Reply #114: No sane health care without a single-payer plan - see my book

[DSperoRN]

I just wrote a book on this that will be out in October, 2006 from New Society Publishers. Because of our splintered, for-profit medical system, all the wrong things are covered and the important things aren't. And that's if you have coverage at all.

My book is called The Truth About Diabetes: Who gets it? Who profits? How to Stop It. In diabetes, basic prevention and management services are not covered or barely covered. But the fantastically expensive complications of diabetes -- things like dialysis, vascular surgery, amputations -- are covered.

The reason is that we cover things that generate profits for drug companies and other big corporations, but not services that are performed mostly by low-level and mid-level professionals and lay people. It's all about money.

Americans pay TWICE AS MUCH per capita for health care as any other developed country, and have the worst health outcomes. Even Cuba, a poor country that spens 4 cents per capita on health care for every dollar the U.S. spends, has better health outcomes than we do.

We need socialized medicine. It's not perfect, but it's so much better than what we have, you can't argue against it rationally. You have to do what Bush always does, Lie, Lie, Lie.