of pocket max (before 3k, now 10k) makes health care practically unaffordable, that is because my private insurance now carries the cost of ObamaCare (or so they say) and the maximum limits Obama promised to impose during the proposal of ObamaCare are either non-existent (as in the premium caps) or about 10-100x as high as promised.

The average ACA insurance cost is now ~22% of your wages, where before ACA they were only ~10-15% and will increase to ~27% in the next 5 years.

Insurance used to be affordable before ACA came along, it's just people had the choice and chose not to, Darwinism at it's best I would say. In many cases Medicare and individual states would take care of the 'gaps'.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Harlequin80]

Holy shit are you kidding?!?! $11k for appendicitis???

I knew the US medical system was a mess but that is crazy! My medical insurance is the top everything and it costs me $146 a fortnight for my family of 4. I was involved in a motorcycle accidents that crushed my collar bone and badly dislocated and broke my wrist. The collar bone was just a plate but the wrist required 4 hours of surgery, 6 screws, a plate, 2 k-wires (otherwise called nails), and 6 months of rehab. I was out of pocket about US$300, and that was because I decided I wanted to go to a private hospital rather than a fully free public hospital because they were running 4 days ahead....

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

If they ever stopped buying them, the government would be very unhappy.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

"If you work in a coal mine and have lung problems are you also discarded to die?"

Charge your employer appropriate compensation and it won't be an issue.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi random cocksucker. I dismiss everything you say on the grounds that it has a tinge of penis odor.

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're poor and you have no prospects, then booze becomes pretty fucking necessary.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

the legislators didn't even read it to begin with

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

I live here and he's right.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi there. I don't know much about the US health care system, but shouldn't the Affordable Care Act have fixed that? How can that happen, that he still has huge medical bills? Can somebody please explain?

It did fix that by using government to create a new marketplace out of thin air, where people are coerced into buying something many of them can’t afford to use, and which sellers still lose money selling.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

The fact that you think your charges are modest at $1000 for two hours work shows just how out of touch you all are in the US healthcare system. My wife is a FACEM (Emergency Specialist/Consultant) in NZ -- you guys might call them "attendings", I think in the US) and on locum rates, she is paid NZD 250/hr. That's locum, so probably double normal rates.

The reason your healthcare system is expensive is that it is a giant rort from start to end (driven in large part by the insurers who want it to say expensive for obvious reasons).

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[sjames]

The problem is the amount skimmed off the top by the non-productive 0.1% That's why the cost of everything keeps going even while less labor is required than even before and pay remains stagnant.

If X takes only 75% of the labor it did 10 years ago, but it's 50% more expensive and nobody got a raise, the money went somewhere.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[ctmurray]

The high deductible cheap plans were banned because they excluded "pre-existing conditions". And offered no preventive care treatment for free. I knew people on those plans, $10K deductible. They were pretty young and willing to take the risk. I understand completely. But a goal of the ACA was to get everyone covered (even those with preexisting conditions) and to get people in for preventive care as that is shown to make the entire society healthier.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

The most obvious are that taxpayers shouldn't be forced to subsidize the consequences if your unhealthy lifestyle.

No, the most obvious is that taxpayers shouldn't be forced to subsidize your non-medical, elective body-modification surgery. Consquences of an "unhealthy lifestyle" are less obvious, in part because determining whether any given condition is, in fact, a consequence of lifestyle choices you deliberately made in full knowledge of such is difficult.

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[ctmurray]

I am on the ACA. I had a plan with $6500 deductible. Unfortunately I reached that max, but now everything is 100% covered. Now I paid more per month than $350, and maybe that is why mine has no co-pays after reaching the deductible. I am thinking your parents compared plans and went for the lower amount and risk the co-pay? You should ask them. But one thing people forget is you are paying the "insurers rate". So the $450 blood tests I got, was paid by the insurance at $80. If I had a co-pay it would have been 30% of the $80. So having insurance does benefit you on all these expenses by giving you a big discount on the amount. And F*** the blood testing company for charging some poor person without insurance $450.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Shados]

And yet countries like Canada where I live have a lower healthcare spend per capita

True, though it isn't THAT simple. And this is where it gets complicated.

The national healthcare doesn't pay for dental maintenance (if you have an infection or a car accident and your teeths get knocked out, yeah. But a simple cavity? Fuck you). There is still an amount to pay on medication, and a lot of medications aren't covered. Countless people don't have a family doctor to get the preventive medicine they need.

Line at the ER are absolutely insane if you're not about to die (but you still need to wait forever to see your family doctor, if you even have one, so you have no choice but to go to the ER for things that should not need it).

I was born in Canada and lived there for 20 years. How much I had to pay on my paychecks was more just for my dental insurance than how much I pay for it all in the US. My grandma paid more for minor conditions in medecine than Ive had to pay ever (and I have some serious conditions). And then she died because they made her wait 8 months for a critical surgery because of lack of beds (once she did have a major condition).

And the difference in taxes I pay was so excruciatingly high, I honestly could put half of the difference aside and pay for health care out of my pocket even if I get cancer 6 times because of all the silly things that get paid with it beyond just health care and other actually important things (of course, the US could go a long way by cutting in silly bullshit too)

Yes, overall even with all that, its still better and more fair for everyone overall, and I'd totally take that over the unfair system we have in the US so that everyone can have the basics. But it's not "better in every ways", and it's very easy to see how many human beings, which can be selfish in nature, would vote against it.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[ctmurray]

This use to be the situation, are you sure it still is?. My wife worked in HR at a big company and saw some cases like this. But with the ACA it is our understanding there are no limits. So even insurance by corporations should be covered to no limit. (My wife retired before ACA was passed so no longer has inside information).

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[sjames]

As far as disagreements about treatments go, you can appeal.

You mean you can ask to be told no in another voice? And then you get the bill because the treatment was already done?

The problem in the U.S. is that it IS half assed. The solution is to do the other half. Then there's a single entity with enough bargaining power to keep us from spending 4 times more per capita than any other developed country for healthcare.

The rest of the world manages, are you claiming Americans are uniquely too stupid to manage it?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[ctmurray]

I looked up this point. http://www.hhs.gov/healthcare/... The ACA banned these limits, unless you have a grandfathered in plan. And I would assume those grandfathered plans ran out before 2016. And there is the ability to put limits on non-essential healthcare.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[whoever57]

Private insurance only pays a 3rd of that at most

The one time we saw some numbers, the insurance company paid less than 10% of the total bill, and we paid nothing. It was the hospital charges for a standard room.

