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Originally Posted by lwarmonger
I will agree that the United States gets substantially less bang for our buck when it comes to health care, and that is a problem that both major parties agree on, although they differ sharply as to how to resolve it... however we are not comparable to Cuba. Plenty of Cubans living here in the US can go back to Cuba occasionally to visit family, and see the quality of healthcare available to the average citizen (this is important, because the average Cuban doesn't go to the same facilities that they show foriegners). They don't tend to be impressed.
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I remember you bringing up a similar argument about Vietnam in this or another thread. My experience has been that people who leave a country always tend to have reservations about it. My aunt who is a naturalized US citizen for instance refuses to believe that India has a better communications infrastructure than the US. No amount of trips to India and evidence to the contrary will convince her otherwise.(I only bring up communications because I'm a commn. Enggr.) I've seen a lot of people of different nationalities like that. People who need a reason to convince themselves that they're better off now than they were before. They don't really realize that they are doing it either. So you'll forgive me if I don't consider that a valid argument.
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Why isn't it fair? Part of what enabled that pharmaceutical industry to develop is the encouragement of free enterprise that makes the US so wealthy. If we were communist we wouldn't have the base of wealth to go on in the first place.
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Okay, "Unfair" was a poor choice. Let me put it this way. The original reply was to a point Shek made about access to cutting edge stuff. Developing nations have a far more limited pool of money to spend. So if $100 will help keep a hundred people healthy but this brand new kick-ass killer drug that costs another $100 will keep an additional individual healthy then you can understand why that addnl. $100 will likely be spent on something else. In fact it's true of America too. The question is about the level at which the cost outweighs the benefit. If at 1/30th the cost they can provide care for 100 as opposed to the 105 that would have been treated in the US, I'd say the citizens are doing okay.
I don't know what this has to do with capitalism. My friend in Canada complains of long waiting lists for visits to the doctor. She nipped across the border to see a doctor instead. I'd say her access the medicine is pretty stunted.
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And the cost of basic medicine for basic things isn't something I ever really thought about. It isn't something that I have ever had a hard time purchasing, nor anyone I know. The vast majority of Americans have sufficient disposable income to purchase any of these "minor" medicines... now whether or not they choose to purchase something else and do without the medicine is up to them.
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I don't really know how it compares with Cuba. Either way my point is that it would be a better metric of easy access to health care.
My point all along has never been that I think Cuba has great healthcare. Fact is I don't know what their system is like. What I'm pointing out is that amount of money spent in raw terms is a bad statistic(when used as a measure of access to health care) especially for the US.