Thursday, September 08, 2005

Continuing about welfare systems

Okey, coffepot empty and not any necessary household chores to do. Actually I have, but this is much more fun than emptying the cat's litter box.


Health care system


Every man, woman and child living in Sweden have health insurance from the day they are born or, more accurate, start living in Sweden. I've read somewhere that Kanada has a similar system but I'm not sure.

This means that if you get sick, wether you're unemployed or not, you get 80 per cent of your normal salary or unemployment benefits. In some cases unions cover the remaining percentage up to full salary, depending on written agreements.

The mandatory health insurance is of course financed through taxes, another red blanket for the right-wingers. Also, companys have to pay for the first three weeks of a sickleave.

Basic rules:

You can stay sick at home for 7 days without any kind of doctor's certificate but after that you either have to get back to work or visit a doctor to get a certificate. The first day you don't get paid for, unless you fell sick at work.

No visit at any doctor or other medical personnel, like chiropractors, can cost more than 200 SEK (less than 20 USD). The only exception is plastic surgery without medical cause, ie. breast enlargement, nose jobs, face lifts and so forth. In those cases you have to pay for it all by yourself, unless you have an psyciatrist's certificate that the operation is necessary for your well being. That is very rare since they try to treat these patients minds first. Operations are the very last option.

Medicines are subsidised by the governement but can still cost pretty much. On the other hand, if you have to buy medicine for more than 1200 SEK (less than 120 USD) during a twelve month period, you get most life saving medicine for free in the next twelve month period.

For some medicines, so called lifestyle medicines like Viagra, there is still a debate wether or not these should be subsidised. I'm not quite sure but I believe that people with diabetes or who are partially paralyzed get it subsidised.


Now I realized that I've ben writing this all day, running back and forth between computer and kids who actually have the nerve to demand to demand food, change of diaper and things like that. There's a movie going on on the Tv and it seems like the kind I like. I think it's called "Medium". So... godnight for now and I'll continue tomorrow.

Over and out.

3 comments:

Maidy said...

The pharmaceutical companies run the US along with the oil companies. If we even tried to organize some kind of nationalised health care, the medical companies would lobby so hard against it, politicians would fear for their careers and bail out.

It sucks when the dollar means more than a life.

Virginia Gal said...

concur on maidink's comments - we have a very BAD health care system in America, sad for a modern nation.

Anonymous said...

Great blog I hope we can work to build a better health care system as we are in a major crisis and health insurance is a major aspect to many.