I choose to have a high deductible/out of pocket limit ($5k deductible), but most of that amount is covered by contributions to my HSA by my employer. Under every scenario for use of medical services (from no use of medical services, to hitting the out out of pocket limit), I am better off with the high deductible.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[whoever57]

The phonies won't be able to con people into paying millions, because the suckers that fall for these sorts of scams don't have millions.

Steve Jobs?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[ctmurray]

I looked him up, he is 69 yrs old, so should be on Medicare. So we all should be discussing what is covered by Medicare. Long term healthcare is not covered (i.e. nursing homes).

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[whoever57]

$350 a month doesn't get you fuck all.

If you are in your twenties or early thirties, you can get a good individual plan for about $250/month, even in the most expensive part of the USA, I know, because that's how much my daughter pays.

However, for myself and my wife, my employer pays almost $2000/month for a high deductible plan.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[drinkypoo]

All butt-hurt because you don't want to hear the truth about how the Affordable Care Act is the worst health-care plan in the western world, and that even Cuba has free health care for everyone?

Don't forget that they have similar health outcomes for what was it, $5.70/yr/citizen or something?

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly for what is said here but having said that... Now don't make me look for a soap-box about how the fast food industry and the sugary drink (A.K.A. Soda Industry) also "Not exactly the necessities of life" as I'll chime in with another health epidemic... diabetes and obesity... are simultaneously burdening our health care system and killing our citizens.

Peace out.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[drinkypoo]

The most obvious are that taxpayers shouldn't be forced to subsidize the consequences if your unhealthy lifestyle. If you smoke and get lung cancer, tough shit.

Smokers who die of lung cancer tend to have lower lifetime health care expenditure than people who live to a riper, older age. Because, guess what? If you extend people's lives out long enough, they tend to hit the cancer wall anyway. And lung cancer has a higher mortality rate than many of these other cancers (your lungs being quite important) so it kills people quicker. If you want socialized medicine to be cheaper you should encourage smoking.

Obesity related medical issues are your own responsibility as well.

Obesity is curable in at least some situations. It really is not always the person's fault. And in any case, you should want it cured whether it is or not, because that makes health care cheaper in general. You can't successfully and cheaply determine whether many health problems would exist without obesity.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't understand this. Why are mortality rates used to compare health care? I thought that heart disease is mostly brought on by lifestyle, and please note that goddamned US AHA which has had everyone loading up on sugars for the last forty years because some assholes convinced them that science said fats are bad for you. Health care would be whether the heart bypass operation was actually successful. That a higher percentage of the population needs heart bypass operations is much more an effect of the lifestyle (individual choices in diet and exercise), rather than the health care (medical treatments given to patients by medical professionals).

It seems like someone is saying that a slashdotter's decision to eat bags of cheetos and 2-liters of mountain dew every night in their mother's basement is a failure of health care in America.

It's studies like these that make things so confusing with all of the anecdotal data. Countries with much healthier lifestyles can have much shittier health care and still come out winning in biased studies like these. But, I guess we should keep selling the same old shit to the US voters, because why should they be able to have nice things?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[aaarrrgggh]

There was an ambulance involved, but yes. Company plus personal contribution $700/month...

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Canadian system works as long as you don't get really sick. All Canadians that can afford it come to the US when they get really sick. It's well known that just to get an MRI will take literally months in Canada which is why so many Canadians come to the US to pay for MRIs when they get really sick. Socialized medicine is rationed medicine and you never realize that until you get really sick. At that point you if quick action is required to survive Canadians either pay up and come to the US or they take their chances and wait or die.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[quenda]

And yet countries like Canada where I live have a lower healthcare spend per capita, we have a longer life expectancy, and nobody here goes bankrupt from medical conditions.

I think you just described all other developed countries too.
While true that US healthcare is exceptionally expensive, there is not evidence it is to blame for the lower life expectancy in the US.
More road accidents, violence (notably guns), racial mix, and obesity do appear to be factors.

i.e. US healthcare is very effective, just horrifically expensive, both to individuals, and as a percentage of GDP.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Harlequin80]

Ambulance transfers are free in Australia, I hadn't even thought of that. So how does that work? You picked up off the road and they ask for your credit card?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

It sucks either way...but...life requires labor so what are you going to do?

I disagree. Its not "sucking", but rather "basic human decency".

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Eunuchswear]

Socialized medicine doesn't somehow equate to free and unlimited health care. We could spend 100% of GDP on health care and people would still eventually get to a point where there's nothing that can be done.

But that's not the way it works. Socialized medicine costs less that insurance based systems. Partly because it involves less bureaucracy.

I'm going to ignore your sociopathic rant about "unhealthy lifestyles".

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Eunuchswear]

All butt-hurt because you don't want to hear the truth about how the Affordable Care Act is the worst health-care plan in the western world

But, amazingly, still better than what was in place before,

Thanks, Mr Romney!

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[shentino]

All this proves is that the insurance lobby has a deathgrip on politics.

Kowtowing to it is not the right answer. What the US needs to do is break up the cartel and introduce some competition. Insurance companies make obscene profits.

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. Let them go with dignity, however.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

> billing errors

This.

I've always maintained the market place is vastly more efficient at effecting changes than most people are aware.

In particular, don't underestimate the ability of your health insurance company (and your ISP, cell phone provider) to turn bureaucratic incompetence into a profit center.

"Your call is important to us! Did you know that now you can enjoy even more of our trademarked GettingRapedOver plans? Join our elite VIP club and earn Points!...."

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[dfeifer]

The problem is that the "Affordable Healthcare Act" has nothing whatsoever to do with healthcare. It deals specifically with health "Insurance" and still has caps on the maximum lifetime expenditure.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[St.Creed]

I'll repeat: "The Institute of Medicine found that poorer health in the U.S. was not simply the result of economic, social, or racial and ethnic disadvantages—even well-off, nonsmoking, nonobese Americans appear in worse health than their counterparts abroad."

It's not just the lifestyle, even though it *is* worse than that of almost everyone else, but it's *also* the way in which the healthcare is structured that makes it more expensive and still provides a worse outcome for people with health comparable to other countries. If you read the report you see that in the USA there is a tendency towards a lot of very expensive medical equipment that then has to be used, so people get MRI scans where you'd normally get an X-ray or just a doctor looking at your ankle. They're great for catching cancer, but they won't help much for other ailments and are merely very expensive placebos in that case. Americans also tend to be overmedicated with drug prices much higher than anywhere else. That's a bad combination for the patient (but very good for the pharmaceuticals).

