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Synaesthesia

>Is single payer the answer ? Frankly I don't know

I think so, it works for European countries, and Canada, which are comparable in wealth to the US. I don’t see why not.

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Most European countries don't have single payer. They just have better regulation.

Care to give some examples?

Typical features for non-single-payer and non-nationalized European healthcare systems include: insurance mandate, "public option", price lists/controls, insurers must be non-profit, insurance must not suck (see: many expensive plans in the US that are, nonetheless, terrible, even post-Obamacare). IIRC Switzerland and Germany's systems both have some or all of those features.

Germany has 200 private insurance companies. They cover the state mandated minimum. You can get better coverage over the base price if you want. Many Scandinavian countries have cohorts or risk pools that are not the whole country. You pay into those pools. You get care anywhere. Kinda like a coop system. True single payer like Medicare or the British system are actually rare.

All European countries have universal healthcare, but not necessarily single payer. Germany(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Germany) has a multiplayer system that allows self-employed and high income people to have private insurance, though all others must take public insurance.

And this varies, but a lot of countries have some form of public + private option, though it's usually universal.

Look at Germany and Switzerland. They are quite similar to Obamacare in a sense: Mandatory insurance, multiple insurances, private providers.

If there is no political will to resist there is a good chance the US medical industry would mess up single payer in the same way they messed up the current system .

Germany. There are several public insurance... companies? with only minor differences. There is also private health insurance that some well-off people choose. Private is cheaper only when you are young and healthy but you have to stay private forever, and it provides "better" (usually just more luxurious, not substantially better) service.

by well off you mean 11% of the population? https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_Krankenversicherung

You can choose to take private insurance if you make more than 60kEUR ;)

German public health insurances are often "Körperschaften des öffentlichen Rechts".

While this means that they're "entities under public law", they're typically running on their own, as a type of non-profit company, with board of directors, annual reports, ...

Probably the closest US organization type would be a non-profit under 501(c)4.

"comparable in wealth to the US"

What is your point?

Qatar - $127,523 GDP (PPP) per capita

Is my point.

They're not, however, comparable in obesity rates.

I'd be happy to see a single-payer healthcare system in the United States with strict denial of coverage for smoking-linked lung cancer, type 2 diabetes, and any other medical problems caused by the choices of the patient.

They aren't, but you're looking at this the wrong way around. You want all levels of government working together to create a healthy society - If your urban planners just defer health costs to private health insurance, what incentive do they have to create spaces that are healthy and productive? Are there measures schools can take to lower mental health incident rates, etc.

Health outcomes aren't determined solely by visits to doctors and the availability of pills.

What about sports-related injuries? Serious question.

Should a marathon runner in this scenario get treatment for knee damage or amateur / recreational boxer - for head trauma?

I didn't say no treatment, just no coverage. If you choose to engage in risky behaviors/activities, then you are more than welcome to buy supplemental insurance as one of the costs of your lifestyle. It would likely be fairly cheap for boxers and runners. Possibly even offset entirely by their associated healthy lifestyles, and therefore eligible for default coverage on a net cost basis.

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