I thought I would publish my ridiculous thoughts on how to fix the healthcare system. This may sound communist with libertarian leanings, but the reality is that the healthcare system as it stands is not sustainable. Gouging should be banned when it comes to human lives. Health care should be available and obtainable to ALL people who breathe oxygen. These bullet points are my strategic Ideas to put the American healthcare system back in the hands of Americans, and to end the corporate cannibalism it is guilty of today.
end big pharma:
— make most pharmaceuticals available OTC (Antibiotics, thyroid meds, etc — this is a normal practice in asia)
— mandate pharmaceuticals to have no greater than a 100% profit margin
— legalize international mail order drug purchases
reduce doctors overhead costs
— end high payout malpractice suits (reduces insurance burden on providers)
— subsidize rent for private medical practices (incentivizes Drs to lower rates)
focus on preventative care and nontoxic food supply
— evangelize preventative health by promoting healthy eating
— encourage preventative disease research instead of pharmaceuticals that treat symptoms
— end HFCS subsidies and ban the use of hormones, chemicals and carcinogens in crops and livestock
squeeze greedy players by adding competition
— mandate hospitals provide monetary quotes on procedures enabling competition
— encourage medical tourism until the medical industry becomes fair to humans again.
reduce costs for basic healthcare to consumers
— mandate blood testing be $10 a prick. (Some companies cost > $500 for one lab)
— mandate hospital diagnostics be free and optional (eliminate gouging in hospitals)
eliminate health insurance entirely
— emergencies come out of a fund set up by the government that replaces health insurance entirely, consumer will pay for the expense personally
— specialty shops / optional healthcare will have to work out a payment plan with their patients
— mandate insurance companies must close. May reopen as healthcare loan providers, interest rates to be competitive with other insurance companies.
— these can be underwritten by the government requiring mandated prices for healthcare procedures
In summary — you still have to pay for your own healthcare but the agreement is between you and your doctor with zero middlemen.
Financial services underwritten by the government regulate gouging and allow for competition between parties.
Q: How does that work if you are minimum wage and your small child gets a cancer that is treatable but needs immediate attention?
You go get fixed. You have the option to choose who to provide the services. They have a company that provides your payment for you. It’s guaranteed to be fair. You pay back the expense over time directly to the providers loan service, or if you default, via tax return.
Also the doctor can work out special arrangements with the customers. for instance a good client can pay the doctor back without the loan provider if the consumers reputation is up to par. Reputation to be stored on the blockchain and publicly viewable by all parties.
Additionally, the payments can be compounded into an interest bearing escrow account to cover the loan providers rate in its entirety.
I also don’t want unregulated anything that I ingest, including food and drugs
Of course there are nuts and bolts to be dealt with like FDA but I think all of that can be public info on a blockchain and people can make proper decisions given trust able facts. Reputation systems and fact based evidence will weed out nefarious / fraudulent players.
FDA is doing a fantastic job of allowing glyphosate in the wheat supply in the US and the hormones in consumer grade chicken meat which causes obesity and cancer causing free radicals in the body. Which is why I am also banning those sorts of things from happening at the source as well. For example: US produced rice has toxic levels of arsenic, great job FDA.
A comment from a friend: Your ideal does not provide leadership to grow and develop medicine. (Research is expensive and big pharma surely does not do the right thing for the right reason)
I worked the American Cancer Association general meeting in Washington DC a few years back. It was a very long gig and sat in on the corporate leadership sessions. They put 100% of their dollars into finding treatments for symptoms and 0% of their dollars into finding cures or prevention. Given a brief opportunity to chat with their CEO, I personally asked her about investing into preventative and cure based research. her response: “That’s not what we are here for.”
Ideally medicine is unnecessary for most things. The bulk of medical problems people face can be filed under “unhealthy food” “carcinogens, and other allergic substances” If you solve those problems the greater healthcare becomes obvious and a lot less enormous than what it is today. Its no surprise that the side effects of a lot of modern medicine cause other costly and painstaking side effects that can line providers pockets for years.
This is MY plan. There are other places to grow and develop. The focus is purposefully on prevention and cures, I don’t really consider making medicine to treat symptoms as being beneficial to society. It wont be needed — if we do this right.