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[sjames]

In the U.S. we have the sin taxes but the money isn't being applied to treat the associated health problems.

Re: Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you really that naive?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[LeftCoastThinker]

So Canada is responsible for inventing:

"Horse. Shit. Insulin, Rhogam, the Salk polio vaccine trial, T - cells, AIDS medications, the ebola vaccine, etc."

Pretty sure that you didn't invent horse shit (or is that horses and shit), or T-cells.

95% of the tens of thousands of medications, tests, procedures and medical equipment are developed in the US, even though it is extremely expensive and difficult to do so. So that makes it what 6:40,000 in favor of the US? Most companies don't want to develop in Canada because it is too difficult to make back their money unless they are also concurrently approved by the US FDA. The private US health care system bankrolls all of these things, and we are also the guinea pigs. Those life saving drugs developed in the US go around the globe and save lives.

Why do wealthy Canadians sneak down to the US every day to have medical procedures performed if it is so great in Canada? My guess is you have never had to have a life saving operation and your opinion of Canadian health care is based on the occasional cold and your annual physical?

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[LeftCoastThinker]

I am a fan of capping medical care at some reasonable level once you reach a certain age. We should as a society be willing to pay a million or two to save a child, who has their whole life ahead of them, but once you hit the median life expectancy, you should accept the fact that you are going to die soon. Everyone dies, be thankful that you have now lived longer than half (the day after you pass the median life expectancy). In the US we have socialized medicine for those over 65 (medicare) so the US tax payer ends up paying 20% of all health care spending on 55 million retirees (.37% spent per million people), along with another 16% for medicaid to care for the 65 million poor (0.25% spent per million people). Meanwhile, just 33% is spent on/by private insurance that covers 58% (~186 million; 0.17% spent per million people). So to recap, the working insured are footing 100% of the bill and only receiving 33% of the benefits. Theoretically they will eventually use Medicare as well, if they live long enough.

The problem is that the retired block all votes, so it is the political third rail to talk about capping medical benefits past a certain age. The working insured are the cheapest block to provide health care for. It is also widely known that Medicaid is heavily used by emigrants from other countries either legally or often illegally. Anyone venture a guess as to how often Canada or Mexico puts up with that from a US citizen?

http://kff.org/other/state-ind...

https://www.cms.gov/research-s...

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[BarbaraHudson]

Fair enough. Steve Jobs was a victim of his own Reality Distortion Field.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

You sir, are a cunt. Please try and work out _why_ you are now, before it's too late and you lay there dying with your own words ringing in your ears.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[Anonymous Coward]

"So maybe lead the charge as an ER Doc to bring those costs down? 100,000$ for a few hours? That's criminal,"

And yet we keep arguing instead that the solution is to have the government pay for it. Rather than make the prices sane and reasonable, we instead all love to argue that we should have the government pay the insanely high prices. And although the government has more teeth to drive prices down, they have less incentive. In fact, they have more of an incentive to move money to friends and beneficiaries. So instead of paying $100,000 to the ER docs, it's being paid to the company that donated so much money to the election of the officials.

Ever wonder why the government doesn't come out and say "those prices need to be more reasonable"? It's because that doesn't benefit them. It's better to say "we will pay for your care, beloved voters, regardless of the cost" while at the same time funneling that money to your benefactors. Kill two birds with one stone, quickly help people that will vote for you while finding more money for the people that help you pay to get elected.

Anyone who seriously thinks that elected officials push for government payer options are doing so to benefit the sick is delusional about politics and has been drinking the kool-aid that they pass out at rallies.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[fahrbot-bot]

You highlight one of the problems: too much complexity. Nobody should have to worry about "deductibles" or "calendar years" or any of that shit.

Things are about to get a little simpler. According to this NY Times article: HealthCare.gov Will Add ‘Simple Choice’ Plans in Effort to Improve Value

“All Simple Choice plans in the same category (like Silver) have exactly the same core benefits, deductibles and co-payments,” states a message to be displayed on the federal website. “When viewing Simple Choice plans, you can focus on other important features that may be different: monthly premiums, additional services covered, doctor and hospital networks.”

Under the standardized version of a silver plan, co-payments would be $30 for a visit to a primary care doctor, $65 for a visit to a specialist, $15 for a generic prescription drug, $50 for a preferred brand-name drug and $100 for a non-preferred brand-name drug. Consumers may be responsible for up to 40 percent of the cost of specialty drugs, including certain high-cost medicines for cancer, rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis.

For the lowest-income families, the charges would be lower.

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[fahrbot-bot]

Socialized medicine doesn't somehow equate to free and unlimited health care. We could spend 100% of GDP on health care and people would still eventually get to a point where there's nothing that can be done.

The most obvious are that taxpayers shouldn't be forced to subsidize the consequences if your unhealthy lifestyle.

People need to be more realistic about medical outcomes and doctors need to be more straight-forward with patents. According to many articles, a LOT of health care spending in on (usually) elderly people during their last year of life. From the articles mentioned below: (Google: end of life care costs:

Medicare, the health insurance program for the elderly, spends nearly 30 percent of its budget on beneficiaries in their final year of life. Slightly more than half of Medicare dollars are spent on patients who die within two months.

But the costs of patients in critical care with chronic disease and multi-organ failure — heavily the elderly and those for whom death is a common but not an immediate outcome — are exceedingly high. The top 5 percent of such patients account for nearly half of spending (more than $600 billion a year), ... Those patients are typically the ones whose doctors do not level with them or their families that their chances are not good, and who are put in hospice programs much later than they should be.

• http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/11/opinion/costs-of-medical-care-at-the-end-of-life.html?_r=0
• https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2690284/
• http://www.thirteen.org/bid/sb-howmuch.html

My wife Susan died, literally in my arms, on Jan 13, 2006 of brain tumor, just seven weeks after diagnosis. She had a Glioblastoma Multiforme (GBM), for which (basically) no one lives past two years and even that is with constantly declining quality of life, and it was right next to her brain stem. As a result, she declined surgery as it wouldn't have extended her life by much and would have left her severely impaired - she didn't want to live or be remembered like that.

Remember Sue...

Re:Why not covered by insurance?

[fahrbot-bot]

The WHO who isn't some random person on a forum rank Canada 7 nations ahead of the USA in its global rankings.

I've never understood why a band is making these kind of decisions.

Glad I don't live in the US...

