[skeletal88]

As someone not from the EU, this is something totally insane and crazy. Once, after my country got out of the Soviet Union, the US was seen as the dreamland of everyone. Now.. I don't think so, when getting sick with something easily treatable will ruin your whole life. That's just not a place I'd like to live in.

Once I was on a date with a younger girl and she was going on about how she'd like to live in the US, and I, being kind of a nerd had a Sheldon type of moment told her how awful it is, and she said "thanks, you ruined my dream". And she was talking about how she spent a summer as a barmaid there, got tonsilitis, visited a doctor who made her take a test for tonsilitis and got billed for it. Here where I live.. you can see that when someone has 1) a high fever 2) inflammation in their tonsils 3) has a swollen throat and white stuff there because of it then they have tonsilitis and you don't need to make additional lab tests, because it's 100% obvious, you don't need to waste time and money on useless stuff.

[azimuth11]

It is not always obvious (e.g. strep throat is similar, but one or the other sicknesses may or may not need medicine) and doing things on a hunch is not how scientific fields should do things when there are simple tests.

Testing also provides safety for doctors against medical malpractice lawsuits.