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Posted

So you guys get UHC but there is an option to buy private insurance, right? How much more does that cost? Is it a suppliment to your UHC or a completely different insurance plan?

 

Obviously that would change depending on where you are but for me a supplementary private insurance would be ~120€ per month and would feature quality of life improvements more than better treatments. E.g. in my case if I had private insurance they would pay for contacts while the public insurance would only pay for the most basic of glasses or I would get a single room at any hospital, or free transportation to my clinic of choice (public insurance assigns you the first free slot within a reasonable distance to your residence, obviously - contrary to popular opinion even state run insurance companies ARE insurance companies and they're just as greedy as the real deal).

 

The more bells and whistles you want to add the more expensive it gets - a full dental plan is another 100€ on top, for instance - public insurance gets you free dental replacements and all standard treatments but not titanium bolted porcelain implants.

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No mind to think. No will to break. No voice to cry suffering.

Posted

So you guys get UHC but there is an option to buy private insurance, right? How much more does that cost? Is it a suppliment to your UHC or a completely different insurance plan?

 

My plan is 500€/year : 150€ deductible (per year), it pays up to 40000 € of medical expenses and other things. It is completely different insurance plan.

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Posted (edited)

So you guys get UHC but there is an option to buy private insurance, right? How much more does that cost? Is it a suppliment to your UHC or a completely different insurance plan?

 

Relatively cheap. Rates vary obviously but you can find it from ~13€/mo for someone under 30 with basic coverage, up to ~70-80€/mo for anyone, with all-encompassing coverage (stuff like acupuncture, assisted reproduction, hospitalization compensation). Mine is middle of the road, for a(n increasingly less) healthy single 30-something, including dental coverage at some 35 merkels per month. Evidently family packages are cheaper per member, the more members there are. Insurance doesn't cover meds, but generally you can take a diagnosis and prescription from an insurance doctor to your public health service GP and have them prescribe the same thing so it doesn't come out of your pocket, unless it's something frivolous like weight loss pills.

 

Completely separate systems as far as the end user is concerned, except for the meds thing (which I don't think is official policy anyway) and what I mentioned in the other thread about a fraction of public healthcare patients being redirected to private hospitals for diagnostic tests and such, but you get some tax deductions if you are privately insured.

 

Treatment quality is really top notch. And our low income per capita relative to other western countries results in generally low prices across the board, which makes this country an attractive destination for medical tourism. Only real downside is the locals...

Edited by 213374U
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- When he is best, he is a little worse than a man, and when he is worst, he is little better than a beast.

Posted

 

Would it be used in the same manner that majestic describes, as an "upgrade plan", above and beyond what your UHC provides you?

 

 

I would say that is pretty accurate description.

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Posted

And a private "family plan" would be about the same 220 for each additional person? So a family of 3 would be ~660 / month?

 

For adults, yes, at least at a first glance. For children, no idea to be honest, but most likely not the full rate.

 

Public insurance automatically covers one's children and a non-working spouse as well. You'd also remain covered while receiving unemployment pay or our needs-based minimum benefit.

 

Minimum benefit is vailable for every citizen, them dirty foreigners as long as they have lived here for at least five years and refugees who were actually granted asylum. The actual costs for the minimum benefits are just a tiny speck of the budget (in the area of roughly 1%). To put things into perspective the money that went into the bank bailout during the financial crisis (uhm, too big to fail and all that) could have financed the minimum benefit system for 30 years.

 

Eh, sorry for the tanget here. ;)

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No mind to think. No will to break. No voice to cry suffering.

Posted

When it comes to that private plan, do employers have to chip in anything?

 

Have to? Not really, no. In Portugal it's not very uncommon for employers to offer private insurance, but that's a voluntary perk, not an obligation. In Sweden, I'm not sure, but I'm guessing it's possible for a company to provide health insurance as part of the collective workers agreement. That doesn't happen with my employer, though.

"My hovercraft is full of eels!" - Hungarian tourist
I am Dan Quayle of the Romans.
I want to tattoo a map of the Netherlands on my nether lands.
Heja Sverige!!
Everyone should cuffawkle more.
The wrench is your friend. :bat:

Posted

According to my most recent pay stub, my employer paid $2000 last month and I paid $883. I also contributed $106 to Medicare.

 

 

What a racket. I still get medical bills as well. Heck, basic dental work for the kids costs me a few hundred dollars every 6 months.

Posted

Dental care for everyone under 24 or 25, is completely free here in Sweden. My oldest has missing teeth and two teeth yet to come down that are currently horizontal, (her mouth X-ray looks like it was made by Dalí) and it's a gigantic boon that I won't have to pay anything for that.

"My hovercraft is full of eels!" - Hungarian tourist
I am Dan Quayle of the Romans.
I want to tattoo a map of the Netherlands on my nether lands.
Heja Sverige!!
Everyone should cuffawkle more.
The wrench is your friend. :bat:

Posted

Well same up here, dental and vision have to be covered with private insurance. Rough to have kids on employer plans, one had a max dental of $1000.

 

Ah vagaries. http://www.politico.com/story/2017/10/17/trump-isis-giving-up-243870

Why has elegance found so little following? Elegance has the disadvantage that hard work is needed to achieve it and a good education to appreciate it. - Edsger Wybe Dijkstra

Posted (edited)

Trump's seeming indifference to the 41 and counting deaths in the NorCal fires doesn't bode well for the people of South Korea.

Edited by Agiel
Quote
“Political philosophers have often pointed out that in wartime, the citizen, the male citizen at least, loses one of his most basic rights, his right to life; and this has been true ever since the French Revolution and the invention of conscription, now an almost universally accepted principle. But these same philosophers have rarely noted that the citizen in question simultaneously loses another right, one just as basic and perhaps even more vital for his conception of himself as a civilized human being: the right not to kill.”
 
-Jonathan Littell <<Les Bienveillantes>>
Quote

"The chancellor, the late chancellor, was only partly correct. He was obsolete. But so is the State, the entity he worshipped. Any state, entity, or ideology becomes obsolete when it stockpiles the wrong weapons: when it captures territories, but not minds; when it enslaves millions, but convinces nobody. When it is naked, yet puts on armor and calls it faith, while in the Eyes of God it has no faith at all. Any state, any entity, any ideology that fails to recognize the worth, the dignity, the rights of Man...that state is obsolete."

-Rod Serling

 

Posted

 

But it is sort of a requirement for him to care and comment in his position.  Lord knows he runs his mouth over everything else, so not as if his words are a precious commodity to spent miserly.

Why has elegance found so little following? Elegance has the disadvantage that hard work is needed to achieve it and a good education to appreciate it. - Edsger Wybe Dijkstra

Posted

When it comes to that private plan, do employers have to chip in anything?

 

No, but they have to partake in the public plan - costs vary between nations and are usually shared by the employee and the employer. It's not all medical costs but also other types of insurance (e.g. workplace accidents or unemployment), paid sickleave, vacations and last but not least pensions. How much that is depends on the nations and vocations - some high risk jobs come with larger insurance costs (but usually at the employer's end, what with us being commies and all).

 

There are companies offering additional benefits. The place I work at offers a tax free additional pension plan where a certain amount of money is deducted each month from my income before taxes, free use of the nearby tennis courts and uhm some hokum voodoo stuff like shiatsu massages.

No mind to think. No will to break. No voice to cry suffering.

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