Cost of a Snake Bite....

Streamer · 2019-09-05T13:04:05.000Z

Off topic I know. But…WoW ! Dig Deep.

NPR

Summer Bummer: A Young Camper's $142,938 Snakebite

The snake struck a 9-year-old hiker at dusk on a nature trail in Illinois. Expensive antivenin and a helicopter ride to the hospital led to big bills that struck her parents a few weeks later.

HONDARIDER · 2019-09-05T15:02:50.000Z

Frustrates me because our government allows them to take advantage of us all. There should be a limit on mark up and it should be kept at a certain percentage. That’s why insurance premiums are the way they are. This is the biggest scam in the world. I feel its borderline criminal.

Someone should come up with a non-profit health insurance company. That would be pretty difficult but possible. At the end of that fiscal year any money left over (For the calendar year) gets distributed back to the customers. Rates would have to fluxuate monthly based on usage. Sounds great. Someone would be a superstar for doing something like that. May even be worth a very large salary if it worked out well.

bmengineer · 2019-09-05T15:07:25.000Z

HONDARIDER:

Someone should come up with a non-profit health insurance company.

So you mean like most countries in Europe and Canada do with centralized health care?

sb56637 · 2019-09-05T15:07:30.000Z

Please be careful to strictly avoid the political side of this topic.

Yourrid · 2019-09-05T15:09:21.000Z

If American’s would stop suiting every single person they come in contact with, our medicine would be much cheaper! The same medicine in Mexico is exponentially cheaper because doctors and companies know the likelihood of a frivolous lawsuit is extremely low.

My wife is a Veterinarian. Every doctor at the clinic gets multiple threats a week from upset owners that they are going to sue. So the clinic has MASSIVE (and expensive) insurance policies in place to guard them from these lawsuits.

Get rid of frivolous lawsuits and government subsidies and the prices will go down (and probably a law on price markups). My 2 cents

sb56637 · 2019-09-05T15:09:43.000Z

sb56637:

Please be careful to strictly avoid the political side of this topic.

Please be careful to strictly avoid the political side of this topic.

HONDARIDER · 2019-09-05T15:24:36.000Z

bmengineer:

HONDARIDER:

Someone should come up with a non-profit health insurance company.

So you mean like most countries in Europe and Canada do with centralized health care?

Was just thinking if we could manage our own health care as a group in which profit was not the main concern then health care could be better and more affordable. Monthly cost should be maybe 10% (Buffer) more than salaries and medical cost accrued for the previous month. basically we pay for what is used. Then at the end of the year what is left over of that 10% if it was not use goes back to the customers. In theory it sounds easy but I could see where it would be hard to manage.

xevious · 2019-09-05T15:27:33.000Z

Wow, I had missed this NPR spotlight. Incredible, the markup that hospital caused. I know the US has some really complicated health care system struggles right now, but in the interim there needs to be some kind of policy to prevent such piracy. There was absolutely no good reason to overcharge like this.

It does provoke something interesting though. For anyone that is outdoors a lot in areas where there may be pit vipers or other venomous snakes, might be worthwhile to track down the most “cost friendly” sources for anti-venom in your area so that if there’s a choice on where to source it, you don’t get fleeced like this.

texas_shooter · 2019-09-05T15:50:48.000Z

There are issues on both sides here. Better left to another forum. And then just to stir to pot a bit tort reform. Non-profit with a multi million dollar law suit isn’t non-profit. I spend a lot of time as a bailiff now some civil trials while more than warranted would wipe out a company. Then insurance reform Premiums can be really high and out of reach for some. Then universal health care but I’m also at the county hospital a lot and they are the provider to those who can’t pay. Lots of long lines and many people who don’t really need anything but company. All the free food and attention, driving up cost. Then we need Mental health care improvements so homeless quit camping out at the county hospitals or shooting up and defecating in the streets. We need mental health reform, too many people just taking pills. We need drug reforms, too many pills. We need a plan to cover micro-plastic contamination affecting everyone’s health. We need action to stop the century old issue of lower testosterone. Men now enjoy wider hips and small arms. We needs a ban on plant base protein substitutes that have high estrogen levels so some one would grow a pair and fix the world for us.

This thread should probably be locked, banned, burned and deleted.

Streamer I like most of your stuff so keep them coming.

By the way insurance companies and hospitals have teams of Lawyers to negotiate what they pay to who charges them. It’s often pennies on the dollar, we generally don’t have those resources. This forces consumers into collectives (insurance companies, government, big brother) that dictate what you can and can’t do or have.

xevious · 2019-09-05T15:54:20.000Z

I don’t think there was a need to steer further down the path of contention. I tried to bring the topic back on form… mainly, the awareness about the severe costs of snake bite treatments. Given that there are outdoors folks on this forum, I would think it’s important info for people to know. It’s not just the fear of injury and pain from the snake bite, but the outrageous costs they may endure in treatment.

scintillator · 2019-09-05T15:56:00.000Z

For anyone that is outdoors a lot in areas where there may be pit vipers or other venomous snakes,
it might be prudent to wear shoes and socks.

xevious · 2019-09-05T16:00:00.000Z

scintillator:

For anyone that is outdoors a lot in areas where there may be pit vipers or other venomous snakes,
it might be prudent to wear shoes and socks.

Absolutely. That is an important point, that in this case the girl was wearing sandals. Very irresponsible of her parents.

siata94 · 2019-09-05T16:05:40.000Z

I mountain bike and see rattlers quite frequently… a local rider posted his hospital bills after a rattlesnake bite… $180K.

One time down a twisty trail, I turned the corner and my 4’ wide path was covered by a rattler sunbathing. Somehow
I landed flat to the left, my bike on the right of it and it slithered toward my bike, I’d landed on its tail end side by chance.

G0OSE · 2019-09-05T16:44:50.000Z

All countries get ripped off for drugs, different countries, different drugs.
At the end of the day the drug companies have us all by the danglers, and they all work together to fix the prices worldwide, fact - that said, if they didn’t make the money they wouldn’t bother researching cures for stuff.

xevious:

scintillator:

For anyone that is outdoors a lot in areas where there may be pit vipers or other venomous snakes,
it might be prudent to wear shoes and socks.

Absolutely. That is an important point, that in this case the girl was wearing sandals. Very irresponsible of her parents.

I don’t think she was with her parents , she was at summer camp.

Letting kids hike in flip flops where there are possibly vipers is never a good idea I’d imagine. Even without vipers I’d have recommended hiking boots.
Maybe the insurance people should sue the summer camp for their incompetence in letting her go out in the first place. Sure, she may not have brought them, it happens, but they shouldn’t have let her go out with flip flops!

Scallywag · 2019-09-05T17:23:13.000Z

I don’t personally know anyone who hasn’t at least taken a risk with their health due to financial considerations - waiting longer before seeing a doctor or foregoing it altogether because it might get better on its own and the expenses are too great.

I have very strong feelings about the systems that create that situation, and for that reason I can’t comment further without things getting political faster than my D4 heats up with the Luxeon Vs.

Streamer · 2019-09-05T18:30:43.000Z

OK… Didn’t think this thread would turn out to be so volatile. I only posted it to see if others had any Monetary input NOT Political input on the cost of anit-venoms. And I did post it in the off topic chatter forum.

I just couldn’t believe the NPR referencing I was seeing and the supplemental data on the sourcing of anti-venoms.

No more to see here. Move along…