Sicko (Special Edition)
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Movie Reviews of Sicko (Special Edition)
Movie Review: Scared Sickless
Summary: 5 Stars
No matter what people may think of Michael Moore, they will be hard-pressed to counter his film "Sicko" with one of a contrarian view. I suppose "Sickohype" or Sickohypo" or "Let'em all Die" just doesn't have the same resonance as "Fahrenhype" did to challenge his previous film.
Perhaps as landmark as Jacob Riis's "How the Other Half Lives," "Sicko" brings the devastating cost and state of health care in this country to light beginning with people who have lived the American dream and expected to live their retirement independently and in comfort. Early on, Moore shows a working couple forced to sell their home to meet medical obligations not covered, and now depend on the charity of their children. Moore carefully singles out several cases of the twenty-five thousand emails he received that reveal the appalling state of health care in a country that nurtures that dream. (None of the stories or emails are about couples in separate bathtubs looking out over a vineyard).
First are the insurance companies that are out to make a profit. (Nothing's wrong with that). However, the profit is at the expense of the medical coverage and preventative care they can deny. If they cannot deny it outright or claim such care is experimental, they will pour through a patient's medical history to see if any condition occurred that was not mentioned or remembered in the application process. This will give the company the means to deny all claims retroactively. Incidentally, doctors receive bonuses for the most claims they can deny!
The next spotlight is on the pharmaceutical companies which are so expensive that many people must continue working well beyond their retirement years, years they should be enjoying, years when there is the greatest need for medication. In particular, Moore singles out the very new and complicated prescription plan, which is more expensive for seniors than ever before, but benefits the pharmaceuticals. (Thank you, Mr. Bush).
Besides our illustrious president benefitting from the contributions of pharmaceuticals, Moore identifies a host of other republicans who have had their hands in drug company pockets--including the lady who was going to provide universal health care in the first place--Hillary Clinton whose plan the drug companies spent $100,000,000 to defeat. Fourteen staffers who worked on the Seniors' Prescription bill, moved on to lucrative lobby positions with the same companies, and Billy Tauzin was hired as CEO for Pharma at $2,000,000 a year. In any other milieu, that is called bribery, corruption, and conflict of interest. In Congress, it's called the cost of doing business.
But what gives Americans a strong sense of pride is our belief that our medical system and healthcare, while flawed, is the finest in the world. Moore is quick to write "denied" all over that fantasy. We see in Canada, Great Britain, and France, how people receive first rate health care, from first rate physicians without having to sell their homes, decide which finger they can afford to save, and have a higher life expectancy than Americans. (Doctors in Britain are actually paid more for getting people into better health habits and regimens).
Misnamed socialized medicine by its detractors, socialized insurance works in these countries efficiently without people crowding in waiting rooms, being taxed to death (as the health companies would have us believe), or dying because they cannot afford the medication, or because the insurance company denied their claim. Moore implies that paying higher taxes makes more sense than losing your homes or retirement to catastrophic illness in what is now the leading cause of bankruptcy in the country.
Moore's direction is flawless. His graphics and humor are engaging; dry and deprecating. This is a film that may make you well-up with tears that a society could take such good care of its companies and business, and dump its destitute on the street. Moore succeeds in making you feel empathy for those who are poorly treated or not at all. He is able to make you think: "Can that happen to me?" or "If it can work there, why can't it work here?"
The special edition also offers more in-depth discussion of health care that could not be put in the original film. This includes conversations with people on the street, HR 636 brought before the house, Norway which has the highest standard of health care in the world. (Yes, it is free). Sadly it also shows some of the people from the film whose family members died for lack of treatment, or because they were turned away.
The final irony of the film is one of the more poignant. The man who runs the most virulent anti-Michael Moore website announced that he would have to shut down because he couldn't afford the hospital care his wife so desperately needed.
Guess what Moore did.
God bless us everyone.
