Coronavirus in the United States - news and thoughts

They can still get covid and spread it, sounds like to me they're like the unvaxxed

 

Do you truly believe that the vaccine is 99%9 effective? I sure the hell don't.

 

Good lord. It was a hypothetical. Of course it’s not 99.9% effective.

 

Also, that is not really how efficacy is defined. That is a percent reduction in severe disease relative to the non-vaccinated population. Either way, no one has ever claimed a 99.9% efficacy to your point.

 

Maybe they don't think Americans are smart enough to figure out how to copy and paste one of the many flavors of universal healthcare that already exist?

 

Not even a week later and we are at 2416 deaths per million and have moved up into 10th place overall.

 

ttps://www.politifact.com/article/2017/jul/21/how-expensive-would-single-payer-system-be/

So, oddly, our calculation produced exactly the same amount of federal health spending -- $1.38 trillion a year -- as Sanders’ own estimate for his single-payer plan.

"However, if you use the higher cost estimates -- the ones in the $2.4 trillion to $2.8 trillion range -- then Trump has a point that a single-payer plan would be more expensive than what the government is already paying for health care."

"Kenneth Thorpe, a professor of health policy and management at Emory University, put the cost at $2.4 trillion a year. A team from the Urban Institute put the number at $2.5 trillion a year. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget projected $2.8 trillion a year."

Is this convincing, or are am I wasting my time? I think I already know the answer to that. Some projections are suggesting that this would more than double healthcare costs.

I'm not saying COVID isn't a short-term problem for immigrants. I'm saying pairing a "single-payer" healthcare system or "universal healthcare" system with pretty much open borders will be a financial burden on our healthcare system. It already causes Emergency Rooms to get filled up pre-COVID. And would cause all sorts of services being used in a single-payer world to go away from ordinary citizens and towards illegal US citizens.

Claiming that immigrants would provide a "net positive for the economy" is a policy consideration that doesn't address the issue I brought up. There are also policy considerations in the name of ending mask mandates and social distancing protocols now.

Yes you do.

Now do ERs filled with illegal immigrants. Presumably they'd be entitled to care elsewhere as well if we had a single payer system. I guess the supply of care would just magically appear, right. The demand went up, we already have limited doctors who are over-worked pre-COVID. Now they have to treat everyone. They're going to be more overworked, and not just in the short-term, but in the long-term.

There's always the possibility of a new variant arising. I think AOC, Obama, and Pelosi had it right that they should be able to live their lives. I just think those rules should extend beyond the "elites."

You're basically saying "we can do more." Well, we could always do more. We've already wasted a year and a half. We have a widely available vaccine. It's time to get back to normal. Living matters too. AOC, Obama, and Pelosi seem to agree with me, as does the mayor of San Francisco.

 

My Lord, my point in that post was that you can't use outlier cases and characterize them as the norm to justify policy positions which I_boy seems to make a habit of doing.

"Well, you can't say that you have nothing to worry about if you're vaccinated, there are breakthrough cases and even hospitalizations."

Policy is largely about risk management. That was my point. It's weighing things like risk and frequency.

 

Our government already spends billions on healthcare. Add these costs to what we spend on private insurance, and Americans spend more than almost any country per person. If single payer meant the government paid the same, but I paid less, that's a win. If single payer even meant I paid the same, that's a win, because we would have universal coverage. I find it difficult to believe that removing the for profit insurance company, that adds little to no value to the product, will cause costs to rise. Which is what this study found.

As for undocumented immigrants, not having universal coverage and the fact they need to live in the proverbial shadows mean we do end up paying pounds for cure, that could've cost ounces in prevention. Increase the guest worker program, make them legal, and have them contribute. If they work, which most do, then they already contribute.

Last, why bring up celebrity hypocrits? I have no use for do as I say not as I do types. At least Obama did cut down his guest list and required all to be vaccinated and provide a negative test.

 

Yep, looks like it was a waste of time.

Bernie Sanders said it would cost the same as the projection from the article I gave you, I gave you academics saying it would almost double the cost.

