I really don't think the Ron Paul's campaign manager thing proves our point at all

[Recursion]

I think it's actually a pretty bad example for us and kind of makes Paul's point.

The campaign manager didn't die because of lack of care; he died because he had a serious illness that the hospital couldn't fix. He still got treatment. Rather than take taxpayer money, his survivors accepted charity from the community (they had a fundraiser to pay off the bill, apparently). This is what libertarians want and it seems to have worked for them, no? He couldn't get insurance because of a pre-existing condition, so rather than drive up insurance rates for everybody else by forcing his insurance company to cover him, people got together and raised money for his treatment.

His death is of course sad, but it wasn't because of a lack of care as far as I can see, and as far as I can tell this doesn't really say much about libertarian vs. liberal health care practices, does it? What am I missing?

[Drale]

1. Pneumonia is very treatable

as long as they catch it. If you don't go to the doctor when you feel sick because your uninsured, they can't catch it in time. Ron Paul murdered this man by not giving him health insurance through his job as campaign manager. Its as simple as that RON PAUL IS A MURDER!!

[Recursion]

3. Did Jim Henson not have health insurance?

Is there *any* evidence lack of insurance led to his not seeking treatment? Any whatsoever? Is there any evidence he was denied treatment at any point?

[quickmik]

33. Pneumonia in the chronically ill

Kent Snyder's "cause" of death was listed as pneumonia. He had a LONG TERM illness. He was categorized as un insurable. But, he was never without care. And if you know anything about the causes of death in the chronically ill, you know that in a weakened condition, pneumonia which can be viral, does not respond to treatment well. A quote from a MEDICAL journal: "Pneumonia affects all age groups, and is still the leading cause of death among the elderly and the chronically ill."

Read "leading cause of death in elderly and chronically ill." Your statement that "Ron Paul murdered this man" is unjust.

[theophilus]

2. Local means are great....as far as they go. The local church or charity or jar at the convenience

store would soon be overwhelmed. When local funds are exhausted pass the case on to the government to do what needs to be done. We should never, imo, have to beg our friends and family for money on this issue. Single payer universal health care is the humane and civilized way to go. No questions and no limits would be great for lifesaving situations.

[Recursion]

7. I'm all for economies of scale which is why I'd like a national payment system of some sort

Though I'm not convinced single payer without a dedicated mandatory revenue stream would be a good idea. A community can probably come up with $400K; what about hugely expensive treatments like chemo or dialysis?

We should never, imo, have to beg our friends and family for money on this issue.

Well, why not? Why shouldn't we turn to our community for support? Why is anonymous universal mandatory payment the way this has to be?

[RockaFowler]

4. OK I think it does

He didn't have insurance, so he didn't go to a doctor or a healthcare facility beforehand. Why would pneumonia cause someone to die?? Even after $400,000 worth of care?? Either there were lousy doctors (unlikely) or they caught the pneumonia too late. Preventative medical care really works. It caught my mother's pre-cancerous tumour. It caught my father's cancer. But like my Grandmother, this staffer did not have preventative care. My Grandmother died of ovarian cancer - that wasn't caught in time because she had no insurance.

[Recursion]

6. Pneumonia kills over 2 million Americans a year

I don't have any stats on how many have insurance vs. how many don't, but I know it certainly does kill some people with insurance (see my Jim Henson bit above). My point is I don't see any evidence that he was ever denied treatment he sought.

[RockaFowler]

9. But how do you know??

Pneumonia is treatable. People who die from it are not treated properly or have no treatment at all.

Oh and JIm Henson died because he didn't receive treatment in time. He went to a doctor who prescribed him aspirin because he wasn't feeling well. He got back home in New York and was still not feeling well. His wife finally took him to the hospital, but it was too late.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Henson#Illness_and_death

He died of Streptococcus pneumonia, a bacterial infection

[Recursion]

10. Well, I know he sought treatment, because he got $400K worth of it

And he obviously wasn't denied treatment, otherwise there would be no bill, right?

[RockaFowler]

11. Pneumonia shouldn't cost $400,000

What don't you understand about that?? It never should have gone that far.

The same with Jim Henson. Except Jim Henson had other problems on top of the pneumonia.

