Here's an idea: Open up pharmaceutical drugs/health programs via NAFTA

Let's just say the Public Option doesn't go through (which I think it will).

The people who are for free trade at all costs and NAFTA in general should have to face the fact that pharmaceutical drugs should be able to be bought legally from either Canada or Mexico, where the prices are a fraction of what they are here in the United States. Likewise with the health programs that each country offers... if an American wants to shop around for a Canadian-style healthcare plan based in Canada, then that option should be available.

Big pharmas like AstraZeneca have locations in both Mexico and Canada. The SAME Crestor one can buy in either Mexico or Canada is IDENTICAL to the over-priced version in the United States.

You can buy international health insurance (usually done for travel) legally (like http://www.ihi.com/), so why not health insurance based on international markets? After all, we're told it's a global market now, so get over it.

You can always hear the media (especially Fox News) always piping up for free trade, so perhaps we could see some heads explode with this idea.

Let's open up the markets! Let's trade freely with our neighbors! That includes the ability to buy pharmaceutical drugs and health programs from either Mexico or Canada!

Why not?

Trust me on that one. Canadians traveling to the US get travel insurance for a reason. Their single-payer program lowers the costs in Canada ad set firm per fee billing schedules, but hospital visits still cost and arm and a leg in the States. Those medical plans wont cover the full cost of US medicine, at all.

As part of the whole "free trade" umbrella, if someone wanted the "international" version of Canadian health care that would be covered as part of a "product" traded through the NAFTA scenario (and since we're told it's a global market anyway), hospitals in the US would have to accept the international card presented to them when coverage is needed.

It could be akin to a Euro Pass in some way.

If you have the coverage through a Canadian healthcare coverage entity, it would cover you in Canada, the US and Mexico initially.

Even if that wasn't "possible" (aka politicians are too bought out to make the plan happen), being able to buy pharmaceutical drugs on an open market would certainly make the prices go down to compete.

"If you have the coverage through a Canadian healthcare coverage entity, it would cover you in Canada, the US and Mexico initially."

I have coverage through my BC MSP, and it covers me in the US and Mexico already. BUT, it will only cover up to certain amounts out of Canada. Why? Because the costs of procedures and general care is expensive outside of Canada. They have no bargaining power in the United States of America. They cannot negotiate low set fees per services. Its entirely out of their control. Single-payer allows them to cover people cheaply domestically, but it has no power internationally.

So what I am saying is if people could buy into it to use in the US, it would be paying out high fucking rates in the US still and needing high ass premiums to cover it. It wouldn't be single-payer anymore in that jurisdiction, and it would lose a huge amount of its ability to cut costs and cover people. It would be as useful as any low overhead, non-profit.

You can't milk the merits of a single-payer system and port it to a capitalistic wet dreamland.

I would fully expect that this would never happen... at least not the ability to buy a Canadian plan...

But it would be interesting hearing Free Traders say that we can't buy pharmaceutical drugs openly and freely from Canada or Mexico, which would sell them at a fraction of the cost in the US.

It is so modern day American capitalist.

Hey, it's free trading!

So, um... if free trading is so cool, then certainly all Americans should enjoy getting their drugs as cheaply as their electronics made in slave camps...