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Government-Run Health Care Kills Thousands
Liberals and Progressives have religious faith in government-run health care systems. I am sure, if left to their own ends, they would much rather prefer we adopt a single-payer system similar to the systems in the UK and Canada. Political necessity only permits a foot-in-the-door policy that mandates health care insurance for everyone. While these systems aren't as inefficient as the top-down single-payer systems (such as Medicare), the current bills passed in the House and Senate impose the heavy hand of the State into almost every dark corner of the health care system in America.
These government fundamentalists march to the canon and cry of the efficiency of government-run systems and mock for-profit systems for being inefficient and wasteful. Yet there is no area of economic activity that the government operates efficiently precisely because of the lack of discipline present in for-profit ventures. The USPS just announced they lost $238 million in 2009. Fedex and UPS were profitable.
The shibboleth of the inefficiency of capitalism has so often been proven wrong by economists on all sides of the spectrum that one can only conclude that these free market deniers are worse than ignorant: they choose power over efficiency. And that is what Hayek called "The Road to Serfdom." After all, it was the Marxists and Socialists who proved by their failures that the free market works.
It is useless to appeal to reason to these fundamentalists. Their quest for power is an end in itself and they won't relent.
What to do?
My suggestion is that we should use scare tactics and create an environment of fear and doubt about government health care plans. This is fair since Liberals and Progressives have been spreading falsehoods about the free market system for a hundred years. We have an advantage: we don't have to lie. The truth is scary enough.
Here are two frightening and disgusting articles that demonstrate what I am talking about. Don't tell me it couldn't happen here.
You might find this first article disturbing.
1,200 Needless Deaths
By Fay Schlesinger, Andy Dolan and Tim Shipman
Last updated at 1:45 PM on 25th February 2010
- Up to 1,200 patients died unnecessarily because of appalling care
- Labour's obsession with targets and box ticking blamed for scandal
- Patients were 'routinely neglected' at hospital
- Report calls for FOURTH investigation into scandal
Not a single official has been disciplined over the worst-ever NHS hospital scandal, it emerged last night.
Up to 1,200 people lost their lives needlessly because Mid-Staffordshire NHS Trust put government targets and cost-cutting ahead of patient care.
But none of the doctors, nurses and managers who failed them has suffered any formal sanction.
Indeed, some have either retired on lucrative pensions or have swiftly found new jobs.
Former chief executive Martin Yeates, who has since left with a £1million pension pot, six months' salary and a reported £400,000 payoff, did not even give evidence to the inquiry which detailed the scale of the scandal yesterday.
He was said to be medically unfit to do so, though he sent some information to chairman Robert Francis through his solicitor.
The devastating-report into the Stafford Hospital-shambles' laid waste to Labour's decade-long obsession with box-ticking and league tables.
The independent inquiry headed by Robert Francis QC found the safety of sick and dying patients was 'routinely neglected'. Others were subjected to ' inhumane treatment', 'bullying', 'abuse' and 'rudeness'.
The shocking estimated death toll, three times the previous figure of 400, has prompted calls for a full public inquiry.
Bosses at the Trust - officially an 'elite' NHS institution - were condemned for their fixation with cutting waiting times to hit Labour targets and leaving neglected patients to die.
But after a probe that was controversially held in secret, not a single individual has been publicly blamed.
The inquiry found that:
• Patients were left unwashed in their own filth for up to a month as nurses ignored their requests to use the toilet or change their sheets;
• Four members of one family. including a new-born baby girl. died within 18 months after of blunders at the hospital;
• Medics discharged patients hastily out of fear they risked being sacked for delaying;
• Wards were left filthy with blood, discarded needles and used dressings while bullying managers made whistleblowers too frightened to come forward.
Last night the General Medical Council announced it was investigating several doctors. The Nursing and Midwifery Council is investigating at least one nurse and is considering other cases.
Ministers suggested the report highlighted a dreadful 'local' scandal, but its overall conclusions are a blistering condemnation of Labour's approach to the NHS.
It found that hospital were so preoccupied with saving money and pursuit of elite foundation trust status that they 'lost sight of its fundamental responsibility to provide safe care'.
Health Secretary Andy Burnham accepted 18 recommendations from Mr Francis and immediately announced plans for a new inquiry, to be held in public, into how Department of Health and NHS regulators failed to spot the disaster.
But Julie Bailey, head of the campaign group Cure the NHS, condemned his response as 'outrageous' and backed Tory and Liberal Democrat demands for a full public inquiry into what went wrong.
