FYI,........ just spreading the word:
QuotePreventable Medical Errors Still Kill Thousands, Cost Billions as Employers Foot Bill
Despite a landmark report a decade ago detailing the deadly nature of the U.S. health care system, a consumer group finds that little has been done to prevent errors that cost the nation $17 billion to $29 billion and kill as many as 100,000 patients annually.
May 20, 2009
Preventable Medical Errors Still Kill Thousands, Cost Billions as Employers Foot Bill
Despite a landmark report a decade ago detailing the deadly nature of the U.S. health system, a consumer group said Tuesday, May 19, that little has been done to prevent the errors that still kill as many as 100,000 patients each yearâ€"a number that the group said is a conservative estimate.
Consumers Union, which publishes the magazine Consumer Reports, published what it called a “review of the scant evidence†of the health system’s efforts to reduce preventable errors that cost the country $17 billion to $29 billion annually, a cost borne by the employers that pay for shoddy care.
The group concluded that it was impossible to gauge what, if any, progress had been made since the Institute of Medicine released its 1999 report “To Err Is Human.†Efforts to reform the system are “few and fragmented†with the exception of a few state laws requiring hospitals to provide information.
“In this report we give the country a failing grade on progress on select recommendations we believe necessary to create a health care system free of preventable medical harm,†the group said.
The report follows a similar analysis by the Leapfrog Group, an employer-sponsored organization working toward reducing medical errors. In a report last month, the group said a majority of hospitals failed to meet quality standards that reduce errors.
For example, 75 percent of hospitals do not fully meet the standards for 13 evidence-based safety practices, ranging from hand-washing to competency of the nursing staff, the Leapfrog Group said.
At the time, the 1999 report by the Institute of Medicine sent shockwaves through the medical establishment. The IOM, one of the National Academies of Sciences that advise U.S. policymakers, concluded that it would be “irresponsible to expect anything less than a 50 percent reduction in errors over five years.â€
The report was followed by a task force appointed by President Bill Clinton, a $50 million allocation to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and several federal bills. Yet today, Congress has yet to pass a bill requiring hospitals to report medical errors.
In its report Tuesday, Consumers Union said the country has failed to:
● Reduce medication errors because hospitals have not widely adopted computerized prescribing and dispensing systems; the FDA has not done enough to help consumers and health practitioners avoid medication errors that stem from similar-sounding drug names and labels.
● Establish a national system suitable for reporting and tracking medical errors.
● Empower the Agency for Health Research and Quality to track national progress on patient safety.
● Raise professional standards and accountability of doctors, nurses and hospitals that commit preventable and widespread medical errors.
The 10-year anniversary of the IOM report comes amid the first concrete efforts to overhaul the health care system led by the Obama administration, which set aside billions of dollars in the federal budget for that task.
Additionally, the administration earmarked $19 billion in the economic stimulus bill to create a health information technology infrastructure that it says will reduce medication prescribing errors and other health system inefficiencies.
http://www.workforce.com/section/00/article/26/44/06.php
Faye, please read all of this. He makes the points that other here are trying to make. You just won't open your eyes.
http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2009/05/15/f-rfa-macdonald.html
Quote
Dear neighbours,
It looks as though you will be hearing quite a bit more about Canada in the next couple of years, so I thought we should have a word.
No, no, now, come on. I'm not going to bore you about our cultural festivals or our clean streets.
It's our health-care system you'll be hearing about. And some of what you'll hear won't be pleasant.
Now that President Barack Obama seems determined to plow ahead with that campaign promise to create affordable, universal health care, the uproar is already starting and my country's system, understandably enough, seems to be the point of reference.
As you might know, we Canadians actually have universal health care. It's a big deal for us. In fact, it's probably the thing we cite most often when we try to explain what makes us different from you (other than our apparent willingness to pay more for just about everything we buy).
Burton Cummings of the Guess Who: American woman, \Burton Cummings of the Guess Who: American woman, "sparkle someone else's eyes." (CBC)
Look, I'm going to be honest here: our system makes us feel superior. I don't know a Canadian who doesn't work it into any conversation with an American that lasts more than two minutes.
Guess who
We call our system a "safety net." We think it helps prevent the sort of crushing social inequality that most of us think is everywhere on your side of the border.
We actually love hearing about your crushing social inequality. It's a favorite Canadian topic. Remember that famous Canadian rock song, American Woman, by the Guess Who back in the '70s? Listen to the words sometime.
