IT'S TIME FOR UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE

Perhaps the difference is that Government management of the Health care system is a hot political issue in the United States, and the political forces supporting it are doing their best (understandably) to make their case in the media.

In Canada and Europe the situation is profoundly different. Government managed systems of various kinds have been in place for decades as part of social welfare programs that are generally more generous than those here. There are political issues over health care in Canada and Europe, but they focus more on current defects in the operation, funding and care provided, and not on going back to free market systems - a process that, for populations accustomed to government care, can be very difficult to accept. More and more the issue in these countries is whether they can continue to pay for the public systems and the actions needed or taken by government to ration the care provided as a means of containing costs.

The Department of Commerce report that you cited earlier about OECD nation regulation of their markets for pharmaceuticals was very illuminating. Much of the effort reported involved government action to limit the availability and use of new or more expensive drugs and medical treatments. In some cases this included fixed budgets for doctors for pharmaceuticals for their patients and even financial incentives for doctors who lower the cost of the prescriptions they issue. Some could interpret this as a rather profound government intrusion into the relationship between doctor and patient that is not in the patient's best interest.

I'm not suggesting that all of this is necessarily bad, but rather that this is a complex issue with many tradeoffs. With that in mind, many of the judgements and opinions I have read here by both Americans and others appear to me to be superficial and simplistic.

I'm sure there are strengths and weaknesses to both a market system vs universal health care.

As hbg has stated, that I agree with, a healthy society benefits everyone. We provide free education in addition to private schools. They both help all children with their education. On the same token, a universal health care system will help all children - not only the ones' who's parents have health coverage from their jobs or those able to afford the very high cost of premiums for a family.

I'd like to see a health care system that combines the best of both.

Not only there: I haven't noticed many developed countries besides the USA without a universal health care system. Actually, I couldn't recall a single ... without some research, that is.

I don't think you could find one that accepted and successfully assimilated as many immigrants either.

How about Holland and the UK?

High for Europe, but not even close to us -- and both are having severe problems with economic and cultural assimilation.

Australia: 2001............ Canada: 2001.................. United States: 2001
Country Number Percent Country Number Percent Country Number Percent
Total 4,105,688 100.0.. Total 5,647,125 100.0.... Total 31,107,889 100.0
United Kingdom 1,033,647 25.2 United Kingdom 614,610 10.9 Mexico 9,177,487 29.5
New Zealand 355,765 8.7.. China* 345,520 6.1.. Philip 1,369,070 4.4
Italy 218,718 5.3......... India 322,215 5.7.......... India 1,022,552 3.3
Vietnam 154,830 3.8.... Italy 318,095 5.6........... China* 988,857 3.2
China* 142,781 3.5...... United States 258,420 4.6. Vietnam 988,174 3.2

France, Germany, Austria, the Benelux countries, Denmark, Scandinavia and England are all listed as having "non-nationals resident" of more than 10 per cent, with Germany in two regions registered figures of "more than 15 per cent."

An average of between 10 and 15 per cent of "non nationals resident" in Western Europe as of the mid 1990's is therefore an accurate estimate, given that official figures are always behind actual statistics, as the number of illegal immigrants always closely shadows the number of legal immigrants.



Above: By 1994, most European Union member states had an average 10 - 15 per cent non-White population, with this figure effectively doubling every fifteen years. This will mean that, unless current immigration trends are halted, all of Western Europe will have a non-White majority population by the year 2090 at the latest, and possibly earlier. These statistics are from the EU's own official records, Eurostat, in Belgium.

We got - within the last 17 years - about 20 million new citizens, all integrated in our universal healthxare system. That is roughly about .... one third of the previous population.

CI -- I think you need to think more about your statistics. Your data is more suggestive of the very low birthrates prevalent among Europeans, particularly the native populations, than it is concerning the rate of immigration.

That may be true, However, what has health care to do with it native population or those of immigrants? Both get it and both contibute to it.

I believe the issues attendant to assimilation of immigrants, both legal and illegal, bear heavily on the right design for public social services. I believe the relatively free labor market, lower cost of public services, and relatively lower taxes of the United States are significant contributors to our long-standing much greater success in assimilating enterprising immigrants from all over the world.

Might be, too. However, our health service managed to assimilate 17 million new citizens from one to the other ... with nearly no complictions.

One problem I see with free market health care is that while the ideal is that the doctors should compete for the patients, the truth is that there are far too few doctors for this system to work as it ideally should. The reason why so few doctors are educated is probably because they know that this is a way of upholding the high wages. -correct me if I'm wrong.

[The number of doctors really is something what surprises me .... and hwere you have to go to find them.
Here, in my village of 4,000 inhabitants, we've got two general doctors, two inernists (one specialised as cardiologist, the other more diabtes but working as a family doctor, too) - all these make house visits.
Additonally, we've got a paediatrist, an ophthalmologist, one orthopaedic specialist and a surgeon (with ambulant operations), three gynaecologist, four psychotherpeutic practises ... . All other specialists as well as two hospitals are in the town, 3 miles away.]

True enough. Germany has experienced two major assimilations since WWII - the first was the return of ethnic Germans from the redrawn borders in the wave of ethnic clreansing that spread across Europe soon after WWII, and the second was in the assimilation of the population of the GDR. Both were accompanied by severe economic and social stresses and dislocations, and both were accomplished successfully.

However, significant as these achievements were, they are not the same thing as a sustained willingness of the native population to accept mass immigration of culturally diverse people, and the adaptability of the social and economic structures required to make it work.

The newly expanded EU is bringing with it a large -scale migration of workers from Central Europe to the West. It may be that EU rules for relatively uniform social welfare standards reduce the impact of all this, and, of course, Europe employs more well-developed guest worker programs than does this country. However, even with all this the situation appears (from here) to be causing some strains.

Yes, true. To get from one day to other more than 30% new citizens did gave some strain. Especially, since they got the same advantages from our health system and social systems as the old citizens, without contibuting a single cent to it.

I agree. That was an act of courage and generosity on the part of the FRG, that I believe has prevented some potential long-lasting problems in the united Germany. The problem is the cost of the action is relatively easy to calculate. However, the benefit accrues in terms of bad things that didn't happen - harder to calculate that.

I also see some advantage to the new immgrants to Germany. Germany needs a younger work force, and one way to achieve that is by immigration. They wouldn't be able to maintain their economy as their native population gets older.

hi , miller and c.i. !
thanks for your advice !
i'm late in replying ; we took a drive into the country today and just came back - distinct feel of fall in the air - overnight only about 12 C !
my "clumsiness" happened in march and i'm doing fine - except for a "DISTICTIVE" scar - the kind german duelling students used to have !
first thing the ER-doctor did , was to thrust his fingers into my mouth and say : "not broken ? " . so i received a double-set of stitches to make ny hide even tougher , i assume !
thanks again for your concern !
hbg

if anyone asks , i'll explain i got my cut ("schmiss" - german for a cut suffered in a duel) in a duel