No Hope For Universal Health Care

The quoted sirvey is about "Canadian educated physicans".

These so-called excanges between the US and Canada are relavtively simple, because of language.

It was interesting to watch the US attract the best engineers to the US during the late 90s until the early 2000s. Then something strange started to happen; those same engineers that came to the US were returning to their home country to start businesses, and helped their economy grow. We now have a reverse brain-drain; and we're not producing enough engineers and scientists to maintain our high tech edge - the future of the world's economy.

The high tech companies in our area are still pressing congress to increase VISAs for high tech workers, but I'm wondering how long that will last.

I can't help but wonder whethe any of the muslim terrorist MDs ever made it to Canada.

I think she's scared it might make her think.

You think, the British police has published wrong data? Why that?

'Sicko' On Life Support

By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Tuesday, July 17, 2007 4:30 PM PT

Health Care: Moviegoers who were urged to "send a message" by seeing Michael Moore's "Sicko" have stayed away in droves. Now the film that was supposed to spark a health care revolution is barely breathing.

Related Topics: Health Care

Few movies have gotten as much free advance publicity as "Sicko." Seemingly endless media coverage predicted it would change the terms of the health care debate, galvanize a public sick of the nation's broken health care system, bust down industry roadblocks to real reform. The New York Times said the movie "was likely to have broad political impact."

Its producers treated "Sicko" like a political campaign, tapping Clinton administration veteran Chris Lehane to run the publicity effort. Moore was everywhere prior to its release, testifying before Congress, heading up rallies and mounting publicity stunts, like inviting 900 health care lobbyists to a special screening.

All this ?- combined with a muscular advertising campaign, the fact that Moore had a certifiable hit in 2004 with "Fahrenheit 9/11" ($119 million in box office receipts), and the supposed mood of the public ?- should have guaranteed the success of "Sicko." As Moore put it, "Every time I make a film, it breaks the last record."

But a funny thing happened on the way to the Moore-inspired national uprising: "Sicko" is bombing ?- financially and politically. After three weeks in wide release, it has managed to scrape together just $15.8 million in box office receipts. For most documentaries, that would be a notable take. But given the expectations, this is an enormous failure.

Box Office Mojo, which tracks ticket sales, notes that the movie will struggle to match "Bowling for Columbine," Moore's ill-fated call for stricter gun control laws.

Democrats, meanwhile, are stepping back from the movie's main message ?- that the nation's health care system is so corrupt that only a complete government takeover will suffice.

As the Los Angeles Times put it, " 'Sicko' is creating an awkward situation for leading Democratic presidential candidates." "Instead of greeting the film with hosannas or challenging it head-on," it said, "(they) [THEY]have sidestepped direct comment." And shortly after the movie opened, the Washington Post headlined a story "For Democrats, Pragmatism on Universal Health Care."

All this has left Moore acting more unhinged than usual. He was last seen losing it on CNN, which had the temerity to run a piece challenging Moore's "Sicko" facts. There he was, pathetically yelling at Wolf Blitzer about how unfair the network has been to him and insinuating that CNN is in the pocket of Big Pharma.

The demise of "Sicko" has created a real opportunity for opponents of socialized medicine to grab hold of the health care issue and champion reforms that actually will appeal to Americans ?- more freedom of choice for consumers, more competition, less costly red tape, real liability reform.

As we've argued in the past, we're in a war over the future of health care. Moore and his troops launched the first salvo, and it failed. Now it's time for a credible counterattack.


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No! I'm not going to see SICKO.

Indie Weekend Box Office: 'Sicko' Still Healthy
Posted Jul 16th 2007 11:05AM by Peter Martin
Filed under: Independent, Box Office, Cinematical Indie

Michael Moore is not as popular a magician as Harry Potter, but he can still draw a crowd. Sicko made an estimated $2.6 million over the weekend, according to Variety, reflecting a downturn of just 26% from the previous weekend. In view of the expansion by distributor The Weinstein Co. to 756 screens, the relatively small percentage drop-off in box office indicates that word of mouth is good. So far, Sicko has earned $15.8 million, which puts it on pace to overtake Moore's earlier Bowling for Columbine and last year's Oscar-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth.

