EDITORIAL: Rationing health care

The Washington Times ^ | April 21, 2009 | EDITORIAL

[richardb72]

Appearing on "Meet the Press" on Sunday, Lawrence H. Summers, President Obama's chief economic adviser, stated, "Whether it's tonsillectomies or hysterectomies ... procedures are done three times as frequently [in some parts of the country than others] and there's no benefit in terms of the health of the population. And by doing the right kind of cost-effectiveness, by making the right kinds of investments and protection, some experts ... estimate that we could take as much as $700 billion a year out of our health care system."

Let's be clear - Mr. Summers is talking about rationing. . . .

[cvq3842]

What’s ironic is the silence of all the pro-abortion types who, until recently, spoke of “rights to privacy” and the government not getting involved in decisions between a woman and her doctor.

[combat_boots]

But not for their families. DC elitists and their pals will get special ‘exemptions’—perhaps on our dime.

[sr4402]

What their talking about is taking the choices away from the doctors and patients and giving it to the government.

A bureaucrat inevitably, gets to make medical decisions exactly like this idiot was proposing "to save money". The result is kids with hugely inflamed tonsils are denied after the antibiotics fail. Penny wise and pound foolish, the infection takes the throat and part of the mouth.

Same for hysterectomies. A bad cancerous tumor is seen, but the hysterectomy is not done. Result, spreading cancer and death.

This is the Liberal/Progressives legacy - sickness and death- be it through abortion, adultery or otherwise.

[Diogenesis]

Mitt Romney chortles, as he inflicts his socialized medicine (HillaryCARE=ROmneyCARE)
upon the Massachusetts citizens.

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"Hospital patients 'left in agony'"
"Patients were allegedly left screaming in pain and drinking from flower vases on a nightmare hospital ward.
Between 400 and 1,200 more people died than would have been expected at Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust over three years, a damning Healthcare Commission report said.
The watchdog's investigation found inadequately trained staff who were too few in number, junior doctors left alone in charge at night and patients left without food, drink or medication as their operations were repeatedly cancelled.
Patients were left in pain or forced to sit in soiled bedding for hours at a time and were not given their regular medication, the Commission heard.
Receptionists with no medical training were expected to assess patients coming in to A&E, some of whom needed urgent care.
Sir Bruce Keogh, medical director of the NHS, said there had been a "gross and terrible breach" of patients' trust and a "complete failure of leadership".
The Healthcare Commission's chairman Sir Ian Kennedy said the investigation followed concerns about a higher than normal death rate at the Trust, which senior managers could not explain.
He said: "The resulting report is a shocking story. Our report tells a story of appalling standards of care and chaotic systems for looking after patients. These are words I have not previously used in any report.
"There were inadequacies in almost every stage of caring for patients. There was no doubt that patients will have suffered and some of them will have died as a result."
Julie Bailey, 47, was so concerned about the care being given to her 86-year-old mother Bella at Stafford Hospital that she and her relatives slept in a chair at her bedside for eight weeks.
She said: "We saw patients drinking out of..."

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"Paramedics told: 'Let accident victims die if they want to' in new row over patient rights (UK)"
Health Service paramedics have been told not to resuscitate terminally-ill patients who register on a controversial new database to say they want to die.
It has been set up by the ambulance service in London for hundreds of people who have only a few months to live so that they may register their 'death wishes' in advance.
It is believed to be the first in the country, but other trusts around the country are expected to follow suit to comply with Government guidelines which state that patients' wishes should be taken into account, even at the point of death.
Patients' groups and doctors have welcomed the scheme, but it has met opposition from pro-life groups who say it violates the sanctity of life.
The system would come into play if a cancer patient, for example, was in serious pain and rang 999 for help to alleviate the suffering.
But if the paramedics arrived and the patient was close to death, he or she would not be resuscitated if such a request was registered on the database.
This would also be the case if a patient on the database was being transferred between hospitals, and had a heart attack.
Dominica Roberts from the Pro-Life Alliance said: 'This is very sad and very dangerous. It's another step along the slippery slope, at the bottom of which is euthanasia as we see in Holland. 'Paramedics should be there to save lives. They should not be there to let patients die. The medical profession should not agree with someone's belief that their life is worthless.'"

