Dear Brenda

You and many others know how hard it was for me, and many others to get treatment because of no insurance.

It took me a long time to figure it out and it is one of the US Governments most guarded secrets, but so simplistic in form to get if you have it. It is almost a

While I realize that our health care system needs alot of work to fix all in it that is broken, you would find many in other countries that would feel fortunate to have our level of health care. I have tons of relatives that live all through Canada, I go there every year and my mom lives about two miles from the border. My Canadian relatives will tell you that they laugh every time they hear someone say how Canada has "free" health care. Are any of you aware of the tax rates in Canada? Last time I was in Prince Edward Island the tax rate was over 16% on everything I bought. Some territories, like Quebec and Ontario, charge an Employer Health Tax and require prescription insurance. And some of the nightmares we hear of here in the US you can hear about in Canada, most of them concerning horrific wait times for treatment.
With that said, I'm not putting down Canada's health care in any way, shape or form. Simply trying to say that while our system here in the US isn't perfect, it's not perfect anywhere else either.
From what I'm hearing, the Moore movie misrepresents more than a few issues here in the US.

I think Minniea's correct to a point about our health care system...it's not "free" in the sense that someone else pays the complete cost. Of course, the same is true for any service provided by any Government, regardless of the nation.

All Government services are funded by the citizens at some level, and the same is true for the Canadian health care system.

I think the biggest fundamental difference is that situations like Petey's are almost unheard of in Canada, regardless of what Province. I live in Alberta, arguably the economic powerhouse in Canada, and the only Province with no sales tax. While I have participated in private health care insurance for my entire working life, I received the same level of care as I would have had I been an indigent street person...that level being extraordinarily high.

My health care insurance provides "added extras", "nice to have's"...complete dental care..prescription drug coverage, etc.

That said, were I unemployed, or otherwise without funds, I would still be provided with treatment, medications, etc. through a variety of publically funded programs.

Sure, it's folks like me that pay the freight in that situation by paying taxes, and God knows, Canadians are VERY familiar with paying taxes.

I'm pretty OK with that; overall I have nothing but the highest praise for our imperfect system. It needs work in a lot of ways, but it's certainly far from broken.

As for Mr. Moore, I haven't seen his latest, but that's how he made BAGS of money on his first two movies; mis-representing certain elements to better suit his own agendas. Some of it I agree with, some not, but you can't argue he's good at what he does!
Wayne

There are so many problems with health care in the US today, and I have seen the best and the worst, as both a caregiver (RN), someone who works in the area of health informatics to provide technology to help with some of this, and as a patient and family member of patients... As stated by Wayne, Michael Moore has made a lot of money by sensationalizing known issues to suit his own agenda. Here is what I think is a more balanced view of his latest movie, if you care to see the other side. http://www.mtv.com/movies/news/articles/1563758/story.jhtml

"the tax rate was over 16% on everything I bought. "

I pay 20% of the costs of my health insurance. That 20% comes out of my paycheck--my employer plays the rest. That 20%, last time I checked, costs me over $1500 a year (this is not for a family policy--just for me). If they taxed me 16% on everything I bought it wouldn't cost me much more than that, and since my employer would not be paying the other 80%, I'd probably have larger salary increases to cover it!

I would encourage everyone to see Sicko. It is Moore's most balanced and accessible movie. Just listen to the stories of people in there, including many who have worked for insurance companies and know accrately how the business of denyong the claims of others works. People are dying in our country, even people who HAVE insurance (in fact, that's who he focuses on, not people like Petey who didn't have any coverage) because instead of treating medical care like having pilcemen and firemen we treat it as a for-profit business.

Nelie

Here We Go!

Nelie- You rule!

Since I love to criticize things I do not know about, I'll stand in the middle of the road on this one. I've only read excerpts from Sicko, but I have also read from movie critics.

It's the same crap all over. The majority who thinks it's false are republicans and the believer

I was simply making observations so that we all realize that it's not always greener on the "other side". I LOVE.....let me re-state that.......LOVE....Canada. Considered moving there when I was much younger as I spent so much time there when I was young. Wayne makes excellent points in his post. I just know that their system also has it's downside, as does the US. Canada simply doesn't have some grossly overweight, unkempt man making millions off of mis-representing all that is bad in a situation. (Can you tell that I have zero respect for Moore?) And YES, I PROUDLY state that I am a Republican. With all of that said........

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY AND GOD BLESS AMERICA.

Happy 4th of July, Minnie. I am not a Republican--more of an independent like Petie I suppose (though I couldn't disagree more with the idea of a flat tax). But I honestly believe that fixing the health care system is something that Republicans and Democrats need to work together on and I intend to hold my representatives responsible for that regardless of which party they belong to.

I'm all for free enterprise but there are some things that should not be for profit and one of those is the health of our nation. The current system is hurting not just individuals who can't afford insurance, and individuals who pay for insurance and then get screwed by their insurance companies (because otherwise they might not make huge profits), it is hurting our businesses, especially smaller ones, who can't really afford to pay for health insurance benefits. And we all pay anyway when so many are uninsured because by the time they end up getting care, at public hospitals that have to take them, they are sick in major ways that could be prevented if they had gone to a doctor earlier. Where does the money needed to care for them at these public hosptials come from? From us, in the long run (both in higher insurance rates for those of us who are paying for insurance and from public funds).

It just doesn't work to have health insurance be something that has the primary goal of making a profit. The primary goal should be care of people who need it--preferably preventative care which will save billions of dollars in costs overall in the long run. As Moore pointed out in his movie (and I tend to be impatient with people who dismiss his movies without seeing them, though I do agree that he does gimmicky things), if we don't start thinking like a "we", as people DO think in most other Western Democracies, this will never happen. And that means we have to get beyoind derogating someone because they have different party allegiances and looking for areas of common agreement.

OK, I'll get off my soapbox now!

Nelie

By the way, one of the things I like about this forum is we have all sorts of different political views and yet we love and care for each other because we are all fighting this horrendous disease. I wish there were more of that in America. We may have different perspectives on the war, we may have different perspectives on whether it is more patriotic to protest the current policy or support it. But there are things we still have in common and e should look at those things when we can.

Moore points out the British developed their National health System right after WWII, when the country was in an economic shambles BUT people felt very united from being under attack by the Germans for so long. They felt like caring for each other was a big part of patriotism. I mean, during the war, people in the cities sent their children to strangers in the country to keep them out of the way of bombs. And people in the country with any place to put someone up at all took them in.

It's too bad it takes being under attack by a human enemy or a disease to realize we are all human should have some common sense of caring for one another. But I guess that is a part of being human.

Nelie

I give up, Petey! What is it?