[Recursion]

12. And clearly he had other problems too, which is why he couldn't get insurance

His sister said he had a pre-existing condition that prevented his being able to buy insurance. Generally people who are otherwise healthy do not get pneumonia in the first place.

Pneumonia shouldn't cost $400,000? Why the hell not? By the time someone gets to the hospital with it, you usually have to do heroic measures to try to save them and those can be extremely expensive. Particularly if there's some other problem you have to try to manage, which there was in his case (no idea; could be HIV/AIDS, could be some other immunological problem, but if he's getting pneumonia at his age he's already sick with something and that's going to make it harder to treat).

[RockaFowler]

13. Wow, I guess you proved the point then

I think I'm done with this conversation. You aren't really listening to anyone else. If he had prevetative care, it would not have been that bad. But because he did not have INSURANCE he could not afford to get the preventative care most people can who have INSURANCE.

[DesMoinesDem]

15. Is that you Bill Frist?

You're giving a prognosis without ANY knowledge of the facts? Come on. People die from pneumonia. Even pneumonia that is caught early. Do you know that is wasn't caught early? No, you don't. Do you know that he didn't receive that best medical care? No, you don't. Using some dead man to try to attack some politician when you have no knowledge of the facts at all is disgusting. Absolutely disgusting.

[RockaFowler]

20. I'm sorry

I made no such statement.

This is not a Ron Paul site. I think I can condemn the man any which way I want to. That includes not providing insurance to his staffers.

Oh and please look up the statistics on Pneumonia. See below

[DesMoinesDem]

22. The use of the dead man to attack is what is disgusting.

I could care less who the politician is. You have no knowledge of the facts of the case. NONE. He died of complications of pneumonia. What were the complications? You don't know. Yet you use this dead man to try to score some cheap points. You should be ashamed of yourself.

[RockaFowler]

24. I love people who don't know me

Do you know why I'm upset?? Because pneumonia is treatable if caught early. $400,000 later, he died. People his age do not usually die of Pneumonia. It's sad to me.

You should be ashamed of yourself, because I care - you really don't seem to care

[DesMoinesDem]

26. You don't care about him.

You're using him. You don't do that to people you care about. People die of pneumonia, even when caught early. You have no idea of why he died. None. You are completely ignorant of all facts in the case. Yet you yammer on like you know something. You don't. He could have had AIDS for all you know. He was a gay man, so the likelihood is increased. You're not his doctor, so stop pretending like you are.

[Bluenorthwest]

14. Over 90% of all pneumonia deaths in the US are infant or

geriatric. Deaths from simple pneumonia in other age groups are very rare indeed.

[Recursion]

31. OK, I've been avoiding saying this, but..

30-something gay male dies from pneumonia. What do you assume?

[Tikki]

5. This is exactly the kind of health related injury/death our President is trying to prevent...

My sympathy goes to the campaign manager's family...not ron paul.



Tikki

[Recursion]

8. What's the evidence universal insurance would have saved his life?

Pneumonia kills millions of Americans every year, and by the time people seek treatment it's often too late (it can progress shockingly quickly; my brother got it as a kid and very nearly died in the hospital). He sought treatment, he got it, he died. It's sad. But I don't see how their way of paying for that should be called immoral.

[Bluenorthwest]

16. The millions are virtually all infants, old people and those

with other complex medical conditions, such as HIV. Almost no otherwise healthy adult under 70 dies from it in the US. Why the need to make it sound otherwise?

[Recursion]

18. He obviously had another complex medical condition since he could not get insurance

He was sick with something (HIV/AIDS? Autoimmune? Who knows? It was bad enough to keep him from being able to get any insurance). Now, once PPACA comes into effect people in his situation will be able to get insurance, which is a good thing.

[Tikki]

17. You get used to knowing you can go see the Doctor without any fear of...

financial retribution, that this is what you do at the earliest signs of...and, believe me...
many, many people outlive the pneumonia...especially a younger, healthier man.

Let's not put them in the grave just because we can...


