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Hanaway's pay is 28.2 million. How many liver transplants would that buy? How many Americans had to die so he could make that kind of money?
How can this bastard sleep at night?
Al Qeada is a faith-based initiative.
by drewfromct on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 05:35:41 AM PDT
[ Parent ]
or liver transplant--which was it? I've now read both. Had a donor been found?
And thanks for the info on Hanaway's pay
by Heart of the Rockies on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 07:06:39 AM PDT
... a donated liver that was a good match for her had became available six days earlier, but then Cigna denied approval for the procedure.
Keith Olbermann speaks for me
by JanetT in MD on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 08:05:42 AM PDT
she had a bone marrow transplant and was waiting for a liver transplant.
by Heart of the Rockies on Sun Dec 23, 2007 at 12:20:45 PM PDT
price, that will buy about 22 transplants.
Wherefore do ye toil; is it not that ye may live and be happy? And if ye toil only that ye may toil more, when shall happiness find you?
by keefer55 on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 07:27:37 AM PDT
And the claims agents in his company get paid a bonus keyed to how many claims they reject each quarter. At least, I am guessing that, since that is basically how insurance companies work to turn a profit.
Stop and think about the business model. It is not geared toward highest possible therapeutic outcome for the patients, money is made through making sure that the fewest costly procedures are done. And this unfortunate young lady? Hey, she already had cancer and was not in great shape, why waste a perfectly good organ on her? Or so goes the corporate cost/benefit analysis process.
Leaving aside this specific situation, we have to ask a serious question:
Who decides?
Who decides if a procedure is done, or not? We need a review process that is independent of us asking an insurance company whether they'd like to spend a few hundred thousand dollars, or not? Sort of a trick question, isn't it? As long as they make their profit margin by refusing a certain amount of medical care, the process will cost the consumer a substantial amount of money each year, while giving them second-rate health care.
by arthura on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 07:42:42 AM PDT
And this unfortunate young lady? Hey, she already had cancer and was not in great shape, why waste a perfectly good organ on her? Or so goes the corporate cost/benefit analysis process.
These kinds of decisions will still need to be made even in a "perfect" universal, non-profit single payer health care system. But the difference is, there should never be any consideration of profit/loss when such hard choices are made.
by drewfromct on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 08:02:58 AM PDT
"Hey, she already had cancer and was not in great shape, why waste a perfectly good organ on her?"
Ummm... for one thing, someone in great shape wouldn't need a new liver, would they? Organ transplants are intended precisely for people in desperate condition. Perfectly healthy people are not exactly flooding the market with requests for new organs for themselves.
"Sometimes I wonder whether the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on or by imbeciles who really mean it." - Mark Twain
by Donna in Rome on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 09:09:10 AM PDT
Obviously, healthy individuals don't need organ transplants. But there are more patients who need transplants than there are donated organs available, and some patients have better odds of surviving than others, so they should go to the head of the line. I'm not a doctor and I'm not familiar with the intricate details of this particular case, so I can't say whether she would have died anyway had she gotten the transplant in time, but it's simply common sense to realize that even in an ideal non-profit system, there will still be such a thing as triage.
by drewfromct on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 09:19:36 AM PDT
In order to have Universal Health coverage Health Insurance Companies must die.
And we must kill them.
All of the employees of the health Insurance companies should begin looking for gainful employment in other fields. For this is one industry that must be Euthanized.
No matter how cynical I get, it's impossible to keep up.
by Flippant on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 09:27:08 AM PDT
for the government program that will make sure every American gets the surgeries they need.
Netroots Director for Oregon Senate Candidate Jeff Merkley
by sarahlane on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 10:40:12 AM PDT
the country gets the money they have stashed too..to fund healthcare..also get the owned hospitals, clinics, labs, etc. Basically the entire private infrastructure. So, we end up with all their stuff..otherwise, someone else will find a way to profit from it. Take it all, and use it properly. That is what we need to do.
What happens when Bush takes Viagra? he gets taller. Robin Williams
by Demfem on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 10:58:53 AM PDT
It needs to be made clear that we are not talking about the doctors. It's the damned middle-men who refuse to pay doctors to save people's lives.
If Democrats have a pre-911 view of the world, Republicans have a pre-July 4th view of the world.
by chadlupkes on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 11:08:23 AM PDT
healthcare infrastructure. The doctors are mostly employees, not owners. Like Humana, for instance. They are a corporate health care company. They own and operate hospitals, labs, etc. Doctors work for them. So, if the private healthcare infrastructure were to be nationalized, nothing would change for the doctors, they would still get paid, the hospital would run at cost, not for profit, and the pharmacies would also run at cost. Yes, a top-flight surgeon would make a lot more than one starting out, but it's that way in all professions. Just the patients wouldn't be paying for the corporate perks, golden parachutes, and other corporate "expenses" incurred by people who have little or nothing to do with their care, but add enormously to the expense. That alone will save billions. There would have to be a small profit margin for the hospital unless funding for new equipment, repairs, maintaining the building, etc. was found elsewhere.
by Demfem on Sat Dec 22, 2007 at 12:48:19 PM PDT
wide narrow
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