Yes, Richard,
We certainly can blame the smokers, the over-eaters and malnourished, the alcoholics and druggies, the reckless drivers, the clumsy, our parents and grandparents for genetic diseases, lazy people, or even those who work and have occupational diseases - all those who dare seek medical treatment - we can blame them for the rising premiums and assumed risks when lucky to be in a group for health insurance which is subsidized by those who pay an elevated fee if they happen to hold a single/family non-group policy. In fact, since the insurance companies negotiate with the caregiver the fee the uninsured does not do so and subsidizes anyone who has insurance since they are billed for the "actual cost" not some discounted fee set up by the insurance company.
And then when complaining about the high premiums, no one looks at the profits and the multi-million salaries and bonuses that are racked up everyday in the insurance industry because those corportations answer to the stock holders not the insured. There is an army of lobbyists in DC protecting the health care industry and its profits.
The Center for Public Integrity released a report finding the pharmaceutical lobby flooded Washington with $155 million from January 2005 to June 2006, employing a stunning 1,100 lobbyists. Why was the drug lobby was so interested in this bill and what did it have to gain? And who pays each of those lobbyists upwards of $300,000 a year while still showing record profits? The bigPharma lobby (of which Lynn Cheney is a paid lobbyist) promoted that the key goal in the 2003 Medicare Pharma bill was to make sure there'd be no interference in the drug companies' abilities to charge high prices and to continue to increase those prices.

So, yes, maybe we do provide care for those who participate in risky health habits but it is more likely that we are providing generous profits to the insurance companies whose bean counters - not your doctor - can decide what treatments are necessary, which tests can be used to determine a diagnosis or if your "insurance" will pay for any of your medical needs.

Maybe that's why the WHO ranks the US 37th in the world for health care. America spends twice as much for health care as other industrialized nations. For that investment, the United States has bought the highest infant mortality rate among 23 industrialized nations; one of the lowest healthy life expectancy rates for people older than age 60 and some of the highest insurance administrative costs. the American health care system scored 66 out of 100 when compared to other industrialized countries on national benchmarks. The United States did not score the best in any indicator.

I have to admit that this thread has brought on some very interesting posts. The experts (tongue in cheek) have come out of the woodwork. Who would have thunk?

Oh my god,
Is this why I can't FRIGGIN' AFFORD HEALTH INSURANCE??? People need to make money
off of disastrous circumstances??....Investors count (gamble) on no horrilble health problems (or say they aren't horrrible enough), and unforeseeable misfortunes (or say they aren't), to make a profit???
Sounds like KATRINA!! But, I am positive they'll take your hard earned money.
Makes me wanna start smokin'!!
Let's fire the loppyists! Put money to early education for our children about health issuses. Most of all, let's be examples.
I'm not kiddin' either.

I am in the middle of quitting smoking. I have been using Chantix, which is a pill that is not nicotine, but strongly curbs the desire to smoke. I have tried the patch, gum, and cold turkey. I recommended Chantix to anyone who wishes to stop smoking.

noOne,
I Know people that have used Chantix developed by Pfizer. Just a note it is a prescription medicine.

And it really does work. Good Luck!

Health Insurance cost is based of several things. I'm no expert, except that I do work in an H.R. dept. but here are a few ideas:
#1 Usage. Insurance companies do research on usage and raise insurance premiums if your company has higher usage.
#2 Lobbyist are a big part of higher insurance premiums.
#3 The entire health care system is making money. Check your bill the last time you had surgery. Chances are there will be billing for more than one surgeon. How the heck do you know how many were in the room for crying out loud, you were almost dead from the anesthesia.
#4 Pharmaceutical companies...there's a joke. The are making money hand over fist. When was the last time your prescription fell into the generic column?
#5 When was the last time you had to go to the emergency room? Ever notice that anyone waiting didn't speak English? Illegals raise our insurance.
The list goes on and on....

This world is hurting. We are all a part of the human race.
Let's try to stay plugged in...

