Igor Jakovsky: Magorn: adiabat: Life lesson: Don't let your insurance lapse.
Buy a cheap major-med policy if you're ever between jorbs, and you won't have this problem.
(HIPAA 1996)

Thank you Mitt, now back here in the real world, when Jobs end, and unemployment is paying about 25% of what you used to make, dropping 3-400/mo on a "cheap maj med policy" isn;t much of an option for most people

And what will those folks do when they are forced to buy insurance? How will they afford it then?

well thanks to the health care exchanges, the 80-20 rule and the public option, Insurance is going to get a lot better and a lot cheaper. When I looked into INS after I lost my job, the only thing even vaguely affordable would have cost me about $350/mo for me, my wife and child, and that was insurance that kicked in ONLY after I'd spent $2500 out of pocket on the deductible and then picked up only about 75-80% of covered expenses up to a policy max of $50,000 lifetime. For low income folks that deductible, co pay and limitation means that is CINO, Coverage in Name Only, because they simply don't have the two large to spend before the ins. kicks in, or the 10K of copay a serious medical condition would cost them

It's not fraud if you wear a suit.

stonicus: Felgraf: hitlersbrain: FarkinHostile: So insurance companies are supposed to lose money as long as the person is really, really nice?

Look, if you donate an organ you are going to have major health issues later. It's amazingly cool to do, but business is business. He can certainly get insurance, but it ain't gonna be the same price as the rest of us selfish MF's pay.

Insurance companies exist to make a profit, not care for people. Welcome to the land of retards.

Then perhaps they should not be involved in a good that everyone, at some point, is going to need, since they may very well be forced to resort to borderline fraud to actually make a profit?

How is it fraud? They looked at the numbers and decided "we'll spend more on you than we will make, so no, you can't haz insurance". Nothing is stopping him from paying the doctor himself. Giving the kidney was nice, but did he also give up half of his brain? How could he not have researched this ahead of time? Now, if he did, and they said "cool",. but now they are saying "not cool", then that is different.

Calling it fraud outright is a huge stretch, but if you think it's morally just to treat being a live organ donor as a pre-existing condition, you're a wretched monster.

Igor Jakovsky: And what will those folks do when they are forced to buy insurance? How will they afford it then?

Community rating is built into the PPACA, so companies can't charge more for certain classes of customers than others (nor refuse them).

More directly, though, you're exempt from any mandate/tax punishment if the cost of a 'silver' plan in your state's health insurance exchange exceeds 8% of your income. That can be extrapolated to exclude 40-50% of Americans from any sort of mandate whatsoever. Though those same lower-income half of the country will generally quality for various degrees of subsidization of insurance purchase.

geoduck42: 504_King_streetcar: Pardon me a moment, I'm just going to go thank my lucky stars that I live in Canada, land of socialized health care, and not some Darwinist madhouse where an act of Christian charity will send you tumbling into penury and ruin while your fellow countrymen cheer your downfall with lusty cries of I GOT MINE.

You are aware of who you folks allowed to become your Prime Minister, right? You'll be joining us soon enough..

True. On the other hand socialized medicine is so entrenched in this country that it would be next to impossible to remove. The best that could be done there is a two-tier system with private and public healthcare side by side. And even that would be a stretch, given that the usual reaction to two-tier healthcare here is on a par with what you folks get when people start talking about single payer. Bear in mind that out conservatives like Harper are still roughly equivalent to right-leaning Democrats in the US. Harper has more in common with Obama that Romney. The other parties are actually to the left of that benchmark, with the NDP, our current opposition, being so far left that no real equivalent exists in the US, unless the Communist Party has being doing really well and keeping quiet about it. We are fairly safe for now, barring a massive shift towards the hard right. If that happens I will be checking to see if Sealand is taking immigrants.

