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Comment by Ra1d3n | Hacker News Reader

One of the reasons I have basically given up my fantasy of moving to the USA is the russian roulette that you seem to have to play with your health and its insurance.

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If you have insurance through your employer you'll be ok. If you don't you'll pay anywhere between $800 and $3000, a month, for healtcare.

The article seems to be saying that in some cases the insurer assesses what the hospital is charging, decides it's too high, doesn't pay it all, and then you owe the hospital thousands of dollars despite being fully insured.

So I don't believe your assertion.

That was a travel insurance, "completely" different from the US healthcare insurance providers, where the issue is in-network and out-network providers, etc.

What happens if you get fired from your job suddenly? And if you happen to have pre-existing conditions, such as a type 1 diabetes, that is known for being very expensive to treat?

How can you live with this fear?

My mom lost her job with benefits, and a month later fell down some stairs and broke her arm. Eventually she was able to get an insurance plan (after getting a new job) for something like $200 or $300 per month (there are in fact cheaper ones depending on your need of coverage and state), while paying off the bills from the broken arm event.

Personally speaking, I have no fear of a similar event happening to me. If it happened, I'd figure something out, or die. Generally speaking, "what we think is unbearable proves to be bearable."

"figure something out, or die"

The Republican party salutes you, you speak their disgusting and morally bereft "truth" with extreme accuracy.

You left out a very important contraction from that quote, namely "I'd". The subject of the sentence changes its meaning entirely. As you quoted, it reads as an imperative, something I did not say.

Fair, I upvoted you because that's a wrong interpretation of what you said.

I'm not defending the idiotic system that is US healthcare, but you can opt in to COBRA until you find something else. 2 main disadvantages are that it is time bound (i think max 12 months) and it is expensive, you have to pay both the employer contribution and your own.

Which makes me quite happy to just be in Germany. I will get all the required equipment to treat my diabetes, even if I lose my job. The insurance I have is going to be quite a lot cheaper when I have a lower income. I very much like the safety it provides and sadly it means I have to give my talent to the European markets.

Insurance won't cover everything... Sometimes there'll be an experimental thing that the insurance doesn't cover.

I tried this, when I lived in the US, even though it was a planned test nobody could give me a quote on what it would cost.

I had great insurance that covered everything. People next to me in the waiting room was paying extra fees to rent the facilities and stuff... Yet, even for a planned procedure neither my doctor or my insurance company would give me a quote or promise that the procedure was covered.

You can't know what the bill will be even for a planned procedure. Even if you ask 3-5 different entities multiple times.

For comparison, for your proportion of NHS costs to approach the lower end of that in the UK, you need to earn 2x-3x the national average salary. At $66k, in 2012, your and your employers contributions to the NHS over tax were around $300/month combined.

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