Newgrounds.com — Everything, By Everyone.

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At 6/9/08 12:09 AM, Elfer wrote: So your mechanism for all maladies is heredity, even though this mechanism doesn't seem to manifest itself in people who are in higher income brackets when it comes to things like infant mortiality?

Prove that it doesn't manifest itself among people in higher income brackets.

There is no "culture" of infant mortality.

There could be cultural attributes that affect the behavior of the mother that would lead to an unhealthy baby.

"Fortune" does not act along racial lines.

Misfortune, if it is caused by racism from society.

Listen, you have a decent argument to make here, but basing it on race is the most idiotic way you could possibly do this.

And the most idiotic thing you could do is continue your baseless, idiotic scrutiny just because you want to pretend that race isn't a factor even though I proved it is.

The way you gauge healthcare quality is when comparing the actual success rate of treatments, compared between the two countries for individual problems.

This is only in the case of curative care.

Provide evidence of the performance of preventative care then. Provide evidence of what is done, how it works, and what the difference is between countries, and the respective measurable effectiveness of it.

Then provide some comparisons of quality then Elfer. Quit being a coward for once and actually provide evidence of your bullshit claims.

Are there any statistics that you would accept as evidence rather than dismissing them as irrelevant or indistinguishable from noise?

LOL is this coming from you? Is this actually coming from you? LOL

Provide evidence of the relevance of preventative care. You need to show that its a factor otherwise your point is moot. Every single time we have this argument you bring it up, but you cannot provide a single source to show that its relevant, or has a measurable effect on this issue, let alone a measurable effect on the comparative health scores in countries.

Sometimes, you have to use common sense and do a thought experiment.

Your "common sense" is in fact a bunch of nonsense that you pull out of your ass.

Provide evidence or shut the fuck up about it.

What is preventative care?

Preventative care is healthcare that focuses on reducing the risk of disease or injury before it occurs, rather than treating it after it has already occurred.

You want to provide some examples? You want to show its measured effect on the health of a country?

Does this extend beyond issues of personal freedom? (a doctor can't make you quit smoking or eat right)

In cases where screening facilities/professionals are widely available, yes. Canada in particular has a serious lack of MRI machines

BINGO.

And the US has a wealth of MRI machines. Also, people in the US are more likely to get screened and diagnosed successfully, at least for cancer:

Early Diagnosis. It is often claimed that people have better access to preventive screenings in universal health care systems. But despite the large number of uninsured, cancer patients in the United States are most likely to be screened regularly, and once diagnosed, have the fastest access to treatment.

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So would this meant he US also has a better preventative system than Canada (and Europe), making your point even more moot than it already is?

Can you provide evidence that Canada's healthcare is superior in preventative areas? Or that any country with universal healthcare has a measurable superiority in preventing, or quickly treating diseases better than the US?

On top of that, better life choices can be encouraged through education, promotion, and subsidies.

Um, subsidies? Subsidies of WHAT encourage better life choices?

A healthcare system cannot determine or direct someone's life choices. But someone's life choices can effect their health. Therefore preventative care in this area, for preventing things like say... lung cancer or stroke, is actually not an attribute of a healthcare system but something that is simply a matter of free will. Education and promotion may have a role, but then again this could be negated by things that are entirely outside of the control of healthcare officials, government or private.

If someone wants to smoke because they think it's cool, they are going to do it. I'm sure that anti-smoking campaigns have had an effect but this can't be a measurable, comparative factor of a healthcare system in a country compared to another.

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How is it better in universal systems?

In private healthcare systems, the business only generates income if people who are already sick come in to be treated.

That's not proof, at all.

But apparently you think that checkups don't exist in the US. Or you're unaware that they generate money for both doctors and insurance companies that cover the cost of those appointments.

There is absolutely no incentive to provide preventative care

Screening procedures and appointments still cost money.

in fact, there is a perverse incentive to allow people to become sick in order to make money.

So... you're saying that our healthcare system intentionally allows people to get sick so that treating them when their condition gets worse will require more attention and generate more money. That's quite an indictment. So you're saying either the brains at the top put less emphasis on preventative care (no proof of course), or that the doctors intentionally don't provide options to patients for preventative care, or don't properly diagnose them?

Provide some evidence for once. Prove that the US system has less emphasis on preventative care than other countries. Prove that ours is less effective because of our supposed desire to capitalize on people's illnesses.

Go.

How is it preventing the incidence of certain illnesses.

Provide proof.

Go.

Tell me what kind of data you would actually consider acceptable "proof."

Your argument rests on your claim that superiority the US has in treating diseases doesn't matter because you claim the preventative care is better. Although of course that's true in theory, you have not provided any proof that preventative care can be measured, that it is effective as a whole, that the US has less quality preventative care etc..

You need to provide measurable, tangible data, not just your whims of imagination, to show that universal systems have better preventative care, that this lowers the incidence or progression of illnesses compared to US policies, that this lowers mortality rates etc...

Put your money where your mouth is for once. I provided proof of my argument, you scrutinize it desperately. You make claims, I simply ask you to provide proof and you can't even do it.

You're a joke.

Then, tell me if you think it's actually possible for any such data to exist in a real-world system.

First off, you're the one that brought it up and used it to negate my argument. If you can't provide any information to show its relevance in the situation, then it's absolutely moot. It's your words, and your imagination, against the facts I provided. I provided facts, you spew out your words and pretend that they negate them.

Meanwhile, I actually I provided a source that shows that Americans are screened more regularly for cancer than Canadians and Europeans, and that this is partially (in addition to better drugs and treatments) the reason for higher survival rates. Although this didn't prevent cancer from ever happening, it prevented it from progressing by treating it earlier. This is a measurable, tangible, factual aspect of preventative care, and it showed the US is superior.

And you're pulling nothing but random claims out of your ass with no proof whatsoever, let alone any of the criteria that you constantly demand form other people.

I demand a high standard of evidence from you because you repeatedly claim to have "proved" something.

And I did prove it.

The word "prove" implies that you have CONCLUSIVE evidence which PRECLUDES other possibilities.

I have conclusive evidence that proved my underlying point, that factors outside of healthcare affect national statistics, making nation-to-nation comparisons on healthcare systems inapplicable in certain areas.

Lol Elfer, you have absolutely zero integrity of any kind. The article shows that several major factors that effect heart disease incidence can not be changed,

And therefore you ignore all of the ones that CAN be changed?

I didn't say there weren't things that can be changed. In fact, I already addressed that several times, by discussing how several things are a matter of free will, and therefore also not affected by healthcare.

The fact that there ARE things that CAN'T be changed based on the population of a country, based on race and heredity, makes an across-the-board comparison between countries with vastly different populations arbitrary when comparing and ranking their respective healthcare systems.

Example: as of 2005, the obesity rate in the US was roughly twice that of Canada.

Race

Obesity is a factor which increases risk of heart disease.

And obesity rate is a factor that is also statistically affected by racial makeup.

If you look at the sourced report for the first link, you'll also see that the US has higher rates of diabetes

Race

and alcohol consumption

Choice.

two other risk factors for heart disease.

And all of which don't reflect on a healthcare system automatically, and are affected by race, culture, personal choices etc...

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At 6/9/08 09:59 PM, cellardoor6 wrote:

At 6/9/08 12:09 AM, Elfer wrote:

Prove that it doesn't manifest itself among people in higher income brackets.

Here's a report with debatable implications.

Are there any statistics that you would accept as evidence rather than dismissing them as irrelevant or indistinguishable from noise?

LOL is this coming from you? Is this actually coming from you? LOL

I'm saying LOL that the evidence LOL that you are LOL requesting cannot LOL possibly LOL exist LOL regardless of LOL whether or not the LOL underlying LOL point is true LOL.