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, complain as much as you want about it, socialized health care is the best thing a country can do for its people.
That and actually regulating the pricing on medical hardware/drugs, it's ridiculously overpriced in the US compared to the same service in say, Canada, without insurances.

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[BarbaraHudson]

For every dollar drug companies spend in research, development, and testing to meet FDA requirements, they spend $4 on marketing. That's why your drug costs are crazy, and why your national broadcasters are addicted to the money that comes from pimping some drug or other that is probably not much more effective (or even less effective) than the one you're already on.

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[jedidiah]

Drug companies spend about 60 BILLION per year on R&D.

MY drug costs are crazy because I have a rare condition and I'm shocked to have ANY drugs developed for me and mine. The small company that "robs" my peeps puts half a BILLION back into R&D.

There are several other companies lining up trying to make better drugs.

Socialism certainly isn't doing this. Otherwise it would be Finland doing all the work.

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[Stephan Schulz]

Socialized Heath Care is more efficient too. The waiting rooms double as morgues!

Socialised health care is not perfect, but it typically has a much better outcome for the average patient - both per dollar and absolutely. The US is neck and neck with Cuba in health care effectiveness (see e.g. this Forbes article). It spends 17.9% of the GDP on health care - Cuba spends 10% And since GDP per person is around US$55000 for the US, US$6700 for Cuba, the Cuban system is about 15 times more efficient.

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[BarbaraHudson]

Drug companies spend about 60 BILLION per year on R&D.

MY drug costs are crazy because I have a rare condition and I'm shocked to have ANY drugs developed for me and mine. The small company that "robs" my peeps puts half a BILLION back into R&D.

There are several other companies lining up trying to make better drugs.

Socialism certainly isn't doing this. Otherwise it would be Finland doing all the work.

If it's that rare, then it's covered by the orphan drugs program. The company got PAID to develop it via direct government subsidies, So what's that about socialism again? Because the government paying industry to develop drugs certainly sounds socialist to me.

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[dunkelfalke]

So you think every drug in existence was developed in the usa?

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[drinkypoo]

Drug companies spend about 60 BILLION per year on R&D.

They spend far more on marketing. And through lobbying, they have created a system that actually reduces drug quality year by year. The way it works is that the bar for bringing a derivative of an existing drug to market is much, much lower than bringing a new drug to market. You don't have to prove that it works even as well as the old drug; indeed, you don't have to make any proof of its efficacy at all. You only need to "show" in a FDA-approved clinical trial that it doesn't kill more people than the old drug. Literally.

MY drug costs are crazy because I have a rare condition and I'm shocked to have ANY drugs developed for me and mine.

If you took the profit motive out of medicine then the research would be done at public schools and universities just like it is now. The difference is that we'd have to come up with some other mechanism for funding the development of a practical drug than buying second and third yachts for some already very wealthy white people. And yes, they are all white people, and many of those corporations have incredibly checkered pasts... especially IGF and Bayer, but not at all limited to those two.

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[Anonymous Coward]

Socialism certainly isn't doing this. Otherwise it would be Finland doing all the work.

Ah. But it is.
http://www.hs.fi/kotimaa/a1421644822218
Compare that to the population and salary levels, and come back and bash socialism then...

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[Anonymous Coward]

WTF is it about the american psyche that sees socialized health care as some sort of identity destroying menace?

If your against all things "socialized" then you should immediately vote to privatize your courts, your fire departments, your police, your elementary and high schools, and ALL of you fucking military and not just a few contractors around the edges. Oh and while your at it privatize your sewer system. Then when your poor neighbour spends their life savings to recover from a simple accident and can't pay their sewer bill you can smell at all day long.

Either socializing services is all good or its all bad or it is case by case. If it is case by case, then fucking look at the health care case. Your health care system is stupid and broken and if you got your head out of your ass long enough and looked around the world you would see that there are people doing it a fuck of a lot better then the USA is. Or is that the problem? Are you so pickled in patriotism that you can't admit that your not the best at everything.

Living next to you is very hard sometimes.

 

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[Anonymous Coward]

there is no advancement i medical care with socialized medicine. The rules only deal with what is available at the moment. Things like lasik eye surgery - where early adopters paved the way for others - may never have had a chance in today's regulated environment. There is a reason people come to the united states for treatment.

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[Anonymous Coward]

We have already seen the failures of a government run system in the united states - its called the veterans affairs hospitals. The patient is no longer in charge of, connected to or responsible for their care. There is more incentive to fake lists than help people. It is better to buy art than medical supplies.

Since when do you want the government to get in the way of your medical care?

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[Anonymous Coward]

In australia receiving my free health care in a public hospital I was in a room with five other patients, they were all had private health insurance. Every one of them spent the entire 2 months I was there whinging about how they were meant to have a private room, how the food was terrible and the tv reception was terrible.

Why were they there? the private hospital couldnt provide the service they needed, didn't have the right doctors, appropriate theatres.

In australia you pay money to get second rate treatment in a private hospital, if your really sick, you go to the public hospital.

Re:Glad I don't live in the US...

[Anonymous Coward]

Start with number 2 (regulating pricing) then we can move slowly forward from there. Introducing socialized medicine into the U.S. is like teaching a 4 year old to ride a motorcycle before they've ever learned to ride a bike. American's need some training wheels first.

what do you mean

[Anonymous Coward]

Performers will include Bob Weir (also of The Grateful Dead), Jerry Harrison (of The Talking Heads), Lukas Nelson, Members of The String Cheese Incident, Sean Lennon and Les Claypool, plus 85-year-old folk singer Ramblin' Jack Elliott, as well as "special guests."

Also of the Grateful Dead? Is the asshole wanting free money a member of the Grateful Dead?

Re:what do you mean

[Anonymous Coward]

JPB has written lyrics for the Grateful Dead. https://w2.eff.org/Misc/Public... ...and despite (in his words) dead for about eight minutes, he didn't find himself in a shaft of light. http://ultimateclassicrock.com...

Good luck to him

[boojumbadger]

I wonder, though how likely it is that any regular person would be able to get anyone else to pay their bills.

Re:Good luck to him

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder, though how likely it is that any regular person would be able to get anyone else to pay their bills.

Survival of the richest/most popular!

Re:Good luck to him

[ColdWetDog]

See my post above. Although most people cannot motivate ex-Grateful Dead artists it seems to be something of a cottage industry at various Elk Clubs, American Legion Posts and social institutions of similar persuasions.

And that's pretty sad.....

Re:Good luck to him

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder, though how likely it is that any regular person would be able to get anyone else to pay their bills.

