Gov controlled healthcare

[knkali]

seems the gov is everywhere....even in the relationship between you and your doctor. Seem fair? How far is too far? First they are gonna control how healthcare is accessible, and now they are controlling how the care and scope of a licensed physician delivers this care. I think how much med you are getting from your doc is between you and your doc and no one else. Soon you will have more people seeing docs from Obama Care and docs are gonna be hard to find due to them leaving the profession if this nanny medicine is allowed to get a firm foothold in our doc/pt relationships. Yes the U.S is in for a 3rd world healthcare system soon and most people are loving the idea until it is too late. Save your money folks. Thailand and some other places that have less regs where cash is king will have better healthcare than us.
http://www.nbcnews.com/health/cvs-cuts-docs-who-prescribe-too-many-narcotics-6C10975693

[Longitude Zero]

Milton Friedmen once said, "If you put the government in charge of the Sahara Desert there would be no sand left in five years."

[knkali]

LZ,

you might find this M Friedman vid a worthwhile looksee
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6t-R3pWrRw

[getsome]

Article in todays paper said United Parcel Service is going to pull health care from their employee's spouses if they work for another company or are self employed and can obtain health insurance elsewhere because of Ovomitcare...This is very scary and I'm sure many other fortune 500 companies will follow their lead...My wife recently was in the hospital for 18 days and as of yesterday the bills we have received total over 200 grand and climbing...I am lucky and blessed with a union job with good benefits which will cover this but if my company were to drop her off my plan and force her to go Obamacare it would kill us financially and the small income she brings in as a part time worker wouldn't be enough to pay for ObamaCrap much less help out with the family budget....

If the Republicans don't find a way to kill this disaster in the making I'm not sure how the working folks trying to get by in this stagnant economy will be able to make it....This is what happens when you put a Socialist Community Organizer with NO business skills in charge of the largest company in the world....Why in the name of God do so many fools think this man has the qualifications and ability to be the POTUS...:confused:

[garyb]

Obama wants govt controlled socialized medicine....like Canada. Where do Canadians (that can afford Health Care) go for their care? You guessed it....the good old USA. I studied socialized health care in college and confirmed what I learned by speaking to Canadians while bear hunting up there. They all hate it. We will find that slowly over time, the number of places you can find for diagnostic studies will become very limited. You will wait in line with those who get health care for free. You will wait months even years for diagnosis and care. Socialized medicine will be yet another of Obama's plans for the demise of America. Fortunately I retired from health care this year. I no longer need to deal with the government from the health care provider side. Problem is, I (WE) ALL will still need to live with the consequences. The USA health care of today is not perfect, but is the BEST health care in the world. Free market Competition is good....even in health care. Socialized health care restricts access, limits funding, reduces quality, etc.... You will all soon see this to be true. Look at Canada if you want to research an example.

[knkali]

I think it will never go away, Obama Care that is. Too much $ invested by big providers into computer systems and protocols to walk away from it. Also insurance companies are gonna make billions so the lobby is very strong. No, I am afraid it is here to stay.

[Bawanna]

Just one more mess for the next "Real" president to clean up. The pile is getting huge.

[Longitude Zero]

LZ,

you might find this M Friedman vid a worthwhile looksee
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6t-R3pWrRw

knkali thanks for the post. I heard him speak at an event in 1978 and I have read several of his books and articles. He handily destroys many so called myths about our economy.

[JohnR]

0vomit and the Dumz only want to pour gasoline on the fire and pretend it's water.

[skiflydive]

Obama wants govt controlled socialized medicine....like Canada. Where do Canadians (that can afford Health Care) go for their care? You guessed it....the good old USA. I studied socialized health care in college and confirmed what I learned by speaking to Canadians while bear hunting up there. They all hate it. We will find that slowly over time, the number of places you can find for diagnostic studies will become very limited. You will wait in line with those who get health care for free. You will wait months even years for diagnosis and care. Socialized medicine will be yet another of Obama's plans for the demise of America. Fortunately I retired from health care this year. I no longer need to deal with the government from the health care provider side. Problem is, I (WE) ALL will still need to live with the consequences. The USA health care of today is not perfect, but is the BEST health care in the world. Free market Competition is good....even in health care. Socialized health care restricts access, limits funding, reduces quality, etc.... You will all soon see this to be true. Look at Canada if you want to research an example.

