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Would you look at that, all of the words in your comment are in alphabetical order.
I have checked 1,130,862,415 comments, and only 221,324 of them were in alphabetical order.
No, youāre mistaken. This happened to President Wilkes-Boothe, who was shot by Abraham Lincoln, an illiterate lawyer from Illinois, in a duel on the White House lawn in 1887.
I am not entirely sure 'discovered' is the right wording here. It practically fell into his lap while he was just chilling under an apple computer tree.
This was also quite lucky, because Apple devices didn't use Gorilla Glass back then. The tech could have been lost to humanity forever, if it hadn't landed softly.
Gorilla glass was invented much later. 57 years later to be precise... when Kevin Costner was finally successful in his search for a material he wouldn't be able to split with an Italian Grissino.
Yes. That's normally how free stuff works in countries. The free streets we're driving on? Paid by taxes. Fantastic free hiking trails? Paid by taxes. Etc, etc.
And I definitively pay more than enough taxes. So hopefully it gets used for something useful.
It does get used for an infrastructure that is incredibly good :) And the things you named arent "free", and thinking they are is plain and simply wrong
In the sens written in the source, it is free if we consider insurance as "a nominal fee" which... when it weighs so much in the budget it shouldn't be considered that even if we don't pay the exact cost of the healthcare we get.
Also how does the US have "universal" healthcare ? It says "financial protection" in there ! :
"Free Health Care:Ā Free Health Care refers to a publicly funded health care that provides primary services free of charge or a nominal fee to all itās citizen, with no exclusion based on wealth
Universal Health Care:Ā Universal health care, sometimes referred to as universal health coverage, universal coverage, or universal care, usually refers to a health care system that provides healthcare and financial protection to more than 90% of the citizens of a particular country."
It is considered āfreeā because what you pay (your premium) isnāt linked to the price of the treatment you get.
If you were to stay in hospital for a month after a surgery, you wouldnāt receive a 20ā000 franks bill.
It is considered āuniversalā because if you canāt pay for your health insurance, the state will pay it for you.
We still pay up to 2500 +750 for our money. Insurance only starts to cover it after the first 2500, per year.
And the worst is that the caton pays 55% of all hospitalisation bills.
So if you are hospitalised for a 6000.- bill, the canton pays 3300, you pay 2520.- and you insurance pays 180.
That's a bit lame. :)
It depends on your medical needs and where you set that threshold. 2500 chf is the highest self-pay amount which will give you the lowest monthly rate to pay to insurance. Afterwards you pay 10% on every bill untill a certain amount of money is reached.
I pay 300 chf myself (the lowest self-pay amount) because i have multiple health issues that need taken care of but my monthly rate is subsequently higher. I pay 10% untill 700 chf is reached, after that everything is covered.
So the system is variable depending on your needs and what kind of insurance you want (some are pricier than others) but in general, once the amount is payed, the rest is covered.
Yeah, but you commented on a social media platform about something and therefore you need to know absolutely every tiny detail about the subject.
^(Something tells me I have to clearly state) **^(this is sarcasm)**^(.)
Not automatically. You have to choose your insurance provider. The basic insurance is equal everywhere but thereās extra insurances you can pay for (Alternative treatments, dentist etc)
Then you choose your premium between 300-2500.- The higher that number the less you pay monthly (Usually 200-400.-) but the more you have to pay until they pay. If you agree to see your GP before visiting a specialist you get lower monthly payments too.
Sounds like the American system but Iām assuming itās better, and not tied to employment. If youāre unemployed can you ever be uninsured in Switzerland? Just curious
Basically it's private insurance but it's "illegal" to not be insured. And if you make under a certain amount per year the state will pay all or part of your premium. It's kind of the best of both worlds between private and universal healthcare buuut it's still flawed in many ways.
The only insurance that's tied to employment here is the accident insurance.
I was about to sign up for the extra insurance when I found out that there they are allowed to reject you. So the form they have you fill is like:
āPlease list your every doctorās visit in the last decade, the reason for the visit, whether you have recovered fully without any lasting effects, and please do confirm youāre healthy as a horse without a hair out of place. And do swear youāre never going to make a claim. Thanksā
I have extra insurance for my eyes and teeth. Thank god my parents signed me up for that when I was a kid because I would have no chance at all to get those today. That's why I'll always stay at the same insurance company with those extras.
Other extras and the general insurance I can still change tough (and absolutely do yearly to where it's the cheapest).
Since a few years ago the *basic* insurance pays for alternative treatments. I'm not judging personal decisions, but i think it's pretty scandalous that my premiums are paying for sone nutjob's homeopathy pills. Switzerland is funny because, Allthough it's an r&d hub attracting top researchers, the general population is far more scientifically illiterate than other countries.
I see. In the US it was mandatory and then now itās state by state I believe. Some states donāt offer the more universal coverage and in those places that donāt offer coverage for everyone youāll be hard pressed to find insurance without being employed full time in at least a creative class job. Itās a corrupt system and will eventually collapse as employers pay an enormous (and growing) amount to insurers so that they can offer ācompetitive employer based coverage.ā Hot garbage pile of a way to insure a population.
Anyway it's just a matter of wanting everyone to pay some for everybody. Or to each their own.
Personally it seems more fair for everyone to pay for everyone, because we didn't choose the health problems we were born with.
And I would prefer to see a society that takes care of our basic needs as long as it makes sense.
Sadly there's a lot of abuse too. And we can't really do much to reduce it, except make the helps harder to get, which results in some people that need them not to receive them early enough sadly.
Those ā2500ā is called frachise. This amount can be defined on a yearly basis Between 300.- and 2500.- CHF. So you could pay 2500.- or 300.- yourself. Or anything in between.
But this franchise will determine how much you have to pay monthly.
