Parihaka

Wow, impressive, only your second post and you are not only posting scientific drivel but you're telling us off for not sticking to the topic as well

Bulgaroctonus

Since there is not a strict procedure or administration here, the World Affairs Board works very indirectly and topics tend to meander. You'll find that almost every post eventually drifts far wide of its original topic. Although this can sometimes be annoying, good debate comes up.

I appreciate your concern for topicality, but Global Warming itself will be discussed in time. Right now, we are all dedicated to the exhaustion of the issues related to obesity and health. A moderator should actually just rename the post to avoid confusion.

Confed999

This isn't any kind of official debate forum. Think of it more like a conversation. Address any portion of the thread you wish. There are also quite a few other "global warming" threads on this board. You might want to read them, and some of the storys/research linked to, and quoted, in this thread.

__________________
No man is free until all men are free - John Hossack
I agree completely with this Administration’s goal of a regime change in Iraq-John Kerry
even if that enforcement is mostly at the hands of the United States, a right we retain even if the Security Council fails to act-John Kerry
He may even miscalculate and slide these weapons off to terrorist groups to invite them to be a surrogate to use them against the United States. It’s the miscalculation that poses the greatest threat-John Kerry

Shek

Sorry, I haven't seen Chicken Little yet. I hear that it's really good.

__________________
"So little pains do the vulgar take in the investigation of truth, accepting readily the first story that comes to hand." Thucydides 1.20.3

barrowaj

I agree completely. Computers and decentralized decision making would have worked better, but in most all cases the free market is the best way of allocating resources.

How can you say that? What about Germany, the Nordic countries, France, etc. Those countries are not authoritarian. I'm not talking about socialism where there is no free enterprise. I'm talking about socialist in terms of government social programs and direction of the economy. In fact, I wouldn't advocate socialism in terms of the ways that its been practiced before for America in any way. I'm a socialist in terms that I think that its an evolutionary idea that technology will eventually help us progress toward. Socialism is not something that can be forced on people, and its not something that is defined in absolute terms.


I hold that the declining growth rate of the US is characteristic of a developed economy. When a country is industrializing and allocating new resources, its easy to grow, but after it has reached maximal allocation, its much more difficult.

The statistics that you give are for the EU, which includes less developed countries such as Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia, Hungary, and Greece. Those countries cannot be expected to have the same standard of care as the rest of the well developed European countries. Your analysis also incorrect because you don't control for the type of cancer diagnosed. Lung cancer incidence is much higher in the EU, and accounts for part of the difference.

Rate of cancer deaths in US: 41%
Rate of cancer deaths in EU: 62% (including underdeveloped countries)

Incidence in US: 173,770 (12.7% of cancers)
Incidence in EU: 243,600 (15.9% of cancers)

The higher incidence of smoking in Europe also contributes to higher rates of other cancers such as pancreatic, which has nearly 100% 1 year mortality.

Anyway, I've done quite a bit more research on this, and the statistics seem to prove that you are right, however the difference isn't as big as you think..

First, it is more appropriate to compare two countries of similar status, so lets compare the US and Sweden. Secondly, we should adjust the statistics so that they are collected from the same year. Because treatments are continually improving, it doesn't make sense to compare two different years. Also, this is a cross sectional analysis, and since incidence is generally increasing it doesn't make sense to compare incidence and mortality along the same year cross section (because survival isn't only within a year). However, I don't have a good way to account for that, so I'm going to assume that its similar between the US and Sweden.

Cancer rates in the US in the year 2000 (according to CDC, not estimates, as the cancer.org chart you linked to was):
incidence: 564.5/100k mortality: 248.1/100k
motality percent: 43.9%

Cancer rates in Sweden in the year 2000:
incidence: 40,880 mortality: 21,876
mortality percent: 53.5%

US cancer stats:
http://apps.nccd.cdc.gov/uscs/Table....2000&Display=n

Swedish cancer stats:
http://info.cancerresearchuk.org/can...eandmortality/

That is a significant difference, and although part of it is maybe accountable to smoking, the whole difference is not. So you are definitely right, the chance of surviving cancer in the US is higher than in Sweden. I don't know if the same thing is true of heart attacks, since I don't have another 1.5 hrs to devote to number crunching.