On the other hand... My brother who lived in Canada had leukemia 3 times in 23 years, was treated at Canada's best leukemia hospital, and never paid a dime.

My mother, who lives in Canada, broke a hip and then in the follow ups they found she had colon cancer, She's just back home after 3 months in the hospital and you guessed it...never paid a dime.

My GF had perforated appendix surgery and a 3 day hospital stay in Canada. The bill was $11,900. One of my employee's kids had identical surgery and hospital stay here in the USA and the bill was $39,000.

I'm NOT sticking up for socialized medicine, particularly the Obamacare fiasco, but I hate it when people dog on the Canadian system which, for some people, is OK.

I've heard it said that the Oblammer Gov't actually wants it to fail so they can say "OK then" and bring in single payer (gov't paid) medical care and tax the bejeebers out of everyone.

[Longitude Zero]

skiflydive in some ways the Canadian system has its good points. However a close friend had to wait 8 months for hip replacement surgery. By the time the Canadian system got around to approving it she was all but wheelchair bound.

Not paying anything can and does have a cost in long wait times. They key truth in your post is the "for some people" statement. No system is perfect but socialized medicine is definitely NOT the way to go.

[JohnR]

Never paid a dime? You mean they don't pay their taxes? They most certainly did pay for their treatment.

[Bawanna]

Bingo! Somebody always pays!

Now with Ovomit care we'll pay even more and get even less. A lose,lose for sure from a very gifted loser in his own right.

The doctors get funny looks when I ask what some procedure is gonna cost. Their usual response is your insurance will cover it. My usual response is that isn't what I asked.

Everybody pays.

Some thing a Credit Card is a wonderful thing (and it is), not like your giving them real money or anything.

[knkali]

this should sum it up:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9u2UU6-wlk

[skiflydive]

Never paid a dime? You mean they don't pay their taxes? They most certainly did pay for their treatment.

After my brother got leukemia the first time he couldn't work anymore so there were no income taxes to pay. My mother is long since retired and doesn't pay income taxes either.

You do make a good point though and one that I also make often.

My point in my post was that Canadian health care isn't as bad as some people make it out to be. You still get great care although on a priority as need basis.

Longitude zero made the point that his friend had to wait 8 months for hip surgery. Evidently it was hard on his friend but they were still mobile. My Mom waited 4 hours for surgery because her hip was broken and she wasn't mobile.

I am NOT a fan of socialized medicine and I know it isn't "Free."

IMHO lots of people in the USA want health ASSURANCE - everything paid for. That's different from health INSURANCE which should be coverage for catastrophic conditions.

One of my biggest objections is having to pay for care for alcoholic, fried chicken eating couch taters who refuse to do anything to improve their condition.

[Bawanna]

"One of my biggest objections is having to pay for care for alcoholic, fried chicken eating couch taters who refuse to do anything to improve their condition. "

Another Bingo right there! Two in one day. I'm buying lottery tickets.

[TheTman]