At 6/9/08 10:02 PM, cellardoor6 wrote:

Tell me what kind of data you would actually consider acceptable "proof."

You need to provide measurable, tangible data,

This isn't an answer to my question. What I'm saying is that no matter what measurable, tangible data I come up with, you'll dismiss it as being caused by race.

Example: as of 2005, the obesity rate in the US was roughly twice that of Canada.

Race

If you look at the sourced report for the first link, you'll also see that the US has higher rates of diabetes

Race

Oh look, statistics only for the US. Exactly what we aren't interested in.

And the most idiotic thing you could do is continue your baseless, idiotic scrutiny just because you want to pretend that race isn't a factor even though I proved it is.

You didn't prove that race is a factor. You showed that race is correlated with things that are factors. You then showed this to be true in the US and UK, and pretended that the UK was Canada.

I'm not saying that what you're saying isn't true. I'm saying that there are ways to make your argument that are SO MUCH BETTER. SO MUCH. BETTER.

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Couldn't have said it better myself hahahahahha

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At 6/10/08 12:51 AM, pcking1 wrote: Couldn't have said it better myself hahahahahha

Woah, i meant to click quote on idiot-finder's post
i dont agree with the person saying he is ashamed to be an american
He is an idiot but that first post came out wrong haha

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At 6/10/08 12:07 AM, Elfer wrote:

At 6/9/08 09:59 PM, cellardoor6 wrote:

At 6/9/08 12:09 AM, Elfer wrote:

Prove that it doesn't manifest itself among people in higher income brackets.

Here's a report with debatable implications.

A study based in Ohio, this is interesting.

Care to elaborate? You want to actually cite it instead of just using the link as vaguely as you just did, expecting me to fish through it?

Are there any statistics that you would accept as evidence rather than dismissing them as irrelevant or indistinguishable from noise?

LOL is this coming from you? Is this actually coming from you? LOL

I'm saying LOL that the evidence LOL that you are LOL requesting cannot LOL possibly LOL exist LOL regardless of LOL whether or not the LOL underlying LOL point is true LOL.

Nice little ploy there.

- I provide evidence of my claims.
- You scrutinize them using a lot of bullshit to do so.
- Included in your bullshit were claims about preventative care.
- I request that you provide evidence of your claims.
- You never did.
- You know you can't, so you resort to childish mimicking to divert attention away from the fact that your entire argument has been thrashed into oblivion and you have no means of salvaging it.

You always do this. Your entire argument rests solely on scrutinizing mine. Yet your own arguments are some of the most laughably inapplicable and sloppy loads of crap possible.

At 6/9/08 10:02 PM, cellardoor6 wrote:

Tell me what kind of data you would actually consider acceptable "proof."

You need to provide measurable, tangible data,

This isn't an answer to my question.

WOW you are hilarious.

It's your argument, YOU provide the evidence. You are making claims about preventative care, YOU provide the data to support them. The burden of proof is on you if you bring an issue or idea up in an argument in an attempt to discredit my argument.

Meanwhile, I even provided an example. I showed you the superiority the US has is preventative care for cancer, by showing that screening and diagnosis is more rapid and effective. Either you're too dim to realize where preventative care quality can be measured, or you already attempted to find information, but the information you found wasn't to your liking so you gave up.

What I'm saying is that no matter what measurable, tangible data I come up with, you'll dismiss it as being caused by race.

What this translates to is "no, I can't provide any evidence to back up my argument so I'm going to revert to hypocrisy and accuse you of unjustifiably dismissing any evidence I can provide, even though that's all I ever do".

Oh look, statistics only for the US. Exactly what we aren't interested in.

Hilarious.

You say this in the very same post where you linked to a study about infant mortality among race and socioeconomic status for metropolitan Ohio only.

This keeps getting better and better.

And the most idiotic thing you could do is continue your baseless, idiotic scrutiny just because you want to pretend that race isn't a factor even though I proved it is.

You didn't prove that race is a factor.

Yeah I did.

Meanwhile you proved absolutely nothing other than the fact that you can prove nothing.

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At 6/3/08 09:12 AM, ZOMG3 wrote: The reasons:

1. Their health service. When you are sick the first thing they look for is your wallet. They leave the poor and defenseless to die. Universial healthcare is the way forward!!!

Two Words; Capitalistic Society. It's the way it should run

2. America has has high emissions of gas and it seems like many Americans dont care about the environment.

That was the case. But as more people are affected by high gas and energy prices, they have been supporting other forms of energy.

3. Americans like the most crappy sports and don't spell words right like colour or favourite. Stop being lazy and add the extra letter. It's not hard.

Well, Americans came up with those spellings while we were still under British rule. It wasn't till the mid-1800's when Websters Dictoanry came out when the spellings were offical. Also, most of our sports are rooted in america. They started before my grandparents were born. the exception is Football, that offically started in the early 1900's. go cards.

4. Americans are ignorant and don't pay much attention to the outside world. Most of them don't even have passports.

Well, more people are focused on the stuff closer to home

5. America - Land of the Free...unless you are in Guantanamo, where you are convicted without evidence and don't give me this crap they are war fighters. Some were picked up from the streets in Africa, held without representation or without appeal for years and then released if they are lucky.

It's a prison. Wadda Expect? Happy Town. Umm, most of them are given a trial, most of them lose. They sometimes get the wrong man (or woman)

6. For claiming they are the first to help in a natural disater, yet denying any fair trade. Fixing the world trade for themselves keeping millions in poverty for their own greed.

Again; Capitalistic Society. Do I really have to spell it out??

7. For fudging the fact that none of the 9/11 hijackers were Iraqi yet many use that as the reason to bomb Iraq.

Well, they were Alquida(spl), and a big alquaida population was in Iraq.

8. Selling $20bn worth of defense to the Saudis where 16 of the 19 hijackers WERE from. Fucking geniuses.

But the acctuall government wasn't like "Death to America!!!!!!" Like Iran or Iraq.

9. Capitalism and materialism combined with negligence and apathy are running rampant while honor, dignity, and true spirituality have gone by the wayside.

Thats modern society for ya.

10. For expeting a country bombed to pieces to thank them afterwards. "We liberated you. Now you are free, even though your home was bombed and your parents raped and mutilated!"

Ummm, look at iraq before 2003, and nowadays, it is a LOT better now then it was in the past.

Any suggestions?

I have vented my anger. That is all.

I'm moving to France and change my name, from John to Jean and enjoy the benefits of France; universial healthcare, quality education, great people etc.

Good, Luck buddy. Zarcoisi is changing it to a capitalistic society.

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At 6/10/08 01:23 AM, cellardoor6 wrote: Care to elaborate? You want to actually cite it instead of just using the link as vaguely as you just did, expecting me to fish through it?

Read the abstract. It says that race is less of an indicator of infant mortality among the high-income families than it is among the general population.

This isn't an answer to my question.

WOW you are hilarious.

It's your argument, YOU provide the evidence.

You're not getting what I'm saying. What I'm asking you is if there's any fact or piece of evidence that would convince you that preventative care is effective and/or is used more heavily in countries with universal healthcare. I suspect that the answer is "no," and with good cause. Health data is too noisy to be able to isolate the effect of preventative care.

You say this in the very same post where you linked to a study about infant mortality among race and socioeconomic status for metropolitan Ohio only.

It's not easy to find a study that involves race and income AND infant mortality for a large area. Since the mechanism of low income --> high infant mortality rate has an actual reason to be true (poor people are generally in worse health for obvious reasons), it's an intuitive result. You are the one arguing for the non-intuitive result, that is, black people have higher infant mortality because they're black, not because they're poor.

Yeah I did.

No, what you proved is that race is correlated with poor health, and that race is conflated with a lot of things that are actually direct causes of poor health.

