85% of all healthcare costs in America are for those over the age of 65. America has the leading health care system for the elderly. We pay for 80 year olds to have surgeries that they can't get in Canada or France.
Nobody wants to talk about it though, because it's not a nice thing to say, that grandma is buying six extra months at a price of a million in treatment.
Socialized medicine will slice the most money out of treatment for people in that demographic. It's by far the largest savings spot. Good or bad, you can debate that endlessly; but that's exactly what will happen.
Was probably found from the same source that I used when researching the worrying fact that, as it turns out, 78.2% of statistics are made up on the spot.
Although I disagree with your flippant tone, it's a fact that over 30% of medical costs come from care delivered in the last 6 months of life. Obviously you'd expect some top-heaviness here, but it makes one wonder about the cost of futile care (both in $$ and human suffering).
It wasn't meant to be flippant (or insensitive), just matter of fact.
My grandmother extended her life by about eight months by having breast cancer surgery at 87 or so. Was that ok? Personally I loved my grandmother. However, it was paid for by taxpayers. Her quality of life was terrible in those last eight months, but she did want to keep fighting to live. It's an extremely sensitive issue to debate on either side. The obvious bottom line is that we can't keep having our cake and eating it too.
There aren't any. The parent to this thread doesn't know what they're talking about. :)
It's just a way that the media/government gets people to accept their poor health care situation: it's better! and you couldn't get it anywhere else! The high costs? That's just the way things are, never mind these examples in every other developed country in the world.
The article you linked to doesn't show this. The pie graph at the end has a big green chunk which refers to, "Remaining health care spending". It doesn't say this only pertains to patient care. Also the chart is about spending higher than expected given our wealth.
I didn't find a place in the article that talked about administrative costs (i.e. salaries, bonuses, profits) that go to insurers.
I don't believe that is the case. Otherwise, we would see a shortage of care provided. Since everyone gets care, the competition with the super rich- if any- is vote driving prices
I still doubt that it is the extra cost of caring for elderly people really well that is the major factor that is keeping the other costs high though. Especially since there are less very elderly people, as a percentage of population, than in other developed countries.
Because people have to reach old age before they get "leading healthcare for the elderly"; the ones that don't reach old age cause low ranking in life expectancy charts.
85% of all healthcare costs in America are for those over the age of 65. America has the leading health care system for the elderly. We pay for 80 year olds to have surgeries that they can't get in Canada or France.
Nobody wants to talk about it though, because it's not a nice thing to say, that grandma is buying six extra months at a price of a million in treatment.
Socialized medicine will slice the most money out of treatment for people in that demographic. It's by far the largest savings spot. Good or bad, you can debate that endlessly; but that's exactly what will happen.