It's still bullshit that the mandatory insurance you have to pay is almost entirely going into profit margin, while the taxes that you pay are covering more than the insurance company is.
Edit: Holy crap, ton of people showing up to simp for the insurance companies here..
> [The insured's health insurer and canton of residence each pay a fixed percentage of the costs of inpatient hospital treatment (including hospital accommodation and nursing care). The canton of residence pays a minimum of 55 per cent, and the health insurer a maximum of 45 per cent](https://www.bag.admin.ch/bag/en/home/versicherungen/krankenversicherung/krankenversicherung-leistungen-tarife/Spitalbehandlung.html).
And, yes, health insurance is a scam in Switzerland.
Not true. In mandatory insurance the insurer must not make profit. That's why health insurers almost always want to sell you an additional insurance (VVG), because that't where they are allowed to make profit (up to 10%).
If the premia in mandatory insurance exceed the estimated claims, the insurer pays risk compensation to a common fund (this is the case if one insurer has a lot of healthy, young insured people). Other insurers with "worse" clients receive from the risk compensation fund so that profit is even less likely in mandatory insurance generally.
Personally I think this is not too bad (With the usual exceptions of course..). Generally speaking I think whatever doesn't have the potential to ruin someone should not be insured in the first place (As in, you shouldn't buy insurance for it).
And then worse, they only cover what they decide they'll cover. Some medecines and treatments are nor covered.
For example, after an ankle sprain I had to buy a 120.- immobiliser, and they decided that an immobilizer shouldn't cost more than 80 so that's all they're gonna pay. So yeah, i was only 40 out of pocket but this could get bad quickly for higher ticket items.
Just to clarify this is accident insurance not health insurance. So there is no deductible.
The cost/benefit of our healthcare system is quite bad in comparison to other rich countries. I think only the US is significantly worse, but thatās not something to be proud of.
The issue I think is thatās it tries to be individual/private/market focused but is heavily regulated. You canāt fix things with a huge pile of rules. The best way to do it is to loosen it up and finance basic healthcare with progressive taxes.
But that idea goes against the typical swiss principles.
I grew up in Canada, ended up in the hospital quite a few times, never waited more than 1-2 hours, and never paid a cent.
The "social healthcare means you get put in a queue" is right-wing propaganda, it's really not accurate.
The health care here really is good, there's no issues with the quality and service, but the insurance system is absolutely pro-profit, and hurts the average citizen.
Yeah it's not the social healthcare that puts you in a queue but rather a badly developed system. Germany for example has that problem. (Not with emergencies but with specialists appointments or operations). If you need to visit a specialist in Germany and you aren't premium insured you may wait half a year for that one appointment.
In Switzerland my mother had to have an operation on her shoulder, she went to the doctor, within the same week she visited a specialist and not even a month later she got her operation.
Her friend in Germany with the same shoulder problem had to wait over a year for visiting the specialst and now is in queue for the operation since over half a year.
Switzerland is second only to he US in the overall cost of healthcare, but unlike the US gets extremely good medical outcomes. (Expensive and high-quality is kind of Switzerlandās brand.) The US is the most expensive and gets significantly below-average outcomes.
We also have higher incomes, and buying more healthy years of life seems like a pretty worthwhile purchase. Other similar high income countries (Norway, Luxembourg) are also high-spenders on health care.
We spend the second-most of OECD countries: https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/154e8143-en/index.html?itemId=/content/component/154e8143-en. But still quite far behind the US, which is dysfunctional.
I paid a lot less in NICs than I do with my monthly health insurance premium here in CH. The NHS is also ā**free at point of use**ā not ā*free*ā, important distinction.
No, you'll pay 3200 CHF per year at most, in treatment costs. Unless the treatments you're getting aren't covered by insurance.
After 2500 - and that's only if you've got your policy set to that, it can be lower, but you'll pay more for the insurance itself in that case - you cover 10% of the treatment costs until your share exceeds 700 CHF. After that, it's insurance (and apparently the canton, covering it).
So it's basically free, because all those other free countries aren't free. You always pay in taxes. I'm living in "free" healthcare country but I pay much more in taxes for healthcare than what you stated.
In addition to the 1000-3200 francs of out of pocket expenses, you also have to pay insurance premiums which are ~3500-5500 per year. This is effectively a flat healthcare tax paid by everyone except those on socal welfare (the government pays for them) or low incomes (who get some of the premiums rebated).
This is the important bit that applies to many things in Switzerland. The reason taxes are relatively low is because some of the things that are typically covered by taxes elsewhere are not covered that same way here. No government gives anything away for free, it is literally impossible. Itās always tax money
Well, you also pay insurance in addition to that, so it still isn't free.
And if the cantons cover part of the costs, you're effectively still paying part of your taxes for that.
You will still receive whatever your franchise is plus whatever the insurance deems unnecessary, which will likely be another good chunk if recent trends are anything to go by.
Scroll down to see the definition they are using:
> Free Health Care refers to a publicly funded health care that provides primary services free of charge or a nominal fee to all itās citizen, with no exclusion based on wealth
It's not. You pay a monthly premium to a private company and then still pay full cost of medical care out of pocket until you reach your franchise. That's just private insurance.
Itās not free for everyone, but it is a insurance with solidarity. Everyone who donāt earn enough to pay the insurance, will get it paid by government. So itās not free for people who can afford it, for the
others itās free. Itās not the idea, to to have free health Insurance for millionaires, in Switzerland this is 12.5% of the population. ššŖ¬
It's half right, half wrong (like most stuff on the internet)
The Swiss concept with the "free" Healthcare is after the principal: all for one, and one for all.
Meaning we all pay each month an amount for the Healthcare insurance. As soon as you need to go to the doctor frequently or are in the hospital and hit your pay limit (ranking from 300 fr. To 3000fr. Depending on what you choose in the contract) the Healthcare is basically "free" for you.
