Prognosis Negative….
A couple of days ago while channel surfing, I stopped on a program that somehow managed to catch my attention in the half second before my finger instinctively pressed the channel-up button. The program was called Mystery Diagnosis, which airs on the Discovery Health channel. The show features “real life” people who are struck by an illness, usually a very serious one, which has most doctors baffled as to its cause or origin.
This particular program featured a teenage girl who couldn’t keep her balance, was constantly dizzy, and suffered from severe headaches. The teen’s mother took her to the family doctor, but he couldn’t come up with any obvious medical reasons for the girl’s symptoms! The mother then took her daughter to see a neurologist; again the doctor couldn’t find anything wrong with the girl.
To make a long story short, the girl’s mother refused to accept the non-diagnoses of the doctors and kept searching for one that would finally help her daughter. After going to several neurologists, they luckily stumbled upon one who was able to diagnose the illness and help the girl with her condition.
The girl had a rare deformity of the skull in which the brain was being “squeezed.” The doctor then performed a dangerous surgery on the skull to correct the problem. At the end of the show, the mother claimed that the doctor who finally diagnosed and helped her daughter was the 9th one that they saw!
So where am I going with this true, but boring story, you ask?
When I heard the mother say that she went to 9 doctors until they found the right one, it sparked a thought in my mind about our current healthcare system, and the impending “universal” government-run healthcare system being pushed by Obama and the socialists in congress.
I asked myself, would the government-run, taxpayer funded healthcare system allow for eight second opinions? Would they allow for five, or four, or even three? Would the woman featured in the television program have been able to keep searching for a doctor until she found the right one, all on the government’s dime? Unless YOUR brain is being squeezed, you would have to answer NO!
If we adopt this socialized health system, how good will the care actually be? If you look at the Canadian or British system, or if you just use your God given brain, the answer would have to be that the care will suck in comparison to the present system. After all, government entitlements don’t come with any frills!
Ask anyone who lives in a government housing project if it’s a nice place to live. The answer would be NO; housing projects are horrible rat infested places to live!
Ask anyone collecting welfare if the pay is good. The answer would be NO; the government gives you just enough to get by!
Ask a senior citizen if living on only their social security is easy. The answer would be NO; it’s not barley enough to keep you above the poverty level!
In the age of economic recessions, ever bloated national debt, and out of control budget deficits, who in their right mind would believe that nationalized universal healthcare would be anything but rationed and mediocre at best? Would you be able to see any amount of specialist you wanted, like the woman in the television show?
Sometimes, one, two, or even three doctors may not be able to help you. In a nationalized system, where do you go from there? The well-to-do in Canada and Great Britain come here, but where would YOU go? Would the determined mother in the television show have been able to save her daughter in a rationed no-frills government run healthcare system?
What do you think?
Reader Comments
A socialised healthcare system doesn’t mean private healthcare is non-existant. Here in the UK there is a thriving market for private healthcare (and insurance). If the mother you talked about was in the UK, I’m sure she could have had as many opinions as she could afford.
However, even within the National Health Service, your general practitioner — who serves as your doctor for non-urgent medical assistance and acts as a gateway to other, specialist doctors — can be changed freely without having to give a reason.
Well done Peter, thank you for setting our misguided American friend straight. I know its scary, Pete, but trust me government health care doesn’t in any way restrict the rights of those who can afford it. Come on in, the waters warm.
If anything the government encourages people to “go private” as it saves costs for those who can’t. Also don’t be so scared of the government bureaucracy, having experienced New Zealand based national healthcare bureaucracy and US based private insurance bureaucracy (whilst living in the states for 5 years). I can say I like neither of them very much, but partially prefer the government version – at least you don’t get such an obvious feeling they are trying to actually make you well, rather than screw you of every last dime. (Perhaps because in the former case, the people that get really sick can never be pushed ‘out of coverage’ so there is less incentive?)
Peter & Miles,
Thanks for the input on “nationalized healthcare”. I fully realize that wealthy Brits, New Zealanders, and Canadians are free to pay for private care. I know this because some of you guys come here to do just that.
The only thing that I have to go on is our first attempt at “universal healthcare” in the early 90’s under the leadership of then first lady Hillary Clinton, aptly nicknamed – HillaryCare.
The Clinton plan actually would have made it illegal for doctors to accept direct cash payments from patients! It also limited and regulated the number of specialist allowed in any particular field. HillaryCare was our first and only serious attempt to achieve universal coverage, and it was a scarier than Hillary without makeup!
Unless the present liberals in congress have wised up since then, I have no reason to believe that any new plan would be much different.
Don’t you know we can’t have the inequity of “rich” people paying for premium care while the rest of the people have to suffer with no-frills coverage!
PM