Anyway, while the progressives among you seem to envy our system, your conservatives hate it. And they seem to think our system is where your president is headed.
They're the ones you'll be hearing most from.
Actually, you're already hearing from them if you watch cable news. A group called Conservatives for Patients' Rights has already started running attack ads talking about the "victims of government-run health care." Most of these "victims," it turns out, are Canadian.
Rationing
The ads seem a bit over the top. But â€" and this is not going to help my popularity back home â€" there's a fair amount of truth in them, too.
One features Dr. Brian Day, a private clinic owner and former head of the Canadian Medical Association, saying that what we Canadians really have is access to "a government/state-mandated wait list."
According to Day, "the wait lists are long, the patients are languishing and suffering on wait lists."
Another features a British Columbia businessman named Don Neufeldt, who grew tired of waiting for treatment for his heart arrhythmia and headed to Oklahoma to have it fixed.
After the doctors there sewed him up, they told him it had been a life-threatening condition. In other words, he could have died on the Canadian wait list.
These ads are already provoking indignation in Canada, but really, they shouldn't. The fact is, the provincial governments that run the health-care system up there practise rationing.
Effectively, they pay doctors to decide who deserves quick treatment and who doesn't. This is not radical; Britain does it too, among others.
Promises
It is an approach that is incomprehensible to most Americans, I grant you. But Dr. Day is right: depending on your age and condition, you can suffer for quite a while in Canada before the doctor gets to you, and it's all pretty much up to the governments, which control the spending taps.
(Of course, if you're somebody important, or you know somebody important, the queue can be quite flexible. Canadian VIPs, as a general rule, don't spend much time waiting for health care).
Now, Canadian politicians are constantly promising to fix the situation and, during election campaigns, they stand in front of big backdrops promising shorter wait lines.
The queues, however, never seem to get much shorter. As one medical-industry monitoring group put it in a report last year: "Commitments (made five years ago) have been only partially met at best."
It's your money
There is something else you're going to be hearing about our system, too: we Canadians can't just reach into our pockets and pay for quick care.
Rick Baker is a Vancouver-based broker who arranges American treatment for impatient Canadians. He appears in the new ads, saying "there is only one other country in the world, that's North Korea, that follows our pattern."
In Canada, he points out, "It is against the law for a medical provider to accept payment for rendering medical services."
Again, pretty much accurate, except for the foolish North Korea comparison. There is a principle behind the ban on patients paying: it's based on the notion that you shouldn't be able to buy your way to the front of the line.
That's a difficult one to explain to Americans. Most of you are accustomed to spending your money as you see fit once the government is finished taxing you. Canadians just don't have that privilege.
Customer service
While I'm at this, dear friends, I might as well tell you a few other things about our system.
You know how doctors here sometimes give you their home or cellphone numbers and ask you to call them directly if you have a problem?
Or how they'll call you in the evening to check up on you after a treatment? Or how many others on the hospital staff here are always trying to answer your questions, instead of telling you only the doctor is permitted to speak?
It's not like that where I come from. Most of you wouldn't be happy at all with our customer service.
In the interest of balance, though, I must tell you about a few other things you won't have to deal with if President Obama gets Congress to adopt something like the Canadian system.
You won't have your health insurance cancelled on an insurer's whim, which happens here all the time, or have it denied if you or some relative was once sick. "Pre-existing conditions" don't matter at all in Canada.
You won't have some bean-counting weasel in your health group or your insurance plan conspiring to deprive you of the treatment to which you are entitled.
You won't lose your health care if you lose your job. You won't have ever-rising "co-pays" and deductibles and fees; and you won't wind up hounded by a collection agent who calls at all hours to inform you that your credit could be wrecked for life if you continue to dispute a charge on your medical bill.
Also, if you spend some time in hospital, you won't end up with months of incomprehensible invoices from everyone who provided any service, from the guy who operated the EKG machine to the guy who read the test results to the woman who administered the anaesthetic to the lab that did the blood work.
The difference between our systems is pretty simple really.
If you have money or gold-plated coverage, you're probably better off here the way things are now.
If you can't afford insurance or you're a working stiff struggling to pay your premiums, you're probably better off in Canada.
It's hard to tell exactly what system exactly President Obama has in mind. It's probably going to involve a big fight. But if you don't mind me offering some advice: don't believe everything you hear.