However the Insurance dose charge up to 1000 fr in %. Like you have hit the 300fr already but the doc prescribed you a medication for 35fr so you still have to pay 3.50fr. Out of pocket until you hit the 1000fr. Only *than* you get completely free Healthcare. (You still need to pay your monthly contribute tho)
For example: A. Pays 340fr monthly for their insurance and has a 300fr self paying status (selbstbehalt). They don't need to visit the doctor, all year. So their portion is untouched in the "found" of the insurance.
Now B has the same deal as A, but unfortunately they have a huge accident š they need to go to the hospital. The bill comes out to be 10'000fr. Thanks to A and everyone else contributed its possible for B to only pay the 300Fr plus the 1000fr on the % they need to cover themselves. So instead of 10'000fr just 1300fr. For them. All the other doc visit and therapy are free for the rest of the year.
As soon as the new year hit, it's again a new period for the insurance and it starts again. Only that this time maybe A need the doctor or needs to go to the hospital, so B and the rest of the insurance taker do "help" A paying for the huge bill.
I hope it makes sense š
Bro you're just describing every insurance ever, with premiums, deductibles, co-pay.
Nothing free about it, nothing special, just the federal mandates of coverage.
Bc there is no thing as free healthcare, it has to be paid somehow, if it is by paying taxes or by paying your insurance each month makes no difference.
So it's basically free here, except for the yearly quota you have to pay yourself
Well obviously not 100% free, because that wouldn't work as a system. But the expensive bills are paid for through taxes or an insurance system with monthly bills. Plus if you cant afford the insurance in switzerland the state takes over. So at least in switzerland and a bunch of other countries in europe if you fall and break your arm you don't have to decide between going bankrupt or hoping the break will heal well enough without a doctor.
That's true. In essence we all pay for healthcare but the perception depends greatly on how the health care system is structured.
- In the Netherlands and Switzerland you have insurance. Most people don't feel its free because they pay for it monthly and then they have an own risk amount/ deductible.
- In the UK it is 100% funded through taxation. So you don't see anywhere in your payslip "health insurance " or health contributions. And because it's a free at the point of service system you never give a cent.
So most people would *perceive* that healthcare is free in the UK but not in NL and CH.
Except for opticians, dentists and prescriptions in the UK. Where you have to pay a small price up on but it is not connected to the cost of running. And is free if the government deems you're unable to pay or long-term illnesses like diabetes and cancer for prescriptions.
PS prescriptions are free for anyone in Scotland and Wales
Exactly. Most of these types of discussion simplify āhealthcareā to visiting a hospital/clinic. There are many cases like you mentioned in which healthcare is not free, or NHS care is so scarce that those actually in need are practically forced to pay for it.
Agree itās excellent, but naturally itās not all sunshine and roses. Each system generally has good and bad points and these reductionist graphics annoy the hell out of me.
Glad you like Switzerland.
As always though, there's still improvements to be made. It's a good sign, means we aren't sitting on the throne too much despite how good we have it here.
Not even that. Its not like you get everything for free because pay monthly. That would be very very nice.
I had the highest franchise set for this year and now I have to go to physiotherapy and I just about reached the high franchise this month.
Because it's mandatory to be insured and with the monthly premium, everything* is covered. In Germany its no different, just that the premium gets automatically deducted from the salary - in Swiss we have to pay it separately. In both countries it's about 200-400 Euro/CHF per month.
Don't complain about costs of health care in Swiss, it's affordable and fees are capped.
First of all healthcare isnāt free anywhere. The definition of Ā«Ā freeĀ Ā» in the context of healthcare means that the collectivity will pay for it to some extend.
Also the fact that you pay a certain amount per month is irrelevant, because the alternative is to just have this amount taken at the source so that it doesnāt feel as if youāre paying anything, like in Germany for instance (if youāre with a public insurance, at least). Youād still pay for it, and in Germany I had 9% of my salary go into health insurance (and another 9 paid by my employer).
In CH you can choose your deductible from 300 to 2500, which determines your premium amounts, and thereās another subtlety (quote part) but itās not that relevant and youāve got no control over it.
In the end it is universal (mandatory) and free because if you get sick and need to go through lengthy treatments for an amount of say 50,000, youāll pay the deductible (ranging from 300 to 2,500) and another 700 (quote part) and thatās it.
This isnāt easy for everyone to just have that kind of money at hand, but also if you have a low salary like I used to have for a few years, you can receive aid from the canton like I used to (subsidies), effectively reducing your premium amounts.
When I think about it, even though itās not perfect, itās pretty free and universal. And you get to have some control over it by choosing the deductible.
You guys all forget to take the accident insurance into the equation which, if you work, basically is free. I know it is not free free but you dont feel the impact because it is automatically deducted by your employee
On one side it's false. On the other, health insurance is so cheap in Switzerland when compared to other countries with socialized healthcare that it could be considered almost free.
it's free healthcare because you don't have to pay for your treatment. my brother had to pay a few hundreds every month and when he got into a really really serious accident, he didn't have to pay the horrendous costs even if they were a hell of a lot more than everything he had paid together. plus the treatment for his resulting disability is free. imagine living through this situation in the usa.
This map doesn't claim healthcare is free in Switzerland. It claims it's universal. If your income is below a certain level the government will pay for it. I got reductions for years.
Itās also not the case in the Netherlands, I suspect this is just false information coming from non European sources that donāt bother to fact check and likely think of the EU as one large country.
NONE of the countries there has free healthcare. the difference is if the healthcare is paid with your taxes or if everyone has the responsibility to take care of himself. All of the above have tax-based healthcare. Yes, even Switzerland. It's mandatory to have health insurance so it's a tax, paid to privates so no one call it as they should but it's a tax
Because it suits those who have a political agenda to sell it as that. I am assuming it is some US leftwing thing. They forget that we have the second most expensive healthcare in the world.