Tory leader David Cameron said: 'We need openness, clarity and transparency to stop this happening again.' Gordon Brown described the scandal as a 'completely unacceptable management failure' and revealed that the cases of 300 patients are now under investigation.
He told MPs the Government was belatedly working on plans to 'strike off' hospital managers responsible for failures. The hospital could also lose its cherished foundation status.
Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said 'These awful events show how badly Labour has let down NHS patients. It should never again be possible for managers to put a tick in a box marked "target met" while patients are pushed off to a ward and left to die.'
The Francis probe was launched following a Healthcare Commission report on Stafford Hospital in March last year. It found that deaths at the hospital were 27 to 45 per cent higher than normal, meaning some 400 to 1,200 people died unnecessarily between 2005 and 2008.
Two weeks before the report's publication, the Trust's chief executive Martin Yeates was suspended. He eventually resigned in May after being offered £400,000 and a £1million pension pot.
The Francis report said staff numbers were allowed to fall 'dangerously low', causing nurses to neglect the most basic care. It said: 'Requests for assistance to use a bedpan or to get to and from the toilet were not responded to.
'Some families were left to take soiled sheets home to wash or to change beds when this should have been undertaken by the hospital and its staff.' Food and drink were left out of reach, forcing patients to drink water from flower vases.
While many staff did their best, Mr Francis said, others showed a disturbing lack of compassion to patients.
He added: 'I heard so many stories of shocking care. These patients were not simply numbers. They were husbands, wives, sons, daughters, fathers, mothers, grandparents. They were people who entered Stafford Hospital and rightly expected to be well cared for and treated.'
Family who lost four loved ones
Kelsey Lintern was at the centre of one of the worst tragedies in the hospital’s appalling catalogue of failure.
She lost four members of her family within 18 months, her grandmother, uncle, sister and six-day-old baby.
Mrs Lintern, 36, almost became the fifth victim when a nurse tried to give her pethidine while she was in labour, despite her medical notes and a wristband clearly stating she was allergic to the drug.
The horrific story began in January 2007 when her baby daughter Nyah had to be delivered by her own grandmother because a distracted midwife was not looking.
The baby was not breathing but she was resuscitated, then discharged by a junior paediatrician just two days later, despite the family’s fears she was seriously ill.
She was not feeding properly and still appeared blue. She died four days later. A post-mortem examination revealed four holes in her heart. Mrs Lintern accepts that Nyah may have died in any case, but said the hospital should at least have ‘realised there was a problem’.
It was when she was in labour with Nyah that a nurse arrived with a syringe of potentially-fatal pethidine, oblivious to the fact Mrs Lintern was allergic to it.
In April 2007, Mrs Lintern’s sister, Laurie Gethin, 37, died of lung, bone and lymph cancer, which had taken 18 months to be diagnosed, even though she was displaying tell-tale symptoms.
Her body, with her eyes still open, was left on her blood-splattered bed in full view of other patients. Tests revealed that Mrs Gethin had ‘markers’ in her blood which can indicated cancer.
But it was only when she was sent for a scan at another hospital that tumours were discovered. Mrs Lintern’s uncle, Tom Warriner, 48, died in January 2008 after his intestine was accidentally pierced in an operation for bowel cancer.
A coroner ruled the death was accidental. That summer, her grandmother Lilian Wood Latta, 80, died hungry and dehydrated after suffering a stroke. She was left in her own excrement during her final days and the family said the dehydration was caused by staff failing to give her adequate fluids.
Mrs Wood Latta had been referred to the hospital by her GP after suffering a series of mini-strokes at home. She was moved between wards three times, and it was left to relatives to change her incontinence pads.
Her dying wish had been to see Mrs Lintern’s new baby Khalen, so, after checking with staff, Mrs Lintern took her daughter in. But as the frail pensioner held her great-grandchild, a nurse appeared and said: ‘What on earth is a baby doing here? You do know we’ve got MRSA and C-Diff on this ward?’
Mrs Lintern, who lives in Cannock, Staffordshire, with husband David and their two daughters, said: ‘It is called the caring profession. But where is the care?’
James Reay died in agony after a junior doctor at Stafford Hospital failed to check his medical history and gave him the wrong drug.
The 67-year-old former miner was admitted to A&E in May 2006 with a swollen leg. Medics administered the anticoagulant Heparin – but failed to take into account Mr Reay’s history of stomach ulcers, which are known to react badly to the drug.
