Quote Originally Posted by selil View Post
Watcher I agree pretty much with the issues you laid out, but the problem still remains that the indigent plague carrier is not going to seek any kind of medical attention unless it is to late. Unfortunately you are correct that the political baggage is tiresome, but as thought leaders we have to go beyond and at least give correct recommendations. The number and type of cases (advanced symptomatic) seen in emergency rooms proves that people without insurance don't even enter the medical monitoring system. Ever. We have to get beyond "socialized" as bugaboo words and simplistic axioms of rejection. We also have to get beyond a standard of "perfect" in talking about implementing these types of systems. The problem is complex and I can not claim to have all of the answers but I can see that the current system is badly broken. The political punditry surrounding healthcare is fallow ground for ideas and concepts. Department of defense has a mission to look beyond the borders at threats external. Law enforcement has a mission to look at threats of criminal nature. The pandemic threat is an internal threat with a substantive history at least as rich with examples as war. Yet even though the death toll in previous pandemics equalled major wars it is given little to no equivalent concern. The reasons are legion. Mostly the political footballs of failed medical policy, big pharma, the AMA, and various political profit seeking constituencies.
Certainly WIM is correct that such a system ("Universal Healthcare") would almost certainly be politically DOA before a pandemic; in the wake of a pandemic, of course, there would be much gnashing of teeth and bitter reproach for not anticipating the threat and establishing a system to deal with it. I wonder what the political watchword for that might be.

But...just to throw a monkey in that wrench, when the SARS scare was on, the public health care system in Toronto was almost overwhelmed by just a few hundred cases, and most of the deaths occurred amongst medical staff. That however, has been attributed largely to inadequate senior leadership at various political levels and within some hospital administrations.