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Posted: 9/18/2009 8:22:59 AM EDT
Ready ... set ... go ...
The Fear and Sympathy Express is now boarding: WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Nearly 45,000 people die in the United States each year –– one every 12 minutes –– in large part because they lack health insurance and can not get good care, Harvard Medical School researchers found in an analysis released on Thursday. "We're losing more Americans every day because of inaction ... than drunk driving and homicide combined," Dr. David Himmelstein, a co-author of the study and an associate professor of medicine at Harvard, said in an interview with Reuters. Overall, researchers said American adults age 64 and younger who lack health insurance have a 40 percent higher risk of death than those who have coverage. The findings come amid a fierce debate over Democrats' efforts to reform the nation's $2.5 trillion U.S. healthcare industry by expanding coverage and reducing healthcare costs. President Barack Obama's has made the overhaul a top domestic policy priority, but his plan has been besieged by critics and slowed by intense political battles in Congress, with the insurance and healthcare industries fighting some parts of the plan. The Harvard study, funded by a federal research grant, was published in the online edition of the American Journal of Public Health. It was released by Physicians for a National Health Program, which favors government-backed or "single-payer" health insurance. An similar study in 1993 found those without insurance had a 25 percent greater risk of death, according to the Harvard group. The Institute of Medicine later used that data in its 2002 estimate showing about 18,000 people a year died because they lacked coverage. Part of the increased risk now is due to the growing ranks of the uninsured, Himmelstein said. Roughly 46.3 million people in the United States lacked coverage in 2008, the U.S. Census Bureau reported last week, up from 45.7 million in 2007. Another factor is that there are fewer places for the uninsured to get good care. Public hospitals and clinics are shuttering or scaling back across the country in cities like New Orleans, Detroit and others, he said. Study co-author Dr. Steffie Woolhandler said the findings show that without proper care, uninsured people are more likely to die from complications associated with preventable diseases such as diabetes and heart disease. Some critics called the study flawed. The National Center for Policy Analysis, a Washington think tank that backs a free-market approach to health care, said researchers overstated the death risk and did not track how long subjects were uninsured. Woolhandler said that while Physicians for a National Health Program supports government-backed coverage, the Harvard study's six researchers closely followed the methodology used in the 1993 study conducted by researchers in the federal government as well as the University of Rochester in New York. The Harvard researchers analyzed data on about 9,000 patients tracked by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics through the year 2000. They excluded older Americans because those aged 65 or older are covered by the U.S. Medicare insurance program. "For any doctor ... it's completely a no-brainer that people who can't get health care are going to die more from the kinds of things that health care is supposed to prevent," said Woolhandler, a professor of medicine at Harvard and a primary care physician in Cambridge, Massachusetts. http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090918/ts_nm/us_usa_healthcare_deaths_2  |
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Posted: 9/18/2009 8:23:58 AM EDT
[#1]
and even more people die from medical mistakes.
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Posted: 9/18/2009 8:24:25 AM EDT
[#2]
CHOOO CHOOOOOOOO
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Posted: 9/18/2009 8:25:27 AM EDT
[#3]
Sweet... less that we will have to insure.
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Posted: 9/18/2009 8:26:42 AM EDT
[#4]
I am saying
How can they make such a claim. 
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Posted: 9/18/2009 8:30:11 AM EDT
[#5]
Overall, researchers said American adults age 64 and younger who lack health insurance have a 40 percent higher risk of death than those who have coverage.
That's it? That's what their study looked at? It didn't look at the lifestyles those uninsured folks lived, didn't look at their eating habits, didn't look at their medical non-compliance? This study isn't worth the paper it was printed on. |
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Posted: 9/18/2009 8:31:42 AM EDT
[#6]
Study funded by .gov Federal Grant money, check.
Study performed by an organization that already agrees with the Presidents position (and that stands to benefit from the implementation of Socialized Medicine) check. Astro turfing by the legacy media, check. Nothing left to see here people, move along. |
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Posted: 9/18/2009 8:34:58 AM EDT
[#7]
And we're murdering about a million babies every year, too.
But nah, forget about that. Let's start spending more federal money on abortions. Kill 1/3% of the population every year to maybe save 1/75%. Sounds good to everyone? |
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Posted: 9/18/2009 8:34:59 AM EDT
[#8]
Even though a lot of that article is hype, some of it may be true. The other day when my child was diagnosed with swine flu and the whole house was put on prophylactic anti-virals and her treated with them, I asked the pharmacist why such an outrageous cost for 10 little pills. My husband and I don't have insurance and I am at very high risk of having complications from swine flu due to my auto-immune disease. She told me that if you need them you will pay that cost no matter what. TEN (10) are $135 without insurance. There is no generic available. So if you have nothing to sell and no way to purchase medications needed to possibly save your life, you die. It is as simple as that! |
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Posted: 9/18/2009 8:36:34 AM EDT
[#9]
Ummm.... didn't Kennedy have insurance?
Having insurance doesn't mean your going to live forever. I hate stupid twist on numbers like that. |
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Posted: 9/18/2009 8:37:46 AM EDT
[#10]
Republicans are just killing off the poor people that Democrats can't.