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"National Health Preview - The Massachusetts debacle, coming soon to your neighborhood."
"Three years ago, the former Massachusetts Governor had the inadvertent good sense to create the "universal" health-care program that the White House and Congress now want to inflict on the entire country.
It is proving to be instructive, as Mr. Romney's foresight previews what President Obama, Max Baucus, Ted Kennedy and Pete Stark are cooking up for everyone else.
In Massachusetts's latest crisis, Governor Deval Patrick and his Democratic colleagues are starting to move down the path that government health plans always follow when spending collides with reality -- i.e., price controls.
As costs continue to rise, the inevitable results are coverage restrictions and waiting periods. It was only a matter of time.

They're trying to manage the huge costs of the subsidized middle-class insurance program that is gradually swallowing the state budget.
The program provides low- or no-cost coverage to about 165,000 residents, or three-fifths of the newly insured, and is budgeted at $880 million for 2010, a 7.3% single-year increase that is likely to be optimistic.
The state's overall costs on health programs have increased by 42% (!) since 2006.

What really whipped along RomneyCare were claims that health care would be less expensive if everyone were covered.
But reducing costs while increasing access are irreconcilable issues.
Mr. Romney should have known better before signing on to this not-so-grand experiment, especially since the state's "free market" reforms that he boasts about have proven to be irrelevant when not fictional.
Only 21,000 people have used the "connector" that was supposed to link individuals to private insurers."

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A Very Sick Health Plan; Bay State’s ‘Grand Experiment’ Fails [RomneyCare]
"The Daily News Record, Harrisonburg, Va. - 2009-03-31 "
"For folks increasingly leery of President Obama’s plan to radically overhaul America’s health-care system,
or 17 percent of the nation’s economy, all this could hardly have come at a better time —
that is, fiscal troubles aplenty within Repubican Mitt Romney’s brainchild, Massachusetts’ “grand experiment” in “universal” health care."

"Initiated on Mr. Romney’s gubernatorial watch in 2006, this “experiment” has fallen on hard times, and predictably so.
Even though the Bay State commenced its program with a far smaller percentage of uninsured residents than exists nationwide,
“RomneyCare” is threatening to bankrupt the state. Budgeted for Fiscal Year 2010 at $880 million,
or 7.3 percent more than a year ago, this plan, aimed at providing low- or no-cost health coverage to roughly 165,000 residents,
has caused Massachusetts’ overall expenditures on all health-related programs to jump an astounding 42 percent since 2006.

So what does Mr. Romney’s successor, Democratic Gov. Deval Patrick, propose as a remedy for these skyrocketing costs?
Well, whaddya think? The standard litany of prescriptions (no pun intended) — price controls and spending caps, for a start, and then, again predictably, waiting periods and limitations on coverage.
As in Europe and Canada, so too in Massachusetts. And, we feel certain, everyone from Mr. Romney to Mr. Patrick said, “It would never happen here.”
But then, such things are inevitable when best-laid plans, with all their monstrous costs, run smack-dab into fiscal reality.

[cvq3842]

Yup.

[BubbaBasher]

If you think health care is expensive now, just wait ‘til it’s free.

[Chief Engineer]

I guess that is the rationale of the bureaucrats in ID who have refused my request for medicaid after being diagnosed with invasive breast cancer. Yup, socialized medicine sure is the way to go (sarcasm intended)

[sr4402]

Great Example. Get it to good listening media as fast as you can. This is exactly what socialized medicine does and if it hits them like a ton of bricks, you may get the treatment you need.

Call your Congressperson and U.S. Senator as well. That's what they are there for.