#5. The alternative is to let the undocumented worker remain ill and maybe even spread the illness to others who happened to be lucky enough to speak English. According to your own statement, illegals do not raise the cost of insurance since they don't (#1) have higher usage of health insurance. (OF course insurance companies raise the premium if they have to pay more claims - to make more money - that's capitalism at it's best and who can argue with that.)
Whether you realize it or not, hospitals are reimbersed for non-paying patients by both the state and federal gov'ts and those are big subsidies. The ER becomes the primary caregiver for the poor because they cannot access care thru private physians and clinics are overwhelmed with long waits for appointments. Have you tried to get an appointment or schedule a test recently? The poor wait until there is no other option than being taken to a ER (the most expensive route for medical care) because they have no other option. IF anyone could ever figure out how much is spent on "illegals" since hospital employees are not border guards and no one has statistics - just guesses - on the cost it might be interesting to know. How do you know that person next to you who speaks Spanish or any other language are not citizens? In many urban hospitals you are lucky if the doctor and nurses speak English but. of course, they are documented workers.
There is a cost that we all assume of providing basic services to all people - roads, schools, police and fire protection, etc etc. Basic health care should be one of those services. I think the lastest figures for administrative costs for Medicaid/Medicare are about 7%. The cost for administrative services for the health insurance industry is 30%. That 23% difference could be spent on health care instead of more bean counters and paper shufflers. .
Next time you are in the hospital, fight with them to get an itemized bill. You might be surprised that the box of kleenex is $125 or those footies are $260 and, of course, medications are charged per pill plus a "delivery charge" for each one to give it to you. Once caregivers learned to unbundle their costs and realized that no one ever challenges the charges, after all, the insurance company is paying the bill, you might be shocked at what one little old aspirin costs and even more not for the surgeon's bill but the cost of using the pre-op room, the operating room and the recovery room.

DreamConch,
You brought up that it is much nicer to fly since they banned smoking on aircraft. Well is seems that the air quality in the economy class got worse. The Airlines have cut back on the filtration systems to save money and the air in the cabin has become more toxic. You should google very interesting read.

Lizrard.
I happen to agree on this. I trust my lungs.

Okay, Michael M, I'm back to remembering that this is a travel forum. Good luck with your surgery tomorrow...or whatever medical profession you're in. Sheesh!

I'm not going to perpetuate this ongoing argument about what is or is not health hazardous to the human race but just comment on two things stated earlier before I finished my long day and logged in.

rotorhead (although he is aggravating me by continuously repeating himself and didn't catch Teresa's subtlely obvious humour) quotes the VI Code about the designation of smoking areas and that gave me a big chuckle. Why?

Because when I got my first restaurant license 12 years ago, I was never informed by anybody that such regulations even existed, The first location I was in was very small (but very well-aerated with ceiling fans and screened but open windows) and even when crowded with several patrons smoking, it never even closely resembled the grey smoke-filled zones which I occasionally frequented in my youth.

When I subsequently left the first location after a prolonged and extended court battle with, "The Landlord From Hell" I had, courtesy of the court, enough money returned to me in escrowed rent to find another location. and re-invent the wheel. The building I found was a disaster but fitted my bill so, with the help of friends, an abused and ill-tended building was eventually transformed. Again, I was never aware of the VI Code concerning smoking regulations and was never appraised of them...

Although I'm a smoker, I hate full ashtrays and whether my bartenders over the years have been smokers or non-smokers, it's one of those "given" rules that ashtrays be emptied pronto. Although I'm in an enclosed building, my many ceiling fans in the main bar area blast away and they, along with two window fans, successfully keep the place pretty much amenable to both smokers and non-smokers. The non-smoking air-conditoned Cozy dining area is off the main bar area and is curtained off. It's a popular spot because it's, well, cosy and has a/c.

Although I have chosen to have a basic masonry and enclosed business in an area close to but away from a beach, I did this for good reason after going through both hurricanes Hugo and Marilyn. In fact my first location was all set to open on September 15th, 1995 which was when WAPA was to put on the main power after everything had been done and all the licences had been secured. Marilyn hit that day.

Sorry, going off point a bit but getting there if you'll bear with me. Although the VI Code already has these smoking/non smoking regulations in place, it has probably never been a big issue and not majorly enforced because pretty much every restaurant here is OPEN! Maybe a few downtown restaurants are all enclosed but I think if you did a survey you'd find that those which are completely enclosed are non-smoking, whether by knowledge of code or because of owner preference?

OK, health insurance. A can of worms both locally and and nationally. First of all, most individuals in the US (including those self-employed) cannot obtain health insurance at a reasonable and affordable premium, period. This is nothing new. Corporate entities offer health packages as part of the deal, more often than not contingent after minimum six months of employment.

However, the majority of healh insurance companies, either through a corporate deal or a private deal, require a signed affidavit from the proposed recipient of these benefits attesting to their age, general health, parent's health, prior hospitalizations for whatever reason, pre-existing conditions, smoker/non-smoker, etc. The list is endless when you read the small print. And that's where they get you ultimately, on that small print.