This wouldn't be a problem if everyone stopped getting those heathen disease causing vaccines.

human $uffering

/makes my blood boil
//which is most likely not covered by insurance

WinnipegDragon: Good to see that private health insurance is working out so well for yet another American.

/Canada
//Snicker
///You guys are suckers


Yeah... well... at least we don't have a Queen.

/got nutin

Organ panels!

If you have a pre-existing condition then it is no longer insurance, it is cost shifting.

You want to go have better health care in this country then

1. convince old people to die with dignity: Link

2. amend the bums and illegals get free healthcare act to read that the only duty a hospital emergency room has is to relieve immediate pain and not provide treatment and stabilization

Everything else is just moving the deck chairs

adiabat: Life lesson: Don't let your insurance lapse.
Buy a cheap major-med policy if you're ever between jorbs, and you won't have this problem.
(HIPAA 1996)

It depends on what state you live in. HIPAA does *NOT* apply when converting to an individual policy although some states have put in such rules on their own.

cameroncrazy1984: adiabat: Buy a cheap major-med policy if you're ever between jorbs, and you won't have this problem.

Thanks to Obamacare, you can now get these even when you have a "pre-existing condition"

Yup. One of the things he really got right.

Abzzstain: cameroncrazy1984: adiabat: Buy a cheap major-med policy if you're ever between jorbs, and you won't have this problem.

Thanks to Obamacare, you can now get these even when you have a "pre-existing condition"

But only if you've been without coverage for at least six months. And they are still very expensive, but better than nothing.

I can see no reason for the 6 month rule. It should go.

Abzzstain: And what if no one will sell you a policy? There is effectively only one insurer in my state (BCBS) and they won't sell me a policy because I have asthma. They won't sell my wife a policy because she's "child-bearing age." Seriously, that was her pre-existing condition they listed on the rejection letter.

Luckily Obama's health plan provides an opportunity for people with pre-existing conditions, but it's still terribly expensive.

Are they on LSD or something? Asthma I can understand but being of child bearing age???

I wouldn't call it terribly expensive. I pay about what I would with an individual policy--it's only terribly expensive in comparison to the employer-subsidized coverage that is what most people are used to.

vpb: Of course, if you get sick, you will be stuck with that "cheap" policy until the law preventing denial of coverage for pre-existing conditions goes into effect, if ever.

It's worse than that--your "cheap" policy will cease being cheap after a while. It's a racket: Look carefully at the rules on rate increases. They can only increase the rates the same for all like customers in the state--but like customers are those who bought *THAT* policy. After a few years they quit selling it and sell something else instead--thereby getting a new pool of customers. Meanwhile the people in the old group start getting sick and the rates start going up. The healthy quickly leave (as they can buy the new version that's still cheap) and so you have a pool of only the sick. The rates go through the roof and soon the old policy is gone.

FarkinHostile: So insurance companies are supposed to lose money as long as the person is really, really nice?

Look, if you donate an organ you are going to have major health issues later. It's amazingly cool to do, but business is business. He can certainly get insurance, but it ain't gonna be the same price as the rest of us selfish MF's pay.

The problem is that that's not what happens. The donors live normal lives. The kidney function test comes back showing a bit of trouble but that's only in relation to baseline--a kidney donor has half the filtration of a normal person, the levels of the stuff they filter is a bit higher than normal because of this. However, since this is due to half capacity rather than half-failed kidneys that doesn't mean it will get worse with time.

Seriously though, I just don't know how anyone can defend the concept of for-profit healthcare.

If someone has cancer, your Weeners should be "How can we help them" not "What is this going to cost".

Nationalize the medical system

Draft all the doctors.

Now.

Ant: Marcus Aurelius: Two words: Single Payer.

That. We're already paying way more than that would cost.

