patrick.net

Blather

Yeah but if not for Obamcare making faith based hospitals illegal for the direct conflict of profit.
300,000 lives were lost.

Tenpoundbass says

faith based hospitals illegal

Where do you get this?
Faith based hospitals are legal according to this: https://www.baptiststandard.com/news/faith-culture/16806-obamacare-changes-the-way-faith-based-hospitals-deliver-care

Yeah I'm sure everyone gave money to the Shriners to opperate on poor sickly little kids so that the Monkey King could come along and dicate how they do so.

Sure. Maybe Obamacare saved 50,000 lives - for those who were able to take advantage of the heavy subsidies...

BUT...

I think a more accurate story would be how many people DIED because of Obamacare - since many people can't afford the piece of shit, high deductible policies - that now plague the insurance market. In other words, how many people are uninsured due to the piece of shit legislation?

Daddy says we'll ban gay sex and save 200,000 in the same timespan. Send aids down the same hell hole as polio.
jazz music says

If the Republicans ever manage to revoke Obamacare, what are the Republicans going to do to prevent an extra 50K deaths in the few years after they succeed?

joshuatrio says

I think a more accurate story would be how many people DIED because of Obamacare

I think that the 50K lives was due to only the effect on hospital acquired conditions due to the way Obamacare changed the incentives for payment. The net INCREASE in the number of people insured has undoubtedly saved more lives. Note, that there is a net increase in insured, and that saves lives when people have catastrophic conditions that are not treated in the emergency room, cancer or heart disease for example. Also, another 4 million people could be insured if republican governors would expand medicaid. But they are letting poor people die and suffer to make a political point.

Hope none were Rep/Con/Teas.

No cash for healthcare? DIE!

YesYNot says

The net INCREASE in the number of people insured has undoubtedly saved more lives.

Source?

HHS web site says 20 million people have gained health insurance. They don't say a 20 million net increase, but I think that is what they mean.
http://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2016/03/03/20-million-people-have-gained-health-insurance-coverage-because-affordable-care-act-new-estimates

You can see the uninsured rates here: https://aspe.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/111826/ACA%20health%20insurance%20coverage%20brief%2009212015.pdf
The uninsured rate went from 20.3% down to 12.6%.
If you take the US population as 320 million, that means that the number of uninusred went from 65 million to 40 million. That is a net increase of 25 million insured.

The number I calculated seems a bit high, so I'm guessing that the 20% and 12.6% exclude people on medicare. That would reduce the relevant population by 55 million, I think. Redoing the numbers gives an increase in the insured of 20 million.

That's a lot of people who might be able to afford treatment for major medical expenses who would otherwise suffer or die.

hhs.gov?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!

Oh please do tell what else does Dick Tatter say?

YesYNot says

able to afford

You mean, "able to shift the cost of astronomical markups instead of questioning or contesting them." I was not going to react to this thread, but you've done it again, pushing the home page to an issue where Democrats poll -10%. "PolitiFact" is financed by commercial "news" sites that depend on provider advertising revenue, and they are simply not objective regarding this policy. “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” You ignore the hundreds of thousands of deaths from iatrogenic causes, which are now the third leading cause of death in the United States, and what else could have been done with the money. You overvalue treatment as if operating in an imaginary universe where it never causes harm and astronomical price gouging is always justified by infinite resources, and so you indulge a false feeling of virtue instead of doing the hard work of thinking.

"Life expectancy drops for whites, flat overall"

The life expectancy gap between rich and poor has also widened, partly because the rich can buy their way out of Obamneycare. Since overall life expectancy is flat, that means poor&middle people are dying younger, partly because of Obamneycare.

You have a habit of dismissing evidence as "garbage," so I will simply quote Democrat Bill Clinton:

"Former President Bill Clinton put his wife in a tough political spot by re-injecting Obamacare into a policy-free presidential race — with just 35 days until Election Day and the media intensely focused on Donald Trump’s tax returns.

Clinton’s comments about “this crazy system,” as he referred to Obamacare Monday night, threaten to shift the campaign’s focus to the Affordable Care Act and its mounting problems, among them, soaring health insurance premiums, fleeing health plans and young people reluctant to sign up for coverage."

In the unlikely event you want to read further, we have a whole thread on this topic.

curious2 says

n the unlikely event you want to read further, we have a whole thread on this topic.

