Visiting the Dentist in Japan...

I do! Twice usually, and Listerine daily!

 

I wash my teeth everyday, with floss (If i have spelled it wrong then tell me please) and thootbrush, i spend 30 Min everyday washing my teeth!

 

I kinda think that's the way it should be though. Ideally, it should be the same (cheap) price for everyone, but if they make you pay more if you make more money so everyone gets the same level of treatment I don't see anything unfair. Sucks for the rich people, but for some reason I don't feel too bad about that. Maybe I'm just tired of seeing them get away with murder in my own country.

 

There needs to be some type of bonus for not going to the doctor that much. My national health care cost in Japan was the exact same as my coverage in the US. The difference is that in Japan I had the same as everyone else. In the US, it covered 90% of everything (but didn't cover prescriptions). Heart attack, brutal car accident? Still covers 90%, no matter where I went. Japan was 80%, and I got Japan's patented crappy care. If you have a heart attack or other serious illness, you will likely die.

The thing is, I literally went to the doctor about twice a year, usually to get a prescription filled and that's it. I walk in, he gives me the medicine, and I walk out. I could even live with out it to be honest. While one of my colleagues has 3 kids and a typically paranoid Japanese wife, one of them seemed to always be under the doctor's care. So he's raping the system for thousands a month, and I'm getting raped. I'm all for national health care, but there needs to be some checks and balances. Car insurance goes up when you wreck your car and down when you don't. I don't see why health insurance shouldn't be the same. It will never happen in Japan though. Their whole medical community survives on the hypochondriac gene... one that's very prevalent in Japanese.

 

I brush twice a day and floss a few times a week. Oh, I use Listerine twice a day with brushings.

 

I agree 100%. I hardly ever go to the doctor yet pay the same amount as my wife who's always going there. Bull Shit is what I call it.

Isn't that the whole country? The problem with this place is that it's run by old bastards who still live in the 1940's.

Yakumo

 

Really? I was always under the impression that Japan's health care system was quite highly regarded.

 

You can tell how new to Japan someone is based on their reaction when a Japanese person tells them, "Oh, you have a cold. You should go to the hospital."

 

You guys complain, but I'd still take what you have over what I have, which is nothing.

Oh, my job offers health insurance, it's just a joke. There's a whole laundry list of things they won't cover (which is everything that's most likely to happen to you.) The fact that it's like $200 a month and that they won't cover the majority of health problems I'm likely to have (incuding any kind of hospital stay past a week) means it's essentially worthless. It's there so my employer can say they offer health insurance. I can't find any decent insurance for less than $350 a month, which is just too much for me at this time.

My brother just had his first child last October. However he was unable to get health insurance for his wife, becasue she was already pregnant. Not that it cost too much, he was unable to, no one would take her. She had to essentially lie and pose as a single mother in order to get insured in time for the birth.

My grandmother has muscular distrophy, and hasn't been able to walk in 50 years. She's never had health insurance, no place my grandfather went to would insure her, for any price. She's in her 80s now, she didn't have adequate coverage until she hit 65 and medicare.

So complain all you want, I'd still take crappy coveragae over no coverage.

 

:lol:, Too right. The first time I heard that about 11 years ago I thought they were joking.

Yakumo

 

Last time I had a cold in Japan, my mother gave me 6(!) different types of medicine to cure me. When I told her that in Holland we just blow our noses regularly and wait for it to pass, she was shocked.:lol:

 

Funny thing is that if we had socialized medicine the prices would be just as high, but they would be paid by others so that you could enjoy a higher level of care. So although it is you now who is complaining about having little to no coverage and it is to expensive it would be someone else complaining about having the same coverage and paying double in.

I understand your situation as I have been there, but I fail to see how a socialized medical system can work effeciently in any way besides in theory.

 

Socialized medicine wouldn't cost that much more. The poor people would have at least minimal coverage. The rich people would be paying a tax that is similar to what they pay for their insurance now. If they want more coverage, they can always get it. It's not something that will rape the upper class, despite what you hear.

If people really wanted to be part of the solution instead of the problem they would quit fucking suing doctors for all sorts of bullshit. Their insurance costs is what has fucked the whole system.

 

That makes little practical sense though. How can someone pay close to the same amount in and have it cover ten people opposed to the one or so that it is covering now?

Inferior care and lowered standards I would imagine. Of course this will not happen immediately, but over time. What is proposed seems like a good idea as the rates stay close to the same, but if you want the same standard of care that you get now, you have to pay in even more for supplemental care. Doesn't seem quite as clean cut as one might hope.

I'm completely with you on the law suit thing. Greedy ambulance chasing Lawyers ought to be cracked down on a bit as well...

 

Look at other countries with social medicine. You'll find similar numbers. My guess is the lower tier of middle class will get fucked the hardest. It's likely they will have the hardest time affording health care. Just a projection.

Your also not considering that there's already quite a bit of money poured into medicaid and other welfare programs. Ideally national healthcare would use these funds as well.

 

The problem is that for profit hospitals and such mark up the cost of thier services nearly 400% when insurance is involved. I can understand major surgury costing thousands of dollars. But does it really cost $3000 to set a broken arm? $500 for a root canal? $100 for a 15 minute consultation? $200 per x-ray? Take a look at the prices for some of this stuff at your local hospital, the only reason they charge that much is becasue they can.

Thing is, in Canada, Japan, or the UK, a doctor is still a valued profession, correct? Doctors still make hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, right? It's not like they get paid minimum wage in these countries. The pharmacuticals still make money in those countries. The only people who get shafted are the insurance companies (which I can't think of an industry more deserving.) So how come they can do it but we can't? Why would it cost us so much more than in Canada or the UK?

Don't get me wrong; I fully expect to never ever ever have socialized medicine in the United States. Becasue we tend to not do things that actually help people in this country, you know, like welfare or public housing. We live in a country that thinks that if you're homeless and insane, then for some reason that can only be your own fault. Pull yourself up by the boot straps and everything, get a job. They just forget to mention that unless you barter away your financial future with thousands upon thousands of dollars in college loans then the only job left is for $7 an hour flipping burgers at Wendys. And even then it's no guarentee you'll get a job that offers decent health insurance. Look at my job, I work for a fucking fortune 500 company for crissakes.

So yes, I know we'll never have any kind of affordable healthcare system here. In fact, by mid century I expect that the vast majority of the population will have no access to healthcare at all.

 

Who Knows Hawanja, maybe it will change in time.