A Health Care Tidbit from the Czech Republic
Visiting his home in Milwaukee, U. S. Ambassador to the Czech Republic Rick Graber spoke at my Rotary Club this noon. He talked about his experiences in nearly two years of service in Central Europe. Jumping around to touch on several topics, of course my antennae were most sensitive to his brief remarks about health care in this country of about 10 million residents.
To paraphrase what I think I heard: health care in the Czech Republic is 'free'. It is interesting however that they - like the U.S. and most countries - are struggling to deal with rapidly rising costs. Up until recently, there had been no cost for receiving care and so, the average Czech sees his/her doctor 16 times per year. "There's no charge, so why not; it's like a social event", Ambassador Graber reported. Faced with such (over) utilization, they are now trying small co-pays; a koruna per office visit. FYI: the currency of the Czech Republic is the koruna which converts at about 15.1 korunas to the dollar. It would surprise the heck out of me if a 6 1/2 cent co-pay had any impact on costs and yet the Ambassador reported the citizens are in an uproar over the new charges!
Interesting, isn't it? I've referenced a P.J. O'Rourke quote before but it bears repeating here: "If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free!"
Labels: Access, Legislation
posted by Jon Rauser @ 1:41 PM
1 Comments
As President & Owner of a successful health insurance brokerage in downtown Milwaukee - 
1 Comments:
Jon,
Great commentary as per usual.
Free healthcare obviously isn't, and ridiculously low co-pays probably aren't a real detterent to utilization, but this situation does remind me of somthing from our healthcare past.
Not long ago America was filled with seniors that were deeply concerned about their perscriptions. (I want to start by saying that I feel for those of meager means that were spending 25-50% of their incomes on medications that were not covered.) It is also pertinent that those in retirement age are now as a group the wealthiest Americans. Seniors are also the largest voting group. Their outrage led to Medicare part D. I do not know the answer, but I'd be willing to bet that a whole lot more name brand prescription drugs are being sold to seniors now that they are covered under Medicare than when they were not.
I have insurance that I pay a great deal for and I have a co-pay for presciptions, oh and by the way, Medicare tax too.
There's no such thing as a free lunch, and there's no such thing as free medicine either.
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