I Could End the Deficit

[rmorse]

There's this thing I keep seeing commercials for - (Something)Cure - that cures skin cancer. It's targeted radiation they concentrate on the cancer spot that kills it with no cutting or scarring. And they use the word "cure" several times. So if they can cure skin cancer, why can't this same technique cure other cancers? Or is it just another bullshit scammer trying to part cancer patients from their money?

That’s because all types of cancer aren’t the same just because they’re cancer. Some cancers react better to radiation than others.

A lot of people seem to think cancer is cancer and its name a certain way due to its location. I thought the same before I got hit with cancer (I’ve had 3 different types now, all before I was 30 lmao). Take Lance Armstrong for example. He had testicular cancer and it spread to his brain and lungs. That doesn’t mean he has testicular, brain and lung cancer. It means he has testicular cancer. Testicular cancer responds really well to radiation and chemo; brain and lung cancer don’t respond as well. Some skin cancer responds really well to radiation. Some skin cancer is slow spreading and you can knock it put with just a mohs surgery.

Side note (and probably why I’ve been hit three times so far) - everyone has their own natural defenses against cancer. If you’ve had cancer before, you’re more susceptible to a different unrelated type of cancer than someone who has never had cancer before because your defenses aren’t as good.

 

[vraiblonde]

That’s because all types of cancer aren’t the same just because they’re cancer. Some cancers react better to radiation than others.

A lot of people seem to think cancer is cancer and its name a certain way due to its location. I thought the same before I got hit with cancer (I’ve had 3 different types now, all before I was 30 lmao). Take Lance Armstrong for example. He had testicular cancer and it spread to his brain and lungs. That doesn’t mean he has testicular, brain and lung cancer. It means he has testicular cancer. Testicular cancer responds really well to radiation and chemo; brain and lung cancer don’t respond as well. Some skin cancer responds really well to radiation. Some skin cancer is slow spreading and you can knock it put with just a mohs surgery.

Side note (and probably why I’ve been hit three times so far) - everyone has their own natural defenses against cancer. If you’ve had cancer before, you’re more susceptible to a different unrelated type of cancer than someone who has never had cancer before because your defenses aren’t as good.

Thanks!

I didn't want to hit the Like button because while this is good information I'm sorry you're going through that.

 

[rmorse]

Thanks!

I didn't want to hit the Like button because while this is good information I'm sorry you're going through that.

Haha it’s all good. I’m still relatively young (late 30s) and in good shape. All the cancers I got hit with have been easy to beat, knock on wood. I keep getting skin cancer popping up every year but that just means mohs procedures and the occasional skin graft. Nothing terrible tbh. Could be waaaaaay worse.

 

[phreddyp]

I did well enough by going to an investment expert that if there were no social security, I'd still be okay. Certainly not flush; not traveling, but thanks to that investment, my 5-year old truck is paid for, my mortgage is $1,100 a month (half the rent of the house across the street), and with just my utilities, but I'm doing okay.

Having said that, if they eliminated SS, I'd be pissed. I've been paying into that since 1972, and I want at least that much out of it.

I believe you missed her point.

 

[PeoplesElbow]

You'll get no argument from me on that - it would still need to be phased in, for the tens of millions who DO NOT have an individual retirement account - and social security is IT. E.g. both of my sisters.

EVERY FREAKING TIME it gets proposed though, the roar goes up from the left and it gets shot down, because they are somehow attached to the idea that government GUARANTEES it - whereas an account based on the market is subject to loss. But for the fact that the stock market has ALWAYS been a good long term investment - even during downturns.

Several have proposed a kind of Thrift Savings Plan for all -as government employees have - funds where they can move and adjust as they pay into it - very easily. I am not sure why it got scuttled. I think there's something about scaling it up for the whole country, where it just doesn't work.

The brokers would lose a huge income stream if the government provided a retirement account with such low fees as the TSP. Pretty sure they are why this didnt happen.

 

[PeoplesElbow]

That’s because all types of cancer aren’t the same just because they’re cancer. Some cancers react better to radiation than others.

A lot of people seem to think cancer is cancer and its name a certain way due to its location. I thought the same before I got hit with cancer (I’ve had 3 different types now, all before I was 30 lmao). Take Lance Armstrong for example. He had testicular cancer and it spread to his brain and lungs. That doesn’t mean he has testicular, brain and lung cancer. It means he has testicular cancer. Testicular cancer responds really well to radiation and chemo; brain and lung cancer don’t respond as well. Some skin cancer responds really well to radiation. Some skin cancer is slow spreading and you can knock it put with just a mohs surgery.

Side note (and probably why I’ve been hit three times so far) - everyone has their own natural defenses against cancer. If you’ve had cancer before, you’re more susceptible to a different unrelated type of cancer than someone who has never had cancer before because your defenses aren’t as good.