Single Payer advocates say things like preventative care, and eliminating the insurance middle man will make single payer cost less money than the current system. It will cut costs no doubt, but you're failing to account for the fact that everybody is going to be using the system now, everyone will be using the system without concern for the costs because they won't be footing the bill, you will be incentivizing people to cross the border for healthcare (which they already do to some extent, but even moreso now).

 

Alachua County still on the decline:

Adult Hospitalization: 168 (down 63% from peak of 453 on 8/20)
ICU: 46 (down 72% from peak of 167 on 8/18)

We are now well below January peak numbers as well.

Go GATORS!
,WESGATORS

 

Crazy how fast the new delta variant has fallen off. In FLORIDA, the drop has been significantly steeper than either of the past two peaks (summer '20, winter '21). The peak was obviously much higher, but the steep drop off is nice to see.

Questions going forward:

(1) Where do we stand with immunity for folks who have had COVID + no vaccination?
(2) Where do we stand with immunity for folks who have had COVID + some level of vaccination (complete or otherwise)?
(3) Are we in a good place in terms of identifying whether children have risk factors or if they are being hit at random?
(4) Are we in a good place in terms of understanding any deviations in risk based on a child's age?

Before anybody hammers on anybody else about what they need to do, I think it's important that we have an understanding on these basic questions. More information, less bossiness. If something is a good idea, let's promote it for all of it's positives instead of making it a political issue. Then people can freely choose, and if there is hestancy, let's address whether or not there's a significant enough portion of those that can potentially be moved with more information or are we talking about a sliver of society that will not be moved regardless of information presented (and do they even represent a significant enough portion of society to matter).

Go GATORS!
,WESGATORS

 

And recent trend (last 14 days), we’re 1st -and it’s not even close.

 

Funny. I live in a border state, and know a lot of people who cross the border for healthcare. Dental work is significantly cheaper. So are prescription drugs. People only cross the border to get to this side when they need expensive, specialized care that their home country lacks due to lack of highly trained medical professionals and/or specialized equipment. Here's a good article showing which way the majority of the healthcare traffic flows.

And yes, everyone would be using the system, including all the healthy 20 - 64 year olds, who generally are the profit centers for health insurance companies. And instead of splitting these people into a number of insurance providers, they would all be in one pool. And instead of insurance companies profiting, we can take that margin and apply it to covering everybody.

Having everyone in one pool would also lower administrative costs. You wouldn't need multiple billing centers for each insurance provider. Having everyone in one pool would also likely lower drug costs because of the economy of scale. Other costs would lower as well, as people would hopefully stop using the ER when things get out of hand, and would instead, seek care earlier. Here's a good article on the cost/savings of preventative care. 1/3 of all US healthcare expenditures occur at the hospital. If we could cut that down to 25% because more people seek preventative care, it would save money.

Of course, all of this is off topic. None of this is going to happen tomorrow, or any time soon. We're stuck with the system we have. And that system we have is going to have to deal with billions in hospital costs due to unvaccinated people with COVID who require expensive hospital care. And everyone with insurance will likely be paying higher premiums because of it.

 

How does single payer work in other countries?

How does medicare work, which is a form of single payer?

No system will be perfect. The biggest obstacle for us would be paying for it. The cost would shift from health insurance premiums to taxes. But as a tax people would bitch and complain about it.

 

No, we are fine. Let's just chug along on our current system, it is working great.

 

I think you have to compare the level of do-it-yourself trouble we cause to ourselves as compared to other countries. Where do we rank on healthy behavior metrics? If we are causing more of our own problems, it stands to reason that we will pay more for that.

Go GATORS!
,WESGATORS

 

Doc i know has a common saying that 85% of all hospitalizations are self imposed. Not sure how accurate that is, but we do a crappy job of taking care of ourselves. Of course, that doesn't mean the chart above isn't valid. Many of those nations spend health dollars on well living stuff so they don't have to spend buttloads on reactive stuff.