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Comment by dools | Hacker News Reader

We don't have ads for this in Australia, and everyone knows about viagra. Ads for drugs aren't creepy, they're fucking crazy. When I watched hulu for a bit I was astonished by them fascinated. Terrified. The US is wild west capitalism

EDIT: And another thing: you guys don't even have affordable health care, so people see this shit they blatantly can't afford advertised at them relentlessly. That's why spam is so lucrative I guess: huge demand built for something virtually no-one can afford.

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> they blatantly can't afford advertised at them relentlessly.

That's not true, because most people do have insurance. The major problem is that the costs are socialized by insurance, so people buy excessive healthcare because then can afford it (they aren't paying).

There are countries where few people have insurance. Health outcomes are poor.

There are other countries where everybody has insurance and the government negotiates medical prices. Japan, Germany, and France are three examples. They have much lower costs than the U.S. and the best health outcomes in the world, measured on criteria like death rates after diagnosis of major disease.

Source: Healing America by T.R. Reid.

Something else those countries have (to varying extent) is strong public transportation and an ancient and coherent food culture, which has helped them resist the epidemic of obesity and diabetes we are suffering in the US. Does your book address this?

Those sorts of things affect disease incidence rates but not "death rates after diagnosis of major disease."

And Japan, for example, has an aging population of heavy smokers.

Dude if you think medicine is TOO affordable in the US then you are seriously out of touch with everything. eg. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/13/us/the-soaring-cost-of-a-s... the comparative cost of have asthma in the US even if you're insured, compared with having it in Australia or most of Europe or New Zealand is sky high. Antidepressants similarly - in Australia you can afford that shit if you're completely poor. Americans need crazy insurance that they get through work to cover it, and then they have to pay through the nose as well.

>The US is wild west capitalism

Yes, this is the true culture of America. Blind acceptance and worship of capitalism.

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