Double. In point of fact. We spend roughly $6,000 per capita on Healthcare in the US and 35 million of us aren't even covered. The next highest industrialized nation is Luxemborg who spends 3800 per capita, followed by the rest of Europe that spnads about 3k each and they all have universal single-payer coverage, that includes perks like being able to get a housecall from a doctor, in the middle of the night just by calling their equivalent of 911. Saves them GOBS of money of the US alterntive which is basically: get sick at night? Go to the ER

Savian: Health Insurance companies are the One True Cancer.

And still no cure for cancer.

Jixa: 504_King_streetcar: Pardon me a moment, I'm just going to go thank my lucky stars that I live in Canada, land of socialized health care, and not some Darwinist madhouse where an act of Christian charity will send you tumbling into penury and ruin while your fellow countrymen cheer your downfall with lusty cries of I GOT MINE.

Can I apply for political asylum on the grounds that the government is trying to kill me financially because I can't afford health insurance? ;)


/one major health issue away from bankruptcy
//thankfully, at least, the kids have Medicaid

Commiserations. Sadly our immigration and asylum policies are erratic at best. One day we're all "NONE IS TOO MANY" and the next it's "WE'LL TAKE ANYONE FROM ANYWHERE! WE'LL TAKE ANYONE WITH A PULSE! WE'LL TAKE THE DEAD! WE'LL TAKE PEOPLE WHO DON'T EXIST!"

Serious Black: Calling it fraud outright is a huge stretch, but if you think it's morally just to treat being a live organ donor as a pre-existing condition, you're a wretched monster.

You can make him the president of the Feel Good Fan Club all day long, but that means everyone else has to pay higher premiums because of what he did? If missing a kidney is bad, then yeah, why the hell wouldn't it be a pre-existing condition? The article does seem to be saying that only having one kidney isn't really that bad. If that is the case, then yeah, it's wrong. But I could give a rat's ass about the sentimentality and emotion of the situation. He made a decision that benefited himself and wants us to help shoulder the burden.

dj1s
So, if you are a rich asshole, you wouldn't donate a kidney to anyone and thus this is not a problem to you.

What if you were a rich asshole and you donated your kidney. And it was that kidney that made you rich in the first place. Now some guy with your kidney is running around, making millions and donating it to charity.

Man, this writes itself. Dan Aykroyd is a rich asshole. He goes in to the hospital for a peenie extension and they put him in the wrong OR. The docs accidentally remove and donate his kidney to humanitarian Eddie Murphy. Eddie gets out of the hospital and starts making and donating all this money. Dan is getting broker by the minute and tries to scam and steal his kidney back.

Big scene: He has Eddie kidnapped after all his other plans fail. Eddieis strapped to the operating room table and Dan comes in, tells him he's taking his kidney back AND he's finally going to get that peenie extension he wanted. "Yeah, it's the wrong color but no one is going to complain.

For some reason, Dan has a change of heart, goes to work for Eddie and together they make Detroit ever so slightly better.

Pair-o-Dice: Savian: Health Insurance companies are the One True Cancer.

And still no cure for cancer.

Cures aren't nearly as profitable.

He should just be happy they didn't kill him, and then tell his daughter "tough shiat" and send her home.

WinnipegDragon: If someone has cancer, your Weeners should be "How can we help them" not "What is this going to cost".

My weener never helped anyone but me.

zetar: Blue Cross Blue Shield? Oh, they're a bunch of sweeties.

They cancelled my insurance the day after I was diagnosed with Stage 3 kidney disease.

/ This was after I've paid them something like $300k in premiums (best guestimate) over the last 30 years.

It's a wonder some single guy with no family hasn't had a "falling down" moment with one of these companies yet....

RembrandtQEinstein: If you have a pre-existing condition then it is no longer insurance, it is cost shifting.

You want to go have better health care in this country then

1. convince old people to die with dignity: Link

2. amend the bums and illegals get free healthcare act to read that the only duty a hospital emergency room has is to relieve immediate pain and not provide treatment and stabilization

Everything else is just moving the deck chairs

Just so You Know?

