
Miami man who flew to China worried he might have COVID-19. He may owe thousands - smacktoward
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/health-care/article240476806.html
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DyslexicAtheist
~44 million people have no health insurance in the US, and another 38 million
have inadequate health insurance.

In China about 95% of the population has at least basic health insurance
coverage.

Zero doubt that the US will be hit the hardest from all the developed
countries. No amount of testing and prevention mechanism the CDC can come up
with, effective mitigation will depend on people seeking treatment and be
willing to go to a doctor even without symptoms.

I'm convinced that the only reason the US hasn't been hit as hard yet is that
they aren't testing on the same scale.

In other news on twitter people from Vietnam, Thailand are currently boasting
that the number of /their/ infected is tiny compared to South Korea - SK just
tests on a massive scale. Not testing and educating people keeps your numbers
low but you'll lose in the long run.

edit: I didn't include sources, my numbers are from the top google search
results, wikipedia etc.

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jiveturkey
> “How can they expect normal citizens to contribute to eliminating the
> potential risk of person-to-person spread if hospitals are waiting to charge
> us $3.,270 for a simple blood test and a nasal swab?” he said.

Hospitals are expensive to run. You shouldn't go to the hospital for a simple
blood test and a nasal swab (even if you have platinum insurance). In this
particular case, the patient already knew he couldn't afford it, and he should
have gone to urgent care instead.

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krsdcbl
As a EU resident, this is still mind boggling to me how in a developed,
democratic country in 2020 you'd be personally charged at all for tests like
these with a possible pandemic on the doorstep, let alone hundreds or
thousands ...

~~~
foxyv
Heaven forbid such a pandemic hit the United States, but it may be the thing
that kicks us in the ass to get started on fixing our health care system.