I'm not even arguing against your underlying point, which is that non-healthcare factors have a significant effect on national health. That statement is true. What I'm trying to get you to realize is that making the argument from race is possibly the worst way to make this point. There's no reason to believe that race is the direct cause of health problems, so suddenly you're trying to prove two points:

A) Non-healthcare factors can affect national health (easy to show)
B) Race is a direct cause of health problems (next to impossible to show)

To prove that race is a direct cause, you have to isolate it from a whole bunch of different factors that can change across countries, even states or cities. By choosing something that doesn't have an intuitive reason to be true, you make the standard of proof far, far higher.

On the other hand, if you just picked income inequality, you could practically hand-wave the association between infant mortality and income inequality, then show that the gini coefficient is higher in the US than in Canada (for whatever reason), and that would be that.

Meanwhile you proved absolutely nothing other than the fact that you can prove nothing.

What is it that I'm supposed to be trying to prove, anyway? Is it supposed to be that preventative care in Canada is better than in the US? As I outlined in this here topic, there's no particular reason for that to be true, since the universal healthcare system here is so badly organized. It's contracted out to private companies, which means it carries all of the problems of privatized healthcare without the benefits associated with competition.

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Also the death penalty gives us a bad reputation. And our oil policy. And we're in the midst of a recession. But with changes, we can fix these things. We can be a true superpower country.

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You aren't the only one. America is the scumiest country on earth. I hate cops thus I hate Americans.

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At 6/11/08 06:52 PM, Expl0it wrote: You aren't the only one. America is the scumiest country on earth. I hate cops thus I hate Americans.

Sarcasm?

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you haven't realized yet that he is not a American? All of these "I am ashamed to be Americans" are pretenders. he is just some French fuck.
I don't understand why Europeans are so obsessed with Americans...

Europeans are obsessed with America because America is a superpower.

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I am tired of these MOTHAFUCKING Anti-Americans on these MOTHAFUCKIG boards!

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At 6/10/08 08:15 AM, Elfer wrote:

At 6/10/08 01:23 AM, cellardoor6 wrote: Care to elaborate? You want to actually cite it instead of just using the link as vaguely as you just did, expecting me to fish through it?

Read the abstract. It says that race is less of an indicator of infant mortality among the high-income families than it is among the general population.

And the fact that minorities are more likely to belong to low-income families?

This isn't an answer to my question.

WOW you are hilarious.

It's your argument, YOU provide the evidence.

You're not getting what I'm saying.

Oh boy. Apparently you aren't getting the simple philosophy that you have an obligation to provide evidence for the shit you say in an argument where you scrutinize the evidence someone else provides. You apparently think that you can claim anything you want, but the moment that someone asks you for proof, all of sudden they're just not "getting" what you're saying. Nice tactic.

What I'm asking you is if there's any fact or piece of evidence that would convince you that preventative care is effective and/or is used more heavily in countries with universal healthcare.

You made claims. YOU prove them. If there is really something behind your claim, you'd be able to provide evidence instead of your own words. THAT is the issue here, quit trying to deflect attention to me and asking me questions as if it's my job to tell you what specific data you should find. That's YOUR job.

Hell, I already provided information about preventative care anyway, and you ignored it. I showed that Americans are more likely to be screened regularly, diagnosed, and quickly treated for cancer. This is an aspect of preventative care is it not? Screening and diagnosing? And the US smoked both Canada and Europe in that area.

You need to provide information that shows that people in universal systems have better preventative care than the US. Prove that it lowers the incidence of illnesses, thus negating the large superiority the US has survival rates from treatable diseases.

That was your original point anyway. YOU brought up preventative care as a way to disregard the fact that US healthcare is so much more successful at treating people. You suggested that preventative care and its superiority in implementation in universal healthcare systems makes survivaiblity from treatable diseases a nonissue, as if preventative care is saving more lives. You have brought up preventative care many times, saying that it's superior in Canada and/or other universal systems, and you have NEVER, EVER been able to even prove it!

You say this in the very same post where you linked to a study about infant mortality among race and socioeconomic status for metropolitan Ohio only.

It's not easy to find a study that involves race and income AND infant mortality for a large area.

Sounds like an excuse.

You criticized me for not providing international information, and yet all you did was provide information about a single areas of a single US state.

Hypocrisy.

Yeah I did.

No, what you proved is that race is correlated with poor health

Yes, and that therefore race-related factors affect health scores of countries without actually reflecting on the system as it compares to other countries.

I'm not even arguing against your underlying point, which is that non-healthcare factors have a significant effect on national health. That statement is true. What I'm trying to get you to realize is that making the argument from race is possibly the worst way to make this point.

Except it's not, because a minority race can routinely be identified as a unifying trait for people who score low in health indicators. The direct cause, be it genetics, culture, socieconomic status, is irrelevant in and of itself, period.

There's no reason to believe that race is the direct cause of health problems

And this is irrelevant, because people of minority races still have persistently lower scores in health indicators. If it was caused by racism and discrimination that would be irrelevant. When I showed how infant mortality is equally as high among minorities in the UK as it is in the US, this alone proved my point. If a universal healthcare system that is ranked higher than the private system in the US can't bring about health equality like universal healthcare is supposed to, yet is scored higher anyway, this shows how the ranking system fails. Non-healthcare factors like the disparity between races in the population is swaying the results when compared to other countries. The fact that the UK has a lower proportion of minorities, and the US has a higher proportion of minorities was PROVED to sway results. If you adjust for the differences you can see that the higher score the UK has is arbitrary when in a discussion about healthcare quality. If the US had the same proportion of minorities as the UK, the US would score higher.

On the other hand, if you just picked income inequality, you could practically hand-wave the association between infant mortality and income inequality, then show that the gini coefficient is higher in the US than in Canada (for whatever reason), and that would be that.

Ahaha it's so funny how after scrutinizing arguments so desperately, you now provide an argument that can't even come close to meeting that same level of scrutiny. You're suggesting that Canada provides a situation where income inequality doesn't exist as much, and that this is part of its better health scores. You avoid addressing the issue of Canadian income inequality being lower because Canada has a more racially homogeneous nation, you're avoiding addressing whether or not inequality/disparity among races exists in Canada as well, which it does, especially among blacks (pg 13) Therefore Canada's lesser proportion of certain races can then negate the illusion of more equality, and therefore showing the existence of a race-correlated health advantage in statistics compared to the US.

Meanwhile you proved absolutely nothing other than the fact that you can prove nothing.

What is it that I'm supposed to be trying to prove, anyway?

You really have an issue with honesty. Providing evidence about your argument of preventative care being better in universal systems/Canada is your responsibility. It's pretty funny how instead of lifting a finger and supporting your own argument, you're now shifting the focus of the topic on asking ME a questions; as if it's somehow my job to specify what exact issue of preventative care you're supposed to find, when it was YOU who brought it up in the first place.

Provide evidence, for once!

Or... you could just admit now that you ran your mouth, made claims you can't validate, and you're a big dirty hypocrite because you constantly ridicule other arguments you don't like even though they provide more, and more coherent proof than you have ever provided.

Is it supposed to be that preventative care in Canada is better than in the US?

Prove that preventative care in the private US system is worse in quality than that of countries with universal healthcare. If you want to use Canada as an example go ahead. Provide evidence that the differing healthcare policies facilitate preventative care, that this actual has a measurable effect on the health of the country.

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Look, no country is a perfect country. Whether it's the things they do and the things they don't do for the world and for their citizens

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UNITED STATES:

TOTAL POPULATION

303,824,646

AGE STRUCTURE

0-14 years: 20.1% (male 31,257,108/female 29,889,645)
15-64 years: 67.1% (male 101,825,901/female 102,161,823)
65 years and over: 12.7% (male 16,263,255/female 22,426,914) (2008 est.)

