full transcript
From the Ted Talk by Jeanne Pinder: What if all US health care costs were transparent?
Unscramble the Blue Letters
Health costs ate up almost 18 pneerct of our gross domestic product last year, but nobody has any idea what stuff costs. But what if we did know? So we started out small. We caelld docrots and hospitals and asked them what they would accept as a cash payment for simple procedures. Some people were helpful. A lot of people hung up on us. Some people were just pailn rude. They said, "We don't know," or, "Our lawyers won't let us tell you that," though we did get a lot of information. We found, for example, that here in the New York area, you could get an echocardiogram for 200 dollars in Brooklyn or for 2,150 dollars in Manhattan, just a few miles away. New Orleans, the same simple blood test, 19 dollars over here, 522 dollars just a few bklcos away. San faicscnro, the same MRI, 475 darolls or 6,221 dollars just 25 mlies away. These pricing variations existed for all the procedures and all the cities that we syeruved.
Open Cloze
Health costs ate up almost 18 _______ of our gross domestic product last year, but nobody has any idea what stuff costs. But what if we did know? So we started out small. We ______ _______ and hospitals and asked them what they would accept as a cash payment for simple procedures. Some people were helpful. A lot of people hung up on us. Some people were just _____ rude. They said, "We don't know," or, "Our lawyers won't let us tell you that," though we did get a lot of information. We found, for example, that here in the New York area, you could get an echocardiogram for 200 dollars in Brooklyn or for 2,150 dollars in Manhattan, just a few miles away. New Orleans, the same simple blood test, 19 dollars over here, 522 dollars just a few ______ away. San _________, the same MRI, 475 _______ or 6,221 dollars just 25 _____ away. These pricing variations existed for all the procedures and all the cities that we ________.
Solution
- plain
- surveyed
- blocks
- dollars
- miles
- francisco
- percent
- called
- doctors
Original Text
Health costs ate up almost 18 percent of our gross domestic product last year, but nobody has any idea what stuff costs. But what if we did know? So we started out small. We called doctors and hospitals and asked them what they would accept as a cash payment for simple procedures. Some people were helpful. A lot of people hung up on us. Some people were just plain rude. They said, "We don't know," or, "Our lawyers won't let us tell you that," though we did get a lot of information. We found, for example, that here in the New York area, you could get an echocardiogram for 200 dollars in Brooklyn or for 2,150 dollars in Manhattan, just a few miles away. New Orleans, the same simple blood test, 19 dollars over here, 522 dollars just a few blocks away. San Francisco, the same MRI, 475 dollars or 6,221 dollars just 25 miles away. These pricing variations existed for all the procedures and all the cities that we surveyed.
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Important Words
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