Ecuadorian Navy Rescues Bezos After Kidney Stone Attack 190
theodp writes "While vacationing aboard a cruise ship in the Galapagos Islands, where the State Department warns the quality of medical facilities and services are 'generally well below U.S. standards', Gawker reports that Jeff Bezos was rescued by the Ecuadorian Navy so he could receive treatment for a kidney stone attack on New Year's Day. The Ecuadorian Navy confirmed Bezos' rescue, which involved taking Bezos by Navy helicopter from Academy Bay in Santa Cruz Island to his private jet stationed on Baltra Island."
Comment removed (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Wait What? (Score:5, Insightful)
I thought the US had the worst medical system in the world. Whats this? A Socialist country (actually half of the politicians in Ecuador are communists) has worse medical treatment? That just doesn't seem right.
Generally speaking, the rule of thumb is, if you are looking for the best medical system for your population as a whole, it will look somewhat socialist. On the other hand, the US is well known to have one of the very best medical systems in the world -- if you have a lot of money. And then when you start talking about money, you start talking about medical insurance rather than medical skill or medical facilities, or the amount of money that doctors or drug manufacturers should earn for providing the care, and then suddenly we're talking politics and not where to find the right doctors.
Sounds like a Standard Evac Insurance Policy (Score:5, Insightful)
Business people who travel the world usually have global medical plans. Most of those plans include evacuation coverage. Medical transfers off a ship are customarily handled by a coast guard. I'm sure the insurance company had to pay for the service.
If anything the insurance company saved a little money because Bezos already had the private jet in position and that saved them the cost of an airline ticket.
Re:Sounds like a Standard Evac Insurance Policy (Score:5, Insightful)
The tone and substance of this story is more than a little suspect. The hospital at Peurto Aoyra (the biggest one) is used to transporting people off island for various problems although kidney stones are usually just treated with morphine and fluids initially. They certainly could handle that. The place is sparse, but clean. The docs there are mostly military (the military, such as it is has a large presence on the island) the commercial airline is owned by the military, and, at least at Baltra (the main airport) there is no evidence of anything else but military aircraft (a grey 737 and a helicopter when I was there).
So, the story line that the "Navy" "rescued" Bezos is a bit overdone. They shipped him to the mainland on a helicopter because that's pretty much the only way to get him to the mainland short of firing up a bigger aircraft. Like pretty much anybody else.
Must be International Drama Queen Day or something.
Kidney Stones (Score:4, Insightful)
The general "treatment" for kidney stones to to fill the patient full of pain killers and/or smooth muscle relaxants and wait. Later an ultrasound would be done to see if other measures need to be taken. Kidney stones [wikipedia.org] are rarely if ever life threatening; They are just very painful.
Re:Wait What? (Score:5, Insightful)
for the best medical system for your population as a whole
Medical needs occur individually. We do no show up at the clinic "as a whole" for a flu shot. Socialized medicine is the ecological fallacy [wikipedia.org] writ large & tragic.
That is one of the few examples where your comment is completely false -- vaccines, after all, only work if a large percentage of the population gets them. Broken legs, okay, that's individual.
Still, I don't see what's wrong with socialized anything... it seems to me that people are still throwing around the world as code for communist, without saying what they actually mean. To start in the beginning, how about that Ron Paul debate question: poor person shows up at the ER, no insurance, is going to die -- you treat them for free, or let them die? The first one seems "socialist", and the second one seems inhumane.
Re:Wait What? (Score:2, Insightful)