In fact I know a retired guy who moved to Maui, and then moved back. The principal reason was the saying they have, "If you have a pain, get on a plane."

You might get served in Honolulu. Quite often you're flying to the mainland, though.

That said, living right in the city isn't necessary at all. The 'burbs have almost every facility you could want.

I lived in Maui for a year and it was always in the back of my mind that my link to civilization was basically one road. And my apartment was just north of Lahaina.

That said I watched my dad die of cancer and let's just say he would have been better off chillin' on a beach or a balcony staring out into the ocean.

The doctors couldn't really do anything other than misdiagnose him and then put him on meds way too late.

I'd pick quality of life over fear of a potential medical issue.

I told this guy I had rotator cuff surgery. One week wait for an MRI, and three for the surgery.

He said the MRI would have been a 4-week wait in Hawaii.

But it's a choice, for sure. There are lots of medical time wasters that are not life-threatening.

It almost makes retiring to Southeast Asia reasonable. Yes, you don’t get Medicare, but then paying out of pocket reasonable prices for medical services means you aren’t eating for anything either, plus you get the beach and affordable everything else living. As long as you don’t get cancer.

> you aren’t eating for anything either

?? might be a typo but I don't know for what

Agreed. My family lives on an island, though not in HI. We've had to do the medivac on one occasion. Yeah it was a bit unnerving and a major pain in the ass but we're still here a few years later.

I'd much rather optimize for the happy days than the shitty ones.

For people aging and not in the best of health, declining vision/response times makes driving riskier, and there is often a preference for homes without stairs as well, which might very well be a condo with an elevator. Then there’s also common area maintenance in condos vs. the manual labor of lawn care, pool care, etc.

Palo Alto is suburbs. It is also home to the best medical care in the world...

Better than Rochester, MN?