come to light:
THE health bills coming out of Congress would put the de cisions about your care in the hands of presidential appointees. They'd decide what plans cover, how much leeway your doctor will have and what seniors get under Medicare.
Yet at least two of President Obama's top health advisers should never be trusted with that power.
Start with Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, the brother of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. He has already been appointed to two key positions: health-policy adviser at the Office of Management and Budget and a member of
Federal Council on Comparative Effectiveness Research.
Emanuel bluntly admits that the cuts will not be pain-free. "Vague promises of savings from cutting waste, enhancing prevention and wellness, installing electronic medical records and improving quality are merely 'lipstick' cost control, more for show and public relations than for true change," he wrote last year (Health Affairs Feb. 27, 2008).
Savings, he writes, will require changing how doctors think about their patients: Doctors take the Hippocratic Oath too seriously, "as an imperative to do everything for the patient regardless of the cost or effects on others" (Journal of the American Medical Association, June 18, 2008).
Yes, that's what patients want their doctors to do. But Emanuel wants doctors to look beyond the needs of their patients and consider social justice, such as whether the money could be better spent on somebody else.
Many doctors are horrified by this notion; they'll tell you that a doctor's job is to achieve social justice one patient at a time.
Emanuel, however, believes that "communitarianism" should guide decisions on who gets care. He says medical care should be reserved for the non-disabled, not given to those "who are irreversibly prevented from being or becoming participating citizens . . . An obvious example is not guaranteeing health services to patients with dementia" (Hastings Center Report, Nov.-Dec. '96).
and
Senator Jon Kyl was on FOX News Sunday today and admitted that the Democratic health care legislation passed in the House and currently being discussed in the US Senate will require all health care providers, including Catholic institutions, to perform abortions.
Isn't it just wonderful what all is in this bill that some congressmen think they shouldn't even have to pretend to read before they vote? No wonder Obama was so desperate to force a vote before these clowns go home on recess; he's terrified of what's going to happen when the people back home get hold of these jerks and ask what the hell they think they're doing?
2 comments:
What will a government run health care plan look like?
We don't need to go to Canada or England to find out.
We have a government run health care program right here in the States.
It's call the VA.
The VA runs the largest integrated health-care system in the country, with more than 1,400 hospitals, clinics and nursing homes employing 14,800 doctors and 61,000 nurses. And by a number of measures, this government-managed health-care program--socialized medicine on a small scale--is beating the marketplace. For the sixth year in a row, VA hospitals last year scored higher than private facilities on the University of Michigan's American Customer Satisfaction Index, based on patient surveys on the quality of care received.
If you want to know what socialized medicine is like. Just ask a vet.
Well, considering some of the stuff that's come out about the VA system over the years- including that awful mess at Walter Reed of all places a couple of years ago- I don't think I'd be telling people "It'll be just like the VA, you'll love it!"
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