Two days later he was rushed to another hospital where he died from internal bleeding after three weeks of intense pain. Yesterday his widow Olwen won afive-figure pay-off in an out-of-court settlement after Mid Staffordshire NHS Trust admitted liability.
Mrs Reay, 69, said: ‘I have won my case but to me it is blood money and I cannot enjoy it. I would rather have my husband.’
With a background in the hotel and catering industry, Martin Yeates was brought in to help Mid Staffordshire achieve the holy grail of foundation trust status as a supposed beacon of quality in the NHS.
A profile on the Trust’s website, since removed, boasted that he had developed ‘a more businesslike approach for the organisation’ after his appointment in September 2005.
The Trust finally achieved foundation status two years later. Mr Yeates’s career in the NHS began when he switched from the hotel trade to manage the catering department at Walsgrave Hospital in Coventry in 1977.
It has now ended with a £1million pension pot, six months salary and a possible £400,000 pay-off for the father of two – despite the Trust’s catastrophic failings.
Mr Yeates, who lives with second wife Lynn in a converted barn in a hamlet outside Stafford, was not at home last night and a neighbour said he had not been seen since Christmas.
It is believed he has spent at least some time in Egypt since being suspended on full pay of £169,000 in March last year – two weeks before an investigation revealed the deaths of at least 400 more patients than would have been expected, and an ‘appalling’ catalogue of failings in care.
Yesterday’s inquiry report said Mr Yeates resigned with effect from June 14, and was paid six months full salary in lieu of notice.
In his report, Mr Francis said Mr Yeates had failed to resolve ‘governance and staffing issues’ at the Trust and that he and colleagues had ‘focused on systems’ instead.
Of the other Trust bosses, former chairman Toni Brisby resigned in March last year after the NHS watchdog Monitor said it intended to remove her. She told the Francis report she received no termination payment of any kind. Jan Harry, the trust’s director of nursing from 1998 to 2006, oversaw disastrous changes to the organisation of wards.
But she told the inquiry she could not recall a decision to axe 52 nursing posts and was ‘not aware’ of plans to drastically alter the ratio of trained to untrained staff. She also said it was not her job to monitor ward standards – a claim later described as ‘absurd’ by Dr Peter Carter, general secretary of the Royal College of Nursing.
Helen Morrey, former director of operations at the trust, admitted that risk assessments about the impact of job cuts were inadequate and accepted responsibility for a failure to thoroughly investigate complaints by patients. She was put on paid leave last July, before leaving the trust in November.
You don't have a choice other than the National Health System unless you are rich. In a free market system, you could sue and drive the bad hospitals out of existence. Or you could go somewhere else. Thus the free market corrects its mistakes. Very difficult in the UK. I do think that our legal system is too liberal with awards in medical malpractice cases, but the idiots in the Republican Party see "malpractice reform" as a cost cutting measure. You can hate the lawyers, but remove them, and there is nothing between us and Leviathan.
This next article will repulse you because of the hypocrisy of it.
Canadian Legislator Goes to Miami for Heart Surgery
By Tara Brautigam (CP) February 22, 2010
An unapologetic Danny Williams says he was aware his trip to the United States for heart surgery earlier this month would spark outcry, but he concluded his personal health trumped any public fallout over the controversial decision.
In an interview with The Canadian Press, Williams said he went to Miami to have a "minimally invasive" surgery for an ailment first detected nearly a year ago, based on the advice of his doctors.
"This was my heart, my choice and my health," Williams said late Monday from his condominium in Sarasota, Fla.
"I did not sign away my right to get the best possible health care for myself when I entered politics."
The 60-year-old Williams said doctors detected a heart murmur last spring and told him that one of his heart valves wasn't closing properly, creating a leakage.
He said he was told at the time that the problem was "moderate" and that he should come back for a checkup in six months.
Eight months later, in December, his doctors told him the problem had become severe and urged him to get his valve repaired immediately or risk heart failure, he said.
His doctors in Canada presented him with two options - a full or partial sternotomy, both of which would've required breaking bones, he said.
He said he spoke with and provided his medical information to a leading cardiac surgeon in New Jersey who is also from Newfoundland and Labrador. He advised him to seek treatment at the Mount Sinai Medical Center in Miami.
That's where he was treated by Dr. Joseph Lamelas, a cardiac surgeon who has performed more than 8,000 open-heart surgeries.
Williams said Lamelas made an incision under his arm that didn't require any bone breakage.
"I wanted to get in, get out fast, get back to work in a short period of time," the premier said.
Williams said he didn't announce his departure south of the border because he didn't want to create "a media gong show," but added that criticism would've followed him had he chose to have surgery in Canada.