Quote from: jandar on May 20, 2009, 09:44:58 PM
Faye, please read all of this. He makes the points that other here are trying to make. You just won't open your eyes.
http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2009/05/15/f-rfa-macdonald.html
Quote
The difference between our systems is pretty simple really.
If you have money or gold-plated coverage, you're probably better off here the way things are now.
If you can't afford insurance or you're a working stiff struggling to pay your premiums, you're probably better off in Canada.
It's hard to tell exactly what system exactly President Obama has in mind. It's probably going to involve a big fight. But if you don't mind me offering some advice: don't believe everything you hear.
jandar, terrific article.
It says exactly what the healthcare reform plan is: keep your gold-plated insurance, while the working stiffs should have a choice for a public option.
Let competition rein free. No need to subsidize private insurance with tax payer dollars, when it's far less expensive to offer a public option.
The eye opening part ought to be on opponents' part more than anything, since I am quite familiar with what opponents like to call socialized medicine,.......heck I spent many years living in Europe which as you know has a "socialized" medicine system, which many of us prefer to call a civilized medicine system.
As a matter of fact one of my five children was born in Europe.
Now tell me, were you ever aware about the 100,000 Americans who are killed by the shoddy healthcare system in the US?
I have been a healthcare advocate for a long time: patient safety, stem cell research and universal healthcare.
In 1998 I started my healthcare advocacy, and I mentioned the 100,000 figure in one of my testimonies in Tallahassee before the legislature in 2003.
But all I get back from people like you is single anecdotal stories that likely are true, but certainly don't measure up the the millions of Americans who are not, or very poorly served in the US healthcare system, which as you can see is quite deadly.
You're right Faye. You changed my mind and now I'm on board with Obamacare. Now will you go away?
JMac,
Since you dislike the Canadian system how about Finland, Israel, Germany, The Netherlands, France, Italy, Singapore or Australia. And you know what's even better all of those countries have a higher rank for medical care according to WHO.
But on the bright side we beat Slovenia and Croatia.
QuotePreventable Medical Errors Still Kill Thousands, Cost Billions as Employers Foot Bill
I am 100% behind this reform. It is needed, with measurable and quantifiable goals. These issues affect over al quality of the entire system...
Quote● Reduce medication errors because hospitals have not widely adopted computerized prescribing and dispensing systems; the FDA has not done enough to help consumers and health practitioners avoid medication errors that stem from similar-sounding drug names and labels.
● Establish a national system suitable for reporting and tracking medical errors.
● Empower the Agency for Health Research and Quality to track national progress on patient safety.
● Raise professional standards and accountability of doctors, nurses and hospitals that commit preventable and widespread medical errors.
As always... your government... our congress is responsible for the non enforcement of some pretty obvious and relatively inexpensive reforms.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/bp/bp101.pdf
"To use the existing WHO rankings to justify more government involvement in health careâ€"such as via a single-payer health care systemâ€"is therefore to engage in circular reasoning because the rankings are designed in a manner that favors greater government involvement."
Not a big fan of UN or WHO opinions either...
QuoteThose who cite the WHO rankings typically
present them as an objective measure of the relative
performance of national health care systems.
They are not. The WHO rankings depend crucially
on a number of underlying assumptionsâ€"
some of them logically incoherent, some characterized
by substantial uncertainty, and some rooted
in ideological beliefs and values that not everyone
shares.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/bp/bp101.pdf
Ah yes The Cato Institute........those wonderful people......the same people who say there is no such thing as Global Warming
They are Crys... how could you disagree with...
QuoteAbout Cato
The Cato Institute was founded in 1977 by Edward H. Crane. It is a non-profit public policy research foundation headquartered in Washington, D.C. The Institute is named for Cato's Letters, a series of libertarian pamphlets that helped lay the philosophical foundation for the American Revolution.
Cato's Mission
The mission of the Cato Institute is to increase the understanding of public policies based on the principles of limited government, free markets, individual liberty, and peace. The Institute will use the most effective means to originate, advocate, promote, and disseminate applicable policy proposals that create free, open, and civil societies in the United States and throughout the world.
A "libertarian" quasi-academic think-tank which acts as a mouthpiece for the globalism, corporatism, and neoliberalism of its corporate and conservative funders. Cato is an astroturf organization: there is no significant participation by the tiny libertarian minority. They do not fund it or affect its goals. It is a creature of corporations and foundations.
