This letter is in response to a recent Flashpoint letter by Dr. James E. Stephens of Brazil titled: ”Government created health care’s dysfunctional mess.”
In his letter, Dr. Stephens focused almost exclusively upon his perception that Medicare and Medicaid cause health care providers a lot of inconvenience and that they provide insufficient levels of reimbursement to doctors as evidence that our health care system is a dysfunctional mess. He referred to negative impacts upon incomes for doctors and hospitals associated with government-run health care programs over and over again. Dr. Stephens did not address the significant benefits to patients associated with Medicare and Medicaid. He also neglected to mention that, for many Americans, Medicare and Medicaid provide the only health care coverage available to them. How many retirees on Medicare would want to give up Medicare and return to private insurance coverage? Not any that I have ever met.
Dr. Stephens then dismissed the relatively short U.S. life expectancy, high infant mortality rates and high costs of health care even though these inexcusable shortcomings are very well documented. He apparently believes that our health care system is far superior to that provided in “socialist” nations. He asked “If we are so bad, why do people from all these countries want to come to the U.S. for the care they can’t get at home?” He then made the assertion that “We deliver the very best health care in the world and I’m proud to be a part of it!“
I agree with Dr. Stephens that the very best health care in the world is available in the U.S. However, it is available almost exclusively at university teaching hospitals like Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and top-flight facilities like the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. Most Americans settle for health care that is of much lower quality and many go without health care altogether. The citizens of countries like France, who have socialized medicine, enjoy far better health care than the citizens of small towns in rural areas of the U.S. How many Parisians who are dissatisfied with their socialized health care system fly from Paris to New York and then on to Indianapolis, rent a car in Indy, and drive to Brazil, Ind., to consult with a doctor?
Interestingly, the health care provided at university medical clinics and teaching hospitals is frequently much less expensive than that provided by doctors in private practice and at for-profit hospitals, regardless of their locations. This is true, in part, because the doctors at university clinics and hospitals are faculty members who earn a relatively low fixed salary and have little incentive to order unnecessary treatments and procedures. For example, I consult with a doctor at Johns Hopkins University who is one of the top specialists in his field. (He, in fact, does see patients who fly in from France.) His charges are so low for an office visit and tests that, depending upon the extent of the services, the cost is significantly less for a visit to Johns Hopkins than for a visit to my local doctor even when including the cost of travel to and from Baltimore!
In theory, if every American was willing to invest the time and effort in order to carefully evaluate the quality of health care and its cost and then travel to obtain the best and least expensive health care, uncompetitive providers would be forced to improve quality and reduce costs or go out of business. Unfortunately, it is extremely difficult to find data on the quality of care provided by doctors. For example, data such as the percentage of surgical procedures performed by a particular doctor that have been successful is impossible to obtain. Likewise, it is very difficult to get estimates of the cost for a particular medical procedure from several providers. Health care providers don’t want this information to be made available to the public.
When you are really sick, you can’t very well go shopping around and wait for appendectomies to go on sale. When you are involved in an automobile accident and are taken, unconscious, to the emergency room, you can’ t take the time to determine if the doctor on duty received top-flight training and compare the prices charged with those at other emergency rooms. No, you get what is available at whatever price they charge. There really is no competition. This is one of the primary reasons why the private sector delivers health care of mediocre quality at high cost to many Americans. The mechanism based upon competition that keeps the quality of such consumer products as washing machines high and the cost low does not function with health care.
In my view, what we need is a universal health care system with a single payer. If everyone in America was enrolled in Medicare, we could ensure that every citizen gets affordable health care. Private health care insurers should be barred from making profits or eliminated. Under such a system, everyone could still choose his or her own doctor and hospital. However, payments to health care providers need to be made at set rates. The government must control prices as is done in virtually every other country in order to prevent the cost of health care from bankrupting us all. Even very conservative countries like Switzerland have imposed price controls on doctors and hospitals. Price controls and a ban on advertising also should be imposed on prescription drugs. A widely available and easily accessed database that would allow consumers to compare the quality of health care provided by doctors and hospitals should be developed in order to help foster competition.
