There is no European model. Although there is probably some kind of single payer system in all EU countries, each country has its own system with variations on how health care is funded, managed and delivered and the quality varies from country to country. For example, there was a controversy in England a while ago about cancer medication. A medical treatment wasn't funded by the NHS because it was considered too expensive for the perceived benefits. I think they reversed that decision after public pressure. As far as I can remember the Irish national health system did fund that treatment. There would be other treatments covered by the British NHS but not covered by the Irish NHS. Other than the Irish system, the UK system is the one that I know a little about and even within that system the quality can vary across the UK. Padraig and others here would know a lot more about it. In the UK, some people choose to take out private insurance while still being covered by the NHS. Here in Ireland, I pay about 200 euros per month for basic private insurance although I am covered by the national health system. Germany has some kind of two-tier system depending on a person's income at the time they enter the system. Funding of health care is a political hot potato in many countries. I think what most Europeans find strange are the news stories of people in the US losing their homes because their insurance (or lack thereof) didn't cover the cost of ongoing medication or medical treatment. The advantage of the single payer system is that people get ongoing basic care and medication irrespective of their means. It isn't free. Somebody pays for it - usually the taxpayer. Neither is it always free at the point of delivery. That's certainly the case in Ireland and probably so in many other EU countries. Nevertheless, for all its faults, better to have it than not.
That section of the movie, since it follows the very scary "night on bald mountain" sequence with its calamities of nature, answering such darkness with the natural "cathedral" of bending trees and procession of nuns? with candles has reminded me more recently of the calm of the New Era after the storm of the natural disasters with their demonic involvement. And who brings the calm finally to the world....the Blessed Mother.....a prophecy within the various scenes!!
You gave me a memory. My father was apparently in New York when Fantasia first came out. He worked out of NYC before WWII. He always mentioned how he dearly loved Disney's Fantasia. RIP, Dad. Those were the early Disney days. Now Disney makes me shudder.
Straight out of everything I have envisioned about the three days of darkness. This really makes me wonder about the spirituality of the creators of this movie. Thank God it included the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary so simply ushered in by faithful nuns.
Dolours thank you for this explanation. To me a single payer system with private secondary insurance makes sense. I cannot understand why here in the US there is such opposition. Of course it Is not perfect but it gives everyone basic level care. I guess it is a case of "follow the money".
I can afford the most basic private top-up insurance because our system allows for a mix of public and private. In the current system, there are private beds in public hospitals and there's a provision for Consultants to see private patients in the public hospitals. The plan for the future appears to be a strict separation between the public and private systems. When that happens I probably won't be able to afford the private insurance. We also have (or had, I'm not sure whether it has been changed recently) risk equalisation in private medical insurance. That means that old people don't pay more because of their age or people with existing illness aren't charged extra when their treatment costs increase. There is a waiting period before people with existing illnesses can make a claim after taking out insurance coverage. It used to be 5 years but I'm not sure whether that's still the case. If I travel to another EU country and fall ill, I'm entitled to emergency medical care in that country to the same level as citizens of the country. As far as I know, the medical provider in that country will then send a bill to the Irish Government for the cost of my treatment. There are very long waiting lists for some treatments in our public hospitals. I heard once of a man waiting for a heart operation here who booked a trip to Paris. When he arrived there, he complained of chest pains and had his heart operation straight away. I wouldn't be confident that a Frenchman would be so fortunate here. And that's just the difference between Ireland and France. Imagine the difference between, say, Greece or Romania and France or Germany.
The Latest Absurd Manifestations of Transgenderism http://www.crisismagazine.com/2017/transgender-lunacy and more..... Army trains female soldiers to shower with “women with male genitalia” http://hotair.com/archives/2017/07/17/army-trains-female-soldiers-shower-women-male-genitalia/
Update: Minister: Israel Will Now Act to Reestablish Jewish Sovereignty Over Temple Mount Read more at https://www.breakingisraelnews.com/...says-government-minister/#CPp5uPUxUbPvEY3F.99 https://www.breakingisraelnews.com/...says-government-minister/#Jsi0mesdtlsO1yrI.97
The whole problem with health care is someone has to pay for it. The poor get it for free, but what kind of quality? And the middle class are picking up the tab. My sister's insurance cost went from $675 a month to $1475 per month with a $10,000 deductible per year for bare bones service, so she can't afford to go to the Dr. Because it is too expensive. So, ironically she is paying for the poor people who couldn't afford to go to the Dr., and now she can't afford to go. Go figure. It makes you not want to work so you can get free health care, food stamps, housing etc. Where is the incentive to work? It's a big mess for sure.