A regular person just goes bankrupt and if they can't, well they just stiff the hospital, the providers, etc .... and good luck getting medical care after that. We do live in a society where there's databases on everything and everyone.

Too many providers are scared shitless of "socialized" medicine. They'll bitch and moan about "student loans" but my wife's lawyer's wife (a surgeon), called up her student loan company after a year or so after her surgical residency, asked for the payoff amount, wrote a check, and knocked off her student loans - all of $175K+ of them. Yeah, she worked her ass off. but her salary is mid low-mid six figures which is awesome money here in Metro Atlanta.

Re:Good luck to him

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder, though how likely it is that any regular person would be able to get anyone else to pay their bills.

That is one of the problems with using an insurance based funding rather than a tax based one.
With the insurance based one there will always be people who aren't covered, either because they neglected to get an insurance or because the insurance company found a way to weasel themselves out of their promises.
Either way you will either have a society where people are left dying on the streets or there will be a bunch of people that will have to rely on charity for survival.
Unfortunately it is problematic to get assholes to donate to charities that benefits others so the entire cost is dumped over to nice people.

A tax based system screws everyone over equally. An insurance based system screws over nice people more in favor of greedy assholes.

Re: Good luck to him

[Anonymous Coward]

The gofundme campaigns are very popular as well. We had a family friend whose 4 year old had cancer. They started a go fund me. It's for a good cause.

Re:Good luck to him

[jedidiah]

People put up charity drives all the time. If you're particularly sympathetic, or you can draw from some tight knit ethnic group, you can attract a great deal of money.

Some idiot lawyer from California that should have known better is probably not terribly sympathetic.

Re:Good luck to him

[Lord Flipper]

I wonder, though how likely it is that any regular person would be able to get anyone else to pay their bills.

It is not difficult to find non-celebrities out there in the real world who have overwhelming medical/recovery needs. It does require minimal effort, of course, which stops a huge number of potential donors, but the key word there is *minimal*. I'm on Social Security, myself, and have been contributing to several individuals' funds, for the last couple of years, to allow them to recover from severe medical emergencies.

Sure, I have to think twice about some superfluous outlays (for instance, I'm still happily using an iPhone 5S, with an eye on an SE...), but again, the effort is minimal. I'm in a fortunate position, to be sure, and not all of us can make these types of choices. That's understandable; but to think that only the rich and famous have access to community aid, is an inaccurate oversimplification of the actual situation.

But, Obamacare

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't we all get free healthcare and every child is above average?

torn on this one.

[Anonymous Coward]

On one hand, this guy has done more for humanity than most, given he's a founder of the EFF, which is fighting the good fight around internet based human rights.

On the other, most people don't get to have their own "benefit concert" when they rack up big medical bills. (Yeah, yeah, I'm sure the US healtlh care system will be hashed within an inch of its life in this thread).

So... are some people more deserving than others, based on what they've accomplished? They're asked for voluntary contributions, and shit I'm inclined, given all what the org he started has done, but is preferential treatment really a good idea?

Re:torn on this one.

[ColdWetDog]

There most certainly is preferential treatment. If you have money, you can get lots of treatment. If you have social contacts, you might get some help (better to have money, it's more consistent).

Even in the Socialist Democracies with government controlled health care systems, the Golden Rule still applies. You can always pay extra for shiny stuff. The sad part about American Healthcare is that you really need to be in the top 5% before you can be assured that a medical issue won't bankrupt you. That's a pretty damning number.

For most Americans in this sort of condundrum, the most effective thing to do is to declare bankruptcy. Of course, that is a harsh punishment in an of itself but it seems to be the preferred way to go.

Then you can get on Medicaid (the State / Federal low income medical insurance system) and get free - and fairly high quality** - healthcare for life.

** Can depend dramatically on your location, religious preference and citizenship status. YMMV. Do Not Taunt Happy Fun Ball.

Re:torn on this one.

[BarbaraHudson]

The average person can live without the internet, and their quality of life would probably improve. Overall, it's caused more harm than good. See Internet Dysphoria

Re:torn on this one.

[Anonymous Coward]

given he's a founder of the EFF, which is fighting the good fight around internet based human rights.

The pope should canonize the whole organization. You believe in the Saints don't you?

Re:torn on this one.

[rbrander]

I'm not aware of a fully socialist country, much less a fully socialist democracy. No, really, look it up. The wikipedia still has the clear, original definition of "socialism": the government owns every store, factory, and farm. Every business and employment of every kind is a government department. That's what Russia was "soviet socialist" republic. "Communism" is about living communally, eating communally, like the Spartans and the Amish.

So Americans looking to denigrate promoted both words downward. Socialist Russia (which never reached 100% socialism, there were always private businesses) was called "Communist Russia", though only a few of their farm communities were communes. And countries with high levels of social services like Sweden got tagged with the "socialist" label, when it was a wild exaggeration for having some government departments much larger than American counterparts...rather the way America had a much larger department of defense than Sweden. (I consider it harmless, fun,trolling to refer to America's "Socialist Army" and "Socialist NSA", forgive me.)

Every time I hear countries with higher levels of social services than America called "Socialist", I check Wikipedia again to see if the dictionaries have thrown up their arms and accepted this as the new meaning of "Socialist", but, nope, you're still saying that Canada must have a Government Department of Food Growing and the Government Department of Car Making.

Now that America is waaay out there as a bizarre outlier in medical care systems, honestly, it's America that should have the funny adjective in front of the name. But we need to ditch the "ist" adjectives that are just too sweeping and prone to wrong interpretation. "Low-Service Democracy" vs "High Service Democracy" ?

OH, and incidentally, if you imagine that your government doesn't "Control the Health Care System" in America, you're blind. Medicare may only be for 65+, but because those are the people that need the most care, that's half the medical work. Not to forget that the government licenses all the physicians, approves all the drugs and medical equipment, and on and on. They control it without paying for it. They call the tune without paying the piper...generally a bad feedback loop.

Re:Watch Forks over Knives

[Anonymous Coward]

life without steak and ice cream sucks but death is worse.

Lies!

Profound

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder, though how likely it is that any regular person would be able to get anyone else to pay their bills.

Survival of the richest/most popular!

The most succinct and profound commentary on our medical system in the USA that I have ever seen.

neuromancer

[Anonymous Coward]

Dixie Flatline? Is that You?