Most grown-ups don't sleep with an Autographed Copy of Atlas Shrugged under their pillow to keep the Looters Under the Bed at bay...

Felgraf: hitlersbrain: FarkinHostile: So insurance companies are supposed to lose money as long as the person is really, really nice?

Look, if you donate an organ you are going to have major health issues later. It's amazingly cool to do, but business is business. He can certainly get insurance, but it ain't gonna be the same price as the rest of us selfish MF's pay.

Insurance companies exist to make a profit, not care for people. Welcome to the land of retards.

Then perhaps they should not be involved in a good that everyone, at some point, is going to need, since they may very well be forced to resort to borderline fraud to actually make a profit?

You'd think that if insurance is so profitable, with so much value being leeched off by owners, somebody would have started a non-profit health insurer that doesn't try to extract any wealth for the owners.

Warren Buffett is a left leaning guy. Why doesn't he contribute start up capital to fund a non-profit health insurer. He could even structure the funding as a note that gets paid back, with interest, over time. Any profits go to pay his reasonable interest and principal back, anything else goes to increased coverage and lower premiums. Every customer would flock to such a company because they'd offer the best coverage and rate because they're not bothering to maximize profits.

adiabat: Buy a cheap major-med policy if you're ever between jorbs, and you won't have this problem.

There is no such thing in my state.

Mugato: WinnipegDragon: If someone has cancer, your Weeners should be "How can we help them" not "What is this going to cost".

My weener never helped anyone but me.

No good in bed huh? They got drugs for that now, maybe your insurance will cover it.

Lol, thought I typed 'first thought', not 'Boobies.'

Dammit

They should tax organs...just like anything else that someone gives you, whether its money, a house, a car....Berkely Bucks.

FarkinHostile: So insurance companies are supposed to lose money as long as the person is really, really nice?

Look, if you donate an organ you are going to have major health issues later. It's amazingly cool to do, but business is business. He can certainly get insurance, but it ain't gonna be the same price as the rest of us selfish MF's pay.

RTFA:
long-term studies have found donors live as long as other healthy people. One study reported that donors live even longer.

WinnipegDragon: Seriously though, I just don't know how anyone can defend the concept of for-profit healthcare.

If someone has cancer, your Weeners should be "How can we help them" not "What is this going to cost".

Hey, America fought a war over this. Nobody can tell me what my weeners should be.

NateAsbestos

Hey, America fought a war over this. Nobody can tell me what my weeners should be.

Well, there are millions of Republicans hellbent on telling you your weener better not be gay.

WinnipegDragon: Seriously though, I just don't know how anyone can defend the concept of for-profit healthcare.

If someone has cancer, your Weeners should be "How can we help them" not "What is this going to cost".

Perhaps you should boycott all drugs and medical devices that were created for profit, then.

As someone who ended his three day Mexican get away by waking up in a bathtub filled with ice cubes, I'm getting a kick out of the comments on this thread.

/I didn't donate it. The bastards took it!

Destroy medical insurance companies. They serve no purpose.

stonicus: Felgraf: hitlersbrain: FarkinHostile: So insurance companies are supposed to lose money as long as the person is really, really nice?

Look, if you donate an organ you are going to have major health issues later. It's amazingly cool to do, but business is business. He can certainly get insurance, but it ain't gonna be the same price as the rest of us selfish MF's pay.

Insurance companies exist to make a profit, not care for people. Welcome to the land of retards.

Then perhaps they should not be involved in a good that everyone, at some point, is going to need, since they may very well be forced to resort to borderline fraud to actually make a profit?

How is it fraud? They looked at the numbers and decided "we'll spend more on you than we will make, so no, you can't haz insurance". Nothing is stopping him from paying the doctor himself. Giving the kidney was nice, but did he also give up half of his brain? How could he not have researched this ahead of time? Now, if he did, and they said "cool",. but now they are saying "not cool", then that is different.