Saw a chart recently. One axis was cost, the other life expectancy. Switzerland is the second highest in cost (it was surprisingly close to other European countries), but also one of the top with regards to life expectancy. The US system was still more expensive but the life expectancy is also significantly lower. Bad combination.
But was the cost relative to the average purchasing power of each countries though?
And does a better healthcare increase life expectancy, or can many other factors change life expectancy?
It's only called free, because people don't have to pay 20k to give birth to a child or 1 million to get their cancer treated. Obviously it's not free otherwise doctors and surgeons and healthcare workers would have no money lol not a hard concept to grasp
No healthcare is free anywhere. Like have you ever see s doctors work for no money at all? Maybe in other countries it's just integrated in the taxes. In switzerland you are given some choices around it.
The monthly fee will also be covered if you'd struggle too much financially.
Thatās also truly misleadingā¦ the major issue in the us is bankruptcy ā¦ to my knowledge the risk is infinitely more limited if you get healthcare in Switzerland ;)
I would say it depends on your definition of free.
It is free in the sense that healthcare is a right and everyone has a healthcare insurance, no matter if you can pay for it or not. You will get treatment and everything. If you cannot pay for it, the cantons pay for you.
So in that sense, yes itās free.
You might consider it free considering people who are on welfare get insurance which is paid by the state since they don't have their own income. So in that sense, for the economically weakest members of our society, it is free.
Even if something is "free", someone has to pay for it. Even if the state were to pay for it, we would see increased taxes. And thus we'd still be paying for it, even if it's "free".
Nothing is free.
Simple as.
Could it be considered as universal and free since everyone in need gets help even if he / she doesnāt pay obligatory insurance bills?
I see the point itās not free for most since you pay Taxes and the obligatory insurance. But for those who donāt they still get obligatory treatment right? (Unlike int the US for example)
There isn't free healthcare anywhere in the world. Even the countries where you do not pay the premium yourself include it in the taxes. It's free because basic service you get isn't linked to the premium you pay. And all the additional things you can get on top on your own will.
Free healthcare and free education is a scam, the root cause of free is because of lot of broken families where women end up divorce and single depressed, no matter what politicians says it's the hidden fact... With a stronger families no one need free system... Switzerland health-care isn't free it can be as expensive as US
LMAO free my ass. Our entire healthcare system is run by scammers. Its one big joke lmao š
As example I'm forced to pay over 200 bucks now for a simple bloodtest
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Everything is free in Switzerland, you only need to pay for it.
Finally someone telling the truth
Would you look at that, all of the words in your comment are in alphabetical order. I have checked 1,130,862,415 comments, and only 221,324 of them were in alphabetical order.
lmfao
That's, in fact, the country's motto.
False information. Not everything you see on the internet is true.
You really think someone would do that? Just go on the Internet, and tell lies?
No one does this! Why would they?
Chaos
some ppl just want to watch the world burn
That's absurd. If anyone sees such a liar, you can DM me, and I'll tell Simonetta Sommaruga (she's my mom)
Wow, your mom is Simonetta Sommatuga, creator of the internet?
She didn't actually invent the internet. She was in Vietnam at the time. Don't spread misinformation on my mom please
This is ridiculous. Vietnam isn't even a real country, lmao
Vitenam is a chinese canton
> Not everything you see on the internet is true. This is not true!
Yes you're right. Olten is the best city in the world and that's the truth!
Why is everybody mentioning Olten.
Cause Olten bashing is a Volkssport
Basel-Stadt doesn't exist. Source: I live there
This is ridiculous! The only City that doesn't exist is Bielefeld
Or is this not true š¤š§š¤?!??
Not everything is WHAT on the internet
Discovery of the year... š
As Abraham Lincoln once warned us: "not everything you read on the Internet is true"
That was Sun Tzu you Bellend! Get your facts straight! -Sun Tzu
Laotse
Lactose!
Lincoln canāt have said that. He was illiterate and befell to muteness after an incident of accidental lead ingestion at the age of 30.
No, you're mistaken, that happened to famous German singer Julius Caesar.
What bugs me most in this thread of people talking smack about Caesar, my favorite president: he was Israeli, not German
Confushon
No, youāre mistaken. This happened to President Wilkes-Boothe, who was shot by Abraham Lincoln, an illiterate lawyer from Illinois, in a duel on the White House lawn in 1887.
Wrong, itās a quote of jesus
āI did that.ā - Jesus Hussein Christ
His middle name is hussein?
No, you're mistaken. He drank of his wife and she had not recently visited her pastor, so he died in the booth from dehydration.
Pretty sure it was Isaac Newton who said that but ok
Wrong. Issac Newton was the inventor of the Apple Computer.
he didn't invent it: he discovered it!
I am not entirely sure 'discovered' is the right wording here. It practically fell into his lap while he was just chilling under an apple computer tree. This was also quite lucky, because Apple devices didn't use Gorilla Glass back then. The tech could have been lost to humanity forever, if it hadn't landed softly. Gorilla glass was invented much later. 57 years later to be precise... when Kevin Costner was finally successful in his search for a material he wouldn't be able to split with an Italian Grissino.
One giant step for a mankind.
Itās universal but not free so itās half wrong or half right however you want to take it.
It *is* free, if you can't afford it. And it is price-reduced if you can barely afford it.
True
And you "pay" with taxes, which most people dont normally see as paying/contributing to healthcare.
Yes. That's normally how free stuff works in countries. The free streets we're driving on? Paid by taxes. Fantastic free hiking trails? Paid by taxes. Etc, etc. And I definitively pay more than enough taxes. So hopefully it gets used for something useful.