More Class Privilege

[macraig]

So he's exploiting his class and privilege to "benefit" whom? Himself. How noble of him. Is his continued delay of inevitable death at this late stage of his life so crucial to civilization that it warrants exploitation of funds from a massive benefit concert that could likely save hundreds or thousands of "less important" lives if used more ethically?

Re:More Class Privilege

[Anonymous Coward]

He seems just a bit self-entitled. Demands his "ascending light"/"cheap carnival ride" from God even after death... thankfully denied.

Re:More Class Privilege

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, it is MUCH more noble to demand tax increases on the middle class so you would never have to pay for medical bills at all. This putting on a concert to get people to willingly donate money who want to help him shows what schmucks they are. They should instead have the IRS just garnish wages from working people until his medical bills are paid for.

You are FAR more generous by suggesting other people pay for medical treatment without their consent or willingness instead of donating money yourself because you believe it is a good cause.

Bonus points if you call anyone who points this out greedy!

Re:More Class Privilege

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently you think there's some correspondence between what you are saying he said, and what he said.

There isn't.

I took it more as suggesting acknowledging that as one's personal health costs to delay the inevitable rise toward infinite, maybe it's time to acknowledge death happens and others will benefit from the money more than oneself. Probably right.

Sorry man this is America

[thegarbz]

Why don't you just roll over and die like the rest of us who can't afford medical bills?

Or just move to a country with a sane health system, rather than the best health system in the world*.

*As voted by the US Medical magazine.

Re:Sorry man this is America

[thegarbz]

I was going for -1 Sad , but got +5 Funny. Man we live in a fucked up world.

Re:Sorry man this is America

[fedos]

What really makes this sad is that here's a guy who can't afford to pay his medical bills while being privileged and connected enough to be able to organize a benefit concert.

JPB and I share several things,

[Anonymous Coward]

not the least of which is the sudden loss of a partner. Much of what you have here on /. is the result of the work of earnest joyful self-taught noob people from his era and ilk. I'll be giving what I can to help.

Re:He could move to a civilized country

[Anonymous Coward]

The famous "USA! USA! USA!, -1" moderation.

America = dead without money

[TractorBarry]

How utterly barbaric is the USA ? One of the most technologically advanced societies on the planet yet you can die because you have no money and are unfortunate enough to need medical treatment..

And all you stupid brainwashed Yanks claim your health care is better than the rest of the world ? Really ? You must love the taste of that Kool aid.

Oh sorry I forgot socialism (or all joining in to do something together) = bad in your tiny minds.

Thank fuck I live in England where we have the utterly civilized NHS. Thankfully I've been lucky enough (so far) to only pay into the system without needing much myself but I know people who've needed treatment, sometimes quite expensive treatment, and I'm proud to say that my taxes helped pay for them. I will be happy to spend my whole life paying into the NHS without ever needing it myself.

Your American medical "system" is a fucking joke. It's like something out of the middle ages.

Re:America = dead without money

[Anonymous Coward]

They spend a huge amount of more money and time on their personal health care, than Europeans, yet they die sooner. Their health care is pretty crap in general, even if you have money.

Re:America = dead without money

[jedidiah]

That would be the same utterly civilized NHS where expensive cancer drugs are denied to patients. The same NHS where doctors need to go on strike. The same NHS where you need to pay for your own diagnostic procedures. The same NHS where orthopedic surgeries are being rationed.

The same NHS where I personally know someone who had to get a mortgage on his house to pay for treatment.

Europe is great so long as you've never been there, have no friends or family there, or have never read their own press.

Re: America = dead without money

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know anyone who's had to pay for a diagnostic procedure. Or had to sell their house for NHS treatment. And you do know the British press is 90% super right wing & run by foreign billionaires who hate anything that benefits the people, dont you?

British oik here.

Re:America = dead without money

[thegarbz]

The same NHS where you need to pay for your own diagnostic procedures.

Wow. You just replied with THAT in THIS article?

Re:America = dead without money

[Type44Q]

Your American medical "system" is a fucking joke. It's like something out of the middle ages.

Rather like a monarchy... ;)

Re:America = dead without money

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmmm, you do know that you are free to have insurance in the UK to pay for procedures if you so desire? The NHS covers 99% of procedures for the majority of the population. Not everything is covered, but almost everything is.

Or you could have the US system, where nothing is covered, unless you pay for it.

And you think your system is better? You really are brainwashed mad people.

Re:America = dead without money

[radish]

I've lived in both and used both medical systems. I'd take the NHS over United/Cigna/BCBS and all the other crooks over here any day. I've no idea where you get your info about the UK but it's wrong.

Re:America = dead without money

[rkww]

At least with a monarchy we don't have to elect a President every four years ;)

Re:America = dead without money

[Cederic]

That would be the same utterly civilized NHS where expensive cancer drugs are denied to patients

Fortunately the same US healthcare options are also available in the UK, so if you don't feel the NHS is meeting your needs, pay for private cover too.

Re:America = dead without money

[sjames]

Dig deeper. Some of those expensive cancer drugs have a cure rate of zero and on average buy 3 months worth of agonizing semi-conscious death in exchange for literally everything you and your children have. Most doctors who have seen someone on them fill out a living will to make sure they'll never be put on them.

They only exist because when the time comes, few who are personally involved can quite bring themselves to affirmatively let a loved one die even if that death is inevitable and actually the best of a small selection of terrible options.

The NHS doesn't deal in those drugs.

Meanwhile, you act as if medical bankruptcy and having to pay for diagnostic procedures isn't an every day occurrence in the U.S.

Re:America = dead without money

[Anonymous Coward]

>The same NHS where I personally know someone who had to get a mortgage on his house to pay for treatment

The same NHS which treats 1 million patients free every 36 hours.

The Concept of Insurance is Lost On You

[Anonymous Coward]

You seem really unclear on the concept of insurance.

If participating in any behavior that increases your risk for a health event disqualifies you from coverage for treatment then either no one would qualify for any coverage at all or we would all have to live cocooned in some hypothetically coocoon of perfect safety that ensures just the right amount of physical and mental activity and consumption of just the right amount of all nutrients.

The entire point of insurance is that there are outliers and that the cost of outliers is amortized across the entire group. The penalty for engaging in risky behaviors is suffering the consequences - the only thing worse than surviving a heart attack is dying from a heart attack. Getting emphysema or COPD from too much smoking is its own punishment even if there is treatment to reduce the effects. Breaking your back and being paralyzed because you went sky-diving one too many times is enough of a just desert all on its own even with daily physical therapy, a free wheel-chair and regular home-visits from a health aide.

and socialized medical sucks?