Movie Review: One burning question in the USA
Summary: 5 Stars
This political documentary is a manifesto against private medical care in the US and for universal free health care, what some have called socialized medicine. Michael Moore thus compares the US system based on the full exclusion of 50 millions Americans from health care and the partial exclusion of million more under the title of denial, the denial of one particular treatment to specific Americans by their own private insurance companies, a denial that can go as far as a full rejection of the client by the insurance company and the cancellation of their contracts and all benefits. To make his point he follows the cases of quite a few people in the US who suffered these "ailments" or "ills" of the US health system. Some people dying because of these denials, even infants, some people living in total discomfort, poverty, dependence even, because of the bills that ate up their homes, savings, and all other amenities they may have had before getting sick. Then he compares with the systems in four countries: Canada, Great Britain, France and Cuba. All of them have a globally free universal system where only some marginal costs are charged, at most. The verdict is obvious. To emphasize the Cuban episode he compares with the care the prisoners in Guantanamo get (free top notch medical care) and the care some rescue workers at Ground Zero after the 9/11 attacks get in the US, and the care they managed to get, for free in Havana from Cuban doctors. The verdict once again does not stand the slightest possibility to appeal. This film though has a shortcoming. He notes the flat rate of a prescription in England (about ten dollars) but does not wonder why it exists. He speaks of a 100% free medical care in France and neglects some side charges. He is probably right with Canada and Great Britain, and definitely with Cuba, when speaking of a state system. But he is under a wrong impression as for France where the health system is not paid by the state but by contributions paid by working people on their salaries and this money is used to reimburse the medical expenses of people up to a certain point and managed by elected councilors representing the workers and employers equally and chosen by their electors on union lists from the trade unions or the employers' unions. The state only intervenes for the people who do not work through subsidies or contributions to the "social security authority" to compensate for the contributions these people do not pay. And what's more about 30% of medical expenses are covered by cooperative, or private, insurances that everyone is supposed, if so is their choice, to get and to whom they pay premiums that are at times higher than the basic contributions. It is a complex system. But Michael Moore does not explore the easy abuse these systems are the victims of from some people who are inconsiderate in overusing medical assistance or care. In England they introduced a flat payment per prescription to encourage economy on drugs. In France a small part of doctors' fees and prescriptions is not covered at all, even by the cooperative or private complementary insurance companies, by decision of the state in an attempt to curb down expenses and particularly abusive expenses. For instance in France brand name drugs that have an equivalent generic, and cheaper, version on the market are only reimbursed on the basis of this generic drug's price. But altogether Michael Moore's discourse is true and right, when we keep in mind that we have to think of the people who always try to get undue or abusive advantage of a generous system, and that we have to consider being economical with drugs and treatment because it is also a syndrome of our advanced stressful societies that many people, and at times those who are least stressed, look for some medical care when none is needed and they use a lot of time of doctors, nurses and other medical personnel for no reason at all except getting some attention. Finally let's keep in mind too that any system, private or public produces a bureaucracy and then a wasteful exploitation of an economic niche in society. This is an important shortcoming of the film: how much money is wasted by private insurance companies in the US to employ people, at times highly paid people, just to deny services to clients, and patients, and how much money is wasted on law suits by clients who are dissatisfied or on damages paid by the insurance companies when they lose these lawsuits? That would vastly account for the denial procedure that has to bring in a profit after paying for the expenses it incurs, money that could be used paying for hospital bills or doctors' fees.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris Dauphine, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne & University Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines
Movie Review: Insurance Cos. and Amzon.com lackeys are sicko of Sicko - but YOU won't be
Summary: 5 Stars
Once again, Michael Moore exhibits his unique ability to make documentaries palatable to entertainment-addicted Americans. We will take our medicine, but it better be concealed by attractive coloring agents, laced with artificial sweeteners, and packaged in attractive bright containers. We have an almost instinctive reaction to receiving too much factual information at one sitting, perhaps developed back in third grade when nodding off to those tortuous flickering filmstrips (some of which Moore magically resuscitates to humorously illustrate various inconvenient truths...a strange and fitting revenge). Moore counters this effectively with an ever-changing admixture of anecdotal personal interviews and interactions, interviews with and opinions from a wide array of experts and dullards (often leaving it up to his audience to decide which is which), strategic use of seldom-seen pictures and films, music, factual narratives, and those controversial and often maligned shock interviews (which accomplish what I believe is their chief purpose of keeping the viewer's attention on the subject matter).
Moore knows that it is extremely easy to come up with a litany of facts that Americans are unfamiliar with. Anyone can do it. Our corporate media spoonfeeds the brainwashed masses with nearly fact-free drivel, making it easy for any movie maker to come up with facts and statistics that even the more educated and better informed amongst American audiences are unaware of. The secret of success is the method of delivery. Hence, the much deserved success of Mr. Moore.