"I would've been criticized if I had stayed in Canada and had been perceived as jumping a line or a wait list. ... I accept that. That's public life," he said.
"(But) this is not a unique phenomenon to me. This is something that happens with lots of families throughout this country, so I make no apologies for that."
Williams said his decision to go to the U.S. did not reflect any lack of faith in his own province's health care system.
"I have the utmost confidence in our own health care system in Newfoundland and Labrador, but we are just over half a million people," he said.
"We do whatever we can to provide the best possible health care that we can in Newfoundland and Labrador. The Canadian health care system has a great reputation, but this is a very specialized piece of surgery that had to be done and I went to somebody who's doing this three or four times a day, five, six days a week."
He quipped that he had "a heart of a 40-year-old, so that gives me 20 years new life," and said he intends to run in the next provincial election in 2011.
"I'm probably going to be around for a long time, hopefully, if God willing," he said.
"God forbid for the Canadian public I won't be around longer than ever."
Williams also said he paid for the treatment, but added he would seek any refunds he would be eligible for in Canada.
"If I'm entitled to any reimbursement from any Canadian health care system or any provincial health care system, then obviously I will apply for that as anybody else would," he said.
"But I wrote out the cheque myself and paid for it myself and to this point, I haven't even looked into the possibility of any reimbursement. I don't know what I'm entitled to, if anything, and if it's nothing, then so be it."
He is expected back at work in early March.
At least he admits that the Canadian system isn't very good. His lack of faith in his own system speaks volumes. Where will he go when we destroy the best health care system in the world?
P.S. Please see my response to the comments, below.
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Yuri Maltsev: The Lesson of Soviet Medicine.
http://mises.org/journals/fm/oct09.pdf
Not a fair comparison.
why not?
Its was a health plan run under a communist dictatorship. The people were more supressed. They had to accept anything that was given to them. The government run health care that they have wouldn't be comparable to what we would recieve.
Not right away perhaps.
The people were more supressed.
I'm glad that you acknowledge that it is merely a matter of degree.
"Our point, however, is not that dictatorship must inevitably extirpate freedom but rather that planning leads to dictatorship because dictatorship is the most effective instrument of coercion and the enforcement of ideals and, as such, is essential if central planning on a large scale is to be possible."
- Hayek, The Road to Serfdom
@rick64
"Our system is not the best, but our doctors and technology are the best. The problem I see is the relationships between the insurance, pharmacueticals, doctors, and hospitals are counterproductive"
this statement is very true. the very design of the system is not to deliver quality cost effective care but for each party to max their profits. You have to alter the system so that giving quality cost effective care gives each party the most profits. Quality and cost effectiveness aren't something I even heard in my training. The doctor doesn't benefit from picking the best drug based on cost and quality. Pharma always makes more with a "new" product and pushes that even if the added benefit is tiny but the costs are much more, new tests, new machines, new products (they may not be better at all (but they all have higher profit margins.
Yes and I would like to add unneccessary surgical procedures which are excessive, are used to boost revenue to feed the Industry.
I live in the UK so I dont have any experiance of the US system, I think the US healthcare cost is about 12% GDP and the UK is about 8% so the US is about 50% more expensive and as I understand many people go without and many get bankrupted,
I also assume the US system is riddled with insurance fraud,
The UK system is riddled with fraud and the big drug companies make huge profits but at 8% of GDP I think the US should consider a UK type system, It may be worth looking into.
My experiance of the NHS is very good, But it is being broken down slowly, If you have money you pay and if you dont its free for some parts, This will probably be a problem for the US if Obama gets his way in decades from now,
One thing at the moment here in the UK if you fall ill you dont have any financial bills after, I do expect that to change after the next election,
The disturbing thing about all the posters is the ideology approach. Once you bring in the concept of socialism or capitalism as being the best approach because it is one or the other it shows you aren't really understanding the issues.
The idea that we in the UNited states do naot have multiple needless deaths because of poor hospital care is false. We have much higher rates of infection than many places.
It is likley you could produce results with both systems. But, you will never reign in costs without the idea of rationing.
When the capitalist approach is to maximize profits to insurance companies and pharma that is all money that could be going towards patient care that never gets there. So, in fact these areas and technology are the most likely areas of savings.
If you want good health care you have to pay the people who work in it well. But, you shouldn't incentivize people by the number of procedures they do. then you get excess. I can't tell you how many needless tests I see done because the MD has to pay for his ultrasound, or makes money off of the test.