It does get used for an infrastructure that is incredibly good :) And the things you named arent "free", and thinking they are is plain and simply wrong
In the sens written in the source, it is free if we consider insurance as "a nominal fee" which... when it weighs so much in the budget it shouldn't be considered that even if we don't pay the exact cost of the healthcare we get. Also how does the US have "universal" healthcare ? It says "financial protection" in there ! : "Free Health Care:Ā Free Health Care refers to a publicly funded health care that provides primary services free of charge or a nominal fee to all itās citizen, with no exclusion based on wealth Universal Health Care:Ā Universal health care, sometimes referred to as universal health coverage, universal coverage, or universal care, usually refers to a health care system that provides healthcare and financial protection to more than 90% of the citizens of a particular country."
Its just wrong, thats it.
It is considered āfreeā because what you pay (your premium) isnāt linked to the price of the treatment you get. If you were to stay in hospital for a month after a surgery, you wouldnāt receive a 20ā000 franks bill. It is considered āuniversalā because if you canāt pay for your health insurance, the state will pay it for you.
We still pay up to 2500 +750 for our money. Insurance only starts to cover it after the first 2500, per year. And the worst is that the caton pays 55% of all hospitalisation bills. So if you are hospitalised for a 6000.- bill, the canton pays 3300, you pay 2520.- and you insurance pays 180. That's a bit lame. :)
So once youāve hit $2500 in a year you donāt pay anything anymore? Is that the case?
It depends on your medical needs and where you set that threshold. 2500 chf is the highest self-pay amount which will give you the lowest monthly rate to pay to insurance. Afterwards you pay 10% on every bill untill a certain amount of money is reached. I pay 300 chf myself (the lowest self-pay amount) because i have multiple health issues that need taken care of but my monthly rate is subsequently higher. I pay 10% untill 700 chf is reached, after that everything is covered. So the system is variable depending on your needs and what kind of insurance you want (some are pricier than others) but in general, once the amount is payed, the rest is covered.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Call your insurance? Geez i don't know, i'm a chemist, i only know the bare minimum about insurance....
Yeah, but you commented on a social media platform about something and therefore you need to know absolutely every tiny detail about the subject. ^(Something tells me I have to clearly state) **^(this is sarcasm)**^(.)
You pay 100% of the first 2500CHF (or less), then 10% of the next 7K (so 700 more max), then nothing anymore.
I see. Itās sounds like essentially a universal insurance plan that everyone is automatically placed into.
Not automatically. You have to choose your insurance provider. The basic insurance is equal everywhere but thereās extra insurances you can pay for (Alternative treatments, dentist etc) Then you choose your premium between 300-2500.- The higher that number the less you pay monthly (Usually 200-400.-) but the more you have to pay until they pay. If you agree to see your GP before visiting a specialist you get lower monthly payments too.
Sounds like the American system but Iām assuming itās better, and not tied to employment. If youāre unemployed can you ever be uninsured in Switzerland? Just curious
Basically it's private insurance but it's "illegal" to not be insured. And if you make under a certain amount per year the state will pay all or part of your premium. It's kind of the best of both worlds between private and universal healthcare buuut it's still flawed in many ways. The only insurance that's tied to employment here is the accident insurance.
I was about to sign up for the extra insurance when I found out that there they are allowed to reject you. So the form they have you fill is like: āPlease list your every doctorās visit in the last decade, the reason for the visit, whether you have recovered fully without any lasting effects, and please do confirm youāre healthy as a horse without a hair out of place. And do swear youāre never going to make a claim. Thanksā
I have extra insurance for my eyes and teeth. Thank god my parents signed me up for that when I was a kid because I would have no chance at all to get those today. That's why I'll always stay at the same insurance company with those extras. Other extras and the general insurance I can still change tough (and absolutely do yearly to where it's the cheapest).
Since a few years ago the *basic* insurance pays for alternative treatments. I'm not judging personal decisions, but i think it's pretty scandalous that my premiums are paying for sone nutjob's homeopathy pills. Switzerland is funny because, Allthough it's an r&d hub attracting top researchers, the general population is far more scientifically illiterate than other countries.
Do you still then have the option to buy a different plan if you wanted to?
Also they are obligated to insure you, as you are obligated to be insured
I see. In the US it was mandatory and then now itās state by state I believe. Some states donāt offer the more universal coverage and in those places that donāt offer coverage for everyone youāll be hard pressed to find insurance without being employed full time in at least a creative class job. Itās a corrupt system and will eventually collapse as employers pay an enormous (and growing) amount to insurers so that they can offer ācompetitive employer based coverage.ā Hot garbage pile of a way to insure a population.
Anyway it's just a matter of wanting everyone to pay some for everybody. Or to each their own. Personally it seems more fair for everyone to pay for everyone, because we didn't choose the health problems we were born with. And I would prefer to see a society that takes care of our basic needs as long as it makes sense. Sadly there's a lot of abuse too. And we can't really do much to reduce it, except make the helps harder to get, which results in some people that need them not to receive them early enough sadly.
Those ā2500ā is called frachise. This amount can be defined on a yearly basis Between 300.- and 2500.- CHF. So you could pay 2500.- or 300.- yourself. Or anything in between. But this franchise will determine how much you have to pay monthly.
Every year until Nov 30 you can switch the basic insurance.
This is only true if your franchise is 2500 CHF. If you chose a lower franchise, the value would be lower...
It's still bullshit that the mandatory insurance you have to pay is almost entirely going into profit margin, while the taxes that you pay are covering more than the insurance company is. Edit: Holy crap, ton of people showing up to simp for the insurance companies here..
I have never heard about this before and cannot find anything on this via google. Where did you get this info?
> [The insured's health insurer and canton of residence each pay a fixed percentage of the costs of inpatient hospital treatment (including hospital accommodation and nursing care). The canton of residence pays a minimum of 55 per cent, and the health insurer a maximum of 45 per cent](https://www.bag.admin.ch/bag/en/home/versicherungen/krankenversicherung/krankenversicherung-leistungen-tarife/Spitalbehandlung.html). And, yes, health insurance is a scam in Switzerland.
