valentine

Chazmo, once again I am in agreement with you. Pandora's box is open, the genie is out of the bottle and we'd better stay on top of technology if we want our kids to have a future.

cordycord

Ulrich has a point regarding "incrementalism" when regarding nukes. HOWEVER, the MOAB is a standard-issue bomb that's damn near as powerful as the first atom bombs. At least we're talking tactical here. There are wackos out there trying to get their hands on biological agents whose outcome could be anything but "tactical".

LINESUPER

Bio weapons are easier to produce, (along with chemical ones) easier to disperse and easier to smuggle. Those are characteristics Terrorists need to be able to do their dirty work. The whole "tactical" nuclear issue gets a little difficult in the real world. Explode a nuc in NYC or DC, and just how long do you think it would take for a couple of muslim "Holy Cities" to become radio active dust? I expect that that scenario has been thought out and preped by DoD. Or maybe we have those Trident subs just doing scenic cruises in the Med for no reason? In any event, I doubt terrorists would resort to such ends, it would be counter productive to their cause. A tactical nuc on US soil would really be bad news for everyone, especially Muslim nations. On the inverse side of this, if we used a "nuc", tacticval or not, it probably wouldn't take long for someone to respond in kind.

valentine

This is the kind of stuff that sickens me:

WASHINGTON (Feb. 2) - Half of all U.S. bankruptcies are caused by soaring medical bills and most people sent into debt by illness are middle-class workers with health insurance, researchers said on Wednesday.
The study, published in the journal Health Affairs, estimated that medical bankruptcies affect about 2 million Americans every year, if both debtors and their dependents, including about 700,000 children, are counted.
"Our study is frightening. Unless you're Bill Gates you're just one serious illness away from bankruptcy," said Dr. David Himmelstein, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School who led the study.
"Most of the medically bankrupt were average Americans who happened to get sick. Health insurance offered little protection."
The researchers got the permission of bankruptcy judges in California, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and Texas to survey 931 people who filed for bankruptcy.
"About half cited medical causes, which indicates that 1.9 to 2.2 million Americans (filers plus dependents) experienced medical bankruptcy," they wrote.
"Among those whose illnesses led to bankruptcy, out-of-pocket costs averaged $11,854 since the start of illness; 75.7 percent had insurance at the onset of illness."
The average bankrupt person surveyed had spent $13,460 on co-payments, deductibles and uncovered services if they had private insurance. People with no insurance spent an average of $10,893 for such out-of-pocket expenses.
"Even middle-class insured families often fall prey to financial catastrophe when sick," the researchers wrote.
Bankruptcy specialists said the numbers seemed sound.
"From 1982 to 1989, I reviewed every bankruptcy petition filed in South Carolina, and during that period I came to the conclusion that there were two major causes of bankruptcy: medical bills and divorce," said George Cauthen, a lawyer at Columbia-based law firm Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough LLP.
"Each accounted, roughly, for about a third of all individual filings in South Carolina."
He said fewer than 1 percent of all bankruptcy filings were due to credit card debt. "That truly is a myth," Cauthen said in a telephone interview.
Cauthen said he was not surprised to hear that so many of the bankrupt people in the study were middle-class.
"Usually people who have something to protect file bankruptcy," he said. "The truly indigent -- people that we see on the street -- there is no relief that we can give them."
Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, a Harvard associate professor and physician who advocates for universal health coverage, said the study supported demands for health reform.
"Covering the uninsured isn't enough. We must also upgrade and guarantee continuous coverage for those who have insurance," Woolhandler said in a statement.
She said many employers and politicians were pressing for what she called "stripped-down plans so riddled with co-payments, deductibles and exclusions that serious illness leads straight to bankruptcy."

cordycord

Valentine,

Very sad news, but does that mean that these people declared bankruptcy after an average of $13k in expenses? Seems a little fishy to me, or am I reading it wrong?

valentine

[quote name='cordycord' date='Feb 2 2005, 02:52 PM'] Valentine,

Very sad news, but does that mean that these people declared bankruptcy after an average of $13k in expenses?

cordycord

I agree with you Valentine. Medical procedures are FAR too expensive, and can have a devastating effect on a family of ANY income. I actually saw the story from Reuters, and read anything they write with a grain of salt.

Now, what I can EASILY imagine is that a family member becomes ill, incurs large medical expenses, AND needs to stop working. No money coming in, and lots of expenses. This doesn't make the story any better, but may better explain why bankruptcy occurs after what most credit card companies will offer a teenager in credit.

Pet peeve--I just want to hear the whole story.

LINESUPER

In my work with the mentally ill as an advocate, it often becames a case of work with no benefits, (mental health benefits have always been lacking in the US) or declaring backruptcy and going on SSI to pay for the health care. In the real world, $12K in social security coverage plus 100% of your health care costs begins to look pretty good if you suffer with major illness. The real problem is not the just the cost of health care, it's the way it's paid for. Insurance compainies are not driven by health care results, they are profit driven companies. There is no reward to them to pay high health care costs to save a life vs. dening coverage and lossing a client or killing the patient. (Many health care plans now require pre-approval for any major health care procedure, and yes they do deny benefits based on what "they" think.) Depending on whether your insurance company has contracts with providers or not sets the price you will pay. Any health provider will have a list of charges that will be different for the same proceedure, dependant upon who is paying the bill. Health care providers are also "profit driven", so if you have no coverage (read that "contract with a set cost"), you will pay a market driven price plus profit adders. And what profit driven health care providers require from the under insured/uninsured is serious money. the people who fall into this catagory are those that work in places that don't provide health care benefits and for the most part don't provide a wage that makes up the difference. That large majority of the working class fall between $16K and $30K per year are there and $13K in med expenses is more than they can afford.

cordycord

Bankruptcy story got me thinking (dangerous )--South Carolina had a 1/3 bankruptcy from medical and 1/3 from divorce. Now I'm for a reasonable form of medical "safety net", but can you imagine people demanding government assistance for their divorce costs?!

Last time I checked, more people were getting divorced than were having catastrophic medical events--unless you put death into that category...

Don't laugh--it could happen

LINESUPER

Ok, it's 8:15 AM and no one has posted the argument of the day - so I'll start. Does any one think personal retirement accounts at the expense of social socurity are a good idea?

I thinks it's a very bad idea, and if inacted will be an albatross around our childrens necks. So how do you y'all feel?