[jpdoctor]

> This article didn't seem all that great. It just claims "the prices are higher"

They buried the reason: “It’s very much something people make money out of. There isn’t too much embarrassment about that compared to Europe and elsewhere.”

Profiting off of the sick and injured has zero shame in the US. In fact, if you can drive the patient to bankruptcy, then you have maximized the take.

For some reason, there is no outrage. Previous generations would have used the word "profiteering", but the word seems unfashionable to apply in modern times to medicine or the military.

[snowwrestler]

Health care companies seek a profit because innovation takes capital investment, and the only way to build capital is to make a profit. The article admits to the value of this when it talks about how U.S. consumers subsidize innovations that have global benefits (like MRI machines).

I totally disagree with the idea that health care companies actively seek to drive patients to bankruptcy. Can you provide any proof of this other than your own opinion?

[jpdoctor]

One example: One of Elizabeth Warren's crusades before the banking crisis exposed that 46% of all bankruptcies circa 2007 were medically induced.

http://www.pnhp.org/new_bankruptcy_study/Bankruptcy-2009.pdf

It isn't exactly news that the industry maximizes profits.

The mere fact that you chose to write "Health care companies seek a profit because innovation takes capital investment, and the only way to build capital is to make a profit" is indicative of the problem. It's almost as if you can't imagine any other means of solving the problem.

I don't think you're alone either. In quantitative medical rankings, the US is 33rd in life expectancy and 34th in infant mortality (behind Cuba!) yet is #1 in per-capita spending.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expec...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_infant_mor...

[danielweber]

46% of all bankruptcies circa 2007 were medically induced.

There were obvious problems with Warren's methodology. If I live in a system with excellent government healthcare, and I end up paralyzed, my family might still go through bankruptcy because they've lost their primary income.

The number is more like 1/4 than 1/2. 26% of bankruptcies have medical debts exceeding $1000. Obviously that includes someone owing $4000 to a dentist as well as someone owing $450,000 to an oncologist, so the real number is some portion of 26%.

[jpdoctor]

> The number is more like 1/4 than 1/2.

Great. So the number of people that have been profitteered into bankruptcy is only 1/2 of what I mentioned.

It doesn't change the basic fact: Profiting handsomely from the sick and dying used to be considered unethical. Now, it is "just business".

[snowwrestler]

The real question is what percentage of medical patients go bankrupt at all.

[snowwrestler]

There is no other known means of solving the problem of funding long-term innovation. This was one of the major lessons of the 20th century.