These steps will improve the overall quality of U.S. health care and dramatically reduce the costs. The health care industry, which makes billions of dollars in profits every year, has fought any and all attempts to reform health care. They have done this by legally bribing and corrupting our elected representatives with campaign contributions and running advertisements filled with distortions and lies designed to scare voters, especially seniors, about health care reform. Unfortunately, they have already succeeded because the health care “reform” bills currently being debated in the House and Senate represent very little in the way of any real reform.
— John Allen
Terre Haute
Flashpoint
FLASHPOINT: Most health care is mediocre and expensive
- Flashpoint
-
-
FLASHPOINT: Graduation rates are up; great news for Indiana
As Hoosiers celebrate the conclusion of a truly remarkable Super Bowl experience, there is even more good news that should fill us with pride.
-
FLASHPOINT: Tech trail leading us into a dense, digital forest
It seems the Southwest Parke schools are the latest to play the laptop lottery game.
-
FLASHPOINT: Republicans enable war on middle class, unions
About six years ago at the pinnacle of the Bush/GOP Dictatorship, I began telling you that the wealthy and Corporate America were laying the ground work to politically, financially and physically take over America.
-
FLASHPOINT: Howey ignores truth to advance his agenda
Brian Howey’s Jan. 8 column about the U.S. Senate race proves once again that he will not allow the facts or journalistic ethics to get in the way of attacking Richard Mourdock and promoting his chosen candidate, Dick Lugar.
-
FLASHPOINT: Putting fairness first
This time of year, with chords of Auld Lang Syne still ringing in our ears, it’s not uncommon or unnatural to think of days gone by as being more desirable than the era we live in today.
-
FLASHPOINT: What really motivates right-to-work proposal?
You may have heard about the upcoming “right-to-work” legislation before our lawmakers in the next session of “law making.”
-
FLASHPOINT: The right-to-work debate: ‘Devil at Our Doorstep’
As the 2012 Indiana Legislative Assembly convenes, January will represent a tipping point for all Hoosiers’ individual freedoms as politicians and Big Labor draw battle lines to determine if Indiana will become the 23rd right-to-work state.
-
FLASHPOINT: State’s House Democrats will offer alternative for job creation
As the leaders of single-party control in state government outline their agendas for the 2012 session of the Indiana General Assembly, it is easy to be cynical about their intentions in the months to come.
-
FLASHPOINT: Community colleges must lead way in reshaping higher education
In the 1970s, I began what was three decades in the automotive industry. ... Today, in my position as president of Ivy Tech Community College of Indiana, I see higher education confronted with some of these same challenges.
-
FLASHPOINT: There’s little right about ‘right to work’ proposal
The danger contained in these three simple words – “Right to Work” — is that they sound so innocent.
-
FLASHPOINT: The next big movement? Reform Congress
We are living through one of the most remarkable times in recent history.
-
FLASHPOINT: Christmas trees and crony capitalism
I’ve been involved in selling fresh Christmas trees for as long as I can remember.
-
FLASHPOINT: Salute to Rooney and all veterans
When I awoke to the news that CBS’s “60 Minutes” commentator Andy Rooney had passed away I was truly saddened.
-
FLASHPOINT: Corporate welfare for Menards?
As near as I can figure from a recent story in the newspaper, our government representatives, state and local, are scrambling to find money to give to Menards because of a distribution center they are thinking about building on the city’s North Side.
-
FLASHPOINT: State Archives needs permanent, safe home
The records in the Indiana State Archives are priceless, one-of-a-kind treasures not to be found anywhere else.
-
Flashpoint: State Archives needs permanent, safe home
The records in the Indiana State Archives are priceless, one-of-a-kind treasures not to be found anywhere else.
-
FLASHPOINT: Attracting foreign investment involves more than business climate
A week before I left Indiana to lead my fifth international trade mission, I met with students at Speedway High School who had visited Japan two years ago. They were sharing their advice on Japanese protocol.
-
FLASHPOINT: Scoring the Indiana Chamber
It is a question asked routinely — almost reflexively — during the last days of a General Assembly: “Will the Chamber score this?”
-
FLASHPOINT: The growing power of lobbyists
Back in 1982, Mississippi’s powerful U.S. Sen. John C. Stennis faced a tough re-election fight. Advisers told him he had an ace up his sleeve: as chairman of the Armed Service Committee, he could raise bundles of campaign cash from defense contractors. But Stennis balked. “Would that be proper?” he asked. “I hold life and death over these companies.”