MEDIAN AGE

Rtotal: 36.7 years
male: 35.4 years
female: 38.1 years (2008 est.)

POPULATION GROWTH RATE

0.883% (2008 est.)

BIRTH RATE

14.18 births/1,000 population (2008 est.)

DEATH RATE

8.27 deaths/1,000 population (2008 est.)

INFANT MORTALITY RATE

total: 6.3 deaths/1,000 live births
male: 6.95 deaths/1,000 live births
female: 5.62 deaths/1,000 live births (2008 est.)

LIFE EXPECTANCY AT BIRTH

total population: 78.14 years
male: 75.29 years
female: 81.13 years (2008 est.)

TOTAL FERTILITY RATE

2.1 children born/woman (2008 est.)

HIV/AIDS - PEOPLE LIVING WITH HIV/AIDS

950,000 (2003 est.)

DEATHS ATTRIBUTED TO HIV/AIDS

17,011 (2005 est.)

CANADA:

TOTAL POPULATION

33,212,696 (July 2008 est.)

AGE STRUCTURE

0-14 years: 16.3% (male 2,780,491/female 2,644,276)
15-64 years: 68.8% (male 11,547,354/female 11,300,639)
65 years and over: 14.9% (male 2,150,991/female 2,788,945) (2008 est.)

MEDIAN AGE

total: 40.1 years
male: 39 years
female: 41.2 years (2008 est.)

POPULATION GROWTH RATE

0.83% (2008 est.)

BIRTH RATE

10.29 births/1,000 population (2008 est.)

DEATH RATE

7.61 deaths/1,000 population (2008 est.)

INFANT MORTALITY RATE

total: 5.08 deaths/1,000 live births
male: 5.4 deaths/1,000 live births
female: 4.75 deaths/1,000 live births (2008 est.)

LIFE EXPECTANCY AT BIRTH

total population: 81.16 years
male: 78.65 years
female: 83.81 years (2008 est.)

TOTAL FERTILITY RATE

1.57 children born/woman (2008 est.)

HIV/AIDS - PEOPLE LIVING WITH HIV/AIDS

56,000 (2003 est.)

DEATHS ATTRIBUTED TO HIV/AIDS

1,500 (2003 est.)

UK

TOTAL POPULATION

60,943,912 (July 2008 est.)

AGE STRUCTURE

0-14 years: 16.9% (male 5,287,590/female 5,036,881)
15-64 years: 67.1% (male 20,698,645/female 20,185,040)
65 years and over: 16% (male 4,186,561/female 5,549,195) (2008 est.)

MEDIAN AGE

total: 39.9 years
male: 38.8 years
female: 41 years (2008 est.)

POPULATION GROWTH RATE

0.276% (2008 est.)

BIRTH RATE

10.65 births/1,000 population (2008 est.)

DEATH RATE

10.05 deaths/1,000 population (2008 est.)

INFANT MORTALITY RATE

total: 4.93 deaths/1,000 live births
male: 5.49 deaths/1,000 live births
female: 4.34 deaths/1,000 live births (2008 est.)

LIFE EXPECTANCY AT BIRTH

total population: 78.85 years
male: 76.37 years
female: 81.46 years (2008 est.)

TOTAL FERTILITY RATE

1.66 children born/woman (2008 est.)

HIV/AIDS - PEOPLE LIVING WITH HIV/AIDS

51,000 (2001 est.)

DEATHS ATTRIBUTED TO HIV/AIDS

less than 500 (2003 est.)

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UNITED STATES:

TOTAL POPULATION
303,824,646

AGE STRUCTURE
0-14 years: 20.1% (male 31,257,108/female 29,889,645)
15-64 years: 67.1% (male 101,825,901/female 102,161,823)
65 years and over: 12.7% (male 16,263,255/female 22,426,914) (2008 est.)

MEDIAN AGE
Rtotal: 36.7 years
male: 35.4 years
female: 38.1 years (2008 est.)

POPULATION GROWTH RATE
0.883% (2008 est.)

BIRTH RATE
14.18 births/1,000 population (2008 est.)

DEATH RATE
8.27 deaths/1,000 population (2008 est.)

INFANT MORTALITY RATE
total: 6.3 deaths/1,000 live births
male: 6.95 deaths/1,000 live births
female: 5.62 deaths/1,000 live births (2008 est.)

LIFE EXPECTANCY AT BIRTH
total population: 78.14 years
male: 75.29 years
female: 81.13 years (2008 est.)

TOTAL FERTILITY RATE
2.1 children born/woman (2008 est.)

HIV/AIDS - PEOPLE LIVING WITH HIV/AIDS
950,000 (2003 est.)

DEATHS ATTRIBUTED TO HIV/AIDS
17,011 (2005 est.)

CANADA:

TOTAL POPULATION
33,212,696 (July 2008 est.)

AGE STRUCTURE
0-14 years: 16.3% (male 2,780,491/female 2,644,276)
15-64 years: 68.8% (male 11,547,354/female 11,300,639)
65 years and over: 14.9% (male 2,150,991/female 2,788,945) (2008 est.)

MEDIAN AGE
total: 40.1 years
male: 39 years
female: 41.2 years (2008 est.)

POPULATION GROWTH RATE
0.83% (2008 est.)

BIRTH RATE
10.29 births/1,000 population (2008 est.)

DEATH RATE
7.61 deaths/1,000 population (2008 est.)

INFANT MORTALITY RATE
total: 5.08 deaths/1,000 live births
male: 5.4 deaths/1,000 live births
female: 4.75 deaths/1,000 live births (2008 est.)

LIFE EXPECTANCY AT BIRTH
total population: 81.16 years
male: 78.65 years
female: 83.81 years (2008 est.)

TOTAL FERTILITY RATE
1.57 children born/woman (2008 est.)

HIV/AIDS - PEOPLE LIVING WITH HIV/AIDS
56,000 (2003 est.)

DEATHS ATTRIBUTED TO HIV/AIDS
1,500 (2003 est.)

UK

TOTAL POPULATION
60,943,912 (July 2008 est.)

AGE STRUCTURE
0-14 years: 16.9% (male 5,287,590/female 5,036,881)
15-64 years: 67.1% (male 20,698,645/female 20,185,040)
65 years and over: 16% (male 4,186,561/female 5,549,195) (2008 est.)

MEDIAN AGE
total: 39.9 years
male: 38.8 years
female: 41 years (2008 est.)

POPULATION GROWTH RATE
0.276% (2008 est.)

BIRTH RATE
10.65 births/1,000 population (2008 est.)

DEATH RATE
10.05 deaths/1,000 population (2008 est.)

INFANT MORTALITY RATE
total: 4.93 deaths/1,000 live births
male: 5.49 deaths/1,000 live births
female: 4.34 deaths/1,000 live births (2008 est.)

LIFE EXPECTANCY AT BIRTH
total population: 78.85 years
male: 76.37 years
female: 81.46 years (2008 est.)

TOTAL FERTILITY RATE
1.66 children born/woman (2008 est.)

HIV/AIDS - PEOPLE LIVING WITH HIV/AIDS
51,000 (2001 est.)

DEATHS ATTRIBUTED TO HIV/AIDS
less than 500 (2003 est.)

sorry for the repost... looked like crap. these are the facts.

---

I'm a proud American!!!I know there's alot of things wrong in America, but it's for sure not completely bad.Also you aren't an American if you aren't proud to be.

---

At 6/11/08 11:56 PM, cellardoor6 wrote:

At 6/10/08 08:15 AM, Elfer wrote: Read the abstract. It says that race is less of an indicator of infant mortality among the high-income families than it is among the general population.

And the fact that minorities are more likely to belong to low-income families?