I'll work my way through that thread, but it will take a while.

curious2 says

You ignore the hundreds of thousands of deaths from iatrogenic causes, which are now the third leading cause of death in the United States,

There are always multiple causes of death. For example, the linked article discussed a guy who went into the hospital with pneumonia and died of secondary infections. We don't know if the guy would have lived if he didn't seek medical attention. In the US, pneumonia kills 16 / 100,000 population. Worldwide, it kills many more people. Look here to see that in some areas, it kills as many as 7,000 per 100,000 people.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epidemiology_of_pneumonia

While I agree with you that the US over-treats people, I don't think that you can complain about the US medical system being responsible for 1/3 of the deaths without taking account of the people that are saved. It's the same error as looking at the saves without accounting for the deaths.

Yeah, I saw Bill Clinton's quote. I'm also not arguing that Obamacare is perfect. It clearly is having financial repercussions that are pissing people off. The point of this thread is to discuss the effect on the number of unnecessary deaths due to lack of care. You bring up a good point that there are deaths due to the medical system, but IMO, the net impact of health care is positive, but not optimized.

YesYNot says

if he didn't seek medical attention...1/3 of the deaths...net impact of health care....

You seem to conflate and substitute discrete or barely related concepts.

Starting with math: the third leading cause of death could not possibly account for 1/3 of the deaths unless the top three were the only causes and they were all equal.

Next, the false binary between going to a hospital and not seeking medical attention. In Costa Rica, a patient with bacterial pneumonia can walk into a pharmacy and pay cash for an antibiotic, no Rx required. (And, they don't have the American MRSA problem, which Americans subsidize via hospitals and CAFOs.) They live about as long as Americans, and pay less than 10% as much to do so. In America, federal law prohibited him from doing that, but pays hospitals, on an infinite fee-for-service model, so he went there for his "free" hospital "care", and then you paid $600k to kill him slowly and miserably.

Last, health insurance is not health care, and health care is not health. You have chosen to empower a revenue-maximizing system because its lobbyists have hijacked your preferred partisan sect. People are not living longer or better, but they are paying more. Most of the money goes to waste, fraud, and abuse, including fraudulently marketed toxic placebos, diagnostic radiation, etc. You have given these fraudulent marketers and lobbyists total control over things you might actually need someday, entrusting your own life and everyone else's to strangers whom you should not trust. If you like books, I suggest The Good Nurse, about a serial killer convicted of murdering dozens of patients (out of probably hundreds killed and thousands injured) in multiple hospitals that figured out what he was doing and moved him on from one hospital to another. Executives lied to police to protect him (and the revenue his crimes generated), and those same executives were never punished, in fact they were empowered and enriched more than ever by the legislation you defend.

I'm surprised you haven't started a thread on the TBTF bank frauds and "robo-signing" (humans committing RICO violations). Seriously, it's a good thing no one reads PatNet anymore, considering the topics you insist on posting home page headlines about.

curious2 says

rting with math: the third leading cause of death could not possibly account for 1/3 of the deaths unless the top three were the only causes and they were all equal.

I thought I read 1/3 in one of your links. Maybe I remembered wrong.curious2 says

Next, the false binary between going to a hospital and not seeking medical attention.

I didn't say those were the only two options. Hillary was a notable example with a different option. Most people with pneumonia are not admitted as far as I know. I simply pointed to the ultimate outcome of how many died per capita in the US, and noted that it was much worse in places with poor healthcare. I also stated that ours was not optimized.
curious2 says

In Costa Rica, a patient with bacterial pneumonia can walk into a pharmacy and pay cash for an antibiotic, no Rx required.

Overuse of antibiotics is the reason for MRSA, and is not something to brag about. It's a terrible idea to let people by antibiotics without prescription.curious2 says

infinite fee-for-service model,

In one of the links I posted, it said that ACA was changing the pay (incentive) model away from fee for service. Maybe it's not going far enoughcurious2 says

Last, health insurance is not health care, and health care is not health

I agree. What I said was that if you get cancer that is somewhat curable, but don't have a spare $100-300K laying around or have health insurance you might die. A heart attack would be treated, as it is an emergency. My point is simply that if you have some malady that needs surgery or other expensive non emergent treatment, you are better off if you have insurance. Whether or not it's a good financial deal is another matter.

curious2 says

pushing the home page to an issue where Democrats poll -10%.

