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Yes, but that doesn't mean I don't have to pay my own copays and deductibles.
For a crown over a root canal caused because a cavity wasn't taken care of in a timely fashion. Come back when you face a really serious medical issue.
As I told another poster, you can choose that for yourself, but don't advocate that for others.
It seems as though you continue to confuse the method and means of paying for care...
with the care itself and perhaps even the merits of seeking care at all when appropriate.
I'll grant that in the current milieu it takes some effort to make the several distinctions, but please
do at least try, and especially so of you're attempting to discuss remedies to the existing system.
No, you don't necessarily have to pay that much. You tell the hospital what you can afford and pay that amount, even if it's just $25.
As someone else said, I'm not sure you understand how this works. If you say that they will first refer you to a lender who can finance the bill. If you don't qualify for that, then they will offer you a payment plan. You can't just say no you wont make payments. If you do, you will be turned over to collections and or sued. If you truly have no possessions or ability to pay, then maybe they will accept the $25. But that means you have nothing; no house, no car no significant assets of any kind.
I have personally known people who have done this. All you have to do is tell the hospital how much you can pay each month and as long as you make the payment on time each money, they can't do anything to you. Many people are not aware of this and will not question the hospitals.
This is completely different than your original response. You said pay $25 and call it good, as that's all you can afford. That is completely different than a payment plan of $25/month to cover a $7000 bill plus interest. Also, just so you see why this doesn't really work is that the repayment term at a reasonable interest rate would be about 65 years.
I suspect, that the point is as the OP so inelegantly posited...
that health insurance isn't what will (or won't) cure what ails.
My apologies. I was having a very bad day. Not an excuse, just an explanation.
The PRESENT health care system, which is controlled by the insurance industry and not the medical community, won't cure what ails us because it isn't in the insurance companies' best interests to do so. They like it just fine the way it is. To adapt part of an old joke about the difference between specialists and generalists, "They're charging us more and more for less and less, until eventually we'll owe everything for nothing."
Completely eliminating all health care insurance, be it public or private, will only make things worse.
What we need to do is take a long, hard, detailed & objective look at how the world's most effective/efficient national health care systems are operated - a process commonly called benchmarking - and try to craft/engineer a similar set-up here.
Not needed. But clarifying follow ups are always encouraged.
Quote:
Completely eliminating all health care insurance, be it public or private, will only make things worse.
I can't think of anyone who would disagree.
Quote:
What we need to do is take a long, hard, detailed & objective look at how the world's most effective/efficient
national health care systems are operated - a process commonly called benchmarking
- and try to craft/engineer a similar set-up here.
Sounds like a plan. Someone should start a thread with that in mind.
Or several HUNDRED thousand if you had cancer. OP, will you write them a check for that?
In the olden days, it was cheap as all doc did is give you two aspirin and tell the family he was sorry for their loss, as the end was near. That is why it was cheap. We couldn't save anybody. Had a strong heart attack 40 years ago-that was a death sentence.
We need to go back to the days when you purchased a cheap major medical policy that covered you for expensive procedures and paid cash for the rest.
We need to go back to the days when you purchased a cheap major medical policy
that covered you for (most of the more) expensive procedures and paid cash for the (lesser levels of care)...
And provide a diagnosis based back door into Medicare for the catastrophic, traumatic, and other such
bankruptingly expensive care and treatments that NO ONE can afford to pay or even afford to insure against.
We need to go back to the days when you purchased a cheap major medical policy that covered you for expensive procedures and paid cash for the rest.
Paying for insurance you may well never use, yes, that's a great idea! Plus, what is "the rest"? A well-baby checkup can cost you $500 with immunizations.
Health care has changed a lot since I graduated from nursing school in 1970. It's far less hospital based than it was then. Such policies made sense at the time. They don't make sense now. Practically no one goes into the hospital for "tests" any more. They're all done outpatient. Fairly major surgeries are done out patient. Hospital stays are much shorter now; you're expected to recover at home, with perhaps a few visits from home health nurse or physical therapist. That's all part of "the rest".
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Not an excuse, just an explanation. 