The major purpose of the Cato Institute is to provide propaganda and soundbites for conservative and libertarian politicians and journalists that is conveniently free of reference to funders such as tobacco, fossil fuel, investment, media, medical, and other regulated industries.
Cato is one of the most blatant examples of "simulated rationality", as described in Phil Agre's The Crisis of Public Reason. Arguments need only be plausibly rational to an uninformed listener. Only a tiny percentage will notice that they are being mislead. That's all that's needed to manage public opinion.
http://world.std.com/~mhuben/cato.html
While your at it why don't you look up their views on smoking and immigration
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Cato_Institute
A senior scholar at the Cato Institute, the respected libertarian research organization, has resigned after revelations that he took payments from the lobbyist Jack Abramoff in exchange for writing columns favorable to his clients.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/17/politics/17abramoff.html?_r=1
QuoteWhile your at it why don't you look up their views on smoking and immigration
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Cato_Institute
You should read the entire sourcewatch article. I suspect you wwould or should agree with some of Cato's opinions. I certainly disagree with some of them.
I disagree with a "institute" claiming to be about "understanding of public policies based on the principles of limited government, free markets, individual liberty, and peace," when it's been proven they will write whatever you pay them to write. They have come out with some of the most laughable policies I've seen in a long time.
Philip Morris writes a check and then they are listed as an organization the company could rely upon to help the tobacco industry. ExxonMobil writes a check and Global warming what?
You mean like...
QuoteCato staffers have called for legalization of currently controlled substances,
and
QuoteCato has characterized the Bush administration's encroachments on individual rights as being the actions of an "intrusive federal government."[2]
and
QuoteCato staff have angered some conservative activists by strongly advocating the liberalization of immigration laws.[51][52]. The Cato Handbook calls for expanded immigration quotas and new visa programs for low-skilled as well as high-skilled workers, and for allowing more refugees to enter
and
QuoteCato staff have criticized such the 2003 decision by U.S. President George W. Bush to go to war with Iraq, prosecution of the war on drugs, giving federal money to faith-based organizations, and the decision of President George H.W. Bush to fight the first Gulf war. The Cato Institute has argued repeatedly against the Republican party on spending issues.[5][6][7][8]
Just *wait* until solar and wind become "Big Solar" and "Big Wind" and write checks to other think-tanks who support *their* standpoint and bottom line. No difference, except that saving the planet is en vogue right now.
CrysG - I guess you and Faye would be experts on astroturf organizations
QuoteCato Institute, pointed out that smokers' premature deaths actually save taxpayers money,
and
QuoteRobert A. Levy, an independently wealthy businessman who became a senior fellow at the Cato Institute in his 50s,[44] has published numerous editorials criticizing higher tobacco taxes, lawsuits against the Tobacco Institute, and other anti-smoking policies
and
Quotethe health risks associated with secondhand smoke are debatable
http://www.accuracy.org/article.php?articleId=51
QuoteThey claim to be pro free markets, Rupert Murdoch joined the board of directors at the Cato Institute, Cato praised him as "a strong advocate of the free market" and quoted his stirring words: "I start from a simple principle. In every area of economic activity in which competition is attainable, it is much to be preferred to monopoly." Meanwhile, in Murdoch's native Australia, his News Corp. dominates the mass media; in Britain he controls more than a third of daily newspaper circulation along with much of cable and satellite television.
QuoteAmong the luminaries at Cato is Jose Pinera, co-chair of its Project on Social Security Privatization. Cato's latest annual report says that Pinera, a former minister of labor and welfare in Chile, "oversaw the privatization of Chile's pension system in the early 1980s" -- but does not mention that at the time the Chilean government was under the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet. Evidently, Cato's concern about intrusive government does not extend to torture and murder.
You can debate WHO and Cato all you want. Fact is WHO rankings have more to do with "fairness" and "equality" than they do with "quality." As with everything it's about evening the playing field. Either you believe that there are rewards for working hard and that healthcare is one of those rewards. Or you believe that that is unfair and that we need to even the playing field! Their can only be participation medals in life, no gold silver and bronze.
I'll take quality any day. Liberals would rather "everyone" have "OK" healthcare than most have good healthcare (which is what we have here.) I happen to be a working stiff who comes from a long line of working stiffs and have no problem with the healthcare system here. The fact that there are folks out there who can pay out of pocket and get awesome healthcare does not bother me. As a matter of fact I think it's great. These are the people pushing heathcare forward.