Is not relevant to the point that was being discussed in this case. The point was that race is at best correlated with health problems in some areas, but is not a direct cause of poor health.

You made claims. YOU prove them.

I'm not asking you to FIND evidence. I'm asking you if you think it's even possible for such evidence to exist.

The answer is that it isn't, because in a real-world system, the data is too noisy to isolate the effects of preventative healthcare. Since there is no way to conduct a controlled statistical review, there is no way to prove the effects of preventative healthcare.

Instead, you have to use simple fucking logic.

Hell, I already provided information about preventative care anyway, and you ignored it. I showed that Americans are more likely to be screened regularly, diagnosed, and quickly treated for cancer. This is an aspect of preventative care is it not? Screening and diagnosing? And the US smoked both Canada and Europe in that area.

You seem to repeatedly misrepresent my position on universal healthcare. I'm not saying that all universal healthcare systems will always be absolutely better in every field than a privatized system.

What I'm saying is that due to the proper allocative use of preventative healthcare, a properly administrated universal healthcare system is more efficient than a privatized system, i.e. more effective per dollar spent. For example, the healthcare in the UK costs less than half as much as the healthcare in the US, but you'd be hard pressed to demonstrate that US healthcare is more than twice as good.

The reason why the US performs a larger number of screenings, particularly MRI scans, is because it is profitable for doctors to order frivolous tests. This is why nonradiologists performing their own imaging are two to seven times more likely to order imaging procedures than are treating physicians with no stake in the radiology practice.

Either their patients are magically much sicker than those of doctors who don't own scanners, the doctors are much more jittery for absolutely no reason, or the doctors want to make more money.

You criticized me for not providing international information, and yet all you did was provide information about a single areas of a single US state.

Hypocrisy.

The difference is that mine is the intuitive result. Your mechanism for race causing health problems is that all black people have bad genes for some reason. My mechanism is that low income causes health problems, and that the discrepancy between races would decrease or disappear when compared at the same income level, i.e. using income as a control instead of a degree of freedom.

Ta-da, that's what the study says.

It's safe to generalize results if there is both logical and statistical reason to believe that it would hold true in the general case. It is NOT safe to generalize when you only have statistics and no logical reasoning.

No, what you proved is that race is correlated with poor health

Yes, and that therefore race-related factors affect

Correlation: it's not causation.

Except it's not, because a minority race can routinely be identified as a unifying trait for people who score low in health indicators. The direct cause, be it genetics, culture, socieconomic status, is irrelevant in and of itself, period.

No, the direct cause is what's important, and correlated factors with no direct link to the actual problem are irrelevant.

There's no reason to believe that race is the direct cause of health problems

And this is irrelevant, because people of minority races still have persistently lower scores in health indicators.

You cannot generalize this result without a mechanistic reason for doing so. If you believe that race is a factor in health issues for societal reasons, then you have to re-demonstrate the relationship for every location that you wish to use it in, because society changes across borders.

On the other hand, if you just picked income inequality, you could practically hand-wave the association between infant mortality and income inequality, then show that the gini coefficient is higher in the US than in Canada (for whatever reason), and that would be that.

Ahaha it's so funny how after scrutinizing arguments so desperately, you now provide an argument that can't even come close to meeting that same level of scrutiny.

What exactly is the hole in the income inequality argument?

You're suggesting that Canada provides a situation where income inequality doesn't exist as much,

Which is true.

and that this is part of its better health scores.

Which is a reasonable assumption

You avoid addressing the issue of Canadian income inequality being lower because Canada has a more racially homogeneous nation,

A position which is both irrelevant to the point being made and one that you have not shown to apply in Canada (here you go, though, although it's not quite as big as the disparity in the US.)

The fact is, even if I do ignore the racial aspect, I've still demonstrated the point that there is an inequality in non-healthcare factors that have a direct effect on overall health.

I'm not saying that your argument from race is incorrect, it's just infinitely more cumbersome than one from income.

you're avoiding addressing whether or not inequality/disparity among races exists in Canada as well, which it does

Which is completely irrelevant, since the point has already been made.

You really have an issue with honesty. Providing evidence about your argument of preventative care being better in universal systems/Canada is your responsibility.

Just like how it's your responsibility to provide evidence that we should exterminate all blacks?

It's easy to attack a person's argument when you're attacking a different argument that you made up.

I think I've said enough times that Canada's healthcare system is definitively worse than that in the US, since it's the bastard child of universal healthcare and privatized healthcare, combining the worst aspects of both.

Other systems can't be compared directly in quality due to the vast discrepancy in spending. However, since people using universal healthcare aren't dying like flies compared to those in the US, it's probably at least safe to suggest that universal healthcare is more efficient than the US system, considering that the difference in quality that you've shown is relatively small compared to the difference in spending.

---

Also, in terms of healthcare quality, in case you wanted some numbers to complain about:

On this page, you demonstrated that in relative terms, Americans have a relative 6.4% increase in survivability for cancer, and a 2.3% increase in survivability for heart disease.

And of course, you get these miraculous, gigantic improvements for a mere 120% increase in spending.

Now, this is just me talking here, but when a spending increase so vastly outstrips a quality increase (as defined by your own criteria), doesn't it suggest that maybe one system is more efficient at spending that money than the other?

---

At 6/12/08 12:56 AM, GunnerX86 wrote: I'm a proud American!!!I know there's alot of things wrong in America, but it's for sure not completely bad.Also you aren't an American if you aren't proud to be.

Thats just stupid. Youre just slobberingly and blindly patriotic. America is not the worst country on Earth, think Sudan and Myammar, but we have huge flaws and until our corrupt and lazy government does something about those flaws I will be as patriotic as GunnerX86. I am not ashamed of being American but Im also not particulary proud.

---

At 6/12/08 12:03 AM, tdominion520 wrote: Look, no country is a perfect country. Whether it's the things they do and the things they don't do for the world and for their citizens

Yeah but there are alot of countries that are doing better than America right now and Ameria has its head in its ass when it comes to our constant stream of foreign policy blunders, health care, and cleaning up corrupt politics. So should I be proud of a country and yell AMERICA'S NUMBER ONE at the top of my lungs when its obviously not number one? Also to people who are not american who have posted on this thread, American patriotism isnt a topic you know alot about so kinda stay away.

---

At 6/3/08 09:12 AM, ZOMG3 wrote: The reasons:

1. Their health service. When you are sick the first thing they look for is your wallet. They leave the poor and defenseless to die. Universial healthcare is the way forward!!!

And rasing taxes on the working men and women of the country is the way were gonna pay for it

2. America has has high emissions of gas and it seems like many Americans dont care about the environment.

WRONG,China has surpassed the U.S. by 8% in greenhouse gas production

3. Americans like the most crappy sports and don't spell words right like colour or favourite. Stop being lazy and add the extra letter. It's not hard.

Your just mad that if you tried to play,youd be crushed.Most people who do that do it for a joke or to be funny

4. Americans are ignorant and don't pay much attention to the outside world. Most of them don't even have passports.

And you base this on what?

5. America - Land of the Free...unless you are in Guantanamo, where you are convicted without evidence and don't give me this crap they are war fighters. Some were picked up from the streets in Africa, held without representation or without appeal for years and then released if they are lucky.

its a prison,your not supposed to be free;your there because you have commited a crime and are waiting for trial

6. For claiming they are the first to help in a natural disater, yet denying any fair trade. Fixing the world trade for themselves keeping millions in poverty for their own greed.

how can we "fix" world trade?it cant be controlled by someone,people want to trade with us because we have a better product,and if the other guy cant match it for a better price or make a better product than he should find something else to trade

7. For fudging the fact that none of the 9/11 hijackers were Iraqi yet many use that as the reason to bomb Iraq.

were not in a war with Iraq,were in a war with Al-Qaeda.We invaded Iraq because they were occupied and lead by Terriost.Since we arrived we removed the dictator,Saddam Hussein,and set up a new democratic government.