I actually saw that. Funny.

CNN had their expert, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, examine the facts in the movie. Maybe most noticeably, he said that Moore claimed Americans had to pay about $7000 per year for health care, while Cubans would only pay $25. The expert said that both numbers Moore gave were wrong.

Moore countered by posting the sources for his numbers. The $7000 figure was from the Department of Health and Human Services. And the other figure was never mentioned in the movie. What was said was that Cubans had to pay $251 per year in health care costs - a number taken from the United Nations Human Development Report.

CNN's expert had messed it up. He apologized.

I'm just waiting for the movie to hit my movie theater. I don't know why the release was so small. My girlfriend, who has NEVER taken an interest in politics and hates that I spend time online with the news and on this website, actually WANTS to see this movie, and so do several of her friends. I was shocked when she told me.

Sicko is the first movie I have ever attended that the capacity audience gave it standing ovation - and I live in the Conservative end of town. Maybe it was because two factories closed this past year and most of the people in the audience had lost their health insurance.

Coward.

GW, The audience in our theater clapped when the movie ended too, but I wasn't sure whether they clapped because it was entertaining or because they agreed with the message of the movie. Could be both. It's been my personal experience that people clap after a movie about 20 percent of the time.

I don't hear much clapping nowadays, and it takes a lot to impress most New Yorkers. I really think the message was what was being approved of - the system sucks and needs to be fixed. It doesn't take a liberal to understand the problem. My area has a lot of (mostly conservative) middle class people who can no longer afford insurance and they are fed up. Our local hospitals are struggling because of it. I rarely see people starting conversations with strangers after a movie, but people stood around outside the theater and discussed what they liked and didn't like about the movie. No fist fights, just frustration that we can't do better as a nation.

We now have over 47 million Americans without health insurance. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the simple fact that people would rather wait a few hours to get service than none at all. Most people against universal health insurance talk about all the fears of social health care without any regard to our country spending the greatest amount for health care with little to show for it; less life span and higher infant mortality rates when compared to countries with universal health care. It's a no-brainer.

BTW, those same people who argue against universal health care (fear of higher cost) doesn't seem to care about the 2.7 billion dollars our government spends on the war in Iraq every week.

I'm glad you like to wait hours for medical care CI, perhaps you need to relocate to the State of Texas,
which as you probably know has a population which is 30% minimally uninsured but does have free hostpitals which offer care to the many uninsured.

Typical waits for ER visits often are 2 days at many of these Texas hospitals, that offer "free care". If one visits such an ER, perhaps one needs to pack a lunch,dinner and breakfast, a little potty , and a sleeping bag all for use in the ER parking lot, while awaiting their turn for medical treatment in the ER.

Have fun!

Order of patients is determined by the triage nurse, who assesses the seriousness of the medical condition of each patient. Those individuals, who are seriously ill, have priority as it fortunately should be.

I went to an ER one evening at about 6 pm, with a 2nd degree burn and pain, all of which I'd had for 24 hours. I had waited, thinking the burn wasn't as bad, as it later turned out to be.

I was taken almost immediately and ahead of several other patients present in the waiting room.

Burn cases ( in general ) need to be attended to as soon as possible to avoid serious complications from infections.

That visit to the ER and one follow-up at the ER the next day cost my insurance $1000.

The care was excellent.

Cost of universal health care in the US:



The New Yorker
7/25/07

Miller, It's really ironic that you worry about the cost of universal health care without much concern for the cost of our war in Iraq - now running twelve (12) billion dollars every month.

Some of us prefer spending our tax dollars to benefit Americans.

I would point out that the average American household spends far more then a thousand dollars a year on their current health insurance. Hard to see how this would change that much.

Cycloptichorn