Thank you Crys... See... they equally offend both ends of the spectrum. Sounds like a well balanced think tank to me. Or are think tanks supposed to parrot... what you think only?
JT,
I know it's so wrong to think being healthy is a write and not a privilege. Oh it's only the non hard working stiffs that are dying with the current system.
QuoteRuess never expected to find herself in such a circumstance. She'd grown up in a comfortable, middle-class household; even after her husband died in 1998, she was able to remain an at-home mom because of his generous life insurance policy. She'd taken pains to make sure she and her sons were insured, first with a policy carried over from her husband's job (the federal COBRA law allows a spouse to continue coverage for three years after a death), and then by carefully researching and purchasing insurance at a cost of $350 a month for her and one of her sons. (She was able to get coverage for her asthmatic son from the state.)
In other words, she did everything right.
QuoteJuliann Delozier of Murphy, Texas, is a 32-year-old, nonsmoking mother of two â€" who, in every obvious respect, is in perfect health. UniCare, a Chicago insurer, approved coverage for her children but not for her. "They would not tell me over the phone why I had been denied; I had to wait to receive a letter in the mail," she says. The letter said the company would not offer her a policy because of her "history of infertility."
Delozier says she'd taken two drugs, Metformin and Actos, to help her ovulate so she could conceive both of her children. She doesn't know why having taken these drugs disqualifies her, especially as she's not planning to have any more children. A spokesman for UniCare declined to discuss it, saying only, "These are decisions made on a case-by-case basis." Delozier is angry. "Why am I, a hardworking citizen who wanted to bear children and needed the aid of a medication to do so, being penalized by health insurance companies? It is totally unfair," she says.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26664727
LoL. So get a different insurer.
QuoteLoL. So get a different insurer.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
QuoteHebert thought about purchasing private insurance but was told that Katie wouldn't be accepted in her current condition. "I filled out an application, but an agent told me, 'You might not want to put it through because she'll have an official denial on her record.'" (The fact that a policy wasn't issued could telegraph to other insurers that she might be a bad risk.)
and
QuoteWhen confronted with an applicant who has any kind of medical history (including routine issues such as allergies, a past cesarean section delivery or acid reflux), insurers are usually perfectly free to charge much higher rates or to deny coverage altogether â€" leading to an entire category of women who are essentially uninsurable.
A woman might not realize she is uninsurable until she needs coverage and finds that no one will sell her a policy. Or she might be hit with this information after months or years of dutifully paying premiums, when filing a major claim provokes the insurer to review her records. Such practices are not only legal but, from the standpoint of the insurance companies, also entirely logical: They are good for business.
QuoteI know it's so wrong to think being healthy is a write and not a privilege.
Crys... How do you feel about actually making it a right. I assume you would not be against a constutional amendment to make it so... I am actually for this. Many people wrongly believe it is or should be a right.
Our rights are clearly defined in our Constitution and a process is in place to make healthacare a right.
BT,
I don't think we need a constitutional amendment. I'll point to the history of England's NHC.
QuoteThe genesis of the NHS stretched back into the 19th Century. Even then some believed that access to health care was part of the structure of a civilized society.
http://www.nhshistory.net/shorthistory.htm
Interesting... why would you not want healthcare to be a right? I have heard you use the phrase "right to healthcare"... so I'm confused. We take many constitutional freedoms for granted and hold many sacred... the women's right to vote for example was a right granted that previously did not exist.
If healthcare is not a right then you can be refused healthcare...
Because for the people to truly feel that healthcare is right they have to commonly agree to it and not have it mandated by law. Everyone agreed that women had the right to vote before the constitution amendment was added.
Prior to WWII England had a health care system like ours is now, but after WWII they emergence of a view that health care was a right, not something bestowed erratically by charity, bipartisan agreement that the existing services were in a mess and had to be sorted out and in increasing view among the younger members of the medical profession that there was a better way of doing things.
Exactly... so why again should it NOT be a right?? You seem to want it mandated by law and forced upon people. Sorry Crys... I am still confused.
Quote
Because for the people to truly feel that healthcare is right they have to commonly agree to it and not have it mandated by law. Everyone agreed that women had the right to vote before the constitution amendment was added.
