Tweet
Can you imagine buying 2 tires for 100 dollars each and the next week you decide to buy two more and find out they are 400 dollars each?
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/05/bu...kers.html?_r=0
So the taxpayers are on the hook for 420,000 dollars per year for Bruce Manne’s meds.
---------------------------------------------------
I recently had lunch with 2 Thai doctors, husband and wife. I scribbled these notes afterwards. He does knee and hip replacements. She is a radiologist. They both came from well-to-do families and chose to work as government doctors making less pay. “How much do doctors in the private sector make compared to you? Ten times as much?” I asked. “More than that, probably 20 times as much,” they answered. “Why does anyone work for the government?” I asked. “The government paid for us to train in the US for 3 years. We both were able to work for people who on the cutting edge in our fields, people who were truly mentors.” “So will you work for the government for you whole career?” “Who knows? If this were 10 or 20 years ago, I would say yes, but healthcare is changing so fast in Thailand nobody knows where it is going. Beautiful private hospitals are being built all around the country, but the prices to receive treatment is doubling and tripling every year or so. Healthcare policy is now completely controlled by the market and the business side of things. Elected officials are not thinking about the health of the citizenry as a whole. The poor voted for Thaksin in large part because of so-called “30 baht healthcare,” but the global market and the government are sabotaging it by cutting equipment, staffing, and doctor training. You’ve got all these rich foreigners coming here for services because even when the price goes up, it’s still cheaper than back in their home country. The real test in the next ten years will be drug prices. Drug prices in Asia are ready to soar. The complicated algorithms that set drug prices based on GDP and a host of other stats are going to be scrapped starting with the passage of the TPP. The big drug companies are all here in Thailand with their huge factories and prices are relatively cheap, but not for long. The number of people with access to drugs they need is falling. The percentage of their wages they have to spend to buy them is going way up.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/05/bu...kers.html?_r=0
So the taxpayers are on the hook for 420,000 dollars per year for Bruce Manne’s meds.
---------------------------------------------------
I recently had lunch with 2 Thai doctors, husband and wife. I scribbled these notes afterwards. He does knee and hip replacements. She is a radiologist. They both came from well-to-do families and chose to work as government doctors making less pay. “How much do doctors in the private sector make compared to you? Ten times as much?” I asked. “More than that, probably 20 times as much,” they answered. “Why does anyone work for the government?” I asked. “The government paid for us to train in the US for 3 years. We both were able to work for people who on the cutting edge in our fields, people who were truly mentors.” “So will you work for the government for you whole career?” “Who knows? If this were 10 or 20 years ago, I would say yes, but healthcare is changing so fast in Thailand nobody knows where it is going. Beautiful private hospitals are being built all around the country, but the prices to receive treatment is doubling and tripling every year or so. Healthcare policy is now completely controlled by the market and the business side of things. Elected officials are not thinking about the health of the citizenry as a whole. The poor voted for Thaksin in large part because of so-called “30 baht healthcare,” but the global market and the government are sabotaging it by cutting equipment, staffing, and doctor training. You’ve got all these rich foreigners coming here for services because even when the price goes up, it’s still cheaper than back in their home country. The real test in the next ten years will be drug prices. Drug prices in Asia are ready to soar. The complicated algorithms that set drug prices based on GDP and a host of other stats are going to be scrapped starting with the passage of the TPP. The big drug companies are all here in Thailand with their huge factories and prices are relatively cheap, but not for long. The number of people with access to drugs they need is falling. The percentage of their wages they have to spend to buy them is going way up.”
Comment