Many of the socialized medical countries have cut what they pay to MDs and nurses so much that they are in fact not very smart. I can tell you by first hand knowledge this is already happening in the US.
The solutions to the medical problem aren;t that difficult. But it means disruption of special interests. Buying them off, as Obama has done, won't lead to savings. These companies are effectively utilities. their rates need to be regulated, their profits regulated. the money saved going to patient care. Data from the companies must be available. the companies that provide the best quality/dollar outcomes will get to charge more, or those that can't do it will see their rates reduced. an additiional problem is there needs to be integration of services (insurance, hospitals, etc.
I can tell you one thing is that the current generation of hospital management isn't qualified to do their job either.
We in fact pay for bad outcomes, get a complication and the doctors and hospitals get paid for it.
As it stands now the great majority of people attempt to game the system to make the most they can. that doesn't provide good quality cost effective care.
I have experienced the health care system in the U.S., Singapore, and Japan. I can say that I have never been in a life threatening health situation, but the system in Japan which is socialized (bad word in the U.S.) is quite efficient and many doctors have been educated in the U.S.. It is economical in Japan.
Singapore on the other has some inefficiencies. The doctors are usually not top level. I was involved in a bar fight where I recieved some deep lacerations on my head and face. I went to the Gov. run hospital and waited for 30 min. to be seen. I was the worse case there at the time. It was crowded and when I was admitted I waited for another 15 min. to be seen by a nurse, then another nurse came in and then a doctor over a period of 30 min. . The reaction from the nurses and the doctor were "Oh my God" when they looked at it , which I thought was very unprofessional. Well the doctor left and the nurse said I had to wait for a specialist to come to do the stitching. So I was waiting and thinking the longer the wait the more likely these cuts are going to leave scars. After 10 more minutes I told them I was leaving and going to the private hospital which astonished all of them. Well I went to the private hospital within 5 min. I was with a doctor and in an hour he was done and did a great job (36 stitches). It was one of the best decisions I made. It cost me probably 4 times the money, but in this situation it was important. It didn't leave any visible scars.
I have heard some of the same stories of poor care in both private and gov. run hospitals. If you have both then the better doctors will be in the private sector because they pay more. So if I had a serious ailment or injury I would use the private one. I believe there could be an efficient gov. run program and there are in some countries, they probably lose money but not to the extent that our system does.
Our system is not the best, but our doctors and technology are the best. The problem I see is the relationships between the insurance, pharmacueticals, doctors, and hospitals are counterproductive. Sorry this is so long.
Canada has a single payer like system. UK is pretty much socialized.
Neither of which are being suggested here.
There is Medicare though which is like a single payer system for the elderly that is very popular. It appears we're better at it than the Canadians. Maybe its because we've got the population to invest in the most advanced equipment and employ the best doctors because of the population we have.
Anyways, this post is a poor attempt at spooking people from a system that nobody in voting on in Congress.
Popular or not, Medicare doctors are bailing. The reimbursement fees are too low for even hospital chains to use the medicare patients for cash flow. Individual doctors can't even pay the office overhead at the reimbursement rates. That is another empty government promise...with tens of trillion$$$ of Obamabucks owed.
Both systems are designed through planned incompetence to kill you with the least amount of expense.
'In a free market system, you could sue and drive the bad hospitals out of existence.'
Of course you can sue - did you not read your own article?
There is a hospital in Redding California that had two rogue doctors that preformed heart operations on perfectly healthy hearts....for the money they were paid by their stupid insurance companies. People tend to trust doctors...and they can be crooks too.
Tell your stories about the evils of national universal health care, I'm not buying it. We don't have the best health care system in the world. There are many other statistics, infant mortality for one, that prove this is true. If you are not one of the lucky ones with insurance or lots of money you have the worst health care system in the world, NO HEALTH CARE AT ALL. Selfish, smug people like you make me angry with your twisted statistics. On one of the so called BAD operations you seem to be saying that replacing a heart valve thru the armpit is somehow 'GOOD' as opposed to going in thru the chest. I hate to be the one to tell you this but that type of 'trick' sugery is bad medical practice. It's the same thing as repairing a car motor by going up the wheel well with 3ft extensions instead of just raising the hood. I would NEVER let a surgeon operate on my heart like that. It's a recipe for a real bad outcome. There are dozens of articles in any years Reader's Digest about worse medical nightmares right here in America. Who do you think you're fooling? Just Who is paying you to say this?
