[Catsmine]

It must be tough to reconcile their "religiousness" with the hatred they show in the political threads. That's the kind of stuff that reminds why I don't get involved with religion or far-right politics.

That's one reason I like this site. The hate filled rants don't show up near as often here as on others. I'd be hard put to think of one on here, but I tend to avoid Religion and Skin Lightening and Teens.

[cdad]

So how does the power to regulate interstate commerce translate into forcing me to buy health insurance that is prohibited from being sold across state lines?

I'm so proud to have been promoted in Ex's book to "dedicated right winger," despite having voted Libertarian since Reagan.

Its not prohibited. That is a false clause. It is regulated by the State at the State level. But if the government has its way that may change because they want to move to "single payer" plan. In that case the states would lose the right to regulate and it would be passed to the government. As in Federal Laws and Regulations. Maybe your not old enough to remember but at one time all the states set their own speed limits and then someone in the goobermint decided to change it by arm twisting and we were all made to drive 55. So when it comes to healthcare it too shall pass. And god help us all.

[tomder55]

Califdadof3 you are correct about the abuse of the commerce clause. It goes back to Roosevelt statism .

But ; just because it has been decided one way in the past doesn't mean the issue can't be reopened .Heck even amendments have been reversed ;and some of the most widely quoted SCOTUS decisions are ones that right or wrong reversed previous ones.

In the chance that this massive takeover of a third of the economy is passed I expect there to be court challenges to it.

Let's take Excon's position for a second and as a devil's advocate agree... I now equate preventing the allowing of dangerous and life threatening drugs from being sold with forcing people to buy insurance ;especially if the government is the provider.

I say lets dismantle the FDA as it is a needless agency intruding on our rights to purchase and abuse any drug we want. It unncessarily impedes the business of big Pharma .Just think of the opportunities for profits if there was no restrictions on what they could sell?

Nahhh... this is a nation that gets worked up to a lather over ecoli in spinach and wants the government to ensure the products on the market are safe and effective. They think it is the proper role of the government under the commerce clause to regulate drugs.

Conversely I have yet to hear the American people demand the government force them to purchase a product .

But what about car insurance ? Sorry ,that doesn't apply either . The mandated parts of auto insurance is protecting the other driver ;and is a state requirement ;not federal.

[cdad]

Ok. Lets look at car insurance for a minute. Since you brought it up. Companies CAn cross state lines. Just so long as they meet state regulations. And why should states force people to have auto insurance? If they did in its purest form then it would be no fault insurance. Not a fault based one. Wouldn't that make more sense? So now we make the leap to health insurance. That is where no fault doesn't apply because the tell us how bad we ( fill in the blank ). And somewhere there will be lines drawn. Now that the goobermint wants to step in we may all be limited in our choices. They don't want to see a 2 tier system. They want complete control. And they are frothing at the mouth for it. I agree its out of hand and things need to be done. But with this much at stake we all have to be responsible.

[NeedKarma]

a) you can drive a car in the US without insurance? I did not know that.

b) all the countries that offer universal health are doing something wrong?

[Catsmine]

a) you can drive a car in the US without insurance? I did not know that.

b) all the countries that offer universal health are doing something wrong?

a) depends on the state. Tennessee passed it in the 90's.

b) going broke. Today it's Greece. My bet is that Italy's next.

[tomder55]

My point about the auto insurance was that the mandatory aspect of it is for protection for the other driver or person .It is not mandatory to insure yourself... never has been... hopefully never will.

And why should states force people to have auto insurance?

I did not make an opinion on that . My point was that it is up to the states to determine that . The Federal government doesn't have the authority in my opinion.

[excon]

The Federal government doesn't have the authority in my opinion.

Hello tom:

If you LIKE the result, you think they have the authority. If you DON'T, you don't think they have the authority...

That's the problem with rightwingers... They LOVE taking away OTHER peoples rights. They don't realize that when they do that, THEIRS are in jeopardy too.

excon

[paraclete]

all the countries that offer universal health are doing something wrong?

Really, how do you figure that? Some people form opinions from biased information and I expect this is what you have done. Some of the countries that offer universal health care do so out of concern for the individual and a recognition that basic health care is a universal human right that might otherwise be denied because of financial problems.