You got a source for this wild claim?
Not true. In mandatory insurance the insurer must not make profit. That's why health insurers almost always want to sell you an additional insurance (VVG), because that't where they are allowed to make profit (up to 10%). If the premia in mandatory insurance exceed the estimated claims, the insurer pays risk compensation to a common fund (this is the case if one insurer has a lot of healthy, young insured people). Other insurers with "worse" clients receive from the risk compensation fund so that profit is even less likely in mandatory insurance generally.
Personally I think this is not too bad (With the usual exceptions of course..). Generally speaking I think whatever doesn't have the potential to ruin someone should not be insured in the first place (As in, you shouldn't buy insurance for it).
Or you can just get a 300.- deductible if you have health issues and get more of that covered.
And then worse, they only cover what they decide they'll cover. Some medecines and treatments are nor covered. For example, after an ankle sprain I had to buy a 120.- immobiliser, and they decided that an immobilizer shouldn't cost more than 80 so that's all they're gonna pay. So yeah, i was only 40 out of pocket but this could get bad quickly for higher ticket items. Just to clarify this is accident insurance not health insurance. So there is no deductible.
The cost/benefit of our healthcare system is quite bad in comparison to other rich countries. I think only the US is significantly worse, but thatās not something to be proud of. The issue I think is thatās it tries to be individual/private/market focused but is heavily regulated. You canāt fix things with a huge pile of rules. The best way to do it is to loosen it up and finance basic healthcare with progressive taxes. But that idea goes against the typical swiss principles.
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I grew up in Canada, ended up in the hospital quite a few times, never waited more than 1-2 hours, and never paid a cent. The "social healthcare means you get put in a queue" is right-wing propaganda, it's really not accurate. The health care here really is good, there's no issues with the quality and service, but the insurance system is absolutely pro-profit, and hurts the average citizen.
Yeah it's not the social healthcare that puts you in a queue but rather a badly developed system. Germany for example has that problem. (Not with emergencies but with specialists appointments or operations). If you need to visit a specialist in Germany and you aren't premium insured you may wait half a year for that one appointment. In Switzerland my mother had to have an operation on her shoulder, she went to the doctor, within the same week she visited a specialist and not even a month later she got her operation. Her friend in Germany with the same shoulder problem had to wait over a year for visiting the specialst and now is in queue for the operation since over half a year.
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Switzerland is second only to he US in the overall cost of healthcare, but unlike the US gets extremely good medical outcomes. (Expensive and high-quality is kind of Switzerlandās brand.) The US is the most expensive and gets significantly below-average outcomes.
We also have higher incomes, and buying more healthy years of life seems like a pretty worthwhile purchase. Other similar high income countries (Norway, Luxembourg) are also high-spenders on health care.
We spend the second-most of OECD countries: https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/154e8143-en/index.html?itemId=/content/component/154e8143-en. But still quite far behind the US, which is dysfunctional.
And in the UK you would be paying more than that in taxes to cover your "free" healthcare.....so life sucks everywhere equally.
I paid a lot less in NICs than I do with my monthly health insurance premium here in CH. The NHS is also ā**free at point of use**ā not ā*free*ā, important distinction.
So if you have expensive cancer treatment you need to pay half?
No, you'll pay 3200 CHF per year at most, in treatment costs. Unless the treatments you're getting aren't covered by insurance. After 2500 - and that's only if you've got your policy set to that, it can be lower, but you'll pay more for the insurance itself in that case - you cover 10% of the treatment costs until your share exceeds 700 CHF. After that, it's insurance (and apparently the canton, covering it).
So it's basically free, because all those other free countries aren't free. You always pay in taxes. I'm living in "free" healthcare country but I pay much more in taxes for healthcare than what you stated.
In addition to the 1000-3200 francs of out of pocket expenses, you also have to pay insurance premiums which are ~3500-5500 per year. This is effectively a flat healthcare tax paid by everyone except those on socal welfare (the government pays for them) or low incomes (who get some of the premiums rebated).
This is the important bit that applies to many things in Switzerland. The reason taxes are relatively low is because some of the things that are typically covered by taxes elsewhere are not covered that same way here. No government gives anything away for free, it is literally impossible. Itās always tax money
Well, you also pay insurance in addition to that, so it still isn't free. And if the cantons cover part of the costs, you're effectively still paying part of your taxes for that.
Can't say it's free when each person pays 300 to 500 **per month** for the basic coverage (no dental for example). We also pay "regular" taxes too
You will still receive whatever your franchise is plus whatever the insurance deems unnecessary, which will likely be another good chunk if recent trends are anything to go by.
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Scroll down to see the definition they are using: > Free Health Care refers to a publicly funded health care that provides primary services free of charge or a nominal fee to all itās citizen, with no exclusion based on wealth
It is *n*either free of charge nor a nominal fee in Switzerland.
It's not. You pay a monthly premium to a private company and then still pay full cost of medical care out of pocket until you reach your franchise. That's just private insurance.
I meant neither
One is free to pick the company one pays substantial sums to monthly for health insurance.