Gee the guy who allowed himself to be operated on by this "trick" surgery is a NHS Chief. Don't you even think that he knows anything about proper procedure? Stop making shit up. You look as stupid as our Precedent doing that.
You're the one that's stupid you PARROT. Every statement a rubber stamp.
What an absolute load of garbage. I would much rather have a health care system with a few flaws, than a theoretically perfect one which suffers the "minor" flaw that the health care companies are free to pull your cover whenever you become too big a liability.
My insurance cannot pull my coverage for any reason but non-payment. Stop making shit up.
Of course they can. They do it all the time. Unless of course you are a Goldman Sachs Employee. Tell me, how was the free sex change operation. Whoops, GS is a Govt run orginization.
So sorry ol chap.
You are an asshole on top of that. No Bullshit. Just the truth
Apart from no one being bankrupted or turned away from a hospital, you want to see how cheap it is to train to be a doctor here. If you are suitably talented you can study at a world class school such as Cambridge for around £3000 a year
Open your eyes America.How many more times will it take after the Vietnamese, Iraqi's and Afghans have kicked your balls around your ears for you to realize that you do not do things better than everyone else and you should not force your views on the rest of the world
Stop making shit up ...or do you want a US Marine to kick your balls around your ears?
Pffff...
Danny Williams just wanted to be out of the public spotlight. He could have had exactly the same surgery in Canada:
"Canadian cardiac surgeons say there was no need for the premier of Newfoundland and Labrador to cross the border for world-class health care.
The treatment Danny Williams received in the United States is available in at least four Canadian centres including hospitals in Vancouver, Montreal, Ottawa and Toronto, doctors told CBC News."
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2010/02/23/williams-surgery023.html
Obviously there WAS a need. He was willing to spend his own money and live. Stop making shit up.
You seem to be saying that Canadian doctors are so incompetent the they would probably have killed him. That is the stupidest thing I ever heard. It's way past, "making shit up," what you need to do is SHUT UP.
Crap article.
As if US profit motivated health care firms are blissfully run by altruists, only seeking a fair return on their capital as they are assailed by evil malpractice lawyers.
What about Tenet Healthcare? Medicare fraud on a national scale.
Only $4 billion in Medicare fraud in 2009? Why don't you conclude that hospitals and doctors are all corrupt the same way that the typical ZH'er assumes that every government official is corrupt.
News Flash: Human nature is subject to temptation and corruption.
And in the US, there are plenty of problems. Here is just one;
Infection Deaths From U.S. Hospitals
Posted on: Tuesday, 23 February 2010, 13:40 CST
A new study has shown that nearly 50,000 U.S. medical patients die every year of blood poisoning or pneumonia picked up in hospitals, AFP reported.
The study, led by researchers from the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy at Washington-based Resources for the Future, showed that hospital-acquired sepsis and pneumonia in 2006 claimed 48,000 lives, led to 2.3 million extra patient-days in hospital and cost 8.1 billion dollars.
The study, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine on Monday, said the two hospital-acquired infections -- also called nosocomial infections -- accounted for about one-third of the 1.7 million infections U.S. patients pick up every year while in the hospital.
Nearly half of the 99,000 deaths a year from hospital-acquired infections reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are also likely caused by the two infections.
According to the study, patients who underwent invasive surgery during their initial hospitalization were more likely to pick up a secondary infection while in the hospital, and elective surgery patients were at even higher risk of nosocomial infection.
The researchers estimated that 290,000 patients in U.S. hospitals picked up sepsis, or blood poisoning, during their hospitalization in 2006, and 200,000 developed pneumonia.
The study used the largest database of hospital records in the United States, which covered hospital discharges in 40 states.
It was discovered that hospital-acquired pneumonia extended a patient's stay in the hospital by 14 days and added some 46,400 dollars to the final price tag, while sepsis extended the time spent in hospital by nearly 11 days and added 32,900 dollars on average to the final bill.
Ramanan Laxminarayan, one of the lead authors of the study, said improving hygiene in clinical settings could prevent the two infections and others picked up in hospitals.
"The magnitude of harm from these infections is deplorable and it is unconscionable that patients continue to experience harm from their interactions with the health system," said two critical care doctors, in a commentary piece also published in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
David Murphy and John Pronovost of Johns Hopkins University's department of medicine wrote in the commentary: "What is glaringly obvious is that preventable harm remains a substantial problem and that investments in research to reduce these harms are woefully inadequate given the magnitude of the problem."
This article is foolish. Everything it complains about happens all the time in the US system.
"Bullying managers make whistleblowers afraid"? Ha -- that's the American national pastime: blow the whistle; get fired; get no help.