Moore cruelly allows the enemies of universal healthcare to speak for themselves, without the assistance of their mainstream media protectors whose job it is to edit, "interpret", interject, and shield them from serious inquiry and rebuttal. Thus, we have raw Ronald Reagan hilariously and moronically explaining his universal-healthcare-as-slippery-slope-into-communist-dictatorship theory for suckers, Tricky Dick and henchman Erlichman endorsing the HMO concept of providing less healthcare for more money, the attack of the corporate clones on Hillary Clinton's attempt to give all Americans access to healthcare, Congressman Billy Tauzin using his momma to shill for insurance and pharmaceutical companies, and then becoming a lobbyist for Big Pharma to make it official....and much more with Moore's calm, dry, lackadaisical, understating commentary throughout captioning the absurdity unfolding before the viewer.
The interviews with people actually experiencing universal healthcare in Canada, England, France, and Cuba provide the most direct and devastating refutation of the lies and propaganda against it from a variety of pro-insurance company shills. Try sitting in a waiting room full of American HMO victims and compare their responses to those of the patients in Moore's film. Or, for the ultimate refutation, try, if you dare, the same thing in an American healthcare detention center's emergency room, the facility where those who committed the egregious crime of having no insurance are sentenced to.
It is hilarious to watch the corporate lackeys on Fox experiencing on-air hysterical fluster frustration fits totally devoid of any substantive rebuttals whatsoever. I especially liked the scene in one of the DVD extras with Sean Hannity on-air where his female co-lackey nearly passes out from a massive shill-swoon hysterical episode while attacking universal healthcare, Michael Moore, and "Sicko", reason enough to watch the DVD. The DVD is a different reality than the theatrical movie, since it contains extra scenes that aren't extras at all. Unlike most extras on DVDs, which usually range from supplemental to total wastes of time, the extra selections on the DVD are actually essential parts of the movie, and you haven't seen "Sicko" if you haven't seen them.
Perhaps the most damaging single fact to emerge from the film is the disclosure, almost made in passing so you may miss it the first time, that approximately 18,000 uninsured Americans die each year from not having healthcare. If true, this is arguably prosecutable genocide against the poor. What we then have is a genuine, albeit much more inconspicuous and lower-scale, Holocaust - the use of a vast corporate "healthcare" system as a means of extermination of a particular class of people, the very definition of genocide, especially when the main method used, neglect, is one the most common tools used to commit genocide. So, why go to Darfur to seek out genocide when you may have to travel just one city block to find it?
Whether or not it is Moore's best film, it is the best film on the criminal travesty that is America's failed healthcare system.
Movie Review: Don't Get sick in America!!!
Summary: 5 Stars
I just had the opportunity to watch Micheal Moore's Sicko. I had heard about the movie when it first came out, but didn't have the opportunity to purchase until a few days ago. I bought it from Amazon.Com and it came within three days.
My doctor had been asking me over the past several months if I had seen it, and I told him, "no."
After watching the movie; now I know the reason that major insurance companies and Pharmaceutical companies didn't want anyone to see this movie. Hence the title "Don't get sick in America" is more than appropriate. We as the one of the wealthiest if not the wealthiest country in all of the western world should have a health care system far better than Canada, the UK, France and Germany as well as other countries. I was simply amazed with the reception that American citizens received in Cuba. A communist country that didn't seem to be communist at all. Free health care for the men and women Micheal Moore brought to Cuba, mainly to try to get medical treatment for the 9/11 rescue workers that were not getting the medical benefits that they should have been getting at home, only to receive proper medical treatment in a country where they were not citizens. I commend Micheal Moore for exposing the Insurance companies, and the HMO's for the greedy companies that they are. Finding almost any reason to deny them the medical treatment that they needed, and in some cases died because of the lack of treatment, and disrespect for those who paid into the insurance companies, and still denied coverage that they didn't want to pay. There was nothing "experimental" about some of the treatment options, but rather that the Insurance company did not want to pay for the treatment that was needed.
I was deeply saddened when a child died from a high fever because the Insurance company whom her mother was covered under denied her the treatment that could have save her life. So in essence Kaiser is guilty of negligent homicide, but no one will ever be charged for the child's death. Only in America could this happen.
I was appalled that men and women were dropped off on skid row in LA because they were not able to pay for treatment. This is not the America I grew up in, and it is not the America that I want to live in. Micheal asked the right questions: If Canada, the UK, France and other countries can have a Universal Health Care System, then why not America? There isn't anything Social about Universal Health Care, but big Insurance companies and some in Congress and even past presidents have said that Universal Health Care is Socialism. So be it! At least all Americans will receive the same level of treatment that our elected officials receive, but their greed gets in the way of sound judgment, and they cave in to the demands of big insurance and big pharma, and line their corrupt pockets with their tainted money. Lives that could have been saved were lost at the hands of greedy CEO's whose job it was to keep the cost of health care down, and make it more profitable for them, at the expense of the most needy in America. It is because of this greed and corruption that our health care system is in shambles, and a shame as well. I wonder what Canada, the UK, and France, and Cuba really think about America and the way our citizens are treated.