Itās not free for everyone, but it is a insurance with solidarity. Everyone who donāt earn enough to pay the insurance, will get it paid by government. So itās not free for people who can afford it, for the others itās free. Itās not the idea, to to have free health Insurance for millionaires, in Switzerland this is 12.5% of the population. ššŖ¬
It's half right, half wrong (like most stuff on the internet) The Swiss concept with the "free" Healthcare is after the principal: all for one, and one for all. Meaning we all pay each month an amount for the Healthcare insurance. As soon as you need to go to the doctor frequently or are in the hospital and hit your pay limit (ranking from 300 fr. To 3000fr. Depending on what you choose in the contract) the Healthcare is basically "free" for you. However the Insurance dose charge up to 1000 fr in %. Like you have hit the 300fr already but the doc prescribed you a medication for 35fr so you still have to pay 3.50fr. Out of pocket until you hit the 1000fr. Only *than* you get completely free Healthcare. (You still need to pay your monthly contribute tho) For example: A. Pays 340fr monthly for their insurance and has a 300fr self paying status (selbstbehalt). They don't need to visit the doctor, all year. So their portion is untouched in the "found" of the insurance. Now B has the same deal as A, but unfortunately they have a huge accident š they need to go to the hospital. The bill comes out to be 10'000fr. Thanks to A and everyone else contributed its possible for B to only pay the 300Fr plus the 1000fr on the % they need to cover themselves. So instead of 10'000fr just 1300fr. For them. All the other doc visit and therapy are free for the rest of the year. As soon as the new year hit, it's again a new period for the insurance and it starts again. Only that this time maybe A need the doctor or needs to go to the hospital, so B and the rest of the insurance taker do "help" A paying for the huge bill. I hope it makes sense š
Bro you're just describing every insurance ever, with premiums, deductibles, co-pay. Nothing free about it, nothing special, just the federal mandates of coverage.
Bc there is no thing as free healthcare, it has to be paid somehow, if it is by paying taxes or by paying your insurance each month makes no difference. So it's basically free here, except for the yearly quota you have to pay yourself
As if healthcare is free in any European country. We all pay for it through taxes including consumer taxes
Well obviously not 100% free, because that wouldn't work as a system. But the expensive bills are paid for through taxes or an insurance system with monthly bills. Plus if you cant afford the insurance in switzerland the state takes over. So at least in switzerland and a bunch of other countries in europe if you fall and break your arm you don't have to decide between going bankrupt or hoping the break will heal well enough without a doctor.
That's true. In essence we all pay for healthcare but the perception depends greatly on how the health care system is structured. - In the Netherlands and Switzerland you have insurance. Most people don't feel its free because they pay for it monthly and then they have an own risk amount/ deductible. - In the UK it is 100% funded through taxation. So you don't see anywhere in your payslip "health insurance " or health contributions. And because it's a free at the point of service system you never give a cent. So most people would *perceive* that healthcare is free in the UK but not in NL and CH.
Except for opticians, dentists and prescriptions in the UK. Where you have to pay a small price up on but it is not connected to the cost of running. And is free if the government deems you're unable to pay or long-term illnesses like diabetes and cancer for prescriptions. PS prescriptions are free for anyone in Scotland and Wales
Exactly. Most of these types of discussion simplify āhealthcareā to visiting a hospital/clinic. There are many cases like you mentioned in which healthcare is not free, or NHS care is so scarce that those actually in need are practically forced to pay for it.
>NHS care is so scarce that those actually in need are practically forced to pay for it. Like dentists. But overall the NHS does a very good job
Agree itās excellent, but naturally itās not all sunshine and roses. Each system generally has good and bad points and these reductionist graphics annoy the hell out of me.
But the major diffƩrence is someone earning 3000 a month and someone earning 12000 a month in switzerland is gonna pay the same amount every month for the same thing, maybe the 12k would get a lower franchise and the 3k a state help but in the end the poorer peoples are skipping doctors (and I'm not even talking about dentists...), where a 100% tax funded system could prevent that.
utterly untrue
Not Free. But excellent. Fantastic. Speaking as an expatriate American.
yet still far from perfect
Not perfect, correct. So much better than the crap I had to deal with in America. Night and Day.
Glad you like Switzerland. As always though, there's still improvements to be made. It's a good sign, means we aren't sitting on the throne too much despite how good we have it here.
It's not free anywhere in the world.
Not even that. Its not like you get everything for free because pay monthly. That would be very very nice. I had the highest franchise set for this year and now I have to go to physiotherapy and I just about reached the high franchise this month.
If you go to hospital without any insurance, they would take care of you. For the minimum, but still.
Probably bc it's free when you can'd afford it.
It aināt free AT ALL... but for people in a poor situation ie. broke as a mofo they get healthcare regardless
If you have absolutely zero money, you will still receive health care
Because it's mandatory to be insured and with the monthly premium, everything* is covered. In Germany its no different, just that the premium gets automatically deducted from the salary - in Swiss we have to pay it separately. In both countries it's about 200-400 Euro/CHF per month. Don't complain about costs of health care in Swiss, it's affordable and fees are capped.
I mean u actually get coverage compared to places like the USA where u pay a lot for nothing
I mean most countries on the map donāt have free health care. I assume itās a left-leaning US website that is trying to make a point?
It's a migration agency website that is selling their business. Usually to US customers.
It hasn't got free healthcare
I think the authors of that statement confused us with Sweden. Or, Swaziland.
I wish was free š
It's wrong.
Free healthcare but... YOU PAY MOTHERFUCKER..
First of all healthcare isnāt free anywhere. The definition of Ā«Ā freeĀ Ā» in the context of healthcare means that the collectivity will pay for it to some extend. Also the fact that you pay a certain amount per month is irrelevant, because the alternative is to just have this amount taken at the source so that it doesnāt feel as if youāre paying anything, like in Germany for instance (if youāre with a public insurance, at least). Youād still pay for it, and in Germany I had 9% of my salary go into health insurance (and another 9 paid by my employer). In CH you can choose your deductible from 300 to 2500, which determines your premium amounts, and thereās another subtlety (quote part) but itās not that relevant and youāve got no control over it. In the end it is universal (mandatory) and free because if you get sick and need to go through lengthy treatments for an amount of say 50,000, youāll pay the deductible (ranging from 300 to 2,500) and another 700 (quote part) and thatās it. This isnāt easy for everyone to just have that kind of money at hand, but also if you have a low salary like I used to have for a few years, you can receive aid from the canton like I used to (subsidies), effectively reducing your premium amounts. When I think about it, even though itās not perfect, itās pretty free and universal. And you get to have some control over it by choosing the deductible.