Someone's cancer went undetected until it was too late? Ha -- in the US, we DO DIAGNOSE your cancer. THEN we let you die without treatment.
I stopped reading. Too foolish.
I am a conservative by nature and abhor government involvement in most things, but adequate health care should and must be a right in any civilized society. If you read Danny Williams story, the option he chose was not available in Canada. That's his choice, but any Newfoundlander with the same ailment would have been treated with the procedures available, without charge, and that's the bottom line. I'll never understand, why we can give trillions of dollars to banks, but we can't find it in ourselves to fund healthcare for our citizens.
At last a conservative with a moral compass; you are one of the few.
And the 45000 dead from no insurance in the US every year? At least they weren't left in their own shit in a hospital.
Fine. How many of these had expensive habits like new cars, big screen DISH TeeVees, credit cards, vacations etc instead of health insurance? And I guarentee you they didn't get refused treatment in an emergency room, so it wasn't no insurance that killed them. Quit making shit up.
And just what do you know about those 45,000 you hatemonger. "Quit making shit up."
Health Insurance companies deny , on average, 35% of claims a year. Lets assume just for fun that they aren't the cheapest claims either. ER care is for stabilization only. You cannot get admitted without insurance once you are stabilized. If you die when you leave tough shit. Many people can't afford insurance now. When a family of 4 pays $25,000 a with $o in combined deductibles, they stop paying when all they realize they are getting is a card for their money when you know they could eat.
Generally I find someone who is as religious as you are about out system either doesn't have to worry about costs or works for an organization that provides nothing but the best because of the size of the organization or it's bottom line. Hell a Managing Director at Goldman Sachs can get one sec change operation and they are a tax payer run company too. So if you are lucky, you might be in!
If you were paying out of your own pocket on a private plan with 45% annual increases and getting denied treatment, you would get religion real fast . Real religion. Not the bullshit you are spouting here. GS employee?
You frek'in child. People like you are the reason we fight so hard to keep this health monster at bay. Liars and you are one of them are running rampant and you all lack trust.
In 2009 denied claims.........
Aetna denied 6.80% of claims
and the highest denier was this company at 6.85% of claims.
Who was that company you may ask? It was Medicare.
Then add the fraud problem to Medicare and you have just one wonderful system. NOT!
"the world's best health care system"
You have to be joking
You keep mentioning Canada. In Canada you cannot pay to get treated, yet everyone, every single Cabnadian has access to all medical services free.
The health industry cannot profit. Who is behind these articles?
Listen, my brother was in a car that was hit by a train and was tossed out of the window suffering life threatening injuries, most notably brain trauma. He was in an intensive care for three weeks in a coma, followed by a couple of months in a rehab hospital. As far as I'm concerned our healthcare system is excellent. I wish Americans would stop trying to convince themselves that we are dissatified with it. It's not perfect but it serves us well when it matters. Pointing out what a politician does as evidence that we as a nation have little faith in our healthcare is misleading. You need a reality check if you think otherwise.
What did the accident cost?
Sorry, but as a former Canuck living in the USA, I find the debate rather stupid. Personally, I think Canada is better managed than the USA. This from someone who lived under both systems.
It's all easy to say "well, I have a Cadillac healthcare, life if good for me". But, my UHC insurance company loves throwing me crap yearly where they pre-approve some treatment and then don't pay my doctor, having me end up paying. So, the thousands I pay yearly are not enough. They work hard in trying to deny coverage as part of the service they offer.
I failed to directly say 'I am Canadian'. All paid for by our healthcare system. Thank God. A volunteer fire rescue team quickly assembled for emergency roadside care, sent to the local hospital, then transfered by helicopter to Toronto for more specialized care.
I'm assuming your brother had health insurance. A great many in the states do not. If he had it, then his bills would have been covered, great. And if he didn't, and got the care you are describing, then it would have been paid for, ultimately, by tax dollars and increased premiums for everyone with insurance. Or, more likely, he'd have gotten basic emergency room service and then been sent home for you to take care of him. How is this better than single payer?
How is it worse than single payer?
Unless you are not wildly in favor of liberty and choice and strongly prefer govt run health care central planning.
Oh please.
The US pays three times more per capita for health care than anyone in the world and we have the lowest life expectancy of any developed nation. Mal practice deaths in the US amount to 495,000 per year.
Econophile, if you are all about free markets, why aren't you spending an equal amount of time on the deaths caused by the legally protected and subsidized healthcare an insurance monopolies?
