Jump in cancer diagnoses at 65 implies patients wait for Medicare: study

Re:Jump in cancer diagnoses at 65 implies patients wait for ... by vkou on Wednesday March 31, 2021 @11:35PM (#26656394)

The only countries of comparable size to the United States are in the developing world. That's a horrible bar for the richest country in the world to be trying to meet. If anything, it has the unique advantage of having unprecedented economies of scale among developed nations.

I keep harping on drug prices, because you keep mentioning R&D. R&D is not the reason for why non-drug healthcare is so expensive. There is no mechanism by which high R&D costs lead to high specialist/GP/nursing/administration costs. There's no way for, say, Pfizer to siphon money from any of that into R&D. R&D is not the reason for why these costs are so high.

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Re:Jump in cancer diagnoses at 65 implies patients wait for ... by bumby on Thursday April 01, 2021 @10:38AM (#26661011)

I’m only reiterating this because your responses make me think I’m not stating my central claim clearly enough: there is not “a reason” healthcare in the US is expensive. There are multiple, sometimes covariant reasons. Only one of those is drug prices. And if you don’t think pharmaceutical companies impact those other healthcare costs, you may not have a sound understanding of the healthcare system.

Related to your comment about the difficulties in comparison, you underscored my other point. People flippantly say “but look at country X’s costs” without understanding the nuances that make such comparisons worthless.

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