>>It's also worth noting how much of health care cost is due to legal liability. I find it ironic that a political party so heavily funding by trial lawyers is hoped for as the savior of health care. Ask John Edwards why there are so many Ceasarians performed in the US. No political party's hands are clean on this and I certainly would be in favor of universal health insurance and serious clinical preventive care outreach, but until there is tort reform it is very unlikely costs are going to be able to be reduced significantly.
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>The tort reform is a scapegoat. Sure, in a deeply American tradition, once people saw the outrageous amount of money raked by white collar mafia, there was a number of guys who tried to use the legal system as a way to get a cut of it. But then the whole thing about the so-called "tort reform" is geared toward total indemnity of corporations, which will be pretty much exempt from being sued for anything short of deliberate murder. Just watch.
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>The litigation didn't make health industry expensive. Litigation came upon it because it was full of money. Nobody sues a shoe shine boy.
But the litigation was predicated on insurance and the insurance industry is excellent at keeping premium income ahead of risk. So insurance companies make more money from a scared medical industry and lawyers make it from everyone. And what does that have to do with quality medical care.
Look at how John Edwards made his money and why any hospital now runs very expensive CYA tests to protect from all future litigation. ( or, in the case of the case where Edwards got rich, they do Caesarians pre-emptively to prevent being sued ) Look at what malpractice insurance costs for a obstetrician. Do you think those costs are not being passed on?
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>>>>So here's a bet: whoever wins in November, will end up doing something spectacularly expensive, profitable and eventually ineffective. Health will not be more affordable for anyone but the system's pets.
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>The bet stays. One virtual beer.
I don't doubt that. But I also don't doubt that all the trial lawyers who fund the Dmeocratic Party have invested huge amounts of money in convincing you they are not part of the problem. Seems it worked ;-)
Charles Hankey
Though a good deal is too strange to be believed, nothing is too strange to have happened.
- Thomas Hardy
Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm-- but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.
-- T. S. Eliot
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for lunch.
Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote.
- Ben Franklin
Pardon him, Theodotus. He is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature.
