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[megpie71]

In this election year in Australia, I'd like to direct the attention of anyone who's larger than about a size twelve toward the following blog:

First Do No Harm: Real stories of Fat Prejudice in health care

Comments

[entropy_house]

I can't believe anyone would use the US health system as a role model. It's beyond dysfunctional, to the point of cruel and inhumane. Not just for any one group of people, either. People without insurance who *aren't* officially on the dole find it nearly impossible to get help. Injured soldiers are treated horribly (the official hospitals for them are antiquated, understaffed, undersupplied and with waiting lists so long many people died while awaiting permission to get treatment.) Disabled people-- *MOST* of the people who apply for assistance because of disability are turned down simply because there's such a backlog of applicants they arbitrarily turn many of them down to clear their books (even terminal leukemia isn't enough to automatically let you be assigned as disabled); approx. 60% of the people who apply and are turned down are eventually approved several years later, after they've lost everything they own and become even more ill because they could not afford treatment-- the percentage approved the second time would be

[vilakins]

I remember reading a book found at my cousin's house when I was 15, called 'The Hospital' which was about the appalling state of the US health system. It was a non-fiction account of life at a hospital, written buy a reporter, I think, and it shocked me deeply, a teenager living in a country where anyone who needed health care got it at that time. It's not quite as good here now--dentists cost an arm and a leg and insurance companies won't insure existing conditions, but if you're hurt or ill or need an operation, you're admitted, straight away for urgent problems, after a wait on a list for non-urgent. It's not as good as the UK system and some poor people can't afford GPs, but it's a hell of a lot better than the US. I believe Australia's ahead of us right now because GPs are free; at least that was so when I was ill there in 1999. I have insurance that pays for specialists or surgery (basically emergencies) and I pay for GP visits and prescriptions

[entropy_house]

The situation's got even worse. At the time that book was written, at least most employed US folks got some health insurance from their employer. Now, very few companies offer it, and most of the ones that do require the workers to pay a large percentage of the premiums. More and more US folk (fully employed, middle class citizens even) have no health insurance, and merely pray they do not become seriously ill.

I do really hope there is a sufficient outcry to prevent Australia from following the US into this horror. At least, we can serve as a bad example.

[megpie71]

Oh, they're not saying the changes are modelled on the US system at all. It's just that I can't help seeing the similarities. We're being offered tax rebates if we pay for private health insurance (which I do anyway because things like glasses and teeth aren't covered under Medicare here) and told if we get full private health care cover before we're 30, we get a reduced rate. Oh, and if you pay for full private health care, your Medicare levy (the percentage of your taxes used to pay for our socialised medical system) goes down. (If you put an equivalent amount of money in a specially marked bank account, you don't get the reduction in the Medicare levy... but it isn't a bail-out of the private health funds, not at all.)