American medicine is screwed up enough as it is, there is already too much government involvement. The FDA and Big Pharma work hand in hand to suppress any "natural" cure for anything that uses plants or unpatentable chemicals in the treatment. There are many different cures for cancer, that have been surpressed simply because Big Pharma couldn't find a way to patent the substance used, so they have the FDA harass the Dr.'s using methods that don't involve using their outrageously expensive chemotherapy drugs. I've been doing research on this for years, and am totally shocked and amazed at how many cures have been squashed by the FDA/Big Pharma alliance. And not because of any danger to from the cure, it's all about GREED. Big Pharma wants a cut of the cure for about everything. Look at all the new drugs that have come on the market in the last 20 years. Most with a list of side effects a page long. And if they can't patent some ingredient, or come up with a synthetic (that usually doesn't work) then they sic the FDA on the Dr. who dares to step outside the boundaries of "traditional" medical practices. Cancer is a Multi Billion dollar a year business, and a cure is always "just around the corner" but they never reach that corner, why kill the goose that is laying the golden egg? One cure they suppressed was as simple as getting a syringe to the tumor area and bathing it in a mixture of Baking Soda and water. The change in PH killed the cancer cells, while leaving the healthy tissue unscathed. Squashed by the FDA because Big Pharma can't patent Baking Soda. At least I'm prepared if I ever have to do Chemo again, there are much less harmful ways of treatment, if search them out. Suzanne Somers fought her cancer with alternative treatments, and is doing quite well, and wrote a book about her experience. In most other diseases, there have been great strides taken in treatment, but the treatment for cancer hasn't changed since the 1930's, cut it out, or poison it out, and at sometime they added burn it out with radiation. All of which has some pretty serious side effects.
One alternate that surprised me, is that taking the concentrated oil of the Marijuana flowers, will cure many cancers. They have folks doing this in States where it is legal. One story that I remember off hand, was a lady with an inoperable brain tumor that chose the marijuana oil, over radiation, and is doing incredibly well without the horrible side effects of having her brain bombarded with radiation, and being poisoned by Chemo. If you look at the literature that accompanies these chemo drugs, one of the major side effects is that they CAUSE CANCER. You may think I'm making up stories, if so, watch the video "Cancer the Forbidden Cures" on You Tube. It's a real eye opener. Search for Royal Rife on You Tube, and see how his cure was being touted in Scientific American, and other professional journals of the day, only to disappear from the scene. With no articles saying it was quackery, or didn't work, people just quit writing and talking about it. The Dr.'s that actually used the device, all "decided" to quit working with Mr. Rife, and he could no longer continue his tests without a Dr. to administer the treatments. The video says he took a group of advanced cancer cases, and treated them with his machine, and 100% were cured.
If this machine actually does what they say it can, than it could be used to treat any disease caused by a virus or bacteria. You just have to find the right frequency to kill the organism. And I guess it's about as harmless as having radio waves pass through you, which is constantly happening anyway. But there you go, if it's that effective, Big Pharma would sure be out a lot of money, so it will never be allowed to be used. It's by no means a cure all, it only works on diseases caused by "bugs".
It works on cancer because of they say it's basically a virus, that causes cell mutation. They can kill the virus, or the mutated cells. Many are skeptical about a "cancer virus" but that is what they observed under their microscope. The first part of the research was developing a 50,000 power microscope, that could view living cells and watch them to see which frequencies killed them. Modern optical microscopes are limited to around 2000 power, and electron microscopes cannot view living tissue, since the process kills anything living.
The microscope and frequency generator are safely hidden away someplace, by some outfit call the World Research Institute, in California. They hope to get this through the FDA approval process, and be able to use it again. Which I doubt the FDA will be very interested in it, since their will be no money in it for them, like there is when Big Pharma gets a new drug approved.
Unfortunately they developed the machine about the same time when Big Pharma was getting interested in chemical based treatments, and wasn't interested in anything else. I'm sure that the FDA had a talk with the Dr.'s working with Dr. Rife, and rather than be ran out of business, they quit working with him. Another case of our government having our best interest at heart. Makes me sick to think of all the people that have died due to GREED. And the influence that Big Pharma has over the FDA. The FDA is clamoring to have control over the vitamin and supplement industry. I pray that never happens.

[Longitude Zero]

One of my biggest objections is having to pay for care for alcoholic, fried chicken eating couch taters who refuse to do anything to improve their condition.

I agree and to add I despise paying for aasshatted motorcycle riders who get squished and are not wearing a helmet. Helmetless riders should never be given heroic aka expensive care. Just bare bones basic care.

I have a friend who tried the marijuana oil malarkey and her cancer worsened rapidly until it was arrested by traditional chemo. In medicine there is no one size fits all when it comes to drug treatments.

[skiflydive]

I agree and to add I despise paying for aasshatted motorcycle riders who get squished and are not wearing a helmet. Helmetless riders should never be given heroic aka expensive care. Just bare bones basic care.

Same thing with meth cooks that roast themselves. Cut their pain meds in half and get the word out.

[downtownv]

I don't know about the surgery stuff but I do know the cuts already in place forces the DME Homecare dealer to provide the cheapest crap he can but in order to realize ANY profits.
Baby boomer that paid the most into medicare will get the lowest quality junk China ever made! :19::der:

[Bawanna]

I butt heads with our state Labor and Industries all the time. They are not conditioned to try and save a buck.

I can buy tubes and tires for 6 to 10 bucks at a bicycle shop but they won't pay for those because they are not a medical provider, so if I go to a medical provider they are 40 to 60 bucks.

I just buy em and don't turn in a claim.

Many times there are so many hoops to jump through it's not worth messing with it. Of course many times it is worth it like van equipment and that sortr of thing.