[Anonymous Coward]

the system is completely flawed when money and profit comes before care.

Re: The Trumpites

[Anonymous Coward]

Likely because there are over a hundred wars being actively fought right now, and Muslims are involved in about 85% of them.

You know, the Religion of Peace.

In America

[Anonymous Coward]

once your health problems are gone, capitalism will take their place. Have the lobbyists and lawmakers made sure that your family and distant relatives inherits your medical debt yet? It's almost as if it's easier and kinder to just let go and die.

Re:In America

[jedidiah]

That's what bankruptcy is for you stupid fool.

So what's the big deal about it anyways? Europeans don't have anything anyways. So why is it a big deal having nothing here? It's not a death mark. It's just a way to get out from under your debts.

Going broke in the US is not so bad really.

Re:In America

[speedlaw]

do you actually live in the US ? this is a shit country to be poor in.

Re:In America

[Anonymous Coward]

Visit any country in Africa or most of Latin America. The poor in the US are upper middle class there. And, would be 1%s in India.
Get out more. Read left wing bullshit less.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:He could move to a civilized country

[jedidiah]

I have bigger medical bills. Probably spent more time in the hospital. Had a more serious condition. Have had to deal with it for longer.

This jackass is a fucking loser. He's not the class of people that government rescue programs are meant to benefit. He's from the class of people that should be able to fend for themselves. He should be able get out of this kind of thing and be able to pay for OTHER people's treatment both directly and through taxes.

This schmuck points to a problem with Americans, not the healthcare system.

Re:Watch Forks over Knives

[Anonymous Coward]

Ssssh! We're only allowed to bring out alcohol and drugs when talking about unhealthy lifestyles!

We Need Single-Payer

[techdolphin]

Nobody in the USA should have to worry about paying medical bills. We need a single-payer health care system.

A single-payer system would:
—Cover everybody
—Eliminate co-pays and deductibles making health care affordable and accessible to everybody
—Increase freedom by allowing people to choose any doctor or hospital
—Reduce overall medical costs for the nation
—Prevent the nation going bankrupt from excessive health care costs

Eventually, we will move to a single-payer system because financially we will have no choice.

Re:We Need Single-Payer

[Shados]

Having lived in a country with single payer health care, and now being a permanent US resident, I think it's a little oversimplifying.

While the benefits of a single payer system is obvious to me, the US isn't a simple country. Some shit doesn't work here for the same (unfortunate) reasons a lot of things don't work in China or in African nations.

All governments are corrupt to some degrees, but the US is really corrupt. All countries have some form of immigration related challenges, but among 1st world countries, the US has one of the more complicated situations in that regard (at least over a long period of time...obviously the refugee situation isn't as bad). The multi-culturalism, 2 party political system, lawyer driven decision making, etc, all make it really hard to implement something like it.

Even if you could magically strike the country with a wand and have a system overnight, it would be drastically worse than anything you're seeing in Europe or Canada (and in many of those countries, the systems aren't exactly great).

Does it have to happen? Yes, of course, its inevitable (unless the US goes bankrupt first). It won't happen overnight though, and countless of problems have to be taken care of first.

Two Years Ago, This Happened to Me

[LoginOrSignup]

Not an infarction though. I was also dead for 8 Minutes. I was 35 and was in good health, maybe 20lbs more than ideal for my height, I swam and cycled a few times a week. But there you go, I coded and died. CPR was performed, then I self-resuscitated (doctors words, not mine), but had presented complete heart failure (everything inconclusive, viral cardio myopathy and myocarditis are the likely causes - but I don't smoke, do drugs and don't really drink that often). I had huge clots in my ventricles.

The doctors were surprised that I had survived - bi-ventricle failure has a very minute chance of survival. I was fortunate, though. I coded at the hospital as I had checked myself in thinking I just had pneumonia (I also hadn't slept in a month). I woke up a week later. Barlow said there are no angels, cherubs, etc. He's right. There's nothing - and if there was something it was straight out of that hallway in Beetlejuice. But that was really just me barely conscious while I was medically sedated. I will say that if you have a bad doctor they can kill you all the same even if you do code there. The ED doc was ignoring me and a friend (who is a also a doctor - and could pass for Greg House) showed up to take charge when the ED doctor tried to brush my friend off and said, "Everyone here is sick." That ED doc was let go not long after that.

I was on ECMO then I was put on a bi-vad and expected to have one path: to transplant. But I was fortunate, I recovered and the bi-vad was explanted. That's just as rare to happen as surviving massive cardiac arrest. At my hospital, I was one of four patients out of ~100 who were explanted without a transplant over 15 years. I was on the transplant list, however and the transplant team was ready to promote me to 1A when my echo and right-heart cath showed massive improvement. Not everything is perfect, I'm still on the list - it's just something that I'm going to have to deal with further down the line. Over a calendar year, I totaled maybe 10 or 11 weeks in the hospital. ICU, step-down and physical therapy for the first go around because I had atrophy from being immobile for 8 days.

With insurance, I was fortunate. I was fully covered. I might not have a ridiculously paying job, but my company did go for the best benefits packages. My out of pocket for all of this was less than $1,000 (most of that was meds and follow up appointments - none was the actual stay in the hospital). It's scary to me that when the time actually comes for a transplant (for me it's not if, it's just when) that my insurance situation will have changed. With my current plan, I've been approved. I don't need one right now, but when the time comes, what then?

What's even worse, IMHO, is that the doctors, nurses, transplant team, etc. know this and really can't do anything except to tell you to fundraise if you don't have the money. They even have seminars and tell you to use gofundme and other crowdsourcing avenues to raise money. All the people I've met who had been on the list for years on various VADs or pic lines for a near constant stream of medicine who couldn't afford to live was humbling when I had it relatively easy. The anger, pain, and confusion of the unknown is just starting to sink in for me now that I'm actually planning long term for this and it's changed what I thought was a plan to get married and have a family. Now I'm second guessing that entirely because I can't stand the thought of someone potentially being burdened financially or emotionally with what I have to deal with.

I wish Barlow all the best and hope he succeeds in his fund raising for his costs. I wish it was that easy for more people who end up in situations like this.

Wow, I did not expect to write all of this. I just realized I've never spoken publicly (even anonymously) about what I've been through.

Re: Two Years Ago, This Happened to Me

[Anonymous Coward]

Cool story.

Re:Two Years Ago, This Happened to Me

[Anonymous Coward]

I've set myself up as DNR and have good life insurance so my wife can make do without my income.

