Ted Rall for October 05, 2018

Public services such as FD paramedics billing individuals is pernicious. The only real marginal cost is fuel for the vehicle. Everything else -their time, training, etc- is already being paid for from taxes. If they didn’t respond they’d still be being paid, but just be sitting there growing stale and rusty. Responding is why they exist.

Healthcare, like student loans, is just a money making racket. It’s resistant to getting “fixed” because of the monied interests that like it the way it is.

BTW, the solutions are typically attacked as “evil socialism” because they would help individuals that the system was supposed to serve in the first place.

First off, let me say the hotline listener may have been totally incompetent. Many people feel like “they want to die” but are doing nothing to hasten the process. Now if the caller was presenting with a plan (I have a gun/ I have pills, etc) and the listener couldn’t help de-escalate the situation, then 911 should be called. It is the only responsible thing. And she talked with a psychiatrist? Those guys are about $200/hour; use a clinical trained social worker instead. Cheaper costs for the same results.

For the most part, just talking, putting your troubles out on the table takes a lot of the power away from them and helps a person see options to deal with them.

If the ER was out of network or even if it was in network but the doctor was not then being charged less than $3,000 was a bargain, even a basic blood test panel or simple blood pressure reading can well be $1,000+.

Meanwhile, it seems that most politicians are dead set against “Medicare For All”, the Republicans loudly, and the Democrats quietly. As for a U.S. NHS, fuggedaboutit. Maybe if we just dramatically expand Sanders’ Community Health Center funding, we’ll start moving in the right direction.

When my mother and I visited England, she needed an emergency room visit. We were in and out in about an hour, just a few stitches and a bandage. We explained that we were Americans and didn’t qualify for free medical care. They explained that it didn’t make any difference, because they didn’t have anyone who knew how to make out a bill or any forms for doing it. Everyone who was getting paid was actually doing stuff to help the people who needed it—- one reason why they could afford to make it free.

My jaw was swollen from a toothache. It cost $200 to get permission to buy a course of antibiotics that cost $25.

Since when is calling a suicide hotline like a Monty Python sketch where they take your liver early?No snark intended, this just seems weird.

We need to git rid of Obamacare so the health industry can boost Wall Street.

Been there. Almost exact dialogue.

Medicare for all.

Many Municipalities use Private Ambulance Contractor who unlike Civil Service FF/EMT are in it only for the money.

I used to work on the Samaritans suicide hotline. We were instructed never to send help unless we were asked. The philosophy was to listen and encourage the caller to open up and talk to us. This was usually all the callers needed (we were trained several hours to do this). If anyone asked for help to be sent, we sent it… but very few asked.

@JoeyB The dialogue in the cartoon is almost identical to a pasting on Reddit (New Mexico), except the hotline contacted police (not firefighters), and the police called EMS.https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/69me25/new_mexico_usa_a_suicide_hotline_notified_the/