Speaking of which I have to rebuild my ramp into the house. Originally they offered to pay but only if I use a L & I approved provider. I just built it myself. Friend offered to become providers but all it amounts to is agreeing to wait 6 months to a year for your money after the job is done.

Frustrating at times. Old Lincoln knows where I'm coming from I reckon, downtown too.

[downtownv]

I butt heads with our state Labor and Industries all the time. They are not conditioned to try and save a buck.

I can buy tubes and tires for 6 to 10 bucks at a bicycle shop but they won't pay for those because they are not a medical provider, so if I go to a medical provider they are 40 to 60 bucks.

I just buy em and don't turn in a claim.

Many times there are so many hoops to jump through it's not worth messing with it. Of course many times it is worth it like van equipment and that sortr of thing.

Speaking of which I have to rebuild my ramp into the house. Originally they offered to pay but only if I use a L & I approved provider. I just built it myself. Friend offered to become providers but all it amounts to is agreeing to wait 6 months to a year for your money after the job is done.

Frustrating at times. Old Lincoln knows where I'm coming from I reckon, downtown too.


10-4 on that!

[tv_racin_fan]

As I understand it Canada has a healthcare sales tax of about 7% in every province save one. So Canadians pay for that healthcare thru income taxes AND sales taxes.

Also I understand that there was a meeting in Saskatoon not so long ago where they had to decide what to do about rising healthcare costs and the need to increase taxation to pay for it.. as I understand it they decided to cut services and increase taxes.

[knkali]

Yep Canadians are taxed a lot and their population is much much smaller than ours which one would think would make healthcare easier to manage.

[TheTman]

I remember Canadians coming down to the US to get the lastest chemo drugs, they were using stuff in Canada the US had used 10 years prior, with 2 new generations of the drug released since then, improving remission rates from 25% to close to 50%. Their medicine was "free" up there, but if it didn't work, then what good was it. They'd come down and pay thousands of dollars out of pocket to get the latest version of the drug, and double their chances of going into remission.

[knkali]

American medicine is screwed up enough as it is, there is already too much government involvement. The FDA and Big Pharma work hand in hand to suppress any "natural" cure for anything that uses plants or unpatentable chemicals in the treatment. There are many different cures for cancer, that have been surpressed simply because Big Pharma couldn't find a way to patent the substance used, so they have the FDA harass the Dr.'s using methods that don't involve using their outrageously expensive chemotherapy drugs. I've been doing research on this for years, and am totally shocked and amazed at how many cures have been squashed by the FDA/Big Pharma alliance. And not because of any danger to from the cure, it's all about GREED. Big Pharma wants a cut of the cure for about everything. Look at all the new drugs that have come on the market in the last 20 years. Most with a list of side effects a page long. And if they can't patent some ingredient, or come up with a synthetic (that usually doesn't work) then they sic the FDA on the Dr. who dares to step outside the boundaries of "traditional" medical practices. Cancer is a Multi Billion dollar a year business, and a cure is always "just around the corner" but they never reach that corner, why kill the goose that is laying the golden egg? One cure they suppressed was as simple as getting a syringe to the tumor area and bathing it in a mixture of Baking Soda and water. The change in PH killed the cancer cells, while leaving the healthy tissue unscathed. Squashed by the FDA because Big Pharma can't patent Baking Soda. At least I'm prepared if I ever have to do Chemo again, there are much less harmful ways of treatment, if search them out. Suzanne Somers fought her cancer with alternative treatments, and is doing quite well, and wrote a book about her experience. In most other diseases, there have been great strides taken in treatment, but the treatment for cancer hasn't changed since the 1930's, cut it out, or poison it out, and at sometime they added burn it out with radiation. All of which has some pretty serious side effects.
One alternate that surprised me, is that taking the concentrated oil of the Marijuana flowers, will cure many cancers. They have folks doing this in States where it is legal. One story that I remember off hand, was a lady with an inoperable brain tumor that chose the marijuana oil, over radiation, and is doing incredibly well without the horrible side effects of having her brain bombarded with radiation, and being poisoned by Chemo. If you look at the literature that accompanies these chemo drugs, one of the major side effects is that they CAUSE CANCER. You may think I'm making up stories, if so, watch the video "Cancer the Forbidden Cures" on You Tube. It's a real eye opener. Search for Royal Rife on You Tube, and see how his cure was being touted in Scientific American, and other professional journals of the day, only to disappear from the scene. With no articles saying it was quackery, or didn't work, people just quit writing and talking about it. The Dr.'s that actually used the device, all "decided" to quit working with Mr. Rife, and he could no longer continue his tests without a Dr. to administer the treatments. The video says he took a group of advanced cancer cases, and treated them with his machine, and 100% were cured.
If this machine actually does what they say it can, than it could be used to treat any disease caused by a virus or bacteria. You just have to find the right frequency to kill the organism. And I guess it's about as harmless as having radio waves pass through you, which is constantly happening anyway. But there you go, if it's that effective, Big Pharma would sure be out a lot of money, so it will never be allowed to be used. It's by no means a cure all, it only works on diseases caused by "bugs".
It works on cancer because of they say it's basically a virus, that causes cell mutation. They can kill the virus, or the mutated cells. Many are skeptical about a "cancer virus" but that is what they observed under their microscope. The first part of the research was developing a 50,000 power microscope, that could view living cells and watch them to see which frequencies killed them. Modern optical microscopes are limited to around 2000 power, and electron microscopes cannot view living tissue, since the process kills anything living.
The microscope and frequency generator are safely hidden away someplace, by some outfit call the World Research Institute, in California. They hope to get this through the FDA approval process, and be able to use it again. Which I doubt the FDA will be very interested in it, since their will be no money in it for them, like there is when Big Pharma gets a new drug approved.
Unfortunately they developed the machine about the same time when Big Pharma was getting interested in chemical based treatments, and wasn't interested in anything else. I'm sure that the FDA had a talk with the Dr.'s working with Dr. Rife, and rather than be ran out of business, they quit working with him. Another case of our government having our best interest at heart. Makes me sick to think of all the people that have died due to GREED. And the influence that Big Pharma has over the FDA. The FDA is clamoring to have control over the vitamin and supplement industry. I pray that never happens.