Not everyone. A majority perhaps. Majority enough to call on the US Congress to draft what would become the 19th Amendment to the Constitution. It was made a Constitutional amendment because of the Federal process that used to be in place in this country. People made demands to their elected officials, the officials listened, and legislated accordingly.
A lot of people were against Prohibition too. But it was made an Amendment (18th), decided on by the public. Then even more people were against it a short time later, so another Amendment was decided on, by the public, to repeal Prohibition (21st).
So if you and your colleagues believe it to be a "right" of the people, call your Conrgressperson and/or demand a Constitutional Convention be called by your State legislature on the matter, to draft what could become the 28th Amendment. If enough people agree with you, it can be ratified and thus be an enumerated "right" of the people.
If it's not mandated by law, it's not illegal to refuse someone healthcare.
Just like now.
Because if tomorrow morning we had a constitutional amendment most of you would start crying.
Oh and we have a lot of laws that aren't in the constitution Doctor_K.
And you've proven how fickle the constitution can be. First prohibition good then prohibition bad. Without and underling belief in something we can just change it out. Doesn't mean that change is good, just that we can change it.
Yep, we do. Laws. You're talking Rights. The two are not one in the same.
I have the Right to free speech, thus codified in the Constitution. I do not have the right to jaywalk or be naked in public. There are laws that prohibit that.
And no, I wouldn't "start crying." Stop thinking I'm fundamentally a cold heartless bastard who does't give a crap about 'people.'
I'd rejoice in the fact that an Amendment was presented, adequately debated, and turned over to the states and the people to be voted on by a truly involved public. Nothing would make me happier. If enough people supported your position, I'd be fine with it, because that would demonstrate to me that Federalism still can be practiced. You want a law mandating it because you feel it's a 'right,' without willing to do it the Constitutional Amedment way. That's not how it's supposed to work.
You're talking about Rights. That's what the Constitution primarily deals in.
But see, there *was* an underlying belief in Prohibition. And Women's Suffrage, AND slave ownership, AND the definition of what it meant to be a citizen. The beliefs were there, then the organized movements formed, then the majority pressed their legislators, then legislation was passed. Majority rule.
The Constitution is not fickle.
The problem is, I don't think the majority is on your side. At least not yet. You're operating in the mindset of tyranny of the minority - because you and some others think it's right, it should just be. It's a "right." I'm saying, if you think it's a right, then it should be Constitutionalized.
If you were smart enough, you'd agree with Bridge and me on this. Make it Constitutional. Because *then* we have no argument, the people will have then spoken, and you will have won. And I will champion it. Hell, I'll even vote in favor of it.
I would love to see the amendment process work for health care. Just think... Conservative constitutionalists would at least have to approve of the process and join into the debate. As it stands now... they are left completely out of the debate because no one needs their approval. It will be constructed by a few approved by a few more and the vast majority of us will simply have to live with it.
I need to look but Britain declared Healthcare a "right" within their system. Im betting France, Canada and other western democracies did the same. If so... it is a no brainer to form a constitutional convention to amend the constitution to declare Healthcare a right.
Quote from: BridgeTroll on May 21, 2009, 01:03:40 PM
It will be constructed by a few approved by a few more and the vast majority of us will simply have to live with it.
I need to look but Britain declared Healthcare a "right" within their system. Im betting France, Canada and other western democracies did the same. If so... it is a no brainer to form a constitutional convention to amend the constitution to declare Healthcare a right.
Yeah, I know how you feel,......single-payer was completely left off the table. Fortunately a group of 15 doctors stood up for it and questioned why single payer was off the table. But it stayed off the table.
Turns out Senator Max Baucus is the highest recipient of campaign contributions from the for profit insurance industry: over $400,000
Yet 2/3 of Americans have expressed support for single payer. Go figure, why single payer gets left off the table. Just goes to show you the huge a disconnect between politicians and the American people.
Exactly Faye... This is why I am a huge supporter of a Constitutional amendment process. The process MUST involve individuals throughout the country. All areas will be debated... by everyone. The debate would provide multiple effects. It would use the framework of the Constitution to explore the idea that healthcare for all is a fundamental right. Secondly that very debate would explore all options for accomplishing the task of providing all Americans with care. Thirdly... it would involve everyone and be voted on by... EVERYONE. Not a select few congressmen(we all know how wise they are)
To be clear however... the process would not mandate solutions... but WOULD mandate that solutions be found and implemented. Lets use the process Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Franklin gave us. :)
BT, how about public financing of campaigns so industry lobbyists don't buy votes in Congress?
