The hopeless people

I watched Sicko by Michael Moore yesterday and was a bit overwhelmed by the fact that hospitals in the US are actually dumping patients without insurance coverage on the street. What's even worse is how the insurance companies are finding ways to deny those with insurance on their claim.

Watching the movie kinds of frighten me on the outlook of Singapore's own medical care. It seems like we are trying to follow the US style of having expensive medical care and only allowing a limitation of Medisave claim for our bills. I was wondering, do our own Singapore hospital did the same to those with no money??? Kick them out of their bed??

Anyway, the best part of the movie was an interview with Tony Benn, a former member of parliament of the United Kingdom. He said this which seems very applicable to not only US but also to Singapore or Thailand. Here's part of the quote but the gist of it :

"People in debt become hopeless and hopeless people don't vote. So I think there are 2 ways that which people are controlled. First was to frighten people and secondly to demoralise them. An educated, healthy and confident nation is harder to govern. And I think they is an element in the thinking of some people that we don't want people to be educated, healthy and confident because they would get out and control. The top 1% of the world population is holding 80% of the world's wealth. Its incredible that people put up with it. But they are poor, they are demoralised, they are frightened and they think perhaps the safest thing to do is to take orders and hope for the best."

Do get the DVD and watch it if you can. Pretty good stuff . :)