IggyPride00;484470 wrote:This is what happens when U.S citizens get stuck subsidizing the world's healthcare system because we are the only country on earth where pharma, medical device companies, and every other tech advancement firm can charge what they want with no form of govt. rationing or price controls.
We are supplementing the profit margin they aren't making in the rest of the world, and have been for a long time now.
If the Canadian govt (just one example of hundreds more like it)only allows a company to charge a $1 a pill, but it costs company X $2, that means Americans are now stuck paying $3 since we are the only way they can make up for the lost profit margin. That is why we have laws against drug re-importation or medicare price negotiation.
It is the big secret that the healthcare companies don't want the public to know, and have paid off our politicians accordingly to make sure the racket stays in place.
The thinking is if we don't supplement the world's profits, that R&D will dry up and innovation will stop. That may be true, but it is getting to the point we can't afford the bill much longer.
The answer is not the implementation of our own government rationing and price controls. That smacks of socialism. Every other government on earth has adopted these anti-capitalist practices which is the
real reason we pay a premium for American-based health care innovation and technology.
The answer lies in a free market. You can lay blame on those eeeeeevil pharmaceutical, insurance, and medical technology companies all you want. Are they part of the blame? Certainly but without eeeeevil profits what incentive is there for these companies to continue to develop life saving drugs and medical technology? Unfortunately you are right...the American consumer/taxpayer gets stuck with the bill as usual.
But it's not entirely the fault of those eeeeevil health care corporations either. In my humble opinion it's our spineless twit politicians who at least share a great deal of the blame. Rather than pressuring "other governments" to stop implementing price controls and subsidizing their own failing socialist health care systems and thereby encouraging the free market to help bring about price equilibrium in the overall health care industry, they take the path of least resistance by legislating our own brand of doomed-to-failure socialist health care which will only serve to exacerbate the problem for American health care consumers in the long haul.
Our laws that prevent re-importation of drugs from cheaper foreign sources, medicare price negotiation, allowing health insurance companies to compete across state lines, tort reform, and many other issues need to be re-evaluated by courageous forward-thinking politicians.
