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By Brooks A. Mick, M.D.
Nov. 22, 2006 Today's Mallard Fillmore cartoon reports that "Harvard scientists have discovered that red wine improves the life span of obese mice. However, they are ignoring the question of why we are the only country in the world with a mouse obesity problem." As part of the Democratic push for socialized medicine, left-wing Harvard physicians such as Stephanie Woolhandler and others are beginning to republish the same statistics as in previous years, statistics which supposedly damn the US health care system and hold up European and Canadian health care as a model for the USA to adopt. Disingenuously, however, they are ignoring the mouse obesity problem. That is, what are the true pathologies in our current system? Once one delves into how the current health care system developed its problems, one can see that the "solutions" proposed by the left-wing Harvard folks will just increase the sickness in the health care system. Government, unions, inept corporate CEOs, and an economically ignorant citizenry comprise an Axis of Health Care Evil which has created perverse incentives in health care delivery. Government gave tax breaks to corporations for providing health care to employees. Sounds good, but where does the money for the health care come from? Ultimately, it comes out of the pockets of the workers who receive lower wages than they could otherwise be paid, though they are fooled into thinking this health care is free. Because they perceive it as free, the law of supply and demand assures that the health care system will be over utilized. It is much as when the government gave away free cheese a few decades ago. If you were paying attention, you noticed that the overwhelming majority of the "poor people" in line to get free cheese were already markedly obese. Just so, the majority of people coming to the doctor's office already have enough health care. Much of a physician's time is taken up with seeing people for acne, , hemorrhoids, dandruff, athlete's foot, and other minor problems that could be just as well treated by a visit to the local supermarket shelf--and the patients WOULD treat themselves except that they perceive this medical care as cheap or free and thus they use it. Supply and demand. The equation should actually be Supply and Demand and Cost. If the cost is made to appear artificially low, the demand will go up even if the supply is not changed. The Harvard ivory-tower physicians will point to various measures of health, but will ignore major factors causing deleterious effects in the USA. They fail to point out that these factors would not be changed by a different payment system. I suspect they have a hidden agenda, however, to change these factors by bureaucratic regulation. The USA suffers from a surplus of easily-obtainable and relatively inexpensive food and gasoline. Thus we eat too much and get too little exercise. We prefer to hop into the car for a trip of a block or two rather than walk or ride a bicycle. And a change in payment method for health care will not change these behaviors. I think the left-wingers have a plan for this, however. They will start outlawing Big Macs and french fries and other foods deemed dangerous. They will outlaw Pepsi and Coke. They will make it a criminal offense to drive two blocks to the grocery store when you could easily walk there. Don't believe me? I think you will see signs that they are already starting down that bureaucratic path. Ultimately, many of the health problems we face are caused by freedom: The freedom to sit in front of the TV rather than go jogging. The freedom to eat a Big Mac with large fries if we want. The freedom to jump into the Chevy and drive down to the corner supermarket. The only way the socialized-medicine bureaucrats will have to change these behaviors is to simply outlaw them. It is interesting to me that the same left-wing people who protest about some imaginary loss of freedom through the Patriot Act will nevertheless lobby for a curtailment of freedom in the service of their own pet project, the socialization of medical care in America. They won't tell you this, however. This is where the final element of the Axis of Health Care Evil comes in: an economically ignorant citizenry. The citizens are too ignorant of economic reality to realize that nothing is free, that they are paying for the health care that they get, and thus that they should exercise responsibility in what they request. The real solution to the health care problem would involve getting companies out of the business of providing health care for employees and retirees. Put THE PATIENT back in charge of his own health care and in charge of PAYING FOR IT. They are paying for it one way or another, so why not take the control out of the hands of HMO bureaucrats and give it back to the patient? If you remove the consumer from the responsibility and act of paying, you produce perverse incentives which will drive up the cost of health care. And it has assuredly happened. Instead, let the citizen-patient put his money into a medical savings account tax-free and let it grow tax-free. This will solve two problems. The patient will again have the responsibility to choose whether to spend his money or not, which will eliminate a lot of nuisance visits to the doctor's office for athlete's foot and acne and hangnails. In addition, it will improve the savings rate in this country, which the left wing gripes about all the time but refuses to do anything about in the way of letting the citizens keep enough money to actually save any! In a different vein altogether, one reason health care costs are so high in the USA is that we, as a people, generally hate to give up! We spend millions and millions of dollars on intensive medical care for people whose medical condition is hopeless. Most of our health care money is spent on the elderly in terminal stages of their illness. Surely this is an area where the ivory-tower socialists will want to instigate rationing once they get their hands on the purse strings. He who pays the piper calls the tune. If you put government bureaucrats in charge of paying for health care, they will be calling the tunes. And you won't like it. The same left-wing bureaucrats who have damaged the economies of Europe would be in charge of your health care. Think about it. And read on. Lastly, from a fine piece by the great economist, Walter Williams: "...a comparative study by Timbro, a Swedish think tank, show(s) that European countries rank with the poorest U.S. states in terms of living standards, roughly equal to Arkansas and Montana and only slightly ahead of West Virginia and Mississippi. Average living space in Europe is just under 1,000 square feet for the average household, while U.S. households enjoy an average of 1,875 square feet, and poor households 1,200 square feet. In terms of income levels, productivity, employment levels and R&D investment, according to Eurochambres (The Association of European Chambers of Commerce and Industry), it would take Europe about two decades to catch up with us, assuming we didn't grow further. We don't have to rely on these statistics to make us not want to be like Europeans; just watch where the foot traffic and money flow. Some 400,000 European science and technology graduates live in the U.S. European migration to our country rose by 16 percent during the 1990s. In 1980, the Bureau of Economic Analysis put foreign direct investment in the U.S. at $127 billion. Today, it's more than $1.7 trillion. In 1980, there was $90 billion of foreign portfolio investment - government and private securities - in the U.S. Today, there's more than $4.6 trillion, much of it coming from Europeans who find our investment climate more attractive. " ------------ About the author Brooks A. Mick: Physician, still practicing medicine but retired from the US Army. Write just for the fun of it, but working on novel in the vein of Tom Clancy's politico-military genre. Email: brooks15@cox.net Comment on this article here! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED! |
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