So, the title for this entry is quite on the mark: Don't get sick in America! If you do, and you have health insurance your carrier just might tell you that the treatment you need is "experimental" and deny you the coverage and treatment that you need that could possibly save your life. All the claims that were denied were frivolous at best, a common Yeast infection is not a real cause to deny someone treatment for a medical condition. The truth is the carrier did not want to pay for her treatment plain and simple.
So in closing all I can say to those who control the health care system in America: "I hope with all that is within me, that this will come around, and you are DENIED the treatment that you have denied so many others, all for the sake of saving a buck." I hope all of you who work for insurance companies who constantly deny claims so you can earn more money all get sick and die, for you so richly deserve it! You know, it is true that what goes around eventually comes around. So be careful of whom you deny treatment, it just might bounce off them and stick to you!
May you all walk in dung forever!!!
Movie Review: Fascinating but beware....
Summary: 5 Stars
I am a physician, living in the USA but originally from the United Kingdom. I have much to say about this documentary which I saw last night but I will not divulge into political bashing in public (just yet...) To start, I have to say I have not been so passionately shaken, moved, broken-down and reinvogorated (all these feelings!) as a doctor since I first dreamt of the idea of becoming one, and even then, I was too young to experience the feelings I went through watching this.
Now I am not here to discuss Michael Moore as a person, nor will I discuss what I think of particular aspects of the American Health Care System overall, since it has both advantages and disadvantages like any other system today, regardless of how severe or imbalanced these may be. What I wish to discuss is my experience watching the documentary and I will say that I had always thought Michael Moore's films represent the "other extreme", if you like, and you should watch with caution. I can safely say today though, that in this particular instance, facts are facts and whether portrayed by Michael Moore or any other person, the problems discussed are real. Every person needs to be aware of them, if only to know them and be aware of their existence, even if one agrees with the system or disagress and chooses to do nothing about it.
There were many valid points raised in the film and these truthfully represent the foundation of this powerful documentary. In addition, Michael Moore proved to have done a nice thing at the end of the film and just for that little gesture, I like him better for this (I never hated him mind you).
A note of caution however, and I wish Michael expanded on that a little and here is what I mean by watch carefully and make your mind up after learning as much of the truth there since this is another extreme. When in Britain, he interviewed a GP (general practitioner or family doctor) who so happened to have reaped the benefits of the health system from the government there. GP's have made the most out of the British government in wages, working hours, incentives and much more, which they may well have deserved. However, this is not the truth of what a hospital doctor's life out there is like. It is somehow less rosey, with doctors being harder worked, with few incentives and unfortunately, easily replaced in a socialist system which cannot afford its own doctors who help maintain the standard of care, despite not being overpaid (and paid much less than the GP you saw yesterday). There have been many redundancies, including great surgeons and doctors who have been forced to seek employment abroad (and incidentally and not surprisingly were quickly taken on by other sensible health care systems). Waiting lists have been the main target for the government, and their reduction has only come at a cost in standard of care delivered to the patients. In reducing these lists, there was no finicial gain. However, political gain was and is huge, and may be even worse than overt financial benefit since patients are decevied of this using political 'spin' and propaganda.
The French system is also truly the best health care system, but clearly France cannot afford what it has been providing to its population and hence the reason for the uprise of riots and strikes that have paralyzed the nation when the government realised that and attempted to cut into a portion of the generous pension schemes offered.
All systems have disadvantages, but yes, you would not be left to suffer as an emergency in the street in Britain or France, and yes that may be more important than any other aspect of health care. That, you can decide.
Regardless, I was immensely moved and most importantly reinvigorated in a new passion to help the sick and do all I can for individuals who need my help. Helpless and desperate individuals as I stand upon them with the solution, cure and knowledge in my own two hands. Nothing will stop ME from delivering the cure. I would give my life as quickly as I would the drugs to help these individuals, such was my sorrow for them. That I have re-sworn to do after watching this and if for reminding me of that alone.... I give this documentary a 5/5.
My comments on health insurance companies is not needed, I can leave that to your imagination.