Posted in Communism/Socialism, health care, insurance, politics, tagged AmeriFlex, Bill Good, CDHC, Cherry Hill, consumer driven health care, Craig Clayton, Doctorpricing.com, election, FSA, government, health care, HRA, hsa, inflation, Kansas City, Missouri, New Jersey, oil, Philadelphia, presidential, Third Party Administrator, TPA, welfare state, William Short on June 1, 2008 | No Comments »
Hello all. It’s been well over a month since I last blogged. A lot has happened that is preventing me from pontificating as much as I would like. First, I moved from Kansas City, Missouri to Cherry Hill, New Jersey, a suburb of Philadelphia. My doctorpricing.com partners (William Short , Craig [...]
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Posted in bioehtics, health care, insurance, markets, medicare, research discussion, wealth, tagged doctor, hospital, government, medicare, bloomberg, patient, health care, Saudi Arabia, medical care, globalization, Aetna, price transparency, Medical Tourism, Thomas Black, insurance companies, Health Net, Blue Cross Blue Shield, Yosef Woodman, Patients Beyond Borders, Mexico, Singapore, Turkey, Brazil, medical malpractice, blood transfusion, Angioplasty on March 26, 2008 | 7 Comments »
Medical Tourism isn’t like regular tourism. It’s a euphemism for traveling to a foreign country for more affordable medical care. And with skyrocketing health care costs in the United States, it’s becoming a reality. Thomas Black of Bloomberg News writes that insurance companies are now offering plans that include procedures in foreign countries, in exchange [...]
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Posted in Communism/Socialism, health care, insurance, markets, medicare, politics, research discussion, tagged government, medicare, health care, economy, income tax, New York Times, transparency, Medicaid, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, medical care, preventative care, free market, Greece, Doctorpricing.com, Robert Pear, federal, Iraq War, defense spending, peace dividend, Soviet Union, Cold War, Congressional Budget Office, black hole on March 9, 2008 | 2 Comments »
Robert Pear’s New York Times article about Hillary Clinton’s and Barack Obama’s health care plans has an alarming statistic. Medicare and Medicaid, our two government-funded health programs, cost our country $627 billion last year - or 23% of all federal spending. Many people like to criticize the Iraq War for its cost - proclaiming that [...]
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Posted in Communism/Socialism, bioehtics, health care, insurance, kidney transplant, law, markets, psychology, research discussion, wealth, tagged Alan Johnson, Avastin, breast cancer, cancer, capitalism, Debbie Hirst, Dialysis, Doctors for Reform, England, ethos, government, Great Britain, health care, healthcare, hearing aid, hemodialysis, justice, kidney transplant, liberal, Liberalism, MRI, N.H.S., National Health Service, New York Times, oncologist, oncology, orthopedic surgeon, pancreatic cancer, Parliament, Paul Charlson, pension, philosophical, philosophy, politics, principles, Sarah Lyall, selling your kidney, Socialism, socialized, Tarceva, taxes, UK, United Kingdom, Yorkshire on March 1, 2008 | 3 Comments »
A reader of mine left an interesting comment on my post about selling your kidney. Here is an excerpt:
“I am waiting for a kidney and have been dialysising for 2 [and a] half years on hemodialysis and 5 years on capd - a gentler type of dialysis… I am…using up resources and cos[t]ing a lot [...]
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Posted in Communism/Socialism, bioehtics, health care, insurance, markets, medicare, misinformation/propaganda, politics, psychology, research discussion, wealth, tagged doctor, consumer, government, medicare, cancer, patient, health care, economics, philosophy, chronic disease, treatment, medical care, heart disease, preventative care, bureaucrat, liberal, conservative, Doctorpricing.com, incentives, Ezra Klein, The American Prospect, Peter Suderman, Doublethink, Andrew Sullivan, The Daily Dish, Healthcare Economist, Jason Shafrin, United States of America, libertarian, heart attack, chemotherapy, trauma, coronary artery bypass, price transparency, life and death, moral agency, Kant, freedom on February 20, 2008 | 9 Comments »
Journalists Ezra Klein and Peter Suderman debate the government’s role in the future of U.S. Health Care (thank you Healthcare Economist). Whose argument carries more weight?
Klein’s main argument is decidedly anti-libertarian, which makes perfect sense because I don’t think he is a Libertarian. Klein’s conclusion is that it will take substantial government resources, research and [...]