However, I would attribute the lower infant mortality in Sweden and longer life expectancy only partially to lifestyle changes, but also due to better access to preventative care. It is also important to consider that we pay 4x as much for our healthcare as the European states, so it better be better!

So, in conclusion, we can say that US healthcare provides better outcomes for those that get cancer, but it doesn't do a good job at helping keep people healthy.

Socialized medicine, with free checkups, etc, is better at keeping people healthy, but is less able to stay on the cutting edge of technology of treatments. A good portion of that difference is probably due to less government funding of healthcare research. In the US, the NIH budget is huge.

A more interesting comparison would be between a free market and socialized healthcare system in two equivalently underdeveloped countries where government funding of research is not as much of an issue. I would put money on the fact that the socialized system would be better.

In conclusion, I wouldn't advocate completely socialized medicine in the US, but perhaps we can do something to give people better access to preventative care.

dalem

Sure. We can lower taxes, reign in litigation and roll back Federal programs. People will keep more of their own money to spend on health care, businesses will be able to hire more of them, and the states can keep more money within their borders to run their own health care.

-dale

barrowaj

Federal programs are providing healthcare to a significant portion of the population who could not otherwise afford it. The other problem is that even if people are given more money from lowering taxes, they won't use it to purchase a sufficient quantity of healthcare.

What is happening though is that HMOs are realizing that people are more healthy if they get regular checkups, and are starting measures to ensure that people do so.

Other than reigning in litigation, what you said would result in a net loss of healthcare to people.

barrowaj

I wholeheartedly embrace individuality. But there are many problems in the US that are caused by and aren't able to be solved with the free market. Just think, without government intervention, there would be anarchy, and there would be no free market.

While I am an idealist on one level, I consider myself to be pragmatic and utilitarian. I'm only talking about ideas that I think will help improve America, not cater to some sort of welfare state.

I think you are far overexaggerating the fact that there is no individual responsibility in the US. I see it everywhere, from immigrants, to small businesses, even to federal employees (not the DMV).

Praxus

They are mixed economies. Oh and socialism is something that can be forced on people. This is evident by the fact that it is being forced upone me.

You hold that, aye? Well prove it.

Everyone has private healthcare providers to some extent except for people on the dole. The cost for socialized medicine, even though it is only for the poor and elderly, per capita, costs just as much as private medicine per capita. So tell me now, which is more costly. You must also remember the effect of lawsuits on doctors insurence costs, which in turn, drastically rise prices. The best thing to do is to limit lawsuit rewards, excepting gross negligence, and get rid of welfare.

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/326

If you get a major afliction, you have a significantly better chance of survival in the United States, then you do in the "best" of countries with total socialized healthcare.

You forget that what you advocate is violence against those who do not want to participate in your social experiment.

dalem

Not my problem.

People can spend their money on what they want. If they don't want to be healthy, so what?

-dale

Shek

My brother-in-law's brother and wife make over 70K a year and choose not to purchase health insurance so that they can maintain a boat for recreation. Should we have to cover his health insurance because he fails to make a smart decision?

Julie

Correct. Who do you think does most of the rebuilding in major disasters, i.e., Hurricane Katrina. The private sector will.

dalem

Excellent example.

-dale

highsea

Lol.....WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!!!

Bahahahaha...

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barrowaj

Then go move to any other country that you please to. You are free to do so.

Well, its the commonly held belief by historians that the new deal is what got us out of the depression, so I think that the burden of proof is on you, not me.

I'm all with you, except that we have a moral obligation to provide healthcare for those that can't afford it. Even the most right wing of republicans aren't about to take away medicare and medicaid. So since we are going to have it we might as well make the rest of healthcare as good as we can. And oh, did I mention that medicare has a lower overhead than insurance companies? (13% vs. 33%). That's right insurance companies waste more money than medicare.

I don't know about "significantly" but yes, if you get cancer you have a better chance of surviving it in the US, provided you have health insurance, medicare, medicaid, or can afford the payments out of pocket. This is because our government funds a lot of cancer research, and we have new strategies for dealing with cancer.

I don't advocate any kind of violence against people. Thats completely untrue. If you want to be a citizen of the US, then pay taxes and do so. If you'd rather not then you don't have to.