I watched the vid. Not sure if I completely buy into only natural remedies as the answer. I think the gov should stay out of it and let people choose their own treatment.

[getsome]

The deal with having insurance companies or Obamacare in charge of your prescription drugs and what your Doctor can prescribe and still be covered under the plan is a very dangerous one...

I have two close friends with medical problems that were being controlled by prescription drugs, one has a thyroid condition and the other suffers from severe depression....Both were doing very well while taking the name brand drugs their Doctor prescribed until in the case of the thyroid patient her Doctor offered to write a Rx for the generic alternative to what she was taking due to the high cost of the name brand so she said ok and tried it and it nearly killed her...After a stay in the hospital and going back on the name brand drugs she improved and is now doing well again...

In the other case of severe depression and mood disorder my friend tried several drugs for depression without much success then finally got on Wellbutrin and after a short time was doing 100% better and it was like a miracle cure until his employer changed insurance plans and wouldn't cover Wellbutrin any longer so his Doctor changed the Rx to the generic and almost immediately he relapsed and went into a "Jekyl and Hyde" type behavior and one day tried to kill himself...

His wife got him into the hospital and after they figured out the Rx change was what caused it and put him back on Wellbutrin he was his old happy self again...They are paying for it out of pocket now and it's very expensive but better than the alternative...His wife looked into it and there's many similar cases on the web of the generic Wellbutrin causing the same thing so when they say the "Generic" is just as good as the name brand don't always believe it...Many of the "Generic" drugs sold now come from China so that should tell you something about quality control and safety concerns...It's all about money and when the single payer system comes to America after OvomitCare crashes and burns we can expect health care and presciption drugs from the lowest bidder.....Damn shame IMO!!!

[Longitude Zero]

As strange as it sounds getsome I know of cases where the very same name brand RX came from two different manufacturing facilities owned/operated by the same pharma company and each had differing effects.

[getsome]

Wouldn't surprise me, When did it happen that every other TV commercial is about some new drug to cure whatever problem people might have and then the last part of the ad is about all the possible side effects up to and including death that taking this miracle cure can cause....Seems to me the Pharmaceutical companies invent all kinds of new diseases and problems that everyone suddenly seems to have and that they just so happen to have a new pill that will cure whatever it is....

Many of these drugs are very dangerous and society would be better off to stay away from them....Ridalin for the treatment of ADD is one that comes to mind...Now there may be a few kids that need these drugs but nowhere near the number of children that are given Ridalin which chemically is very close to Cocaine and Chrystal Meth so how can that be such a good thing...

