Comments about ‘Re-evaluating health: Paradigm shift for care possible’

Let's see:
Smokers and drinkers cannot buy nor can their employers provide health insurance?

Will eating a burger and fries void my insurance policy? Who is going to decide what I am allowed to eat?

The insurance company is going to set a limit on my weight beyond which I will not be able to get insurance?

If I don't meet their expectations on the type and amount of exercise I get I am uninsurable?

And who is going to decide what behaviors are risky that will prevent me from getting coverage? Is driving a car more risky than taking public transit? Are some personal associations more risky than others? If I get AIDS or break an arm playing baseball will I lose coverage because it is assumed I have engaged in risky behavior? Are my thoughts and emotions not based on acceptable ideals of mental health?

Where will they draw the lines and who gets to choose the level of control the nanny-state has over my actions and thoughts?

Welcome to the Zombie State!

Definition of Capitalism:

"Capitalism is an economic system in which the means of production are owned by private persons, and operated for profit and where investments, distribution, income, production and pricing of goods and services are predominantly determined through the operation of a free market."

Definition of Socialism:

"a political theory advocating state ownership of industry.
an economic system based on state ownership of capital"

What in the world is happening to our country? Why are we legislating every little personal thing....? This is NUTS!

One of the worst things to happen to health care insurance was when those providing the isurance became the ones providing and determining services.

Perhaps if we went back to paying as we go for our personal health care, the marketplace costs would become more reasonable as such entities compete for our dollars rather than being given them through premiums and holding onto them at all costs to keep their shareholders happy.

In agreement with uncannygunman, I was just thinking yesterday of the intrusion of the government in requiring drivers and passengers to wear seat-belts. Small incursion to be sure. Likely to save lives. Over the line in government control, likely not, but close.

Now their seems to be a desire by government to intrude quite conspicuously. I don't know the details of the law, but we should be fairly concerned of the proverbial "unintended consequences."

If the government can structure policies that in the end, coerce people to exercise, lose weight, etc., it has gone over the line, for oh so many reasons.

Do the legislators really think reforming the way we obtain insurance will lower the cost of an MRI, a hospital visit, or the COST OF CARE in general? The doctors and hospitals are "absent from the table" of this discussion. Don't lay all of this on the insurance companies. They are just trying to keep up with the cost of getting treatment. Keep the boys on the hill out of businesses they no nothing about.

There's nothing new about prevention. Give me a break!

Lets take it one step farther. AIDS is a life style sickness just as is over eating and smoking. Lets make people practice safe sex in order to be covered.

It looks to me like this would protect those entities who are really at the root of this problem in the first place. We have to tackle the GREED that is at the root of these astronomical costs.

I would love to see insurance companies and their huge profits go by the wayside and return to arrangements between patients and their healthcare providers (a concierge-type model). Pools of patients (say on a state or employer basis) could hire a broker who works for them to negotiate reasonable prices for medical care. Another thing, why aren't we tackling the outrageous cost of pharmaceutical items?

While I would hope that we all would make wiser dietary and lifestyle choices, legislators are approaching this from the wrong direction, in my opinion.