8.24.2009
Springfield News-Leader Op-Ed
Health takeover will create rationing
Roy Blunt
I've held more than 40 events across Missouri this month, discussing health care and the ways we can provide higher quality, more competition and access for everyone. I heard from single mothers, small business employees, retirees concerned about Medicare cuts, manufacturers and journalists. They asked well-considered questions about the Obama administration's plan to orchestrate a trillion-plus-dollar takeover of our health care.
Many expressed concerns about standing in line to see their doctor. Others worried about a bureaucrat standing between them and their physician. Employees at small businesses fear lay offs resulting from higher taxes to pay for this colossal government intrusion. Many expressed outrage that their taxes could pay for health care for people in the U.S. illegally.
I visited the St. Louis Post-Dispatch editorial board last week for a frank, hour-and-a-half-long discussion about health care. I was surprised that our lengthy conversation generated one editorial challenging minor points from a 90 -minute meeting, rather than a constructive analysis of the hottest topic in public policy today. I was even more surprised when the News-Leader reprinted it.
Their editorial challenged my assertion that someone my age -- 59 -- would be hard pressed to get a health care bureaucracy to approve hip replacement surgery. The paper found the average age for hip replacement is 65, but that tells us nothing about the bureaucratic hurdles patients jump to get a procedure approved. The Wall Street Journal reported the story of Bill Murray of Alberta, Canada, who sought help for his arthritic hip for over a year. Finally, the specialist recommended advanced hip replacement surgery. But the health care bureaucrats decided Murray, age 57, was "too old" for the procedure and denied his request. Adding insult to injury, they told him he couldn't spend his own money on the surgery! (1)
The editorial also focused on the exact number of illegal immigrants in the country. It's impossible to count millions of people who don't want to be counted. Discussing specific numbers of illegal immigrants only nibbles around the edges of a larger problem: it doesn't matter whose count you use; taxpayers shouldn't subsidize health care for illegal immigrants.
Proponents of the government plan will claim your health care won't be impacted. But a government plan is like an elephant in a room full of mice. The smart mice get out of the room; the slow mice get trampled; and the only thing left is the elephant. A government health care provider will run everyone else out of business and, soon, will be the only competitor left.
Just this week, Canada's Vancouver Sun reported that thousands of surgeries in the Vancouver area may be cut because of budgetary shortfalls. I can't think of a starker example of what could happen when you depend on government for your health care.
At a Health Care Solutions Group hearing, Richard Baker with North American Surgery Inc. testified that Canadian hospitals receive a set budget, regardless of the procedures they perform or how many patients come to the hospital. The number of surgeries doctors may perform each year is limited. If you're toward the end of the line, you're simply out of luck. A Canadian woman named Shona Holmes shared her harrowing experience in her country's medical system. She was diagnosed with a brain tumor and then placed in a line behind others waiting for cancer treatment. She came to the United States to seek treatment. She survived, and now she will tell anyone who asks that socialized medicine could have killed her.
A cancer survivor myself, I've studied differing survival rates for many forms of cancer. In the United Kingdom, a prostate cancer patient has a 51.1 percent chance of survival; in the U.S., that patient has a 91.9 percent chance. In the U.K., a breast cancer patient has a 69.7 percent chance of survival. In the U.S., however, that same patient has an 83.9 percent chance.
These statistics are attributable to the health care rationing that is the result of a government-run system. When you are sick, time is of the essence. Standing in line to talk to a bureaucrat is not the answer, and survival rates in the U.K. and Canada back that up.
You know something is fishy when the people pushing for a public takeover of health care aren't willing to subject themselves to the same plan. If this government takeover of health care is such a brilliant idea for America, it should be good enough for members of Congress. But the majority on the Energy & Commerce Committee refused to vote on my proposal to require the president, vice-president, and all members of Congress to enroll in the public plan.
I suppose they don't want to stand in line to see the doctor either.
(1) The Wall Street Journal, 'Too Old' for Hip Surgery, Nadeem Esmail, February 9, 2009