An issue dear to us is how lousy US health care delivery is. For now, we are living in the south of France. Sevearal times now we have visited their medicare office signing up for their system. It is amazing. Can you imagine, even without signing up and paying nothing , having not subscribed yet; we find out we are allowe 10,000 euros coverage, just for having been given the type visa we hold. Our monthly cost is $186 for its premium. Really a tax. But, the coverage is. Dental, pharmacy, eye care. We pay a 8% deductibe if costs go over 10,000 euros for any given service. Up until that figure it is only a 3$ charge per visit. Includes medicines.
Can you believe we connect with the French, they actually brag about their health care delivery. They think it the best in the world. Our premimums in the US would be 7 times the French costs. And here, we do not have the HMO crap, that encouraged us to move here in the first place ; after our California HMO jeopardized my wife's life. We are bitter over that.
We return to the US , we will have to deal with the 'donut hole' you all are coping with . A reason to maybe stay here forever. Plus, we return, our monthly US medicare premiums will almost equal our French cost for a far inferior plan. And we will have no dental. (Dental services here are basic services. (You pay a far higher deductible for thinkgs like crowns, tho.)But, at least we have some dental, unlike the US.
Other reason to stay here. Nursing home care is less than half of US costs and we really get sick we can go up to the Netherlands and end our misery.
Plus all medical services are reasonable as starters. (Ex. I got heat stressed this summer. Needed attention at night when I got the shakes. The response a doctors' house call!!. Gave me a valium shot to get my breathing under control Cost for a doctor's house call, 45 euros. ) Can you imagine, a HOUSE CALL.
What slays me, even here at DU, many members defend the indefensible, the US medical care system. Among people, I'd hope would know better. The US system, the most wasteful in the world and some at DU not find it an offense.
A sample snip of the current healthcare premium inflation and it's related effects on Americans.
WASHINGTON - For the seventh straight year, premiums for employer-based health insurance rose more than twice as fast as overall inflation and wages, an annual survey of employers shows.
Most at risk are millions of low-income workers who haven't taken coverage as employers require their workers to pay higher out-of-pocket costs.
Forty-nine percent of employers surveyed indicated that they'll make workers pay more for coverage in the future.
The number of uninsured Americans has grown for five straight years, with 46.6 million lacking coverage in 2005.
The average 7.7 percent premium increase for 2006 was the smallest since 2000 and marked the third straight year that the rate of growth has slowed, according to the survey, released Wednesday by Kaiser Family Foundation and the Health Research and Educational Trust.
But most Americans probably have felt little or no relief because their paychecks haven't kept pace with the rate hikes. Workers' earnings increased only 3.8 percent on average from April 2005 to April 2006, while inflation, up 3.5 percent, erodes their disposable income.
Since 2000, inflation has jumped 18 percent and the amount that workers pay toward family health-care coverage has skyrocketed 84 percent, the survey found. Average wages have increased 20 percent over the same period.
So even while the premium-rate increases have moderated - down from a 9.2 percent jump in 2005 and an 11.2 percent spike in 2004 - experts say there's no reason to celebrate.
"I think you immediately understand why a reduction in an already high rate of increase is pretty meaningless to average working people and why they're still feeling the pain," said Drew Altman, the president of the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit educational group that's unrelated to Kaiser Permanente, a health insurance company.
This year, the average annual premium for single coverage is $4,242, of which workers pay $627, up from $610 in 2005. Family coverage costs an average of $11,480, with workers paying $2,973 annually, up from $2,713 last year.
Since 2000, workers' annual contributions have increased on average by $293 for single coverage and by $1,354 for family coverage, the survey found.
Rising health-care costs have forced many companies to scale back or drop coverage. Five million fewer workers are receiving job-based coverage in 2006 than in 2000, the survey found. And the percentage of firms that offer health benefits has fallen from 69 percent in 2000 to 61 percent this year.
That's prompted concerns that the job-based health insurance system, which covers nearly 175 million Americans, could unravel in the face of runaway costs.
Most at risk are millions of low-income workers who haven't taken coverage as employers require their workers to pay higher out-of-pocket costs. Forty-nine percent of employers surveyed indicated that they'll make workers pay more for coverage in the future. The number of uninsured Americans has grown for five straight years, with 46.6 million lacking coverage in 2005.
Below is a link about US health insurance premiums WASHINGTON - Story by Tony Pugh, of McClatchy Newspapers.
http://www.commondreams.org/healines06/0927-09.htm If you Americans don't get your health care act together, we may not be able to reutrn, ever. We are particularily upset over Gov. Arni's veto of Single Payer in California. All caused by the approximate half a million dollars he takes from the health care industry. There are no other solutions.
For some reason this link does not work. The site is Common Dreams lead thread for Sept 28.
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