Excellent point.

Post #215,666 by mmoffitt 7/19/05 6:07:48 PM Reply	Excellent point. The real driver for higher premiums is insurance company profit. Which, as you and Ben rightly point out, is tied to market returns. It's been a while since I worked for an HMO (2000), but back then - and I realize this is a state issue - we had to have 6 weeks of claims in reserve. For all my ranting, I realize that physician salaries, while excessive, are not going to solve the problem. Ultimately, I think my old CFO put his finger on it when he said, "The real problem with healthcare is that we spend 80% of the money we spend on healthcare in our last two months of life. If people could just accept that dying is a consequence of being born, we could save a ton of money." bcnu, Mikem It would seem, therefore, that the three human impulses embodied in religion are fear, conceit, and hatred. The purpose of religion, one might say, is to give an air of respectibility to these passions. -- Bertrand Russell
Post #215,724 by CRConrad 7/20/05 3:19:42 AM Reply	80 % of deaths occur in hospitals - let's tear 'em all down! Mike Moffs it: Ultimately, I think my old CFO put his finger on it when he said, "The real problem with healthcare is that we spend 80% of the money we spend on healthcare in our last two months of life. If people could just accept that dying is a consequence of being born, we could save a ton of money." I think I see what you (and he) mean... But I'm not quite sure that that is what you (and he) are saying, exactly. I mean, the money we spend on healthcare gets spent when we are ill -- when the heck else would you spend it? And when we are ill is also, logically and inevitably, when we are liable to die -- so all too often it turns out that the period we spent spending money on healthcare also was our last. That doesn't mean we shouldn't try at all to treat illnesses that are in principle treatable, now does it? Yes, yes, I know you were really talking about ultimately futile efforts to prolong the very last days of a life that is actually already all but over -- but the way you (or your old CFO) put it, it sounds a bit like the fallacy in my "Subject:" line. [link\|mailto:MyUserId@MyISP.CountryCode\|Christian R. Conrad] (I live in Finland, and my e-mail in-box is at the Saunalahti company.) Your lies are of Microsoftian Scale and boring to boot. Your 'depression' may be the closest you ever come to recognizing truth: you have no 'inferiority complex', you are inferior - and something inside you recognizes this. - [link\|http://z.iwethey.org/forums/render/content/show?contentid=71575\|Ashton Brown]
Post #215,753 by drewk 7/20/05 12:05:34 PM Reply	No, they're talking about terminal cases Remember Terry what's-er-name? That's the people we're talking about. Doctors aren't allowed to ask the question, "But if we keep the heart beating, is that really 'alive'?" I've heard people demand heroic measures, "just to have one more day with him." If even in your most optimistic projections you can't see more than a couple of days or weeks, how about making them comfortable? Nope, gotta prolong that life. Fight to the bitter end. And it will be bitter. === Purveyor of Doc Hope's [link\|http://DocHope.com\|fresh-baked dog biscuits and pet treats]. [link\|http://DocHope.com\|http://DocHope.com]
Post #215,785 by CRConrad 7/20/05 3:40:30 PM Reply	A) Schiavo. B) Yeah, I know. C) Yup, as Fernet-Branca grappa D) But still, the way he put it made it sound like it would also include cases a la "Dang, it was this close that it would all just have been a bad memeory for him to tell his grandkids forty years from now". The ones where it becomes clear only afterwards that the period when one spent all that dough turned out to be ones last. (For those cases, "most of what we spend is at the end!" is a fallacy pretty much like my "shut down the hospitals!" joke[let].) Sure, I know that wasn't what he meant to talk about... But his ex-CFO happened to do so. [link\|mailto:MyUserId@MyISP.CountryCode\|Christian R. Conrad] (I live in Finland, and my e-mail in-box is at the Saunalahti company.) Your lies are of Microsoftian Scale and boring to boot. Your 'depression' may be the closest you ever come to recognizing truth: you have no 'inferiority complex', you are inferior - and something inside you recognizes this. - [link\|http://z.iwethey.org/forums/render/content/show?contentid=71575\|Ashton Brown]

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