The way they try to kick people off insurance/outright refuse to pay claims/claim they 'never got the claim' (despite it being filed three times by the dentists office and once by me), the instant something bad happens to a person? The company 'discovering' a reason they're ineligible (that they strangely never brought up before)?

Debeo Summa Credo: Felgraf: hitlersbrain: FarkinHostile: So insurance companies are supposed to lose money as long as the person is really, really nice?

Look, if you donate an organ you are going to have major health issues later. It's amazingly cool to do, but business is business. He can certainly get insurance, but it ain't gonna be the same price as the rest of us selfish MF's pay.

Insurance companies exist to make a profit, not care for people. Welcome to the land of retards.

Then perhaps they should not be involved in a good that everyone, at some point, is going to need, since they may very well be forced to resort to borderline fraud to actually make a profit?

You'd think that if insurance is so profitable, with so much value being leeched off by owners, somebody would have started a non-profit health insurer that doesn't try to extract any wealth for the owners.

Warren Buffett is a left leaning guy. Why doesn't he contribute start up capital to fund a non-profit health insurer. He could even structure the funding as a note that gets paid back, with interest, over time. Any profits go to pay his reasonable interest and principal back, anything else goes to increased coverage and lower premiums. Every customer would flock to such a company because they'd offer the best coverage and rate because they're not bothering to maximize profits.

If it's so difficult to make a profit, then, perhaps it's not a resource that a for-profit industry should try to handle.

This happened to my mother. Humana: cravenly mercantile scum of the earth.

adiabat: "Life lesson: Don't let your insurance lapse."

Sounds to me like you've been lucky enough that life hasn't taught you how the insurance system actually works.

Suffice to say: if everyone always had the opportunity to pay for insurance and it only lapsed because they chose to allow it, we wouldn't be talking about healthcare reform.
The nonsense you just spouted only really applies to people who've never had to *use* their insurance.

FarkedOver: Destroy medical insurance companies. They serve no purpose.

Nobody NEEDS insurance: what we need is healthcare.

Relatively Obscure: jack21221: zetar: Blue Cross Blue Shield? Oh, they're a bunch of sweeties.

They cancelled my insurance the day after I was diagnosed with Stage 3 kidney disease.

/ This was after I've paid them something like $300k in premiums (best guestimate) over the last 30 years.

My sister's insurance tried to cancel her the night she got shot through the neck, because she had a billing dispute (that was resolved) 3 months prior.

And that's nothing that couldn't be solved by eliminating their taxes and regulating them less. Duh.

Don't forget allowing cross state insurance. That will fix everything. Oh and tort reform.

Felgraf: jack21221: My sister's insurance tried to cancel her the night she got shot through the neck, because she had a billing dispute (that was resolved) 3 months prior.

I still don't understand how crap like that isn't considered fraud.

By any reasonable definition it is considered fraud. But this is the U.S.A., where anything that you can do to make a buck, up to and including buying officials to make laws that allow you to do increasingly terrible things to your fellow man, up to and including killing them or dooming them to a life of crime/poverty/disease/etc, is considered good business practice and half the country cheerleads it, even though they are the ones who suffer as a result.

NateAsbestos: FarkedOver: Destroy medical insurance companies. They serve no purpose.

Nobody NEEDS insurance: what we need is healthcare.

And the way to provide healthcare is not through insurance companies. Healthcare shouldn't be about a profit. We're talking about people's lives here.... it's disgusting that people are faced with the choice of pay up or die.

stonicus: Serious Black: Calling it fraud outright is a huge stretch, but if you think it's morally just to treat being a live organ donor as a pre-existing condition, you're a wretched monster.

You can make him the president of the Feel Good Fan Club all day long, but that means everyone else has to pay higher premiums because of what he did? If missing a kidney is bad, then yeah, why the hell wouldn't it be a pre-existing condition? The article does seem to be saying that only having one kidney isn't really that bad. If that is the case, then yeah, it's wrong. But I could give a rat's ass about the sentimentality and emotion of the situation. He made a decision that benefited himself and wants us to help shoulder the burden.