-
FLASHPOINT: Fiscal hawks: Speak out on state’s largest publicly funded project
Indiana has a number of fiscal hawks among our elected officials who talk tough about ending subsidies and cutting wasteful projects.
-
FLASHPOINT: A great company will soon disappear from community
This is in reference to the Tribune-Star story of Aug. 6 concerning the Terre Haute Sherwin-Williams plant’s intention to close by end of the year:
-
FLASHPOINT: Collegiate relations committee proposal addresses neighborhood ills
With the beginning of the school year, it is apparent that Terre Haute is a college town in many respects, especially for those who live in the Farrington’s Grove neighborhood, south of downtown.
-
FLASHPOINT: Indiana learning from a founding Hoosier family
The Delph family excursion through southern Indiana over the Labor Day weekend was as memorable as it was enjoyable. Lilly turned 5 and got to spend her birthday at Holiday World riding rides and eating sweets. Abby got to drive Dad around on the pretend cars foretelling our new world order. Emma, Anna and Evelyn further cemented their status as rollercoaster girls dragging Mom and Dad on the Voyage, arguably the most brutal ride of all for parents.
-
Social media makes news more intimate, more disturbing In decade after 9/11
When a student recently asked what was “the hardest story” I had to cover during my 26 years working at CNN, the question caught me off guard.
-
FLASHPOINT: Better access to quality health care can happen
Over 50 million Americans live in areas where there are simply not enough health care providers to meet their basic needs.
-
FLASHPOINT: Seeking understanding from insanity of war
On the evening of Sept. 11, 2001, my family and I gathered to watch the unending news reports and the searing images of our homeland under attack.
-
How to listen to a politician
As summer draws to a close and next year’s political campaigns get down to brass tacks, you’re going to be hearing a lot more from politicians seeking your vote.
-
FLASHPOINT: Congress must help keep American dream within our reach
Since the 2010 mid-term elections, House Speaker John Boehner and his blindly dedicated Republican followers have not introduced a single bill for job creation.
-
FLASHPOINT: Howey’s Aug. 21 column was inaccurate
Elected officials accept public debate.
-
FLASHPOINT: Measles outbreak demonstrates the need for up-to-date vaccinations
Real incidents that engage national, state and local health professionals can be far more fascinating than television investigative dramas and are clearly more important.
- More Flashpoint Headlines
-
FLASHPOINT: Graduation rates are up; great news for Indiana
Police: Houston Found Dead in Her Hotel Room
Recording Superstar Whitney Houston Dead at 48
Palin Brings Anti-Washington Message to CPAC
Maine GOP Chairman Says Romney Wins Caucuses
Fans 'Speechless' Over Houston's Death
Androgynous Model Walks Runway As Man and Woman
Raw Video: Deadly Blasts in Syria
Obama Scraps Birth Control Mandate
US Airmen's Killer Sentenced to Life in Germany
Latest Jason Wu Collection Shows Chinese Roots
ShowBiz Minute: Madonna, Beresford-Redman, Pawsc
Raw Video: Whitney Houston's Last Performance
Paul Suffers Narrow Loss to Romney in Maine
Stars Show Support at AMFAR Charity Gala
Snow Strands Italian Towns
Navy Names Ship for Gabrielle Giffords
Raw Video: Rough Seas Stop Oil Removal
The Muppets Are Oscars Bound!
Uzbek Man Pleads Guilty in Plot to Kill Obama
BCBG Kicks Off NY Fashion Week
Lusetich: AT&T Rd. 3 recap
Whitney Houston's body is removed from hotel
Raw Video: Aurora Borealis As Seen From Space
Whitney's Final Days - EXCLUSIVE
Romney Tops Santorum in CPAC Straw Poll
First glimpse of Blue Ivy Carter
Angry Dad Shoots Teens Laptop
Peek inside Barbie's closet
Absolute Lin-sanity
Madonna's Daughter Shaves Head
5 Killed in Wrong-way Crash on I-10 in La.
Test on Comforter in Powell Unit Shows Blood
Hero Driver Saves Kids From Burning Bus
Funeral to be held for Powell boys
Sandusky on having to stay inside and people turning on him
Woolly Mammoth Caught on Camera?
Did JLo 'Assault' Marc Anthony on Camera?
Christie Brinkley's Runway Slip
Toddler forced to run half-naked in snow
