the 40 million uninsured is the Health care boogey man

[Mormon Red Death]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

"easily covered by charity."

link?

http://www.methodisthealthsystem.org/body.cfm?id=72

A system in Your neck of the woods covers 50 million dollars worth

[Mormon Red Death]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

50 billion dollars is not a lot?

Not in health care

[Mormon Red Death]

http://energycommerce.house.gov/repa...rsigni2099.htm

500 million in charity care for ascension health

[Mormon Red Death]

Rack another 85 million for IHC

http://intermountainhealthcare.org/x...chpcharity.xml

[MikeWaters]

You never answered my question of who is going to pay for doctor's emergency care, and for outpatient care.

[Mormon Red Death]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

You never answered my question of who is going to pay for doctor's emergency care, and for outpatient care.

the hospital will. Can you think of any emergency docs that are not employed by the hospital? To the Emergency Doc it doesnt matter if the person doesnt have insurance. As far as OP goes the hospital will take 95% of that hit.

[Solon]

Originally Posted by Mormon Red Death

the issue is that there is already things in place... we just need to make it easier for these people to take advantage of the programs

Or fund the programs so that people can use them. E.g., there is a multi-year waiting list for HUD housing programs in Philly because the (granted, inefficient) programs don't have enough money. In the meantime, people live in squalor.

[Mormon Red Death]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

You never answered my question of who is going to pay for doctor's emergency care, and for outpatient care.

Btw who do you think is taking the hit now?

[Mormon Red Death]

Originally Posted by Solon

Or fund the programs so that people can use them. E.g., there is a multi-year waiting list for HUD housing programs in Philly because the (granted, inefficient) programs don't have enough money. In the meantime, people live in squalor.

I cant speak for HUD but I notice FICA everytime it leaves my pay check. That is what pays for Medicaid.

Medicaid is funded its just poorly poorly ran. Filling out a medicaid application is difficult and it takes forever to be approved. Improve the access and people get the care they need

[MikeWaters]

Originally Posted by Mormon Red Death

Btw who do you think is taking the hit now?

I guess you don't fully understand how this works. Yes, ER docs usually get paid on a contractual basis, so it doesn't matter if they have insurance or not (generally speaking, because you can bet that if very few people in the ER have insurance the contracted amount will be less).

But what happens when surgery is required. The on-call surgeon is called. Why is he on-call? Because he has privileges. Why does he have privileges? So he can do surgeries at that hospital. Does he get paid for doing surgery on the destitute? No.

I can only think of one medical provider in town that works with the poor that isn't either govt. or contracted with the govt. But they are beneficiaries of a professional golf tournament, and they don't serve that many people and only do counseling.

Where is the private charitable place you go to get your asthma medicine? There really isn't any. Certainly not enough for 10 million people.