Worth A Click

In the USA, if you don’t have insurance, the healthcare system doesn’t exist for you.

Riiiiight. Her problem’s not that she’s uninsured, it’s that she’s not an illegal alien. Then, they’d take care of her:

http://www.cbs8.com/stories/story.107562.html

Doctors are caring for nearly a dozen wildfire burn victims who are
illegal immigrants.

[…]

With surgeries, treatments and even aftercare, UCSD says the price tag
will likely be large. On average, most burn patients stay in the hospital
for 15 days, but in this case, these patients will be treated much longer.

“Anyone who comes to us needing care, we provide care and we figure out
the funding afterwards,” Dr. McAfee said.

For an American citizen who doesn’t have medical insurance, county funding
or help from Medi-Cal can often cover some of the expenses. But
undocumented immigrants won’t receive that funding. Therefore, UCSD says
the hospital swallows the bill.

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At least she’s not in Canada, where the government run health care system has already disintegrated:
http://www.onthefencefilms.com/video/twowomen.html

See what I did there? I cited an anecdote, and extrapolated from it to make a broad generalization.

Also, post your email address here and I will email you virus-free text files. By doing so, you will help provide health care for sick ladies.

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Wow, Patriarch, you mean up in Canada the worst problem they have is they don’t always have enough doctors for specialty operations, AND you can’t skip ahead in the queue by paying the doctor money?

I really should move.

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I sincerely love when anyone (such as Phanatic) attempts to convince anyone else that, somehow, illegal aliens just have it really good in the States. It’s as if they’ve never even actually met —

Ah, right. There we are.

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It’s as if they’ve never even actually met –

It’s as if you’re erecting a giant strawman and arguing against it rather than the point being raised!

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What giant strawman is that? That you’re contending that illegal immigrants are — somehow — benefitting from the system at the cost of the rest of us? I’m not attacking a strawman, I’m attacking the base assertion, which is on-the-face-of-it ridiculous enough to send the house of cards tumbling down.

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I lost the selected Asterix images when my Livejournal account got nuked, sadly. If I can find fresh Asterix scans I’ll probably redo it at some point, although it’s not really a priority.

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“Probably” is always good enough for me with you. As long as you keep being awesome and don’t die, I will never question or make demands of you.

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Phanatic, it cannot be considered irrelevant that she will be getting the exact same care or lack of it, if she was an illegal alien, since you asserted that “Her problem’s not that she’s uninsured, it’s that she’s not an illegal alien. Then, they’d take care of her.”

If we ignore that point, and focus on your statement that:

“Health care is a finite resource. It’s rationed. In the NHS, it’s rationed on a different basis than it’s rationed here, but in either case, it’s rationed. It’s a rival good.

What do you call it when someone consumes a rival good without paying for it? I’m not going to quibble over whether “stealing” is the correct term, but “You’d get exactly the same care!” is irrelevant. What’s relevant is the use of the resource by those who do not pay for it, and the fact that that consumption *drives up the cost* for everyone else.”

Then, in order to determine the relevancy of that remark, we must consider the effect on her problem of the fact that illegal immigrants in the US receive some health care for which they are not paying.

I will now admit that I have little real knowledge of the US health system. I have next to none of the effect of illegal immigrants on it.

Therefore, I will make the assumption that illegal immigration has increased the health care prices in the US by 15 % across the board for all treatments. This is, I believe, far too high an estimate, but it will be assumed to be true right now.

Would the woman MGK is referring to be able to pay for her treatments, in case the prices for medical services had NOT increased the assumed 15 %? I sincerely doubt it – the price of the brain surgery in question is far out of her league.

Thus, her problem is not illegal immigration driving up health care prices, but her not being covered by health insurance and her not having a job which could provide her with the money. And therefore, I consider the illegal immigration issue irrelevant in this question.

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