Daniel in SD
(supervised)
I'm still waiting for someone to explain this! I keep seeing people say this.
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Coronavirus
- Thread starter Wenche
- Start date
I rarely disagree with you. This time you have said something that is not strictly correct. Canadians can and do buy private health insurance, but it resembles Medicare supplements more than a basic private policy. Still, it pays for substantially upgraded care. True enough, basic health care is socialized.
Personal health insurance
vgnLocale=en_CA
FWIW I have lived in both socialized and US-style limited-socialized systems. (France, UK, Brazil, Japan). There are, in my opinion, quite different strengths and weaknesses between the options. IN some countries, such as Brazil, there is free universal health that treats mostly poorer people, sometimes well, sometimes very poorly. Private insurance is quite cheap for outstanding care precisely because the public system remove 'emergency room as primary care' as is common is, say, the US. Similarly, the bureaucratic component of public management disappears as do co-pays.
I will not argue for one system or another because they all have different character. That said it is nice to have every inoculation free and unbureaucratic, and even better to have zero processing of eligibility or copays. Sadly I have had personal experience in several systems.
bkp_duke
Well-Known Member
I was referring to the basic care system. I am aware that Canadians can purchase health insurance, but my understanding is that it is for only things not covered by the socialized system.
And I agree - in the US, no one should be allowed to use the ER for primary care. Emergency care only. This has been a significant driver of cost in the US system.
They've reportedly not run any tests, so no new cases isn't a shock.
To explain *why* some of us think that we may be doing more harm than good? The short answer is that being poor is *very* bad for your health. If you don't understand that, then you must have enjoyed a rarefied life (and aren't fearing job loss right now).
I don't know the correct response to all of this. I'm just concerned that there has been a *lack* of concern about the economy and how the economy directly affects lives in so many ways.
X Fan
Active Member
Does anyone know what the baseline is?
ie specific weekly history vs present or yearly average vs present etc.
The reason why I ask is that Florida always spikes in the first quarter due to visitors but then slacks off greatly in the other 9 months. Therefore is their chart measuring y/y compared to same weeks or annual data?
Explanation; disproportionate reactions are bad because they carry secondary consequences.
Over 4 million annual deaths related to air pollution and 8 million annual deaths related to smoking don't seem to worry the average Joe, at all. But now he's heading for the toilet paper.
There's a relation when it comes to unemployment and mortality rates due to things like displacement, lack of health benefits, poor diet/immune system due to lack of quality foods, suicide, etc..The relationship is around 1% unemployment in the US leads to 35k deaths. This is just for the US. In other countries where the government can't do much to support the unemployed, the rate will be higher. This doesn't even take into account the next generation of youth that get displaced or permanently put into economic and social situations that lead to unhealthy lives or premature deaths. So yes, in a way we are threatening the lives of the current generation and the next generation for the elderly generation which is not logical. Sounds harsh I know. It would be very unpopular but forcing the population over 50 or 60 into absolute quarantine for 4-6 weeks and letting the population under 50 go about their normal lives would be the best possible path forward. I know I might get flack for this thought process, but the longer we keep this social distancing, the more lives that will be lost in the long run.
A massive overreaction can and probably will lead to more deaths from unemployment and the effects of depression than the actual virus. Right now, we're in hysteria and no ones is thinking about this. I'm still in the camp that after 3-4 weeks of lockdown, people and governments will realize that they will have to open up parts of the economy.
I was, although I just posted about my experience with multiple healthcare systems.
On this topic I'll offer a specific take.
Before Virus Outbreak, a Cascade of Warnings Went Unheeded
Many years ago when I was doing epidemiology there were less sophisticated versions of the two 'war games' discussed in the NYT article. Bluntly, these games, one under Obama one under Trump both made it clear taht teh US was not prepared. By contrast South Korea took their lesson from the disaster of SARS:
e015e096-6532-11ea-a6cd-df28cc3c6a68
The primary difference was that one country did not have the political will to prepare for an uncertain future event. The other, with a disaster fresh in mid, did have that will.
The US has numerous people who are fully prepared to prepare, and strong advocates to do so. The political will, though is no longer willing to do what it takes to eradicate measles. polio or anything else. Being prepared and acting to prevent is very expensive and demands large resources, most of them governmental. The US has done such things many times, including several diseases. Now we see the return of several of those because ill-informed people refuse vaccinations. That is exacerbated by people who want the Federal Government to be absent from health contingency planning and preparedness. Frankly, much of those sad results come together with political polarization that demonizes political differences.
One can argue about preparedness but we are doomed not to be prepared if we will not pay for preparedness.
FWIW, the entire Federal infrastructure of which I was a part of a program as an epidemiologist no longer exists. Even more poignant, I was seconded to the NYC Health Department helping manage infectious disease outbreaks. Oddly, the US Public Health Service has had a very long and checkered history;
United States Public Health Service - Wikipedia
If the country had been willing to devote the resources to be prepared fro an unknown outbreak it could easily, but expensively, have done so.
Because of political decisions the US, and much of the world, chose to operate 'uninsured' and unprepared. We might face the facts. As global temperatures rise and climactic extremes accelerate there will be more and more outbreaks coupled with reduced resilience. Every climatologist and epidemiologist knows that. Everything from skin cancers, water and air pollution-driven diseases to viral and bacterial outbreaks are happening with greater virulence and frequency.
If there ends out one benefit from the present catastrophe it might be the the world will engage in greater cooperation to manage such outbreaks and prevent the ones that might be prevented. Somehow this needs to be transformed from a partisan political view to a rational scientific one.
Is that possible?
Daniel in SD
(supervised)
Fortunately the current coronavirus response will dramatically reduce air pollution! And people will have less money so they'll smoke less.
I agree that there could be secondary consequences and we should weight those. I'd like to see them quantified before I worry about them though. People shouldn't be trying to induce panic!
Having lived under both systems for over twenty five years each, you're correct that there is no perfect system. However, there isn't the fear of bankruptcy in Canada. In the U.S. it's something like 530,000 annually. Now depending upon where you look you can find reports that say it's not true or there are other factors, or that Canadians have the same rate, but the perception is there regardless of the actual facts. People act on perception more often then they act on reality.
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So, second attempt posting this (first one seems to have been disappeared):
About | Qlife
Looks like a perfect fit for the present need, provided a good reagent can be developed. Which is of course the poodle's kernel, as it were. Follows the "give away razor, sell the blades" model. Not necessarily for profit at this time; once established on the mass market that handy little thing could test for almost anything.
I would credit that more to higher sun intensity (UV-C) rather than temperature. See video from Minute Earth on coronavirus from 5 years ago...
Ars Technica: The doctor who helped defeat smallpox explains what’s coming
This article seems to be making the rounds over the last few days (originally posted on Wired). Discussion from an epidemiologist that is consistent with what's being talked about in this thread. How we got here and where we are going.
This article seems to be making the rounds over the last few days (originally posted on Wired). Discussion from an epidemiologist that is consistent with what's being talked about in this thread. How we got here and where we are going.
And you also left out Private Care option in Canada, which is still cheaper than US. The rich can self pay and health insurance is not really an issue anyway.
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