I just wanted to rant about socialized medicine. My mother in law is in a Ukrainain hospital dying. Ukraine has socialized medical care. So all the expenses related to her coma, stroke, etc. should be covered, right? Wrong. As with everywhere else where socialized medicine is implemented, if you want actual service, you have to be prepared to pay. Sure, they'll let you in the hospital for "free" if you fall into a coma. But your relatives have to bribe the doctor for competent service, buy the medicines you need, either take care of the nurse duties themselves or pay someone who will, etc. In other words, the care is free, but you get what you pay for. You could literally die from neglect if you don't pay anything for the "free" medical care. My mother in law has had infected bedsores before because the nurses usually don't bother to change your position on the bed. There was an incident a few months ago where my mother in law was complaining to her daughter because when the nurse finally made her rounds she said, "Ewww, how gross you are!" when she saw my mother in law's bedsores oozing yellow puss. Now, my mother in law is almost certainly (barring a miracle) on her way out of this world. She's had her third stroke and she's doing very poorly. My wife is over in Ukraine right now caring for her in her dying days. It's a tremendous burden on her to do the stuff the nurses won't. It's a burden on me to pay for medications that socialized medicine won't. In short, socialized medicine is costing us time, money, and frustration even though the US is not fully socialized yet. All trials are for our benefit, but that doesn't mean that I can't bemoan evil. And socialized medicine is evil.
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If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom, go from us in peace. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen! - Samuel Adams
My wife worked well over 10 years before I came along as a nurse in a hospital in Denmark. For a lot of years after we were married she was very outspoken about the perceived advantages of the Danish health care system as opposed to that in the USA. Only after she had had surgery in England, Italy and the USA was she able to acknowledge that the care was better here. More recently during our mission in Denmark she went to a hospital for outpatient care and more fully realized that "things have gotten worse".
Is there any difference between socialized medicine and mandatory healthcare required by government? It seems to me both violate an important principle. Both thrive on the taking of money from one person and giving it to another. Both require socialism in government, something Church General Authorities have told us to "eschew" and oppose.
BTW, when my wife was in hospital lin Italy I had to bring in all her meals.
Yup, they have to take meals to my mother in law too. We may complain about hospital food in america (although when my wife gave birth, they actually provided good food), but the fact is that you can get food in an American hospital, whereas it's not provided in many other countries. I see the future of US medicine in what's happening now in Ukraine and other countries, and it's scary.
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If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom, go from us in peace. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen! - Samuel Adams