[Chief Engineer]

My case involves three distinct and separate issues. We approached three different pro bono law firms and one which we heard from had won a case involving an illegal alien who had been working illegally when he suffered a stroke. He accumulated over $110,00 in hospital debt which Ada County in ID refused to pay. The law firm took the case to court and won so we approached them. We received a letter from them advising they were only interested in representing cases which were in the “national and public” interest although their website advocates they believe in upholding the Constitution.
I arrived in this country legally on a K-1 (Fiancee) Visa on July 23, 2002 and married my husband July 26, 2002 and have lived here ever since. We began the paperwork towards obtaining a green card for me but ran into the unexpected expense of a series of chest x-rays ordered by the doctor because I had had a positive tb test over 30 years ago when I came into contact with a girl in grade 12 who had tb. If someone has had a positive tb test they must have a series of chest x-rays. The money which was spent on those x-rays was to have been spent for the green card and now the price has gone from $400 up to $930 plus the biometric fingerprint fee, travel to and from the immigration center in MT and other related costs which come to a total cost of $3000. My husband is on Social Security.
I was enrolled in a specific program for under and uninsured women funded by the federal government and when the intake woker contacted me the first thing I told her was that I did NOT have a green card but I had entered the country legally following all the proper laws and procedures and waiting for two years before being allowed entry. She phoned me back two hours later to advise me I had been enrolled. When I went to the mobile van I again advised them I had entered the country legally but did NOT have a green card. Since then it has been an absolute nightmare (I have been called a liar threatened with deportation by a bureaucrat who relates a K-1 Visa with a tourist Visa and the Director of the Dept had advised the holder of a K-1 Visa is only allowed into the U,S, for 90 days to marry a U.S. citizen... he read it on the internet so it must be right), not to mention that bureaucrats with the Dept of Health and Welfare haven’t got a clue about the asbestos laden vermiculite insulation used in homes which people were exposed to. I lived in one of those homes for 14 years and vacuumed up the insulation daily and my boys thought the pellets were something pretty neat to play with. My husband has gone in to speak with the news director of the local tv station today to see if they would be willing to do a news story on the issue and our Senator is working hard on the issue as well. Wide stance Craig couldn’t be bothered since we were just a lone vote and not big money from big ag business.

[MrB]

abortion and AIDS treatment will not be rationed

guaranteed

[cvq3842]

Yup.

[Diogenesis]

Healthcare for the taxcheating politicians will not be rationed, either.

[socialismisinsidious]

Socialized Medicine aka Universal Health Care PING LIST

FReepmail me if you want to be added to or removed from this ping list.

[justiceseeker93]

Lawrence Summers should get a legitimate medical degree as a minimal requirement to assert an opinion on national TV as to what surgical procedures are necessary and which are wasteful.

As it turns out, hysterectomies can save the lives of women with some cancers, despite Summers' conclusion that "there's no benefit in terms of the health of the population." Only in the leftist's collectivist mindset does "the health of the population" take priority over the health of the individuals within that population.

[ml/nj]

Lawrence Summers should get a legitimate medical degree as a minimal requirement to assert an opinion on national TV as to what surgical procedures are necessary and which are wasteful.

This is a sore point with me. I think it is disgusting that Jane Brody, who was probably a journalism major, is allowed to pretend to give "health" advice in the NY Times. (If she's still there - I don't get the NYT anymore.)

ML/NJ

[Diogenesis]

Summers hates women, so perhaps this is his way
of getting them back.

[des]

Pain or chronic bleeding would just be your little cross to bear.

[justiceseeker93]

Summers hates women, so perhaps this is his way of getting them back.

Although Summers is out of his league on the issues of tonsillectomies and hysterectomies, I wouldn't go so far as to agree that he "hates women." I'm aware that he was involved in a controversy as the president of Harvard when he spoke about the relatively small numbers of female scientists, or something to that effect, stating (roughly) that gender differences in aptitudes account for that. The unjust flak that he took from the feminists for those remarks led to his resignation from that position, IIRC.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks justiceseeker93.