Tikki

[kiranon]

19. He couldn't get insurance because of a pre existing condition. It

proves the point, that health care is needed for everyone and best friends/churches/community cannot afford to pay for health care for 50 million uninsured people. It shows how heartless Ron Paul is. He cared more about the disruption to his campaign than his friend/campaign manager's inability to get health insurance. It happened as they were rolling out the campaign - such poor timing I guess. How does Mr. Paul know if his friend delayed getting treatment because he did not want to be a charity case, was afraid of the cost or decided to tough it out so he could be there for Ron Paul? Ron Paul was/is a doctor. Did he do anything to help his campaign manager get health services? Lots of questions to ask on this one. We need universal health care and less spent on political campaigns, wars and corporate welfare.

[Recursion]

21. I'm definitely in agreement that it proves that

If PPACA had been in effect already he would have been able to buy an insurance policy. But that means other policyholders would have been paying the $400K rather than neighbors.

[quickmik]

34. You don't know that.

You're reading into this to make a political point.

[Ilsa]

23. The little charity cans for people with hospital bills are everywhere, probably to the extent

that they go unnoticed most of the time. That's no way to manage healthcare costs.

[ljm2002]

25. "He couldn't get insurance because of a pre-existing condition"

So that's one thing.

Another thing is, did he delay seeking treatment due to not having insurance? That is a very common thing, and often contributes to bad outcomes.

Also, the fact that his survivors "accepted charity" is indeed what the libertarians want, but is it what we want? As a society, I think we can provide health care for our citizens without requiring them to have bake sales, etc. It's ridiculous.

[Recursion]

27. I certainly don't want a charity-based medical system

Or rather, I would love that but I lack the trust in my neighbors that would require.

did he delay seeking treatment due to not having insurance?

I have to agree that is the important question here; if he did, that does matter to the question. If PPACA were fully in effect, would he have bought health insurance? If he had it, would he have gotten care any sooner? (Pneumonia in people with other illnesses can be infamously fast-striking.)

[ljm2002]

29. Regarding PPACA...

...I'm not terribly enthusiastic about the bill, as it has ridiculous loopholes (e.g., Medicare can still not bargain on drug prices, which is utterly insane and certainly contributes to keeping costs up) and it does not go far enough (i.e. single-payer, or at the very least a robust public option, would have been nice).

So who knows if he would have bought health insurance. Even with health insurance, people often put off diagnosis and treatment because of the deductibles and copays. The PPACA was supposed to get more people insured, but everything I've read indicates we now have 5 million more people uninsured than we did 2 years ago (45M vs 50M). And it doesn't go very far to make sure that people get affordable insurance, or insurance that actually covers them or pays enough.

[w8liftinglady]

28. i think it proves it exactly.

I care for the uninsured who are expected to "pull themselves up".

Young men who let wounds fester because they can't take off of work- no sick time, no insurance.
Young hypertensives who stroke because they can't afford their prescriptions or follow-up.
Young diabetics in end-stage renal failure on dialysis because they weren't helped manage their disease early on.
...and young sick people who die because they can't go to the ER,can't afford their meds.


and,yes- we have jars in all the local restaurants collecting money for Ms. X or Mr. Y- a teenager or young family member who has a life-threatening disease...and no insurance.

We have young people dropping dead here in the Lone Star State, thanks to our fantastic universal healthcare.

[Recursion]

30. You're interpolating the idea that he avoided treatment because of cost

I really don't see that.

[yardwork]

32. I doubt that the bill was ever paid. I'm sure that the hospital wrote most of it off.

Ron Paul was being extremely disingenuous (ok, he lied) when he stated that churches and community groups (I thought that the Republicans despised "community organizers" anyway) used to cover care for people. Paul knows that hospitals write off billions in unrecoverable charges every year. That puts an enormous strain on our teaching hospitals and results in much poorer care than we would all enjoy if we had a more equitable system of care.

[quickmik]

35. Really?

Do you know anyone in the health insurance field? Or, better yet anyone that is involved in Medicaid fraud? I do. The fact is the the insurance companies get massive discounts on the bills. Ditto Medicaid. Except of course where price negotiation has been banned by legislation to pad the profits of Big Health Corporations. The bills are padded by the providers. Big time. Take a look at the billed to customer payout vs what the insurance company pays. Discounts are often 60% or more. So the $400,000 bill can probably written down to $160,000 or less with no loss. And a bunch of that in this case is being paid for by contributions raised privately by the Paul campaign.