Heart Surgery, Viagra, Healthcare Costs Thailand

Here in Thailand I can buy Viagra for $2 a pill and have heart bypass surgery for $12,000 at a world class hospital in Bangkok (that's less by 2/3's of what your co-payment would be on medicare or a 80/20 private insurance plan in USA). The lawyers, health insurance, medical device makers and pharmaceut­ical companies run the corrupt health care system in America and will continue to gouge the citizens as long as the politician­s they are in bed with continue in office.

Failure of American Capitalism & Social Economic System

If capitalism and the social economic system in America is so great why can't I find a job at age 56 (age discrimina­tion) and why do I have to have a job to get affordable good health insurance? Being unemployed I have to choose to either pay for housing and food or super expensive health insurance in America (decent health insurance rates for people over 50 are costing $1000's a month now). So if I have a major illness I will have to go bankrupt and loose all my savings. This is the great American Capitalist System, when we would rather spend trillions on teaching our young people to be soldiers instead of doctors, nurses, teachers and entreprene­urs? Because we place more emphasis on defense and building war machines, what are we defending, the right for Halliburton to win the war in Iraq? And charging people so much money to go to medical school or college while pharmaceut­ical companies price gouge, lawyers make millions in malpractic­e suits, and corrupt politician­s make millions from special interests and special deals after they leave office, this is the wonderful reality of capitalism and our wonderful democratic system? How's that working out for you?

Let Them Eat Cake: The Elitist PR War Against Health Care Reform

I once heard the comment about people dying in Africa “it was not a successful famine” not enough people died. The bottom line, this is all about Darwinism, survival of the fittest. If you have bad luck and cannot afford health insurance, and have a major medical problem, too bad for you, you die. We are not civilized human beings, we are animals.

excerpt from a letter to my friend back home in the USA (I am USA expat living in Thailand now for 3 years):

The stark reality of trying to make a living in Dallas and this health care issue is insurmountable. One major health problem and I am financially ruined. I am sure the job situation has not changed for guys like me at age 54 with my background and the prospects for a good quality of life is bleak. So, I am making the best here, I pay about $450 a month (there are cheaper places) and have a nice place with good cable and internet. Don't need a car, walk to the sky train in 5 minutes, eat good on $5 a day. I can see the dentist and have cavities filled or cleaning work done for $12 including xrays. I can see a medical specialist, dermatologist (trained in USA) or general surgeon for $9. The doctors here care about people and not so much about money, often they come back from USA after working there because they don't like working in the USA medical system. I want to do something about changing the attitudes on Health Care reform in the USA. I don't understand why we can't fix the system in the USA and Charles Payne of Fox News wants to perpetuate the unsympathetic bias that is pervasive in America regarding this issue: (see below post). Now with all the unemployment back home, I think there will be many people without health insurance and maybe we can rise up against the elitist unsympathetic pigs running this PR war. Why does this issue have to be so adversarial? We have to ask, who stands to loose if we design a medical system that is affordable? But I think it’s all a moot point because the people in control who could make a difference love money and believe they are superior human beings “Let Them Eat Cake.” Greedy lawyers have driven up malpractice insurance so high that you practically need to be a millionaire start practicing medicine. Health insurance executives purposely create policy to stall paying claims and stall approving medical procedures. Their strategy is to clog the system and do everything they can to sabotage doctors and customers. They hire lawyers to write insurance policies that are so complex intentionally making it very difficult to understand what is actually covered in your policy. They are gouging the public and making huge profits paying themselves huge salaries laughing all the way to the bank while people are dying. This is beyond greed, it is pure evil.