Hard to improve on your explanation but possibly simply some.

Cancer is a cell mutation that makes the cell grow uncontrollably, the type of cell that is doing it and the type of mutation are also a determining factor in what can fight it.

Cells mutate naturally all the time but your body knows something is wrong and terminates those cells, its the tough ones that survive as cancer. THats part of what makes cancer so hard to cure, the mutated cell being tougher than the natural cell.

 

[Squiddie]

I’ve always wondered how it’s possible that pharmaceuticals CAN cost almost nothing - but medical TESTS and LAB WORK are astonishing. I GET how a doctor might bill insurance around 100 or so for a 15 minute visit - but we once were billed 500 for a similar consult with a specialist.

THIS is the reason we pay more for medical care than the rest of the world - AND we’re less healthy.

Pharmaceutical prices are largely dependent on the complexity and availability of the ingredients and the amount of competition in the market. The more specialized processes required to make the medication, the higher the cost is going to be. You can get 500 capsules of omeprazole for $30 because its simple to produce and dozens of manufacturers make it. Xarelto can cost upwards of $600 for 30 tablets because its made by one manufacturer.

Tests and lab work bills cost so much because you're mostly paying for the upkeep of the machines that store, scan, and analyze the samples. You're also paying for the sterile storage and safe transportation of them as well, but most of it is operating costs. Any of those machines can cost tens of thousands of dollars, if not more. These are specialty built precision machines designed for the sole purpose of complex chemical analysis, it's not like they're feeding a vial of blood to a scanner you can buy at Staples.

I don't agree with the pricetag, but that's the cost to keep that stuff running not on razor thin margins.

 

[vraiblonde]

Pharmaceutical prices are largely dependent on the complexity and availability of the ingredients and the amount of competition in the market.

You better tell Big Pharma that because they think they should price drugs based on what people will pay and how important the drug is toward saving a life.

People are more medicated now than ever in history, yet we are no healthier. Children are medicated to within an inch of their lives. Pharma freaking *advertises* their drugs on TV and encourages us to "ask our doctor". Well I didn't get a damn doctor so I can tell him what treatment I should have, I got him so he could tell *me*.

Our healthcare system is a ****ed up mess. Doctors and Pharma are in it for the money, not to make anyone healthy.

 

[Squiddie]

You better tell Big Pharma that because they think they should price drugs based on what people will pay and how important the drug is toward saving a life.

People are more medicated now than ever in history, yet we are no healthier. Children are medicated to within an inch of their lives. Pharma freaking *advertises* their drugs on TV and encourages us to "ask our doctor". Well I didn't get a damn doctor so I can tell him what treatment I should have, I got him so he could tell *me*.

Our healthcare system is a ****ed up mess. Doctors and Pharma are in it for the money, not to make anyone healthy.

The pursuit of profits and ethics are two things that do not work together. The moment you start trying to be ethical is the moment you get eaten alive in the pharmaceutical sector.

Both doctors and pharmaceutical companies are complicit in the gross over-medication of our population. We've reached a point where we have a medication for almost every symptom. The thing that happens when we reached that point is that doctors start to prescribe medication for side effects caused by medication. Your anti-seizure medications give you depression? Doctor gives you Zoloft. That Zoloft gives you ADHD-like symptoms? Doctor gives you Adderall. Repeat this cycle until you are on 9 different medications, with only one of them to treat the initial problem and the other 8 to mitigate side effects of the copious amount of drugs being put into your body.

People willingly accept it because we're trained to think that the doctors know everything and that they are always the final word. I can't tell you how many people I've met that are taking so many different medications at once that they forget what they're putting in their body. It's insanity.

It's been profits first, healthcare second for a very long time.

 

[vraiblonde]

The pursuit of profits and ethics are two things that do not work together. The moment you start trying to be ethical is the moment you get eaten alive in the pharmaceutical sector.

Both doctors and pharmaceutical companies are complicit in the gross over-medication of our population. We've reached a point where we have a medication for almost every symptom. The thing that happens when we reached that point is that doctors start to prescribe medication for side effects caused by medication. Your anti-seizure medications give you depression? Doctor gives you Zoloft. That Zoloft gives you ADHD-like symptoms? Doctor gives you Adderall. Repeat this cycle until you are on 9 different medications, with only one of them to treat the initial problem and the other 8 to mitigate side effects of the copious amount of drugs being put into your body.

People willingly accept it because we're trained to think that the doctors know everything and that they are always the final word. I can't tell you how many people I've met that are taking so many different medications at once that they forget what they're putting in their body. It's insanity.

It's been profits first, healthcare second for a very long time.

My loathing of the medical industrial complex is well known to anyone who reads my posts. Or knows me in person. Or has had to have me as a patient.