And what is with this partisan trash on zerohedge? I come here to escape the Harlem Globe Trotters vs Washington Generals garbage.
Just don't get MS in the UK
"NHS patients denied multiple sclerosis drug
Beta interferon should not be given to NHS patients with multiple sclerosis, the National Institute for Clinical Excellence - Nice - is to recommend, it emerged today.
The long-awaited decision will come as a blow to thousands of MS sufferers who have been pinning their hopes on obtaining the drug."
Or.............
"Life prolonging cancer drugs to be banned because they cost too much
Thousands of patients with terminal cancer were dealt a blow last night after a decision was made to deny them life prolonging drugs.
The Government's rationing body said two drugs for advanced breast cancer and a rare form of stomach cancer were too expensive for the NHS.
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence is expected to confirm guidance in the next few weeks that will effectively ban their use.
The move comes despite a pledge by Nice to be more flexible in giving life-extending drugs to terminally-ill cancer patients after a public outcry last year over 'death sentence' decisions."
The problem is that centralized decisions affect everyone in the country. It isn't the decision from one insurance company that will only affect their members.
Oh and another thing "dirty" hospitals within the NHS only became a problem after Thatcher privatized their cleaning operations
Oh really, so when Trusts tell to cut back it is the cleaners that are at fault and not the trusts. I see, always blame someone else.
"Cleaners at an NHS hospital with a poor record on superbugs have been told to turn over dirty sheets instead of using fresh ones between patients to save money.
Housekeeping staff at Good Hope Hospital in Sutton Coldfield, have been asked to re-use sheets and pillowcases wherever possible to cut a £500,000 laundry bill.
Posters in the hospital's linen cupboards and on doors into the A&E department remind workers that each item costs 0.275 pence to wash.
Good Hope reported a deficit of £6million last year and was subject to a report by the Audit Commission because of its poor financial standing."
What the person is saying is that contractors underpay their help, under staff & overwork them so they can get bigger profits. Commonplace in contracting out, along with corruption & sweetheart deals. Not the workers fault at all.
In Germany is a dual health system with private and government-run insurance.
Overall the results are the same; the privately insured get over-treated and the government-insure have to wait a little.
The statement that private enterprise is always more efficient then government is a religious belief and not more.
So a Nationalized system can't be abused? I beg to differ.
France....
"Doctors, nurses and other health professionals have taken to the streets of Paris to protest against government plans to cut back on a health service which has a projected overspend this year of eight billion pounds.
The abundance and generosity of its health service has turned France into a nation of hypochondriacs.
It consumes far more drugs than any other nation in Europe, and they are almost always the expensive patented kind rather than the cheaper generic alternatives.
French pharmacists have never had it so good. And now they fear their government is going to ruin it. "
And in Germany you may call it over treatment but others call it getting better service.
"Health Care in Germany -- a Matter of Class?
Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift:
The kind of insurance one has determines a lot in health care
Most agree that Germany's creaking health care system needs reform. Cries have gotten louder that the system of public and private insurance providers has created two classes of health care.
When Peter Stegman calls to set up a doctor's appointment, he usually gets what he wants. The 37-year-old Berlin resident who works in the mobile phone industry is insured privately, and if he wants an appointment on the next day, he almost always gets it.
"You just get treated better when you have private insurance than if you have the public kind," he said. "The service is better and you have more choice."
Before coming to Germany from Finland two years ago, he investigated the country's insurance system and was told that if he could afford it, private insurance was the best option, since people on the public plans get lower priority with many doctors. "
I know the problems in the US system. I just like to point that Nationalized systems aren't the panacea that supporters present it as.
If you actually read the article on the Canadian system and did not use it for your own propaganda you would realize that Danny William did not say that the Canadian system was not very good. He actually praised it! What he did do was go to where the expertise was for the type of procedure he needed. We do not have the patient volume that the USA has for our surgeons to develop some special procedures. I would much rather have our health care system then the US system. Our system does a very good job at taking care of all of our citizens at a fare cost. It is not free! We all pay medical premiums every year unless you are destitute. The government then subsidizes the system with tax money so in the end we all pay to take care of us all. Due to our sparse population we may not have all the leading edge expertise. People that can afford to pay the extra cost for private heath care are allowed to do it here in Canada or else where. We have private diagnostic and surgical clinics in Canada as well. It just happened that the procedure Danny wanted was not available here, hopefully it will be soon. I am not opposed to private heath care but a country needs to have a well functioning efficient public system as well so all if it citizens have access to quality heath care.