Liberty MavenDr. Ron Paul talks Health Care on CNN
June 16th, 2009 8:02 am | by Marc Gallagher | Published in Big Government, Free Market, Health Care, Liberty, Ron Paul | 7 Responses
Ron Paul appeared on CNN yesterday morning to discuss reforming health care on American Morning. The host introduces Paul by saying that he has a “unique perspective”. Perhaps if Ron Paul’s perspective wasn’t so unique we’d be in a much better place.
Paul agrees that health care needs reform, but socialized medicine is the wrong way to go. He’d like (as you can probably guess) to free up the market for health care in order to lower costs and return health decisions to the doctor and patient rather than a third party insurance company.
Watch below for the doctor’s prescription for health care.
June 17th, 2009 at 4:20 pm (#)
As a Ron Paul Canadian, I must say that health care in particular & the social safety net in general, is one of the very few areas where I fall short of total agreement with the general philosophies of the good Doctor Paul.
He says "I don't like socialized medicine" & then he uses the one flaw in the single payer Canadian system of socialized medicine to demonstrate that the entire model is flawed.
Dr. Paul points out that some Canadians elect to find treatment in the capitalist driven American "user pay" model specifically because of the ability to avoid the waiting "in lines" for elective surgery etc., if you can afford to pay for immediate service yourself.
The Canadian medical system actually works very well on the general front line patient care & the diagnostic medicine side of services, & the volumes Of emergency & critical care needs of the population are adequately addressed as well.
The FACT is, that most of the medical needs of "all" Canadians are successfully met in a timely manner, & "all" the expenses for this service are fully covered, free of charge by our government.
Having said that, there are admittedly some elective surgeries, & possibly the ability to access some of the most recent advancements in treatments for some medical concerns, that Canadians will experience waiting lists for service, but anything that is considered "life threatening" is always prioritized with few systemic complaints.
Canada's model may not be perfect, but it does consistently meet the needs of the vast majority of the population quite adequately, decade after decade (since the 1960's).
I would advise Dr. Paul & the rest of America to examine the benefits of the Canadian system, improve it with something like a two tier public/private system if you can, but look at it objectively as a reasonable means of successfully meeting "all" the people's medical needs, regardless of their ability to pay.
June 17th, 2009 at 5:15 pm (#)
Regardless of the merits of the Canadian system, no government can provide anything "free of charge". (That's simply government propaganda). It cannot dole out a single penny until it has taken it from the people first.
And in this country, the U.S. Constitution clearly states that all functions outside of the 18 enumerated powers given to the federal government fall to the individual states. Medical care in any form fails to appear among those 18 enumerated powers; therefore, without a constitutional amendment all of this discussion is moot.
June 17th, 2009 at 5:26 pm (#)
Yes, I suppose waiting for months for cancer treatment, dialysis, non-elective surgeries, etc., overflowing ERs, and the inability to find family physicians are just small speed bumps in the medical utopia that is the Canadian "free" health care system.
There are countless firsthand stories of the horror stories (many written by doctors) about socialized medicine in Canada if one would bother to look around.
The U.S. system's biggest flaw is cost, something easily addressed by tort reform–at the state level.
June 18th, 2009 at 6:06 am (#)
Though he has been in good shape his entire life and is a non-smoker, my grandfather was diagnosed with lung cancer in May of 2007. I am still a student, however I come from a medical family, my father is a surgeon and our neighbors are physicians as well.
At the time of his diagnosis, he had no lymph nodes and the cancer was easily operable. In the United States, he would have been treated within a week and would make a full recovery. Unfortunately, my grandfather lives in Canada.
It was 3 months before his operation took place, by which time he had several lymph nodes the cancer had spread to. The purpose of the operation was no to save his life, it was to give him time.
Thanks to Canadian healthcare, he has less than a year to live!
June 18th, 2009 at 6:08 am (#)
I agree the Canadian system might work well. This is America though, and we have too many special interests embedded in our government. If our government through them out and gave us a system that would work, I think we might be happy with it. They won't though. They will tax us more and drive down our quality. Personally, I'd like to see a system where we have a catastrophic government insurance (no insurance companies), then have private insurance provide plans that may be purchased on top. Like you get your own room in a hospital or they cover the 1/2 of the governments deductible, or non-generic prescription drugs. Then kick out medicare. I would also like to see doctor visits go to cash. As Paul points out in his book, car insurance doesn't cover oil changes. Unfortunately, what we have in America will allow the insurance and drug companies to suck more of us dry.
July 21st, 2009 at 11:40 pm (#)
Keep the propaganda flowing. You guys are doing great. That's why no politician in Canada, not even the most hard core conservative would suggest getting rid of their system. Yes it must be horrible. And it's always Canada. As if no other industrialized nations of the world has universal health care. Wait they all do except us. Hell even third world Taiwan has it. But lets only mention those horror stories north of the border. A friend of a friend, and any time you ask for particulars, hospitals, dates, name of patient, you greeted with a deer in the headlights.
Great job paid RNC spokespeople
July 21st, 2009 at 11:45 pm (#)
K. Morris is clearly C. Lueless.
I very much dislike Republicans.