On point, but if you die of lung cancer and you admitted you were a one-pack-a-month smoker, benefit claim denied. If you admitted you were a one-pack-a day smoker, your premium would have risen accordingly. If you die of lung cancer and weren't a smoker, tar deposits were found in your lungs on autopsy so we don't give a flying whatsit where you lived or what you did, benefit claim denied.

rotorhead, dear heart, either take a break and indulge in some nice sensamilla or a coconut rum on the rocks. Repetitiveness does not become you. Cheers!

PS: Ij just read something recently in a novel which struck home for me as a resident of the Virgin Islands for 23 years:

"It was a city without pretense...where people were struggling simply to live, not obsessing over how to live well."

Sorry it took me so long to post. I use threaded view and it took me a few hours to scroll past the Kenny thread. Hahaha. I know I am the only one laughing, but I heard that laughter is the best medicine. Unless of course you are laughing at a woman from Jersey fist fighting a man who was just taking a smoke break on a beach in the Caribbean. Then of course, according to the CDC you could die of a heart attack from breathing in the second hand smoke if you are a woman which I am.

Roto and Liz,
My point was not that the CDC lies, but that second hand smoke is not high on my list of things to fight as it is easily avoidable for me and I haven't fallen over dead from a heart attack the few times I have been around a smoker, but that could also be because I am not on the birth control pill. Which maybe also raises all of your health care premiums since I have three kids and would be two over my limit if I lived in say...China! They have smokers and lots of second hand smokers and live in close proximity to each other and the majority of women are on the birth control pill since you can only have one kid and their rate of heart attacks in women exposed to second hand smoke is not higher than ours in America. So how does that prove the CDC right about second hand smoke??? It could prove the theory that only American made cigarettes are deadly though.

As Bill Maher says, never be close minded on a subject as there will always be new ideas, insights, and discoveries and being so close minded just makes it a religion. 🙂 I don't want to make smoking into a religion, so I will try to stay as healthy as possible. Although I am in the religion that Black Widows do not make good pets. Swear to god those things can kill you and if I see someone smoking one I will tell them that in New Jersey they would be in prison as those are dangerous to themselves and to us if we get a second hand bite.

Well I hope that answers all your questions and may you say to yourself..."I am never asking that crazy bitch anything!!!"

Teresa

Yeah Teresa! The trolls and naysayers be sleeping for true. You are indeed a true Sag, the seeker of the truth. I gone now. Got to watch Bill Maher.

And Miss "Tilly" wants some loving! Cheers dear!

People who smoke are the same as people who litter or who pour toxic chemicals into streams and rivers. And the people who say leave them alone and let the smoke are the same ones who say nothing when other people litter or polute.

I'm sorry but I speak up. WHAT ARE YOU DOING?

What am I doing? At this point, I'm flipping you the bird.

Make that two birds for rotorhead.

People who smoke are the same as people who litter or who pour toxic chemicals into streams and rivers

I never did that Roto :o) Little bit extreme don't you think????

Are you totally "green" because if you aren't you're contributing to pouring chemicals into our streams and rivers everyday. What do you do clean your toilet with? How about, what kind of soap you use?

This thread is just rediculout. It's like an eye for an eye.

Oh crap .... now we'll have to start paying health care costs for the hearing impaired from the overuse of cell phones .... just another good reason to tell someone to get off the phone on the beach! (don't think spraying it with Lysol will help!)

Using a mobile phone for more than hour a day could damage hearing, experts have warned.

Research shows that those who regularly use their mobile for longer than an hour a day find it harder to hear - with words starting with the letters s, f, h, t and z proving particularly troublesome.

The study, presented to an ear, nose and throat conference in the U.S. this week, comes as mobile phone use in Britain soars to record levels.

The latest research compared the hearing of 100 mobile phone users aged between 18 and 25 with that of 50 others who did not use mobiles.

Off I go to pour ome oxic chemical down he ewer y tem and dump my tra h (including the cig butt ) on the local inter tate ... have a good day

This showed a link between longterm regular usage and hearing loss, with those who used their mobile for more than an hour a day for more than four years tending to find it harder to distinguish sounds.

The problem was particularly noticeable in the right ear, to which most people hold their phone.

High-frequency sounds, such as those made by the letters s, f, h, t and z, were most likely to pose a difficulty, making it hard to distinguish between words such as hill, fill and till.

Researcher Dr Naresh Panda said it is possible radiation from longterm mobile use damages the inner ear.

Early warning signs may include a warm feeling in the ear, ringing in the ear or a feeling it is clogged up, the American Academy of Otolaryngology's annual conference heard.

Weary,
Just in case you become concerned, that last post was not me.