Thread: Sarah Burke dies, leaves debt to her family.

Originally Posted by Neomalthusian

Well that has a nice ring to it, but what does it mean?

That they don't spend half a million on someone with no chance of recovery.

Originally Posted by Seraphima

I figure they waited as long as they did for family to visit and to discuss and figure out the process of organ donation.

While essentially charging them $61,000 per day.

Originally Posted by Seraphima

Assuming they arranged organ donation, that takes some time to set-up. Again, assuming that is what took place, $61,000/day isn't really that much with the amount of lives that could be saved and/or improved.

But the costs of those transplant surgeries are also covered by the collective, we have to assume. Saving lives is great. In theory there is no dollar amount to assign to a human life, and all that stuff. But when families are increasingly failing to afford health insurance every year, and premiums rise and rise and rise, we have to look at this "spare no expense to save a life" medical philosophy we've got going on.

To bring this a little bit back to Earth, a few minutes of digging (starting with wikipedia) led to some indication that the medical bills were closer to $200,000 and the other $350,000 is to set up a private foundation.

yes, but it was not in that order.

They anticipated bills of up to 500k, then called out for donations, then got donations, then got the actual numbers from the hospital and it was in the 200ks. So they didn't actually set out to raise more than they needed, the foundation was an unexpected benefit.

I went to the page and it's was amazing to see almost all the donations are 50 bucks, 20 bucks, 100 at the most. Yet they got hundrds of thousands. I wouldn't donate to that... there's tens of millions of people with no insurance... none of them with the resources to put kids through a lifetime of skiing lessons.

We already have death panels but we call them insurance companies.

Originally Posted by EnigmaO01

Try being an American in America. We middle class are so screwed when it comes to health care. Obama tried to fix it but was blocked every which way by the repubs.

one non example does not represent "middle class America".

Originally Posted by Seraphima

I figure they waited as long as they did for family to visit and to discuss and figure out the process of organ donation.

who pays for the operation in a organ donation scenario? How much credit if there is any goes back to the donor and their situation?

Originally Posted by Neomalthusian

Well that has a nice ring to it, but what does it mean?

Same thing as family values.