Why We Must Ration Health Care

This is a term that I am not comfortable with. Rationing healhcare means denying cure to patients even when the cure is available. The premiums of insurance companies are always based on the prices of drugs for different diseases or cancer. If 1000 people insure for something then maybe 1 out of that actually needs to be paid by the insurance company. While premiums have to be reasonable, just because the premiums might rise, a person who needs the treatment should not be denied treatment or drugs that he has to have in order to survive.

You have advanced kidney cancer. It will kill you, probably in the next year or two. A drug called Sutent slows the spread of the cancer and may give you an extra six months, but at a cost of $54,000. Is a few more months worth that much?

If you can afford it, you probably would pay that much, or more, to live longer, even if your quality of life wasn’t going to be good. But suppose it’s not you with the cancer but a stranger covered by your health-insurance fund. If the insurer provides this man — and everyone else like him — with Sutent, your premiums will increase. Do you still think the drug is a good value? Suppose the treatment cost a million dollars. Would it be worth it then? Ten million? Is there any limit to how much you would want your insurer to pay for a drug that adds six months to someone’s life? If there is any point at which you say, “No, an extra six months isn’t worth that much,” then you think that health care should be rationed.

In the current U.S. debate over health care reform, “rationing” has become a dirty word. Meeting last month with five governors, President Obama urged them to avoid using the term, apparently for fear of evoking the hostile response that sank the Clintons’ attempt to achieve reform. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed published at the end of last year with the headline “Obama Will Ration Your Health Care,” Sally Pipes, C.E.O. of the conservative Pacific Research Institute, described how in Britain the national health service does not pay for drugs that are regarded as not offering good value for money

Source: www.nytimes.com...

It's all weird. Maybe one day my wife will get the treament she needs for the arthritis that is crippling her. Meanwhile, my 79 year old mom gets little white bumps removed from her face. And it's her own fault, for eating too much beef. WTF? Mom hasn't produced anything for anyone but herself, for the last 35 years. My wife wife works hard and we can barely afford the medicines for her arthritis.

I'm all for rationing health care since most health problems are self-inflicted. The fatties, smokers, gays, and druggies/alkies should be told no HC for you unless you buy it privately.