8. Selling $20bn worth of defense to the Saudis where 16 of the 19 hijackers WERE from. Fucking geniuses.

saudi arabians are not terriost,they dont want to kill us.If they killed us it would eliminate there biggest customer.

9. Capitalism and materialism combined with negligence and apathy are running rampant while honor, dignity, and true spirituality have gone by the wayside.

so your saying its bad for someone to just live their life and spend their own money without worrying about someone else is bad?And what Proof do you have that honor, dignity, and true spirituality are gone?

10. For expeting a country bombed to pieces to thank them afterwards. "We liberated you. Now you are free, even though your home was bombed and your parents raped and mutilated!"

I admit they we have bombed and destroyed the country a little,but we have helped rebuild it.Its not like were going to make a mess and not pick up after ourselves.And they are the ones raping and mutilating themseleves.For you to sugest that our men and women of the armed service would do that is one of the most disgusting things Ive ever heard.They are some of the most courageous,honorable,and kindest people on the planet to volunteer to protect and serve our country,ready to give there lives if necessary,for ingreats like you so you can sit here and complain and whine about it

I hope you do move,it'll be a much nicer place without people like you around.

---

At 6/12/08 10:02 AM, Elfer wrote:

At 6/11/08 11:56 PM, cellardoor6 wrote:

At 6/10/08 08:15 AM, Elfer wrote: Read the abstract. It says that race is less of an indicator of infant mortality among the high-income families than it is among the general population.

And the fact that minorities are more likely to belong to low-income families?

Is not relevant to the point that was being discussed in this case.

Except for the fact that it is.

The point was that race is at best correlated with health problems in some areas, but is not a direct cause of poor health.

And yet it could be the cause of low income, thus being a cause of poor health.

You made claims. YOU prove them.

I'm not asking you to FIND evidence. I'm asking you if you think it's even possible for such evidence to exist.

I already showed that I did you disingenuous ghoul. I already provided evidence of US care being superior in preventative care for cancer. Because the US screens people more frequently, cancer survival rates are higher.

The answer is that it isn't, because in a real-world system, the data is too noisy to isolate the effects of preventative healthcare.

What this really means is that you know you can't prove what you said and you're desperately finding any avenue to absolve yourself of responsibility.

You made claims. You couldn't prove them. You made it about me to divert attention, and now you're using an excuse that there's no way to provide evidence for your claim, even though I myself provided evidence of preventative care in one issue being better.

Just admit now that you're completely full of shit and you can't prove your claims.

Since there is no way to conduct a controlled statistical review, there is no way to prove the effects of preventative healthcare.

WTF are you talking about? I already proved the effect of preventative care for cancer treatment in the US!

Holy hell.

Let's take a look again:

Overall Cancer Survival Rates. According to the survey of cancer survival rates in Europe and the United States, published recently in Lancet Oncology:

- American women have a 63 percent chance of living at least five years after a cancer diagnosis, compared to 56 percent for European women.

- American men have a five-year survival rate of 66 percent - compared to only 47 percent for European men.

- Among European countries, only Sweden has an overall survival rate for men of more than 60 percent.

- For women, only three European countries (Sweden, Belgium and Switzerland) have an overall survival rate of more than 60 percent.

Survival Rates for Specific Cancers. U.S. survival rates are higher than the average in Europe for 13 of 16 types of cancer reported in Lancet Oncology, confirming the results of previous studies.

- Of cancers that affect primarily men, the survival rate among Americans for bladder cancer is 15 percentage points higher than the European average; for prostate cancer, it is 28 percentage points higher.

- Of cancers that affect women only, the survival rate among Americans for uterine cancer is about 5 percentage points higher than the European average; for breast cancer, it is 14 percentage points higher.

- The United States has survival rates of 90 percent or higher for five cancers (skin melanoma, breast, prostate, thyroid and testicular), but there is only one cancer for which the European survival rate reaches 90 percent (testicular).

Early Diagnosis. It is often claimed that people have better access to preventive screenings in universal health care systems. But despite the large number of uninsured, cancer patients in the United States are most likely to be screened regularly, and once diagnosed, have the fastest access to treatment.

Conclusion. International comparisons establish that the most important factors in cancer survival are early diagnosis, time to treatment and access to the most effective drugs. Some uninsured cancer patients in the United States encounter problems with timely treatment and access, but a far larger proportion of cancer patients in Europe face these troubles.

-------

Score one for American preventative care.

Instead, you have to use simple fucking logic.

You have no logic.

You pretend that your logic overrides the facts all the time, and yet you never provide facts that fortify your logic. Because you can't, because you're incredibly illogical. You just have this false assumption that your baseless claims carry weight simply because they come from your own mind.

You seem to repeatedly misrepresent my position on universal healthcare.

You seem to repeatedly make up bullshit to divert attention away from your failed argument.

I'm not saying that all universal healthcare systems will always be absolutely better in every field than a privatized system.

You said that universal systems are better because they employ preventative care and private systems employ the most profitable care.

In order to make that point legitimate, you'd have to PROVE:

1. Preventative care is emphasized more in universal systems than it is in the US.
2. That this emphasis translates into better, more developed preventative treatments/policies.
3. That this preventative care has a measurable effect on health, and saves more lives and is more effective at successfully keeping the population healthy and prolonging life than the US system.

You have to prove those things in order for your claims to even be considered credible, to prove they even affect the argument.

What I'm saying is that due to the proper allocative use of preventative healthcare, a properly administrated universal healthcare system is more efficient than a privatized system, i.e. more effective per dollar spent.

AHAHAHA. You're obviously changing your tune so that you can continue to make an argument that, although equally idiotic, can appear to fortify the claims that you have failed to validate.

You have made the point that preventative care makes survival rates and the success of other treatments irrelevant because it prevents diseases/illnesses in the first place. That was your argument, you've made it before:

At 8/3/07 09:05 AM, Elfer wrote:

At 8/2/07 11:24 PM, cellardoor6 wrote: You apparently haven't looked at the stats I've provided... if Canada's preventative healthcare is more efficient, it obviously isn't more effective considering it ends up saving less lives than American healthcare which revolves around curative care.

Of course curative is going to look more effective if you look at the survival rates of people who are already afflicted with diseases. The point of preventative care is to keep people from getting those diseases in the first place.

---

Continuing on.

---

As I said, Elfer, you used preventative care as a way to disregard the superiority the US has in curing diseases. Yet you didn't, and can't, provide any evidence.

For example, the healthcare in the UK costs less than half as much as the healthcare in the US, but you'd be hard pressed to demonstrate that US healthcare is more than twice as good.

You'd have a hard time proving that preventative care in the UK is better than it is in the US. You'd have a hard time proving that preventative care in the UK is what makes it's health score relatively high, and or in a position where the US couldn't be twice as good.

For lung cancer, the survival rate IS twice as high in the US than in the UK. For all cancers it's not that high, but it's still pretty stark.

UK = England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland.

Cancer survival rates:

England

Female: 52.7%
Male: 44.8%

Scotland

Female: 48%
Male: 40.2%

Wales

Female: 54.1%
Male: 47.9%

N. Ireland

Female: 51%
Male: 42%

------

Average UK

Female: 51.4%
Male: 43.7%

Combined: 47.5

United States

Female: 62.9%
Male: 66.3%

Combined: 64.6%

And of course, cancer is the 2nd leading risk to public health in both the US and the UK (assuming due to stats from England and Wales). So it's a pretty big deal that the US has this much of a better survival rate.

