A physician in Colorado writes an open letter imploring physicians to think about upcoming health reform:
Although I completely agree that there are genuine problems with the current system, more government interference in medicine can only make things worse, not better. One basic principle we all learned in medical school was, “First, do no harm”. This applies as well to politics as it does to clinical practice. Most of the problems of the current system have been the result of bad government policies. Adding more government bureaucrats to the mix will only make things worse.In my opinion, it is not the government’s role to guarantee health care for all Coloradoans, any more than it is the government’s job to guarantee all citizens a car, or a job, or a great haircut. It is morally wrong and economically unsustainable. It is precisely the attempts by the governments in Canada and Great Britain (or states like Tennessee) to guarantee universal “cradle-to-grave” coverage that has led to the runaway costs and inadequate health care in those places.
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{ 7 comments }
Is it really the case that most physicians don’t see healthcare as a human right. I know Kevin’s opinion and most of the docs who comment here, but I just thought they were the complainers. If that is the general opinion of the profession, then it’s another case where docs are out of touch. Maurice Bernstein has some insight in why physicians are not appreciated.
” Those “hated” physicians are those who are not working for their patients but actually are working for themselves and obviously patients easily sense that attitude.”
What’s funniest about all these things is how wrong they are. The UK’s health system may have problems, but the “runaway costs” are all on this side of the pond. I don’t have up-to-date data but a few years ago we spent nearly double per capita what the UK did. Canada also gets universal coverage for far less per capita than the US, and within the US the cheapest health system is the VA, and it has the best outcomes. Really, I hope the doctors who spew this stuff spend more time looking at data when they try to treat their patients. What’s odd is that this is a MUCH more important decision but all their training and statistical knowledge and understanding of sources of error and bias go out the window when they talk about this.
Evan:
Russia spends less than half per capita of what Canada or the UK spends. Why don’t we replicate their system? The floor for what needs to spend is probably even lower. Closer to zero. 85% of the people will be happy with it because 85% of the people are healthy and don’t need it at any given time. Everybody dies eventually regardless and this way they drop off the retirement and disability roles faster saving money all around. Society doesn’t need weak people.
If health care is a right, it is the right to seek it privately under ones own terms without the interests of “society” controlling it that is the fundamental natural right. Look at facts Evan. Look at the consultants in Britain who are told that, in a scheme to jigger the stats, they will not be paid unless the patient has been on the waiting list to be seen for at least 8 weeks. Look at the waiting times to initiate cancer treatment in both those systems, and the lower survival rates that result.
A private system like the US is geared to the consumer–the patient, not to the bottom line of the GAO.
What I found interesting in the letter was the qoute about the “compelling consensus” driving reform in Colorado. I have visions of the compelling consensus in Paris for the Terror. If we are to be a constitutional republic, and not a mob, then that constitution limits the power of the majority to force it’s will on the minority. The sick will always be a minority.
Regarding the VA being efficient, it is very efficient to hire enough nurses to chart vital signs but don’t bother to actually take them and notice that the patients are stone cold dead.
Anon. I eagerly await any data showing that the US gets better outcomes across the board, in life expectancy OR in patient satisfaction than other countries that have Universal Coverage. You show me that we do better on EITHER number and I will agree that our system should be maintained as is. But you wouldn’t treat someone with a medicine just because someone said something scary about it would you? You wouldn’t advocate an operation just on someone’s say-so. You’d want data.
Is that so hard to get?
Im glad i dont live in russia.
Evan:
The book by Dr. David Gretzer, “The Cure . . ” reports the data you are asking for on patient satisfaction and on medical outcomes. It is the satisfaction and survival rate of patients with life-threatening illnesses that are the measure of quality medical care, not how happy the healthy are with it, nor life-expectacy of the overall population which is much more dependent on lifestyle.
First, get the spelling right if you’re going to quote him as an authority. Second, realize that he is not advocating that healthcare should be denied to those who can’t pay; he thinks the fix is the free market system. Thirdly, he deceptively cherry picks his data.
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