This thread is not about what is politically popular. It's about understanding the real impact. If there were a law that made everybody pay an extra $100 per year and as a result 40K peoples lives were saved, would the law be popular? What if the republicans said that no lives were really saved, and it was just a tax to support a gov't bureaucrat? I'm betting that law would be unpopular. Would it be worth it? That depends on whether or not you think a life is worth $750K. Would it be worth it if the Gov spent that $30Billion fighting terrorism and only saved 1000 people?

YesYNot says

Overuse of antibiotics is the reason for MRSA

Overuse in American subsidized hospitals and CAFO, as I said. Other countries don't have nearly as much of this problem.

YesYNot says

idea to let people by antibiotics without prescription.

The word is "buy", not "by". At the level of countries, MRSA correlates with subsidized hospitals and CAFO (especially pigs), and does not correlate with prescription laws. Countries that let people buy antibiotics without prescription are not the countries causing or spreading MRSA; to the contrary, it's coming almost exclusively from your preferred regulatory regime of subsidized hospitals, CAFO, and prohibiting actual humans who need antibiotics from buying them. You would prevent people who need medicine from buying it unless they jump through all the extra toll gates that you choose to impose. The policy you defend, and which most Americans rightly disapprove of, is "a disaster," or (as Bill Clinton said) a "crazy system". It maximizes revenue while slaughtering people. Your arrogance is beyond belief: importing terrorists so you can rent out rooms to them, empowering corporate revenue maximizers who are causing MRSA while disempowering actual humans who die from it, and then congratulating yourself on feeling virtuous about it all.

curious2 says

The word is "buy", not "by". You

No shit.
curious2 says

It maximizes revenue while slaughtering people.

I see a lot of hyperbole, but no data from you. I also see a lot of complaints, but no solutions from you. What would you do with all of the people with preexisting conditions?

YesYNot says

I see a lot of hyperbole, but no data from you.

LOL - I provide more data than almost anyone on PatNet, but you refuse to read.

I meant to add, your Prohibition mentality has company. The original version of ClintonCare would have made it a federal crime to buy or sell a vaccine outside of the mandatory ClintonCare system, so nobody could get vaccinated without enriching the lobbyists who would have had exclusive control of the vaccines.

YesYNot says

What would you do with all of the people with preexisting conditions?

Invest in research to find cures, instead of holding them hostage and monetizing them, which is the revenue maximizing model that you prefer, including your insistence on infinitely subsidizing and pushing toxic placebos.

Oh, and stop waging wars in foreign countries and then importing the aggrieved whom you've displaced for the benefit of Saudi Arabia. It is truly incredible that you can fool yourself into pretending to compassion when your policies slaughter so many people for profits.

curious2 says

Invest in research to find cures

That will help people in the future, and I'm all for more research. I'm talking about the people who are on the chopping block today. That was the primary reason for Obamacare, and I've yet to hear any solution to that problem from any of the people who complain about Obamacare. That is the primary reason I'd rather see Obamacare get fixed than axed.

curious2 says

your insistence on infinitely subsidizing and pushing toxic placebos.

I've never insisted on that. I've also referred a book to you called overdiagnosed. So if you care to admit it, you'll see that I've recognized some of the problems you have with the medical system. In many ways, they are connected with the insurance industry and pay incentives.
curious2 says

LOL - I provide more data than almost anyone on PatNet, but you refuse to read

You regularly provide links and heavily document, which I've noted in other posts. But, I haven't seen any data to show that Obamacare has been slaughtering people. I assume that you are finding a creative way to say that more people are dying due to Obamacare than are being saved by it. But I've never seen any data to back up that claim. Have you?

Also, I've not gone through and picked apart each post of yours, b/c I'm trying to focus on the important things. It doesn't mean that I agree with whatever I've ignored. For example curious2 says

At the level of countries, MRSA correlates with subsidized hospitals and CAFO (especially pigs), and does not correlate with prescription laws.

While I agree that antibiotic use in CAFOs is a big problem, prescription laws correlate with a lot of other factors, so teasing out whether or not it would be a problem in this country where people want to take antibiotics for everything is pretty much impossible.

YesYNot says

That's a lot of people who might be able to afford treatment for major medical expenses who would otherwise suffer or die.

Not with those $6000 - $12000 per year deductibles!