The US might do well to emulate the level of concern for basic human rights among their own rather than criticizing others

[NeedKarma]

really, how do you figure that? Some people form opinions from biased information and I expect this is what you have done.

Uh no. I live in a country that has UHC and love it. I was challenging them.

[tomder55]

If you LIKE the result, you think they have the authority. If you DON'T, you don't think they have the authority...

Ex ;you seem to think there is a right to obtain any drug you want on the open market... OK ;would you disban the FDA and all related regulatory agencies and leave it caveat emptor... or do you think it's within the government's authority to regulate and control drugs ?

Your position on this appears to be inconsistent .You would for instance put all types of regulatory controls on banking and finance so the public isn't exposed . So your argument right back at you .

But there is a huge difference between allowing safe products or not allowing dangerous products on the market and forcing people to purchase them . It's apples and oranges.

[excon]

Your position on this appears to be inconsistent .You would for instance put all types of regulatory controls on banking and finance so the public isn't exposed . So your argument right back at you .

Hello again, tom:

I'm not arguing that the government SHOULD or SHOULDN'T have these powers. I'm just pointing out that they DO have these powers.

excon

[speechlesstx]

Uh no. I live in a country that has UHC and love it. I was challenging them.

I wonder how much this guy likes it. Here is your Canadian health care success story of the day:

Sick man faces bankruptcy — or death

Cancer patient must pay for drug needed to keep him alive

By MARK BONOKOSKI, Toronto Sun

No sense mincing words.

Suffering from brain cancer, Kent Pankow was literally forced to go to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. For lifesaving surgery — at a cost to family and friends of $106,000 — after the health-care system in Alberta left him hanging in bureaucratic limbo for 16 crucial days, his tumour meanwhile migrating to an unreachable part of the brain, while it dithered over his case file, ultimately deciding he was not surgery worthy.

Now, with the Mayo Clinic having done what the Alberta Cancer Board wouldn’t authorize or even explain, but with the tumour unable to be totally removed, the province will now not fund the expensive drug, Avastin, that the Mayo prescribed to keep him alive and keep the remaining tumour from increasing in size — despite the costs of the drug being totally funded by the province for other forms of cancer.

Kent Pankow, as it turns out, has the right disease but he has it in the wrong place.

Had he lung cancer, breast cancer, or colon cancer, then the cost of the drug — $4,555 per treatment, two times a month — would be totally covered by Alberta’s version of OHIP.

But he doesn’t.

And so he is not only a victim of brain cancer, he is also a victim of arbitrary discrimination.

Full disclosure. Kent Pankow, a 40-year-old Red Seal sous chef, is a son of the man who married the spouse of my late brother. And it was while vacationing with them at their winter home in Los Cabos, Mexico, recently that this story began to unfold back in their home province of Alberta.

But do not think, even for a moment, that this could never happen in Toronto or other parts of Ontario.

Our supposedly universal federal health care system, the pride of most Canadians and the political struggle of America, is only as good as the length of the waiting line and whether you have the right disease at the right time.

After writing more than 150 letters to everyone from the prime minister to virtually all health authorities both federal and provincial, and being ignored in return, Kent Pankow’s wife, Deborah Hurford, decided to finally go public.

CTV Edmonton did a major feature on the family’s plight on the 6 o’clock news and, almost before the program ended, Alberta’s health and wellness minister, Gene Zwozdesky, was on the phone to their home — ensuring himself some positive press in the follow-up that aired later that night.

Then, when he heard the Pankows had filed a human rights complaint against the province, justifiably citing medicare-based discrimination, Zwozdesky suddenly went mute — stating he could no longer discuss the matter publicly.

Ten years ago, when first diagnosed with a glioblastoma multiforme brain tumour (GBM), Kent Pankow was given five years to live.

After beating it down once, however, with his first surgery having been performed in Alberta, he spent nearly seven years in remission until the cancer’s return in 2008.

And he is not prepared to give up.

“He’s a fighter,” says his wife, admitting, however, that the cost of the drug has been a significant drain on friends and family who have not only donated large sums of their own money, but have also organized fundraisers to keep hope alive, including school penny drives.

“When Kent goes for his Avastin IV injection, he sits next to patients who receive the same drug for free because they have another type of cancer — like colon cancer,” Hurford says.