Yes, someone always has to pay and it's always the squeezed middle who bear the brunt. It's no different here. I'm not holding up our system as some kind of ideal standard because it's far from that. I'll give you a couple of examples of why I wouldn't want to lose our single payer system (I'm talking about my own relatives): One with no private health insurance developed kidney failure in his late thirties, needed dialysis three times weekly and after a while wasn't able to work. He was on dialysis for years before having a kidney transplant, after which he was on anti-rejection medication for the rest of his life. Nobody in an ordinary job could have afforded the private insurance it would have taken to cover his medical costs. Another developed cancer, had the surgery followed by chemo and radiation therapy and ongoing treatment from a side effect of the surgery. Eventually the cancer returned and she is once again receiving ongoing treatment. With the same basic level of private insurance as I, she gets to see her oncologist rather than an assistant at an appointed time in a private clinic and the private insurance covers tests like ct scans, pet scans, etc. Without the private insurance, she would still get to see the oncologist but would have to spend hours waiting in line in the hospital outpatients department and would most likely have longer intervals between the scans. The private insurance doesn't cover her medication. The public health services pays for that along with the the medication for all her other ailments. Because a relative in the US was on the same medication, a monthly injection, we know that each injection costs $2,000. The relative in the US with good employer provided health insurance paid a co-pay of, I think, about 10% but I'm not sure of the amount. The Irish relative pays nothing. I know of another person in the US who, unemployed, was in receipt of food stamps. She was taken ill suddenly and because she was a long drive from the nearest hospital, they sent a helicopter for her. It cost her nothing. Short of something like a mayday message from a sinking ship in the ocean, our health service wouldn't send a helicopter to pick up a patient. If our income is below the means test, we pay €100 per night for a hospital stay, up to a max. of €1,000. We pay some money for medication up to a monthly max. of about €140. I'm not sure of the exact amount because I don't take medication. General practitioners' fees are not covered and they can range from about €40 to €70 per visit. Those who qualify for free medical care pay nothing for hospital stays or GP visits and about €2.50 per item on a prescription. Some people qualify for free doctor's visits but have to pay the €140 prescription charge. Hardest hit are those who earn just above the limit on the means test. They would probably be better off not working, but I don't know enough about it to say for sure. As far as I know there are no hospital stay charges in the UK and their prescription charges are minimal. It's probably the same in Germany and France. I think Holland are in transition from a private or mixed public/private system to an all public system. The reason I prefer to keep the single payer system is that none of us knows what lies ahead for us and better a basic provision which enables us hold on to our homes than a cadillac version that would cost us our homes if we couldn't afford the premiums. Other European countries have a better system than ours. Some are worse. We all pay high taxes. I was trying to explain to Muzhik that there is no one size fits all European Health Care system and it's unlikely we will have a single, pan-EU system without a centralised means of funding it. Also, each country negotiates its own deal with the drug providers, making medication cheaper in some countries than in others. Advocates of the single payer system in the US talk as though the citizens in the poorer EU countries have the same service as those in the richer countries. That's not so and won't be so because it would mean the Germans, Dutch, etc. subsidising healthcare in the poorer countries. Welfare payments also vary from country to country and there's a convoluted system covering benefits for migrant workers within the EU. And yes, it is abused.
VDH, as usual, writes an excellent article on the "State of Affairs" in the USA. It would NOT be difficult to write a similar article about The Catholic Church with much of the same Talking-Points and Good/Bad Actors "The Fifth American War" http://www.nationalreview.com/artic...elites-vs-populists-egalitarianism-vs-liberty GOD SAVE ALL HERE!!
Facebook removed twenty-five Catholic pages without explanation on Monday, and restored them a day later. I predict that it won't be too long till Catholic beliefs are labeled as "hateful" and banned permanently. http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/new...c-facebook-pages-removed-without-explanation/
Aren't we being told to look out for a cashless society (and classless!)? We're already watching the very few taking over the distribution of food supplies (Amazon) and others for energy, etc. Now this is being pushed by the same types of "elitists"....some of whom have the goal of population control: Why universal basic income is gaining support, critics The idea of government giving every person a universal basic income has been gaining traction thanks in part to endorsements from some Silicon Valley celebs. Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen and others want to explore the idea. ...... Some see it as a way to compensate for the traditional jobs with benefits that will be wiped out by robotics, artificial intelligence, self-driving vehicles, globalization and the gig economy. Others see it as a way to reduce income inequality or to create a more efficient, less stigmatizing safety net than our current mishmash of welfare benefits. “I think ultimately we will have to have some kind of universal basic income, I don’t think we are going to have a choice,” Tesla CEO Elon Musk said at the World Government Summit in Dubai in February. ........ Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen and Y Combinator president Sam Altman have all said it’s worth exploring. Y Combinator’s nonprofit research lab started a basic income pilot with fewer than 100 people in Oakland last fall with the goal of gathering information to structure a larger research proposal, its director, Elizabeth Rhodes, said. The concept has been around, with different names and in different countries, for centuries, said Karl Widerquist, co-founder of the Basic Income Earth Network. ........... That’s why some proposals would reduce or eliminate payments to children or to adults over 65 if they are getting Social Security and Medicare. Some would limit the benefits going to high-income people, either directly or indirectly by raising their tax. “In the simple model, everyone in the lower half (of the income distribution) would be a net beneficiary, everyone in the upper half would be net payers,” Widerquist said. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://www.sfchronicle.com/aboutsfg...-basic-income-is-gaining-support-11290211.php Pretty soon, human nature being what it is, such a "utopian" concept, would eliminate all incentives for creative type of work and people would be eliminated in favor of robots....and only those at the top who are throughout history the only ones to get the "dachas"!! NWO. If they control individual income you will be controlled in order to even receive that income. This is also to reduce any power via profits of the wealthier but not the super wealthy.
One of the European countries is already trying it out on a pilot scheme. I can't remember whether it's Finland or the Netherlands. I think the Swiss voted against it in one of their many direct democracy ballots. The pilot scheme isn't open to everyone. It's being spun as a support for people who want to try starting their own business but couldn't take the risk of losing their unemployment benefits while the business gets off the ground.
Cognitively, I can't bring myself to call people with male genitalia and chromosomes, women, and vice versa. I am sure soon the likes of me will be fined for being a non-believer.
Back to the Charlie Gard story. The latest is that he has been granted American citizenship so that he can be flown to the US to receive treatment. I surely hope this comes about. The American doctor and an expert from a Vatican hospital in Rome talked for 5 hours to the people who are literally holding Charlie and his parents hostage. Signs