Oops

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh gosh, if only he lived in a modern, first-world-country, with universal medical cover.

Re:The Trumpites

[Anonymous Coward]

you mean the FBI is at play, again

You aren't a consumer here

[speedlaw]

I love the "consumer" model of health care....guess what, you aren't. Medical stuff is the only thing you cannot price shop or even compare. Even if you could, the hospital will charge you differently for different insurers...and as I found out once....if you don't hit the deductable (five stitches from a minor accident) you don't even get your insurance company rates (all that money and I'm not even in the Buyer's Club ?) When you get really sick, every single thing you use is billed. Bed. Docs...Drugs...machines (and when a relative had a breast biop done, they charged for each use of the machine, not just "turn on and use". No normal person can keep track of this, and the hospitals know it. Insurers, who have an idea, will fight tooth and nail on costs and fees. What we end up with now is two tiers. If you can get into or afford private insurance, not an ACA plan, you are working for Government or a very large company. If you don't, you are stuck with an ACA plan, which will NOT cover a majority of your doctors, or even possibly the hospital. Yes, folks who work for Govt. or big companies are still somewhat protected from the health insurance nightmare. So, yes, it is very conceivable that this person is getting nailed by "out of network" charges. When you are laying in a hospital bed, you don't ask the attending if they take Aetna or Blue Cross, and send them hither if they say no. For years, US insurers have benefited by their claims practices, fobbing off the poor and old on the Government, and skimming the cream of "healthy" risk pools. The ACA stopped the worst practices, but also forced anyone who could to leave the exchange plans. I got an ACA plan once. Every single provider..my kids pediatrician....wife's ob/gyn....my GP...the allergiest "oh we're sorry we don't accept any insurance from the exchange". You are all the access of a Medicaid patient but you pay full price for the lack of services....and I used to pay 1/3 the price for the same docs to smile at me and take a $20 copay...so an ACA plan is a non-starter in the NYC area and I'd seriously consider paying the tax penalty if I was unable to get coverage elsewhere. The insurance industry has managed to propagandize the low information bits of our population to not want "socialist" medicine. I've been exposed to the Canada and German systems...while not perfect, they are a hell of a lot more fair and reasonable than the mosh that we have here in the US...the only folks who are "OK" are the Big Company and Government policy people. All the rest are one illness away from a trip to Bankruptcy Court. Thank the Bush Administration for not allowing negotiation of drug prices, and the Obama Administration for the ACA and tax penalty. The lack of a 'government option' was clearly designed to make sure there wasn't competition or any reliable measure of the private industry practices. At a very minimum, there should be published price schedules at hospitals, a right to sue health insurers for poor claims practices or denial of vital services, and one single payer pool, not the cherry picking of the healthy. After all, if you limit coverage to folks who can work a 40 hour week, you've just cut off most of your expensive patients...and insurance companies have gotten away with this far too long.

Re:You aren't a consumer here

[Anonymous Coward]

Why are you against freedom? Do you need government (i.e. me and everybody else) to wipe your ass?

That's what you get for being a fat slob.

[Anonymous Coward]

You can sit arouind on the sofa all day eating, smoking, and playing with your tablet. Or youi can choose to spend part of your day doing some physical activity, like take a walk. Too much laziness, too much web surfing, too much smoking will kill you. Put down that twinkie, fatso!

Re:That's what you get for being a fat slob.

[speedlaw]

Marathon runners get heart attacks, and folks who eat healthy get cancers too. Illness isn't always "your fault". You could cross the street today, look both ways, in a crosswalk and green light, and get seriously messed up by an uninsured and stolen car. just sayin...

US spends more, gets less

[illtud]

https://ourworldindata.org/the...

Don

[Anonymous Coward]

Has The Donald grabbed you by the pussy?

He bought is ticket

[Anonymous Coward]

Threw his lot in with silicon valley scum, knew what he was getting into, I say let him die

Insecure

[Anonymous Coward]

The great irony that the donation page isn't https protected.

D'oh

Re: The Trumpites

[Anonymous Coward]

But most fomented by others

Preview of Socialized medicine in the US?

[Anonymous Coward]

Posters need to visit an ER sometime. Note how many people come in with small problems or children with runny noses. It makes no sense until you realize that most are either on Medicaid or have no money. Both will see a Doc, neither will pay. How do you run a business like this? Charge the government, existing insured people, and/or raise rates for everyone.
For a preview of Socialized medicine, visit Maui in Hawaii some time. State supported medical care. Heaven for many posting here!

My wife tore a muscle while jogging in west Maui, on a Sunday. No medical care of any type on that side of the island open on Sunday. Need to drive 45 minutes to other side of island. ER is stuffed with mostly Pacific Islanders. Entire families come! A party in the waiting room. We were quoted four hours to see a doc, as there were a dozen kids with runny noses ahead of us. After an hour, the nurse saw my wife in pain and managed to get her in unnoticed, as the wrath of those extremely large people would have been great if someone in real pain was ahead of the wet-nosed grandson.
After another hour, we saw a doc. He immediately gave my wife pain meds and a temp cast to get us home the next day. He apologized for the wait and indicated he was the only doctor on duty... for the ENTIRE HOSPITAL. That is right, ONE doctor.
Why?
'Look at the waiting room', he said. 'Free healthcare is free, people do not see why they should be prudent'. The system is maxed out. The new 'Commons'.
We can argue all day about options on healthcare. But when it is free, one doctor in a hospital and a four hour wait will be the norm. And, if you are over 65, the Canadian 'death panels' will apply.

wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

An ACA compliant plan has a maximum out of pocket of 13660 and unlimited payout

plain medicare worse than ACA

[Anonymous Coward]

Limits on hospital stays. Only pay 90% (paid 0% before Bush fix).
Drugs going into six figures mean five figure copay.

John Perry Barlow

[bird]

He gave one of the most memorable and insightful talks I've ever heard, this at the 1994 Usenix Technical Conference. This was before the tragic consequences of "intentional communities" was evident to any but deep thinkers like JPB. We need people like him on our side. I hope this works out well for him.

Oh, Cassidy...

[scooterTrash]

All the best JPB. I named my son after one of your 'Dead songs: Cassidy. I recall reading a Reason article with JPB: The backstory there was how he’d spoken to Douglas Adams (Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy) just before DA passed away. DA had begun “working out” and had a massive heart attack. JPB was going to re-invent himself, hence the JPB 2.0 http://reason.com/archives/200...