I believe ALL boys have ADD and it's a perfectly normal thing and it's the real reason God invented Boobs so boys could pay attention to something!!!...:cool:

[garyb]

I will do my best to say this tactfully, so as to not insult anyone. When people think the socialized health care system is great because they did not have to pay a dime for their care, the point is missed. Someone paid for that healthcare. Our system was that we paid for our own health insurance (employers contributed too in some cases)and we pay our own healthcare bills. Socialized health care is such that the working folk pay for the non working folk to get that same care for free. It may be that the working folk receive the health care and don't pay a dime, but so do the non working folk who receive it free because it gets paid for by the working folk. If you give this responsibility to the government, guess what happens???? The same thing that happened to our Social Security payments. The government uses those funds as they choose. The taxes for health care get absorbed in the government's general debt and they continue to increase taxes to pay for it while our national debt continues to sky rocket. The purse is not managed well by the government and health care will not get managed well either. Additionally, in socialized care....availability and access is restricted. There are much fewer facilities (although they may be good ones) to receive diagnosis and care, which means you wait. As an example, Canada has far fewer MRI's and CT's etc... than does the USA, from which you may access that service, etc.... The Canadians I know do not like the Canadian health care system because they wait many months for certain forms of care. It is a fact. Some may benefit from socialized health care but the mass does not.

[knkali]

well my recent look at what's out there for insurance through an insurance broker was not good. Yeah I could find cheaper plans but before they would cover much of anything, the deductible (usually $1500 and up) must be paid first. So what the companies are putting out is lower cost catastrophic care plans to satisfy OC affordability. Wow.

[muggsy]

On the other hand... My brother who lived in Canada had leukemia 3 times in 23 years, was treated at Canada's best leukemia hospital, and never paid a dime.

My mother, who lives in Canada, broke a hip and then in the follow ups they found she had colon cancer, She's just back home after 3 months in the hospital and you guessed it...never paid a dime.

My GF had perforated appendix surgery and a 3 day hospital stay in Canada. The bill was $11,900. One of my employee's kids had identical surgery and hospital stay here in the USA and the bill was $39,000.

I'm NOT sticking up for socialized medicine, particularly the Obamacare fiasco, but I hate it when people dog on the Canadian system which, for some people, is OK.

I've heard it said that the Oblammer Gov't actually wants it to fail so they can say "OK then" and bring in single payer (gov't paid) medical care and tax the bejeebers out of everyone.

Your statement that your mother and brother never paid a dime for their medical care is a fools statement. They paid for those treatments everyday of their lives through higher taxes. Allow me to post this next comment in caps for emphasis. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A FREE LUNCH! They may not have paid anything out of pocket at the time of their treatment, but they paid just the same and you have no idea of the true cost of their healthcare.

[skiflydive]

Your statement that your mother and brother never paid a dime for their medical care is a fools statement.

As are a lot of yours Muggs.

You don't know the facts involved. Here are just a few.

In 23 years my brother's treatments and hospital stays and marrow transplants (I was the donor) amounted to several million dollars. He never paid that amount of taxes. Hell, he was a car mechanic. He never made that much. Because his leukemia was very unusual a lot of the costs were absorbed by the research hospital at which he was treated.

My mother lived in the US from 1965 until my dad retired and they moved back to Canada a few years ago. Her treatments, surgery and almost 4 months in the hospital amount to several hundred thousand dollars in care. She never paid that much in any taxes...ever.

If you had read the rest of my posts you'd see that I don't support socialized medicine or, for that matter, socialized anything, because I am well aware of the ramifications you are bloviating about.

My entire point in my original post was that before Americans start yakking about how bad the Canadian system is, they need to know that it isn't bad for everybody.

Before you go about insinuating that people are fools, have a good look in the mirror pal.

[tv_racin_fan]

"On the other hand... My brother who lived in Canada had leukemia 3 times in 23 years, was treated at Canada's best leukemia hospital, and never paid a dime."

Never paid a dime?

I have to agree with muggsy on that one sir. That brother did pay quite a bit tho he may not have paid anything upon service he surely paid them taxes for all them years.

He paid a goodly share of the income tax portion of healthcare and he paid a goodly share of that sales tax portion I would wager.