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Posted in Communism/Socialism, bioehtics, health care, insurance, medicare, politics, psychology, research discussion, wealth, tagged capitalism, coverage, Democrats, doctors, George Stephanopoulos, government, health care, health insurance, HealthPopuli Blog, Hillary Clinton, insurance, Jane Sarasohn-Kahn, John McCain, Kevin Sack, mandate, medical care, medicare, NEJM, New England Journal of Medicine, New York Times, pandering, patients, physicians, political correctness, president, presidential, Republicans, Robert Laszewski, Socialism, tax system, The Health Care Blog, universal coverage on February 16, 2008 | 7 Comments »
John McCain (re: health care in the USA):
“For all the grandiose promises made in this campaign, has any candidate spoken honestly to the American people about the government’s role and failings about individual responsibilities? Has any candidate told the truth about the future of Medicare? Its costs are growing astronomically faster than its financing, and [...]
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Posted in bioehtics, health care, insurance, law, medicare, misinformation/propaganda, politics, psychology, research discussion, tagged doctor, insurance, government, medicare, physician, blog, health care, obesity, John Edwards, statistics, Charlie Munger, science, attorney, Crossover Health Blog, Shannon Brownlee, Overtreated, The Desperate Cure, Bone Marrow Transplantation, breast cancer, hope, greed, waste, John Grisham, The Rainmaker, Francis Ford Coppola, Matt Damon, Danny DeVito, lawyer, ambulance chaser, lawsuit, scientific method, statistical significance on January 26, 2008 | 3 Comments »
The Crossover Health blog has fantastic commentary on Shannon Brownlee’s book “Overtreated: Why Too Much Medicine is Making us Sicker and Poorer.” I haven’t read the book, but I understand it’s about waste in American Health Care. The blog focuses on one particular chapter entitled “The Desperate Cure,” which chronicles the failure of Bone Marrow [...]
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Posted in Communism/Socialism, health care, insurance, politics, psychology, tagged Africa, aged dependency ratio, America Alone, Australia, Canada, CDC, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, economics, Europe, France, GDP, Gerald Ford, government, Greece, health care, HIV, hospital, Islam, Islamic, liabilities, Mark Steyn, Muslim, national defense, pension, SARS, Secular Humanism, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, Skynet, Socialism, Terminator, Toronto, tsunami, Uncle Sam, universal health care on January 20, 2008 | 6 Comments »
In Mark Steyn’s book “America Alone,” an argument is made that big government makes its citizenry dependent and eventually helpless, in a manner of speaking. Gerald Ford had a famous quote which speaks to this: “a government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take away everything you have.” Many [...]
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Posted in Communism/Socialism, health care, insurance, markets, medicare, misinformation/propaganda, politics, psychology, wealth, tagged adaptation, bigot, bigotry, blog, conservative, creed, Democrat, doctor, England, Freakonomics, free market, gender, government, health care, hospital, insurance, judgment, liberal, Medicaid, medicare, Michael Moore, race, religion, Republican, Sicko, Socialism, socialized, Stephen Dubner, UK, United Kingdom, Wall Street on January 12, 2008 | 4 Comments »
When we make snap judgments based on race, creed, religion, or gender, we are bigots. When a Wall Street trader makes a snap judgment, he can either make or lose a lot of money. The latter probably more closely resembles the original reason for the adaptation. Long ago in our development, making judgments that [...]
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Posted in Communism/Socialism, bioehtics, corporate practices, employee benefits, health care, insurance, kidney transplant, law, misinformation/propaganda, politics, tagged hospital, insurance, government, politics, blog, Wall Street Journal, WSJ, health care, John Edwards, Socialism, presidential, election, CIGNA, Medicaid, socialized medicine, capitalism, Senator John Edwards, New Hampshire, primaries, doctors, liver transplant, attorney, plaintiff, irony, Nataline Sarkisyan, jury, rationale on January 7, 2008 | 4 Comments »
The Wall Street Journal chronicles John Edward’s attempt to tug at New Hampshire’s heart strings by telling a misleading version of the story of the death of a 17-year old leukemia patient and Cigna Corp., the insurance company that delayed coverage on her liver transplant.
Edwards, a former trial attorney, is the most extreme of capitalists, [...]
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