It’s called the VA:
A shortage of surgeons, nurses and auxiliary staff has created a backlog of 500 patients awaiting orthopedic surgery at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in La Jolla, a surgeon who works at the hospital said Tuesday.In some cases, those patients must wait as long as a year and a half for their surgeries, orthopedic surgeon Mark Murphy said, in response to questions from the North County Times. He added that 227 of the patients are waiting for joint-replacement surgery.
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{ 6 comments }
Wow . . . no way!
La Jolla?
I used to work there!
San Diego?
I used to live there!
You know who else lives there?
A whole lotta of our brave men and women . . . a whole lot.
Marine Corps Air Station Miramar Marine Corps Recruit Depot San Diego
Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton
Navy Submarine Support Facility Naval Base Point Loma
Naval Station San Diego (aka 32nd Street Naval Station)
Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center San Diego.
Naval Air Station North Island
Naval Amphibious Base Coronado
PLUS
4+ years in Iraq (5+ Afghanistan)?
PLUS
“In 2004, the VA changed its rules and began to allow returning service personnel from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan automatic eligibility into the VA health care system for an initial two-year period, Murphy said.
Veterans hospitals across the nation were immediately flooded with new patients, he said.”
= definitiely caused by the “single-payer” financing/delivery model?
So it is completely logical to conclude that if the VA were not “single payer” (as you incorrectly dub it) that this would not have happened (at least to this degree)?
Um-kay [sigh] . . .
That has to be one of the most opportunistic and intellectually disingenuous “arguments” made in this debate I have ever seen.
And would you mind at least getting the basic terms correct?
The V.A. is NOT really a “single-payer” system. In a “single-payer” national health insurance system (Canada, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, etc.) health insurance is publicly administered but [mostly] privately delivered. Medicaid and Medicare would be more like this than the V.A.
The V.A. is more akin to Great Britain and Spain, which have “national health services”, where physicians are most salaried and hospitals, publicly owned and operated.
Ugh . . .
Kevin’s not afraid of intellectually disingenious arguments.
I love the left’s new strategy.
Nuh uh!!! That’s single payor not socialized medicine. Yes, that’s right. Try to confuse the public. That is your only chance of getting socialized medicine … errr single payor medicine … errr whatever. The end result will be the same whether the government owns the building or not. What does it matter if they pay you a salary or pay your for each procedure? Same difference.
There is nothing new about the left trying to confuse the public.
To the first reply: actually the VA mishap in this case is a DIRECT RESULT of it being a single payer model.
Why do you think a flood of new people was allowed into the system?
Answer: the military population DEMANDED it, and the politicians responded to it. You do know that politicos will respond to increased demand by the public right? They will throw them a bone to get votes.
Those pressures dont exist when you have to pay for your healthcare, but when its “free” the rush to jump on the bandwagon is overwhelming. This push causes politicians to open loopholes for wider access. This creates a traffic jam, causing skyrocketing demand. Then you get the supply side shortages that cause waitlists a mile long.
So yes, this VA screwup has EVERYTHING to do with it being single payer, aka “free” healthcare.
Anon 12:44 sure sounds like a bureaucrat who is/was in the VA…
typical, instead of addressing the real issues, develop more confusion by teasing the minutiae between “single-payer” or national health services…which is just what they do! In the end, time for the day has been spent and paid for by the lowly taxpayers, with nothing accomplished.
At the same time, label the opposition ‘disingenuous’ without appearing to be the pot calling the kettle black…way to go!
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