Michael Moore's "Sicko" is hot internet news

[Baylan]

Considering that the biggest holy grail for commercial medical research is finding a drug that 'cures' the symptoms, (Not to mention accountability to shareholders -> Pushing a drug that's less effective then what others already made out on the market -> Not performing or reporting on proper scientific studies (Conducting only the ones required for certification)), commercial medical research is, in my mind a terrible endeavour.

Leave research to scientists - ones that aren't accountable to shareholders.

I'm not really following your logic here, but this is my take on what I understand - I think the biggest holy grail for commercial medical research is a drug that cures either heart disease or cancer reliably. No matter if you cure the symptoms of cancer, if you still have cancer, you're going to die sooner than you would earlier.

Indeed. Why would you want to spend your life doing research at a university for 80,000$/year, actually trying to come up with drugs that cure people, when you could be getting paid 200,000$/year by a medical company that's not interested with the effectiveness, safety, or oversaturation of the market, as long as it doesn't cut down into their bottom line.

For the same reason that if/when I go into my chosen career (law), I hope to be a prosecutor and eventually a judge, both of which are not the most profitable of law positions - because I believe that it is the right way to use my talents. It is undeniable, however, that there are people in the world who are obsessed with money. And while there may be a huge disparity of income for those doing research at universities versus pharmaceutical companies, the overall level of income for researchers in the U.S. is higher (I can't find exact statistics, but this is my understanding).

Also, whoever manages to find a drug that can vaccinate HIV, or cure heart disease/cancer is going to make a killing, and in my eyes, they should.

Consider how much money is say, spent on drug advertising - that's money that's not going towards finding new drugs. It's going down the drain.

And the solution to that problem isn't privatising medical research. It's the other way around.
So, instead of paying for something where we'd be getting our money's worth, it's preferable to pay our pill tax to drug companies, who'll spend half of it on marketing, and the other on outrageous (Compared to the public sector) salaries.


I'm not saying that a doctor's worth only 80,000... But When there exists such a gap in salaries, funding, etc, it's no surprise that private companies have monopolised the industry.

It's never taken me more then a week between scheduling an appointment, and showing up for one. Now, I've only been to a few specialists, and not some extremely obscure ones, but so far, I've been content with the speed of the process. The results, not so much, but that's what you get for going to doctors. I do hear horror stories about people having to wait 6 months for non-life-threatening operations, but it hasn't been my experience, so far.

Which is why I feel it is important for the government to step in and regulate, or at least offer health insurance at a cheap rate for those of low incomes - help out those that need it, but those that already have sufficient coverage should not have to deal with the drawbacks of a universal system, either. In the same vein, keeping at least a portion of the sector private allows for the best and the brightest to head toward that profession. I, for one, would rather have an American doctor than a Canadian doctor.

And just because you personally have never seen the disadvantages of the universal system personally doesn't mean that they're invisible. There are real problems to every system, and none are easily resolved.

And for the record, if you want to see waste, just look at the US medical system. Much more money is wasted per dollar spent on curing people in it, compared to various NHS services throughout Europe or Canada.

Our system is in need of reform, but I think that our system is better set up to deal with the problems of the 21st century than a universalist system. Anyone who believes that universal health care is the easy and correct answer is looking through rose tinted glasses, just like someone who believes that one political party can cure all the ills in the world.

-Baylan