“Brain tumour patients deserve the same rights as other cancer patients, including access to the same lifesaving treatments — and without additional costs.

“I can’t begin to tell you how frustrated, angry, disgusted and appalled I am with both the Alberta health system and the individuals within the system who continue to perpetuate such an archaic and inhumane approach to the treatment of patients.” she says. “It seems like they are doing everything in their power to ensure that Kent succumbs to an early and unnecessary death.”

“The Avastin is working. The size of the remaining tumour has remained static since October,” she says.

“But how can anyone afford almost $10,000 a month for a drug — even if it is saving a loved one’s life?”

When Alberta health minister Gene Zwozdesky called the Pankow home on the night CTV Edmonton aired its story, he purportedly blamed the feds, namely Health Canada, for deciding what drugs are covered, and for what.

Federal Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq, however, in a letter to Deborah Hurford, wrote that “while Health Canada is responsible for the market authorization of drug products, the province and territorial governments are responsible for managing the list of drugs for which public reimbursement from government drug plans is available.”

This, too, is passing the buck.

What Aglukkaq would not explain to Hurford — citing confidentiality — was why Avastin received a notice of compliance from Health Canada for other forms of cancer, but not yet for brain cancer as in the United States.

Nor would she offer any information regarding any application before her department for the use of Avastin in the treatment of brain tumours.

“Based on Kent’s MRI’s and radiology reports, and analysis by his surgeon at the Mayo Clinic, Avastin is playing a key role in stabilizing Kent’s tumour,” says Hurford.

“Without it, Kent’s tumour will grow and he will die.

“So why then,” asks Hurford, “is (everyone) choosing not to help Kent and other brain tumour patients who are forced to go public with their private health issues and fundraise for their lifesaving medical treatments?

“Where is the dignity in that?”

It took 16 days for government bureaucrats to decide Pankow wasn’t worthy of surgery. Then after saving them the expense of the surgery by paying to have it in the US at a hospital that wasted no time in deciding his surgery worthiness, Canada’s marvelous system won’t pay for his lifesaving meds because it’s the wrong kind of cancer.

Gosh I can’t wait for my government to help me with my health care ‘choices.’

[excon]

Gosh I can't wait for my government to help me with my health care 'choices.'

Hello again, Steve:

You always bring up the oddball case as if to prove that the overarching policy is bunk. Because individual bureaucrats are jerks doesn't convince me of anything.

Do I think THIS plan is good, or will work? No. I think that because the policy IS bunk. It has nothing to do with how some bureaucrat is going to act.

excon

[speechlesstx]

Hello again, Steve:

You always bring up the oddball case as it to prove that the overarching policy is bunk. Because individual bureaucrats are jerks doesn't convince me of anything.

Btw, welcome back. I don't ALWAYS do anything here like you and NK seem to think. He ALWAYS loves his health care and that's great, but a lot of Canadians don't love their health care or there wouldn't be so many coming to the US for treatment, and there wouldn't be such a booming business in private clinics. Them's just the facts.

[NeedKarma]

It's always a system being tweaked, like any system. We don't have to deal with any of the paperwork that you guys seem to deal with. Here's another fact: who are all these americans frequenting the health and wellness boards here for issues that should be dealt with by a doctor? It's overwhelming! The fact is that while you may have great facilities a great many do not have access to them.

[tomder55]

I believe the majority of the American health tourists are taking advantage of the perscriptions there and the price controls rather than seeking the services .

[excon]

I believe the majority of the American health tourists are taking advantage of the perscriptions there and the price controls rather than seeking the services .

Hello tom:

I don't know about that... Sarah Palin said that her family trekked down to White Horse for free treatment of her brother's burnt foot.

Besides, going to Canada to buy meds cheaper than you can at your local store, is what? Bad?? You're not saying, are you, that oldsters should throw themselves on their sword, for the good of the politicians?? Nahhh, you're not saying that. You live in NY. Are you saying that if it was cost effective, that you wouldn't do it??

excon

[tomder55]

I don't take an opinion against medical tourism at all ;although I trust my local pharmacist more than some desk jockey broker working on a worldwide basis.

[speechlesstx]

So all those folks asking questions here don't have access to health care? I think that's a stretch.