I apologize. I worded my statement badly and it is incorrect. I do not wish to cast aspersions on any nations or people who offer emergency health care to their non-citizens without restriction. I know what I really meant, but I didn't say what was in my mind.
Let me try to word my complaint better.
In the US, just as in most countries, anyone who shows up at a hospital emergency room or emergency clinic receives emergency care. I don't know how it works in all countries, but that means that someone who is in the United States illegally will receive that medical care also. I take it from the comments above that the same applies to most other countries, or at least those represented in this thread.
I do not begrudge any person receiving medical care in the US if he or she needs it. That was not my point. What I do resent is that the hospital or clinic has almost no hope of receiving payment for that medical care given to an illegal, because the illegal immigrant generally does not have the money on hand, nor does he or she have medical insurance.
That means that I pay for that person's medical care. I don't object to helping those who need help. I object to being
forced to pay for that care without being asked about it, through increased insurance premiums or higher cost to me, or both. The point I failed to make earlier was simply that I will soon be forced to purchase "cover everything" medical insurance for myself through a government-run board who will then decide what care is best for me.
That's what happens when a government runs everything. Everyone gets the same level of service and no one has to pay for that service as an individual. The price of the service is harvested from the taxpayers' wallets. And the more people which use that service - which appears to be free but isn't - the more money it costs to run it. No nation can afford to give away medical care for everyone within its borders irrespective of cost. No nation in the world has that much money. Health care must, by all the rules of economics, be rationed at some point or the system ends up bankrupt.
This blog , which appears to originate in Sweden, submits that Sweden's health care system (basically a one-payer system, which the Obamacare system will be when fully implemented), doesn't work as well as advertised. There are also a number of comments at the bottom, most of which support the blog's premise. And though I haven't done so, I could list any number of similar Websites which would say the same thing about single-payer systems in other countries.
I understand that one or two malcontents do not make a case for a national failure. And I know that for every negative blog or article or even book there is a positive blog or article or book to counter it. I am not making a blanket condemnation of all state-run healthcare systems in the world.
However, I have yet to see any government of any nation take over large segments of the economy without damaging that economy. The wage and price controls, public works projects, and restrictive legislation of FDR's administration did not break the US economy out of the Great Depression. It took World War II and the need for soldiers and defense industry workers to reduce the unemployment rate to reasonable levels and to lift the poorest of the poor who wanted some measure of success out of poverty.
I know that not everyone agrees with my position on health care. That's okay. But I'd like to base the discussion on facts (correctly stated ones, please - I will be more careful in the future) and not on theory or rhetoric.
I also found, for example, a Swedish government website which touts the system without being a cheerleader for it. But any system is only as good as the people who operate and administer it. If there is no incentive for a person to do a better job, that person is unlikely to perform that job better than in the past. And placing all of our healthcare eggs in one government basket is a bad idea for that reason alone.
