Should socialized health care deny/delay treatment to smokers and the obese?

[9-10ths_Penguin]

I always have to chuckle to myself when people talk about free health care because someone is paying for it through taxes, the money just doesn't fall out of the sky as the Greeks found out just a few years ago and tried to re-sue Germany for WWII reparations since they squandered the rest in a welfare nation. Once you hand over the the money and power of choice to a bureaucracy then you are subject to the whims and limitations of whoever is running the show at that specific time period. As far as the OP goes I'd say the word "elective" is key and yes I believe that if one hands over that power to someone else then they have the right to prioritize, like it or not they did it to themselves.

Universal health care isn't "free": everyone pays a reasonable amount so that nobody has to deal with catastrophic expenses when serious illness happens.

It also has the side effect of reducing costs, partly by encouraging people to get checkups and preventative care (thereby nipping problems in the bud before they become expensive acute problems) and partly by the effects of monosony (or near-monosony) on the purchasing power of the health care provider when purchasing goods and services.

 

[Quagmire]

...Just like a drug dealer.

Replace the variable of "eternal life" with a drug of your choice and your sentence will still work. Thus, God is a drug dealer.

.

Replace it with "sheep testicles" and it still works. Thus, God is a purveyor of sheep testicles.

Hey cool! If you completely ignore logic, you can do anything you want with that sentence.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

As for 'elective,' this is a term looser than the bowels of Noro patients. A surgery could be considered elective based on entirely arbitrary criteria. When I was in highschool I had a breast reduction surgery, which was then considered medical because of the back pain it caused (they took off 5 lbs of unbalanced tissue after all, it also prevented the shoulder divits and compromised trapezius muscle my mom had because she waited to get the surgery as an adult) and because breast cancer runs in my family and I would never have been able to find a growth during self-exams until it was already too big to not already have likely metastasized. Today that sort of surgery is considered purely 'elective,' and not covered by the majority of health insurance.

My insurance, through the state of Indiana (called HIP), and it will cover a double mastectomy in a male who has gynocemastia, but it will not cover the same exact procedure that has the same exact necessity in a female-to-male transsexual. I have "voice therapy" as a covered service, but not when the therapy is to sound more masculine or feminine.

Similarly, knee replacements.

It wasn't knee replacement, but my last private insurance really screwed me on a knee surgery, letting the claim sit in pending status as my 26th birthday approached, ending my coverage and their responsibility over my care. My state insurance has actually been pretty good though, and has covered all my medical needs thus far (though I'm now treading into needs it doesn't cover).

 

[powellbr5591]

No, if we start with the obese and smokers, where do we draw the line? The elderly, those with cancer? This is a way for the sons of muspell to push eugenics into the mainstream of society and should be stopped before it spreads to other areas of life like a cancer and usher in a new wave of fascism that would serve to empower a new world order to turn man against man.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

That's socialism for you, make those most in need go without.

 

[Lyndon]

no, that's facism. You don't have a clue what socialism is, obviously!!

 

[jonathan180iq]

Thanda's portrayal of God's motivations is indefensible IMHO but so is calling God a drug dealer, give me a break!!

I agree. "Drug dealer" is an analogy I usually reserve for clergy and proselytizers, not gods.

In the analogy, god(s) would be the intoxicant itself, not the middle-man.

Replace it with "sheep testicles" and it still works. Thus, God is a purveyor of sheep testicles.

Hey cool! If you completely ignore logic, you can do anything you want with that sentence.

I'm glad this post got so much attention.

As a means of extending an olive branch, might I suggest taking a walk over to your local public library, checking out the latest copy of Merrian Webster's masterpiece, and looking up the word satire.

Google works just as well...