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Posted: 9/18/2009 9:17:00 AM EDT
[#11]
Quoted: Even though a lot of that article is hype, some of it may be true. The other day when my child was diagnosed with swine flu and the whole house was put on prophylactic anti-virals and her treated with them, I asked the pharmacist why such an outrageous cost for 10 little pills. My husband and I don't have insurance and I am at very high risk of having complications from swine flu due to my auto-immune disease. She told me that if you need them you will pay that cost no matter what. TEN (10) are $135 without insurance. There is no generic available. So if you have nothing to sell and no way to purchase medications needed to possibly save your life, you die. It is as simple as that! I can certainly sympathize with you there. I *do* have medical insurance and my husband and I are spending $340.00 per month out of pocket for medication for both of us. That's not counting the $160.00 per month we pay for medical coverage on us and the 25.00 office visits we BOTH have to go to once a month for labs. My husband takes two kinds of BP medication (at $60.00 a pop), sinus and allergy meds (at $30.00), and stuff for a heart condition (also at $60.00). I take eleven pills per day. With me being too sick to work ... we're having to choose between food and medication for the most part. We've lived off Ramen noodles and water for almost six months now. I've been doing my shopping at the local church pantry for occasional canned beans or tuna, but most people can't donate food so the shelves are bare. We borrow internet from my neighbor with his consent. We have no cable television, no air conditioning running, no phones, and we turn on one sixty watt light bulb in the living room when it gets dark enough so that we can read. I've sold just about everything I own, including my engagement ring, just to try to keep our head above water. My AR15 is next and after that ... I don't know what we'll do. Our nest egg is basically GONE on medication. So, I know your pain. And I'm sorry you have to go through it. It's hard. I hope your daughter heals and that none of you get sick. |
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Posted: 9/18/2009 9:21:28 AM EDT
[#12]
So nature taking it's course is a bad thing? Since when did the hippies stop caring about mother nature?
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Posted: 9/18/2009 9:24:21 AM EDT
[#13]
In other news, I've linked billions of deaths worldwide to "natural causes."
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Posted: 9/18/2009 9:31:18 AM EDT
[#14]
I wonder how many of those 45,000 spent their money on shiny wheels for their car instead of taking care of business? We each prioritize what we spend our money on. I take care of business for me and my family. If someone chooses to buy shiny wheels for their car than so be it. I shouldn't be taxed to buy them free health care.
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Posted: 9/18/2009 9:32:13 AM EDT
[#15]
That's it? Seems like a small number, minuscule almost.
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Posted: 9/18/2009 9:33:05 AM EDT
[#16]
The unabated passage of time causes death in people. We must stop time now to stop death. That's why we are creating a new czar in charge of stopping time.
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Posted: 9/18/2009 9:40:41 AM EDT
[#17]
So that's what all those plastic coffin things stacked up are for!!
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Posted: 9/18/2009 9:41:54 AM EDT
[#18]
Beats lining them up and shooting them
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Posted: 9/18/2009 9:53:42 AM EDT
[#19]
Quoted:
and even more people die from medical mistakes. Several times more, in fact.... |
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Posted: 9/18/2009 9:54:47 AM EDT
[#20]
If that were true (which it is not) then it is a self correcting problem, we have to run out of uninsured people eventually.
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Posted: 9/18/2009 10:11:59 AM EDT
[#21]
Quoted: Quoted: Even though a lot of that article is hype, some of it may be true. The other day when my child was diagnosed with swine flu and the whole house was put on prophylactic anti-virals and her treated with them, I asked the pharmacist why such an outrageous cost for 10 little pills. My husband and I don't have insurance and I am at very high risk of having complications from swine flu due to my auto-immune disease. She told me that if you need them you will pay that cost no matter what. TEN (10) are $135 without insurance. There is no generic available. So if you have nothing to sell and no way to purchase medications needed to possibly save your life, you die. It is as simple as that! I can certainly sympathize with you there. I *do* have medical insurance and my husband and I are spending $340.00 per month out of pocket for medication for both of us. That's not counting the $160.00 per month we pay for medical coverage on us and the 25.00 office visits we BOTH have to go to once a month for labs. My husband takes two kinds of BP medication (at $60.00 a pop), sinus and allergy meds (at $30.00), and stuff for a heart condition (also at $60.00). I take eleven pills per day. With me being too sick to work ... we're having to choose between food and medication for the most part. We've lived off Ramen noodles and water for almost six months now. I've been doing my shopping at the local church pantry for occasional canned beans or tuna, but most people can't donate food so the shelves are bare. We borrow internet from my neighbor with his consent. We have no cable television, no air conditioning running, no phones, and we turn on one sixty watt light bulb in the living room when it gets dark enough so that we can read. I've sold just about everything I own, including my engagement ring, just to try to keep our head above water. My AR15 is next and after that ... I don't know what we'll do. Our nest egg is basically GONE on medication. So, I know your pain. And I'm sorry you have to go through it. It's hard. I hope your daughter heals and that none of you get sick. Thanks, I hope things look better for you also. The swine flu meds were on top of the additional $500 (sometimes more) we shell out on medications a month, so I understand your monthly medication issues also. |
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