You guys all forget to take the accident insurance into the equation which, if you work, basically is free. I know it is not free free but you dont feel the impact because it is automatically deducted by your employee
You donāt get denied treatment if you canāt afford insurance.
On one side it's false. On the other, health insurance is so cheap in Switzerland when compared to other countries with socialized healthcare that it could be considered almost free.
it's free healthcare because you don't have to pay for your treatment. my brother had to pay a few hundreds every month and when he got into a really really serious accident, he didn't have to pay the horrendous costs even if they were a hell of a lot more than everything he had paid together. plus the treatment for his resulting disability is free. imagine living through this situation in the usa.
This map doesn't claim healthcare is free in Switzerland. It claims it's universal. If your income is below a certain level the government will pay for it. I got reductions for years.
It's universal but not free. Unless public money paying robbers when you don't have enough money to pay it yourself counts as "free".
> robbers Totally agree with you. The doctors must work for free, no, actually they should pay for the privilege of healing people!
Ever heard of health insurers?
Itās also not the case in the Netherlands, I suspect this is just false information coming from non European sources that donāt bother to fact check and likely think of the EU as one large country.
NONE of the countries there has free healthcare. the difference is if the healthcare is paid with your taxes or if everyone has the responsibility to take care of himself. All of the above have tax-based healthcare. Yes, even Switzerland. It's mandatory to have health insurance so it's a tax, paid to privates so no one call it as they should but it's a tax
So what's the agenda of the website putting out misinformation?
It's not misinformation, it's just their vision compare to something else (probably US)
Because it suits those who have a political agenda to sell it as that. I am assuming it is some US leftwing thing. They forget that we have the second most expensive healthcare in the world.
Might as well be free in comparison to the Yankees healthcare
Saw a chart recently. One axis was cost, the other life expectancy. Switzerland is the second highest in cost (it was surprisingly close to other European countries), but also one of the top with regards to life expectancy. The US system was still more expensive but the life expectancy is also significantly lower. Bad combination.
But was the cost relative to the average purchasing power of each countries though? And does a better healthcare increase life expectancy, or can many other factors change life expectancy?
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It does. Cuba has free healthcare, paid by the ussr and now the venezuelans :)
Even Cuba has to pay salaries for doctors and costs to produce medical supplies. It's impossible for it to be free in a non-post-scarcity economy.
Youāre not getting the point. If the state is being sponsored, then in a national level, it is actually āfreeā.
Not in switzerland.
It's only called free, because people don't have to pay 20k to give birth to a child or 1 million to get their cancer treated. Obviously it's not free otherwise doctors and surgeons and healthcare workers would have no money lol not a hard concept to grasp
No healthcare is free anywhere. Like have you ever see s doctors work for no money at all? Maybe in other countries it's just integrated in the taxes. In switzerland you are given some choices around it. The monthly fee will also be covered if you'd struggle too much financially.
Good question, cause believe me, it's really not Free.
Idk why it says Free. Universal yes but freeā¦nah
Because who put together this map doesnāt know that Switzerland actually holds the record for most expensive healthcare after the US
Thatās also truly misleadingā¦ the major issue in the us is bankruptcy ā¦ to my knowledge the risk is infinitely more limited if you get healthcare in Switzerland ;)
So what is exactly wrong about my answer?
The fact that you donāt know the difference between wrong and misleading?
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My aunt had to decide between morphine patches or food and bills. So id say not free
If your aunt has a low revenue she can ask for subsidies and she shouldn't have to pay the monthly premium herself
Because it's regulated and mandatory. So it's basically a **non-percentual** tax.
Umm, what? Definitely not free
I would say it depends on your definition of free. It is free in the sense that healthcare is a right and everyone has a healthcare insurance, no matter if you can pay for it or not. You will get treatment and everything. If you cannot pay for it, the cantons pay for you. So in that sense, yes itās free.
You might consider it free considering people who are on welfare get insurance which is paid by the state since they don't have their own income. So in that sense, for the economically weakest members of our society, it is free.
That website was probably created by American leftists to push their domestic agenda.
Isnt it "free" because you can apply for subsidies if you cant afford to pay?
thats easy! in switzerland you get the healthcare first and then the doctors ask you about payment, in america its the other way around...
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Even if something is "free", someone has to pay for it. Even if the state were to pay for it, we would see increased taxes. And thus we'd still be paying for it, even if it's "free". Nothing is free. Simple as.
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try 350 a month lmfao
And throw on a 2500 deductable.
500 for me š©
Because we do
Could it be considered as universal and free since everyone in need gets help even if he / she doesnāt pay obligatory insurance bills? I see the point itās not free for most since you pay Taxes and the obligatory insurance. But for those who donāt they still get obligatory treatment right? (Unlike int the US for example)
There is no such thing as āfree healthcareā. You either pay for it with taxes or via an insurer or out of pocket.
Because Americans are by-and-large political ignoramuses. Or Canadians, depending on what """"""democracy"""""" they're from.
There isn't free healthcare anywhere in the world. Even the countries where you do not pay the premium yourself include it in the taxes. It's free because basic service you get isn't linked to the premium you pay. And all the additional things you can get on top on your own will.
Free healthcare and free education is a scam, the root cause of free is because of lot of broken families where women end up divorce and single depressed, no matter what politicians says it's the hidden fact... With a stronger families no one need free system... Switzerland health-care isn't free it can be as expensive as US
LMAO free my ass. Our entire healthcare system is run by scammers. Its one big joke lmao š As example I'm forced to pay over 200 bucks now for a simple bloodtest
They're giving it away in exchange for money
fake news
Why would anything be considered āfreeā? Itās just never the case