Seriously? You're going to say the decision to give somebody whose kidneys were failing was something that merely benefited himself? I'm done talking with you.

MaudlinMutantMollusk: Romneyed in the boobies

/what utter detached, unrealistic bullsjiat

That is a sexual act I would like to learn more about. Sounds kinky.

geoduck42:
504_King_streetcar: Pardon me a moment, I'm just going to go thank my lucky stars that I live in Canada, land of socialized health care, and not some Darwinist madhouse where an act of Christian charity will send you tumbling into penury and ruin while your fellow countrymen cheer your downfall with lusty cries of I GOT MINE.

You are aware of who you folks allowed to become your Prime Minister, right? You'll be joining us soon enough..

Harper will go full retard with his majority gov't (it's already happening) and provide loads of material for the other parties to paint him and his whole party in a very bad light in the next election. They will have a very hard time holding power.

The worry is the damage he will do in the meantime. Harper is really, really gunning to trash our environmental laws. That seems to be priority #1. Medicare doesn't seem to be on the Cons' hitlist for the time being; it's actually good for business to have a healthy population. Plus, killing or crippling Medicare would make Canadians VERY unhappy, since most of us have had an "expensive" medical episode of one kind or another in our lives, and benefited greatly from the system here.

BMFPitt

Perhaps you should boycott all drugs and medical devices that were created for profit, then.

I have been thinking about this lately...

So do humans just invent things to make money? Did they invent the needle to make money? Did some one find cures for a certain disease just to make money? Are we really that f*cking disgusting of a species?

FFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUU

busy chillin': BMFPitt

Perhaps you should boycott all drugs and medical devices that were created for profit, then.

I have been thinking about this lately...

So do humans just invent things to make money? Did they invent the needle to make money? Did some one find cures for a certain disease just to make money? Are we really that f*cking disgusting of a species?

FFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUU

Referring to the patent rights to the Polio vaccine Jonas Salk said the following: "There is no patent. Could you patent the sun?"

FarkinHostile: So insurance companies are supposed to lose money as long as the person is really, really nice?

Look, if you donate an organ you are going to have major health issues later. It's amazingly cool to do, but business is business. He can certainly get insurance, but it ain't gonna be the same price as the rest of us selfish MF's pay.

Yes, absolutely. The insurance company is absolutely supposed to lose money on this person. They make money on those who don't donate a kidney, who are healthy, who pay more than they use. They're a Casino; nearly everyone will lose money to them but occasionally, they'll have to pay out.

madgonad: The guy is 53 and a retired teacher. Fark him. Tell him to go back to work until he hits the normal retirement age and is covered by Medicare.

30 years as a teacher and he ends up on Fark for giving his daughter a kidney and NOT for darling a student? Give him some insurance!

Serious Black:
stonicus: Serious Black: Calling it fraud outright is a huge stretch, but if you think it's morally just to treat being a live organ donor as a pre-existing condition, you're a wretched monster.

You can make him the president of the Feel Good Fan Club all day long, but that means everyone else has to pay higher premiums because of what he did? If missing a kidney is bad, then yeah, why the hell wouldn't it be a pre-existing condition? The article does seem to be saying that only having one kidney isn't really that bad. If that is the case, then yeah, it's wrong. But I could give a rat's ass about the sentimentality and emotion of the situation. He made a decision that benefited himself and wants us to help shoulder the burden.

Seriously? You're going to say the decision to give somebody whose kidneys were failing was something that merely benefited himself? I'm done talking with you.

Well, I'm sure that watching his child NOT die was greatly enjoyable for him. He really just did it for his own gratification. It's the equivalent of some welfare mom using her food stamps to buy a book just so she could read for pleasure. I ain't paying for that shiat.