Someone in the US has almost a 2/3rds chance of surviving from cancer, while it's less than half in the UK.

That is huge. That can't be measured in dollar value.

--------

Anyway, Now you're emphasizing cost as if that's the job of healthcare to be cheap. Funny how you try to paint the picture that people are after money in the US system, but then you proceed to argue about cost effectiveness instead of TREATING PEOPLE SUCCESSFULLY. If you were really concerned about the quality and purpose of healthcare in saving lives, you wouldn't emphasize the money required.

Frankly, paying more to save lives cannot be measured on a by-dollar basis. That's fucking stupid. If I spent $50,000 to have a 65% survival rate, I wouldn't give a crap if someone payed half as much to get a 50% survival ate. If you're emphasizing actually treating people and actually saving lives, it's pretty damn stupid to gauge the lives saved by the dollars spent. First off, because you still can't prove the actual effectiveness of the universal systems preventative care, and secondly because spending more to have a higher success is not, at all, in detriment to the system.

The fact that the US system has such lavish spending in research and development, and using the latest technology and latest drugs (all of which are expensive) makes it HILARIOUS that you argue that universal systems are more humane or more moral. On one hand you argue that a private system is greedy or wants to make money off of people's illnesses so it doesn't emphasize preventative care (which of course you can't prove), but NOW you're touting cost effectiveness as some grand benefit universal healthcare has over private systems.

Your argument is like a shapeshifting chupacabra.

The reason why the US performs a larger number of screenings, particularly MRI scans, is because it is profitable for doctors to order frivolous tests.

LOL, "frivolous" huh? Even though it ends up causing people to be screened, diagnosed, and treated more successfully?

Seriously, how can you have such a severe lack of sense to the point you say this crap.

You criticized me for not providing international information, and yet all you did was provide information about a single areas of a single US state.

Hypocrisy.

The difference is that mine is the intuitive result. Your mechanism for race causing health problems is that all black people have bad genes for some reason.

Nope, it's that whatever the cause is, race is a trait that of a demographic that persisently underperforms in health indicators compared the general population in both of the countries I compared. Providing that race effects the national statistics.

My mechanism is that low income causes health problems, and that the discrepancy between races would decrease or disappear when compared at the same income level, i.e. using income as a control instead of a degree of freedom.

And yet you ignored the income inequality exists in Canada, and that the income inequality that's lower in Canada can be explained by its lower proportion of races that belong to groups the US has in abundance.

It's safe to generalize results if there is both logical and statistical reason to believe that it would hold true in the general case. It is NOT safe to generalize when you only have statistics and no logical reasoning.

And you had absolutely no logical reasoning behind your argument.

Correlation: it's not causation.

Apply that to your argument.

You're correlating low-income with poor health, but you're not proving that being poor makes people unhealthy.

There's no reason to believe that race is the direct cause of health problems

And this is irrelevant, because people of minority races still have persistently lower scores in health indicators.

You cannot generalize this result without a mechanistic reason for doing so.

I proved that race is a unifying trait of people who unferperform in health indicators in the two countries I compared.

I proved that race is causing is effecting the disparity. Whether it is discrimination, genetics, culture etc... that is irrelevant.

---

On the other hand, if you just picked income inequality, you could practically hand-wave the association between infant mortality and income inequality, then show that the gini coefficient is higher in the US than in Canada (for whatever reason), and that would be that.

Ahaha it's so funny how after scrutinizing arguments so desperately, you now provide an argument that can't even come close to meeting that same level of scrutiny.

What exactly is the hole in the income inequality argument?

Why do you ask me questions in reply to one of my posts when immediately after the segment you reply to, I already answered that question?

You're suggesting that Canada provides a situation where income inequality doesn't exist as much,

Which is true.

Because it has racially homogeneous nation, and has less of certain races, yet those races still underperform in Canada, thus showing that Canada's illusion of equality is simply because Canada has less minorities and less people to suffer inequality that exists to the US in a higher degree simply because the US has more minorities.

and that this is part of its better health scores.

Which is a reasonable assumption

No it's not. In fact, it's patently false.

You avoid addressing the issue of Canadian income inequality being lower because Canada has a more racially homogeneous nation,

A position which is both irrelevant to the point being made and one that you have not shown to apply in Canada (here you go, though, although it's not quite as big as the disparity in the US.)

Lol you're so full of shit it's hilarious.

I already showed linked to things showing income inequality in Canada between blacks and whites, and then you just link to vague nonsense.

The fact is, even if I do ignore the racial aspect, I've still demonstrated the point that there is an inequality in non-healthcare factors that have a direct effect on overall health.

You have absolutely ZERO integrity.

You are making an argument that could EASILY be discounted by saying "correlation =/= causation dur hur hur" if someone used the same stretches of ridiculous logic that you use.

I'm not saying that your argument from race is incorrect, it's just infinitely more cumbersome than one from income.

Except it's not, because I proved that income is statistically effected by race in both Canada as well.

you're avoiding addressing whether or not inequality/disparity among races exists in Canada as well, which it does

Which is completely irrelevant, since the point has already been made.

AHAHAHAHA

I proved that disparity among races in Canada exists in income equality. Blacks in Canada have significantly lower income than whites. Thus defeating your ENTIRE argument in that regard, and thus providing my point that race is swaying national statistics.

Let's take a look at the facts.

Canada (pg 13)

Median income all Canadians: 22,120
Median income black Canadians: 18,702

The average black income is 84% of Canadian national average.

United States:

Medial income total population: 32,140
Median income African Americans: 27,101

The average African American income is 84% of US national average.

So, you're saying that the fact that the 12.8% of the US is African American, but only 2.2% of Canada is black will have absolutely no effect on national statistics if - in fact, as you say - income inequality is the main culprit in lower health scores?

Nice try Elfer, but you're done. What little argument you started with has been destroyed on all fronts.

---

Pheeeew..... Big list. Here we go:

At 6/3/08 09:12 AM, ZOMG3 wrote: The reasons:

1. Their health service. When you are sick the first thing they look for is your wallet. They leave the poor and defenseless to die. Universial healthcare is the way forward!!!

Well true I will give you that.

2. America has has high emissions of gas and it seems like many Americans dont care about the environment.

Americans care about the enviroment! That gas-chugging asshole driving a hummer is Ashton Kutcher. A typical anti-american steareotype.

3. Americans like the most crappy sports and don't spell words right like colour or favourite. Stop being lazy and add the extra letter. It's not hard.

Thats a matter of opinion. maybe our sports are too athletic for you?

4. Americans are ignorant and don't pay much attention to the outside world. Most of them don't even have passports.

iggnorant?! no fucking way, we have gone past iggnorant and into shoving the truth into our faces. Like-it-or-not, every american is unwiitingly forced to not be iggnorant.

5. America - Land of the Free...unless you are in Guantanamo, where you are convicted without evidence and don't give me this crap they are war fighters. Some were picked up from the streets in Africa, held without representation or without appeal for years and then released if they are lucky.

Yes land of free. We have rights up the shitter, so many fucking rights that many have to be removed. and i really doubt your Guantanamo bullshit story.

6. For claiming they are the first to help in a natural disater, yet denying any fair trade. Fixing the world trade for themselves keeping millions in poverty for their own greed.

We ARE the first to help in a Natural Diaster you retard! But when america is in trouble, god forbid they send some money.

7. For fudging the fact that none of the 9/11 hijackers were Iraqi yet many use that as the reason to bomb Iraq.

Wrong again! Many, nearly all americans know that the 9/11 highjackers were Iraqi.

8. Selling $20bn worth of defense to the Saudis where 16 of the 19 hijackers WERE from. Fucking geniuses.

Not the americans, that was bush and his crackpot team of super genii.

