patrick.net

I always base my beliefs on one person's opinion especially when I don't know if he has a secret agenda.

thunderlips11 says

mell says

A system where you go to jail for importing drugs just because they are cheaper elsewhere can hardly be called free.

Mell, would you not agree that the reason it's illegal to import those drugs is a largely free market in political donations? Money = Free Speech?

That is likely a contributing factor, however a society does not vote and act solely on paid propaganda, or at least it shouldn't, otherwise it gets the government it deserves ;) The fact that people are voting or leaning Libertarian despite them having by far the least amount of donations shows that crony laws can be reversed. Moreover some seem to be already illegal wrt the constitution, but they don't get called out and protested against enough. The whole healthcare industry, not just the insurances, operates more like a criminal racket, similar to the housing industry. The question is always whether it is worth reducing freedom and to what extend for perceived equality, but campaign contributions and donations are definitely a topic worth discussing, no matter what political stance.

bob2356 says

mell says

bob2356 says

Let's see, 20 people out of 18,000 went the US specifically for health care. I don't consider .1% to be all that very common, but I'm not a libertarian. You guys have some very different definitions from the rest of the world.

That has nothing to do with being Libertarian or not. It shows that you can get really good and fast quality care here, but you have to pay for it, and probably only a few can afford to do so.

So there are other ideologies that define .1% to be very common? Which are those?

You are saying 99.9% of canadians desire to get their health care in the US but can't afford it? Based on what? More than twice as many canadians rate their health care system satisfactory than americans do.

Not 99.9%, but way more than those who can afford. I didn't say it is an inadequate health care system, and if you take the average coverage for all it may excel. However the US has always been the country where people flew in for really complicated health matters if they could afford it. Maybe this will change in favor of another country, but I am sure top quality medicine has a strong correlation to the degree of freedom in that country.

mell says

. However the US has always been the country where people flew in for really complicated health matters if they could afford it. Maybe this will change in favor of another country, but I am sure top quality medicine has a strong correlation to the degree of freedom in that country.

The US has been the country where people flew in because where else are they going to go? The other advanced health care systems are public systems so you have to be a citizen or permenent resident to use them. That may start to change a little some advanced countries considering medical tourism, although there are a lot of legal issues to work out in each country. Ironically the largest group of medical tourists by far is americans.

So you are saying you believe that only .1% of canadians needing health care can afford health care outside of canada? I don' t know about that. What are you basing this on?