| 3/3/2008 9:31:00 AM | Email this article • Print this article | Universal health care: the wrong prescription
Guest Opinion
by Brian Schwartz
What good is having medical insurance if you can't get medical care?
Peddlers of "universal health care" - from Hillary and Obama, to 2nd Congressional Democrat candidate Jared Polis - don't get this.
"Universal health care" is false advertising for politically-controlled medicine, with government as the "single-payer" monopolistic insurer. But having coverage does not guarantee getting medical care.
Because patients prepay through taxes, medical care appears "free." Hence, they have strong incentive to over-consume and providers need not compete on price. To contain cost, government restricts your access to life-saving treatment. In countries with such coverage, patients die waiting for treatment.
The Canadian Medical Association Journal reported one year, 71 Ontario patients died awaiting coronary bypass surgery and more than 100 more became "medically unfit for surgery." Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported, "one hundred nine people had heart attacks or suffered heart failure while on the waiting list. Fifty died."
A former Canadian Medical Association president told The New York Times, "Physicians across Canada are in advanced stages of burnout because of work conditions" causing them to "retire early ... or simply leave."
"Access to a waiting list isn't access to health care," Canadian Chief Justice McLachlin wrote when striking down legislation banning private insurance in 2005.
Last year a New York Times headline reported, "As Canada's Slow-Motion Public Health System Falters, Private Medical Care Is Surging."
And England? BBC reported "up to 500 heart patients die annually while they await potentially life-saving surgery." The Times claimed a British woman "will be denied free National Health Service treatment for breast cancer if she seeks to improve her chances by paying privately for an additional drug."
A Daily Telegraph headline reported, "Sufferers pull out teeth due to lack of dentists." Another article said, "doctors are calling for NHS treatment to be withheld from patients too old or who lead unhealthy lives."
Consider politically-controlled health care in America - Medicaid and Medicare. Doctors are five times more likely to refuse new Medicaid patients than privately-insured patients. Increasing reimbursements won't help much. More than two-thirds of doctors reported being overwhelmed by Medicaid billing requirements, paperwork, and payment delays.
ABC News reported "Medicare rules bar cancer drugs for patients," including the privately-insured.
Single payer advocates cite international life expectancy comparisons to support their cause. But life expectancy depends on factors unrelated to health care, such as unintentional injury and homicide.
Health economist Robert Ohsfeldt found when accounting for these two factors, life expectancy in America is comparable to that of Canada and England.
What really matters is your chance of surviving a serious illness. American Cancer Society personnel claim, "U.S. patients have better survival rates than European patients for most types of cancer."
So if politically-controlled medicine isn't the solution, what is?
Not a Massachusetts-style "individual mandate," which forces everyone to buy insurance. This is essentially single-payer in disguise. Insurance regulations severely limit competition, so insurance companies are effectively government contractors for politically-defined insurance.
The Boston Globe reported that to contain cost, Massachusetts authorities will "probably cut payments to doctors and hospitals" and "reduce choices for patients."
Because the tax code deeply discounts employer-provided insurance, you're essentially stuck with your employer's non-portable plans. Hence, insurance companies can be stingy and deny you care. They know losing you as a customer requires you to change jobs. With government as "single-payer," to change insurance providers you must move to a different state or country.
Our system encourages thoughtless over-consumption and skyrocketing cost. The tax code punishes paying for medical care out-of-pocket and rewards buying insurance. So insurance has become prepaid medicine, and patients over-consume like business travelers dining on the company expense account.
Legislation mandating minimum benefits makes insurance unaffordable for many.
Colorado law compels widowed wives to pay higher premiums for prostate screening, maternity, and marital therapy. Some Colorado legislators recognize the injustice. Just as businesses incorporated in other states can operate in Colorado, Coloradans should be able to buy affordable policies from insurance companies meeting less damaging regulations in another state.
The uninsured are not the problem. Rather, they are a symptom of the problem - government meddling in personal choices.
Brian Schwartz is an author for the Independence Institute and an optical engineer in Boulder. His free-market proposal to the Blue Ribbon Commission is at WhoOwnsYou.org.
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