That would allow all options to be at the table. As it was, industry was over-represented while the favored option of the people was left off the table.
I assume you are referring to all lobbying and lobbyists... not just health industry reps. My initial reaction is that it sounds good but it probably is a freedom of speech issue. I hire someone of influence or access to insure my point of view is adequately represented. I think lobbyists are something we may have to regulate but cannot eliminate.
One persons lobbyist is anothers advocate... :)
The solution seems to start killing old people. They are such a drag on social security and they will be on Uni care as well. But if we don't have 'em, then the government systems just might work! Let's take a lesson from the British shall we? They are way ahead of us.
QuoteBaroness Warnock: Dementia sufferers may have a 'duty to die'
Elderly people suffering from dementia should consider ending their lives because they are a burden on the NHS and their families, according to the influential medical ethics expert Baroness Warnock.
By Martin Beckford Social Affairs Correspondent
Last Updated: 12:59AM BST 19 Sep 2008
The veteran Government adviser said pensioners in mental decline are "wasting people's lives" because of the care they require and should be allowed to opt for euthanasia even if they are not in pain.
She insisted there was "nothing wrong" with people being helped to die for the sake of their loved ones or society.
Her comments in a magazine interview have been condemned as "immoral" and "barbaric", but also sparked fears that they may find wider support because of her influence on ethical matters.
Lady Warnock, a former headmistress who went on to become Britain's leading moral philosopher, chaired a landmark Government committee in the 1980s that established the law on fertility treatment and embryo research.
A prominent supporter of euthanasia, she has previously suggested that pensioners who do not want to become a burden on their carers should be helped to die.
Last year the Mental Capacity Act came into effect that gives legal force to "living wills", so patients can appoint an "attorney" to tell doctors when their hospital food and water should be removed.
But in her latest interview, given to the Church of Scotland's magazine Life and Work, Lady Warnock goes further by claiming that dementia sufferers should consider ending their lives through euthanasia because of the strain they put on their families and public services.
Recent figures show there are 700,000 people with degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's in Britain. By 2026 experts predict there will be one million dementia sufferers in the country, costing the NHS an estimated £35billion a year.
Lady Warnock said: "If you're demented, you're wasting people's lives â€" your family's lives â€" and you're wasting the resources of the National Health Service.
"I'm absolutely, fully in agreement with the argument that if pain is insufferable, then someone should be given help to die, but I feel there's a wider argument that if somebody absolutely, desperately wants to die because they're a burden to their family, or the state, then I think they too should be allowed to die.
"Actually I've just written an article called 'A Duty to Die?' for a Norwegian periodical. I wrote it really suggesting that there's nothing wrong with feeling you ought to do so for the sake of others as well as yourself."
She went on: "If you've an advance directive, appointing someone else to act on your behalf, if you become incapacitated, then I think there is a hope that your advocate may say that you would not wish to live in this condition so please try to help her die.
"I think that's the way the future will go, putting it rather brutally, you'd be licensing people to put others down."
Her comments were criticised last night by MPs, charities and campaigners.
Neil Hunt, the chief executive of the Alzheimer's Society, said: "I am shocked and amazed that Baroness Warnock could disregard the value of the lives of people with dementia so callously.
"With the right care, a person can have good quality of life very late in to dementia. To suggest that people with dementia shouldn't be entitled to that quality of life or that they should feel that they have some sort of duty to kill themselves is nothing short of barbaric."
Nadine Dorries, the Conservative MP for Mid-Bedfordshire, said: "I believe it is extremely irresponsible and unnerving for someone in Baroness Warnock's position to put forward arguments in favour of euthanasia for those who suffer from dementia and other neurological illnesses.
"Because of her previous experiences and well-known standing on contentious moral issues, Baroness Warnock automatically gives moral authority to what are entirely immoral view points."
Phyllis Bowman, executive director of the campaign group Right to Life, added: "It sends a message to dementia sufferers that certain people think they don't count, and that they are a burden on their families. It's a pretty uncivilised society where that is the primary consideration. I worry that she will sway people who would like to get rid of the elderly."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2983652/Baroness-Warnock-Dementia-sufferers-may-have-a-duty-to-die.html
You accusing someone else of a straw man argument? You must know - you are the master.
I actually thought it amusing and not for serious debate Stephen. Smile.