9. Capitalism and materialism combined with negligence and apathy are running rampant while honor, dignity, and true spirituality have gone by the wayside.

Spiritualism? you mean religion right? Well most americans are decent people but most just don't want to accept the fact that there is no god.

10. For expeting a country bombed to pieces to thank them afterwards. "We liberated you. Now you are free, even though your home was bombed and your parents raped and mutilated!"

Bombed to pieces? We only bomb countries in desperate situations! and we do it free the people from worse fates!

Any suggestions?

Suicide

I have vented my anger. That is all.

Vent elsewhere

I'm moving to France and change my name, from John to Jean and enjoy the benefits of France; universial healthcare, quality education, great people etc.

Have fun, fucking traitor

---

At 6/12/08 10:23 AM, Elfer wrote: And of course, you get these miraculous, gigantic improvements for a mere 120% increase in spending.

And that doesn't have anything to do with the fact that the US spends so much more on research and development right?

78% of all global biotechnology spending is by the US. This is included in total healthcare spending.

It's not that we're spending 120% on each individual procedure, it's that we invest heavily in new technology and medical breakthroughs while pathetic countries like Canada simply buy the product years later (in small numbers to cut costs of course) without ever having spent money on the development.

Now, this is just me talking here, but when a spending increase so vastly outstrips a quality increase (as defined by your own criteria), doesn't it suggest that maybe one system is more efficient at spending that money than the other?

If you think money is more important than people's lives, yes. If you think the government balancing its budget is more important than spending more to have more timely and more successful treatments, then sure.

But then again, that completely destroys your prior arguments about one system being more humane than the other.

---

Three full posts? Can you try to be more concise in the future? I have about an hour of personal leisure time in a day, I'm not going to devote it all to getting into a protracted debate over what mostly amounts to debating strategy.

At 6/12/08 06:33 PM, cellardoor6 wrote: What this really means is that you know you can't prove what you said and you're desperately finding any avenue to absolve yourself of responsibility.

No, it means I'm aware that there are no statistics available for the imaginary Canada/Europe in which no universal healthcare system exists.

Just admit now that you're completely full of shit and you can't prove your claims.

I think I've already asserted that I can't prove them.

WTF are you talking about? I already proved the effect of preventative care for cancer treatment in the US!

Later on, you mention that the US provides 78% of the world's biotech research funding. Can you demonstrate that it's preventative care rather than experimental treatments that is causing the discrepancy?

In any case, didn't I already mention why the US has more expensive tests administered?

You said that universal systems are better

You're conflating efficiency with absolute quality.

You have made the point that preventative care makes survival rates and the success of other treatments irrelevant because it prevents diseases/illnesses in the first place. That was your argument, you've made it before:

"Irrelevant" and "less important" are not the same thing. If the treatment outcomes for universal healthcare systems were DRAMATICALLY worse than those for a privatized system, I'd say that there's no way that it could explain the better health despite lower spending.

At 6/12/08 06:35 PM, cellardoor6 wrote: You'd have a hard time proving that preventative care in the UK is better than it is in the US.

Conflating efficiency and absolute quality again.

That is huge. That can't be measured in dollar value.

Of course a universal healthcare system will not be as good as a private healthcare system that spends twice as much. I don't advocate switching to universal healthcare and also dramatically slashing spending, then you'd end up with healthcare just as bad as Canada or Europe.

Anyway, Now you're emphasizing cost as if that's the job of healthcare to be cheap. Funny how you try to paint the picture that people are after money in the US system, but then you proceed to argue about cost effectiveness instead of TREATING PEOPLE SUCCESSFULLY.

Try to wrap your head around this: A system which is more effective per dollar will be able to provide more successful treatment for an identical sum of money. It's not the job of healthcare to be cheap, it's the job of healthcare to do the best possible job with the money available.

LOL, "frivolous" huh? Even though it ends up causing people to be screened, diagnosed, and treated more successfully?

Considering that the site I linked to suggested that up to 50% of MRI screenings aren't really justified, I would consider that to be a frivolous waste of resources. If you have an amount of MRI machines that's above optimal, you'll have an amount of something else (examples: ambulances, emergency rooms, beds, etc) that is sub-optimal for the amount of money present. You studied econ, right? You know about allocative efficiency, I shouldn't have to tell you this.

And yet you ignored the income inequality exists in Canada,

Because it's irrelevant to the point.

Let's get something straight here: At this point, the whole race thing is not about which of us is right and which is wrong. It's a matter of debating strategy. We both know that income inequality exists in both the US and Canada, and we both know that race is correlated with low income is correlated with poor health.

What I'm trying to get through to you is that regardless of the validity of what you're saying, it's a waste of time to make your point in this way. It is a relatively simple matter to dismiss the health differences between countries as due to non-healthcare factors. You're insisting on making your argument like so (using income as the example of the correlated factor):

A) Canada has a more racially homogenous population than the US
B) Race is a cause of low income in both Canada and the US
C) Therefore, Canada has a lower income disparity (still needs statistical backing to be compelling)
D) It is logical to say that low income causes worse health
E) Therefore, Canada's better health status does not imply better healthcare

What I want you to see is this: Regardless of the truth of statements A and B (particularly B), they are superfluous to the argument. Statements C and D are sufficient to demonstrate the truth of E, without the assistance of A and B. A and B are just extra assertions that have nothing to do with direct causes.

And you had absolutely no logical reasoning behind your argument.

Do you honestly have no idea how "less money = worse health" is an intuitive result?

Correlation: it's not causation.

Apply that to your argument.

My argument has an intuitive mechanism. If you'd like to suggest that either infant mortality is causing low income, or that there's wizards causing both low income and infant mortality, be my guest.

On the other hand, I'd be inclined to believe that an inability to afford healthy food and a healthy lifestyle, as well as the inability to afford non-covered health issues would result in worse health.

I proved that race is causing is effecting the disparity. Whether it is discrimination, genetics, culture etc... that is irrelevant.

Discrimination and culture are not a direct cause of diseases. Genetics is, but there's no particular reason to believe that minorities have inherently poor genes. Any way you slice it, there's no reason to believe that race is the DIRECT cause, therefore bringing race into the argument will always be nothing but an extra hurdle to clear before getting to the actual argument.

Again: I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm saying you're going about this in a stupid way. If you want to continue bringing superfluous points into your arguments, be my guest. Discussion over.

At 6/12/08 06:37 PM, cellardoor6 wrote:

You're suggesting that Canada provides a situation where income inequality doesn't exist as much,

Which is true.

Because it has racially homogeneous nation,

Sure. However, since we've already gotten to the important point, why take it the extra step? it's superfluous.

I'm not saying that your argument from race is incorrect, it's just infinitely more cumbersome than one from income.

Except it's not, because I proved that income is statistically effected by race in both Canada as well.

It's still more cumbersome. It's just a few extra things to prove that aren't necessary

So, you're saying that the fact that the 12.8% of the US is African American, but only 2.2% of Canada is black will have absolutely no effect on national statistics if - in fact, as you say - income inequality is the main culprit in lower health scores?

Income inequality is the direct culprit, i.e. the one with the closest logical link to poor health that is also supported statistically. Whether or not income inequality is due to race is irrelevant to the argument.

RECAP:

- I am not denying that race may be the cause of poor health in the US
- I AM saying that this is unnecessary to prove to demonstrate the underlying point, i.e. good health does not imply good health care
- This whole discussion, I've just been trying to inform you that you've been debating inefficiently by regressing farther than you need to to demonstrate a point
- Since you seem to believe that I'm trying to argue against your base point, which I'm not, I'm no longer going to discuss the race/income issue with you. You may declare yourself the "winner" in this if you wish, though I'm not sure how you can win at taking advice badly.

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Here's another reason>>> www.oldamericancentury.org/14pts.htm