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Originally Posted by moosenose
Well, I do know that Cubans do routinely flee their home country on rickety boats and inner tubes. Haven't heard a whole lot about Americans doing that, unless you count the so-called "Americans" who supposedly fled to Canada after the 2004 election...
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Do you have any information regarding the quality of life of the average cuban citizen?
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Isn't that in their Constitution?
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You've read it? By all means don't be afraid to post a link.
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I've known a fair number of lower middle class people who had health problems, and didn't end up destitute. An example of this is a friend's father, who had quadruple heart bypass surgery. He's fine, and they're not broke. Of course, they didn't go to college, maybe that's why they're OK.
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This evidence isn't quite as anectdotal as you may prefer, but...
http://www.soundmedicine.iu.edu/segment.php4?seg=460
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Healthcare & Bankruptcy
Air date: March 27, 2005
Hosts: Barbara Lewis, David Crabb, MD
Interview: Stephen Jay, MD
Chair, Department of Public Health
Indiana University School of Medicine
A few weeks ago, a Harvard study found that more than half of all personal bankruptcies in the US were the result of unpaid medical bills and illness. And since 1981, there’s been a 2200% increase in medical bankruptcies.
Plus, a recent poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation and Harvard School of Public Health found that 63% of respondents said the high cost of healthcare and insurance should be one of the top priorities for the president and congress.
Those studies have got people talking about one of the defining issues of our time: how to pay for healthcare. We speak with Stephen Jay, MD, chair of the department of public health at the IU School of Medicine. Dr. Jay has been immersed in this topic for years.
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Here's the actual study:
http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi...haff.w5.63/DC1
It's kind of long, and i don't want to waste space with actual scientific information that could otherwise be filled with knee-jerk nationalism so i'll just post the first part:
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ABSTRACT:
In 2001, 1.458 million American families filed for bankruptcy. To investigate medical contributors to bankruptcy, we surveyed 1,771 personal bankruptcy filers in five federal courts and subsequently completed in-depth interviews with 931 of them. About half cited medical causes, which indicates that 1.9–2.2 million Americans (filers plus dependents) experienced medical bankruptcy. Among those whose illnesses led to bankruptcy, out-of-pocket costs averaged $11,854 since the start of illness; 75.7 percent had insurance at the onset of illness. Medical debtors were 42 percent more likely than other debtors to experience lapses in coverage. Even middle-class insured families often fall prey to financial catastrophe when sick.
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