The August 2007 issue of The Heartland Institute's, Health Care News publication is packed with great stuff from cover to cover.
Following are excerpts from two of the articles:
Experts Warn Against Socialized Health Care
Written By: Karla Dial
Published In: Health Care News
Publication Date: August 1, 2007
Publisher: The Heartland Institute
A panel convened in Minnesota by a financial consulting service on June 14 called universal health insurance coverage "an economic and moral imperative." Policy experts nationwide responded by urging policymakers to consider other solutions for controlling health care costs.
Former U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson led the panel discussion sponsored by Deloitte & Touche USA LLP.
The Deloitte Center for Health Solutions, the firm's policy research arm, has developed a $70 billion plan to pay for universal coverage nationwide, according to a June 15 article in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. The plan would have the federal government pay $24 billion a year and consumers about $94 a month in premiums.
Empty Promises
But many analysts say "universal coverage" plans won't do anything to lower the cost of health care. In fact, they say, these schemes tend to do the opposite--and strip individuals of choice in the process.
"Universal coverage is just another name for socialized medicine," said Twila Brase, president of the Citizens' Council on Health Care in Minneapolis. "That which the government mandates, the government is obligated to control. Universal coverage is government control of health care dollars and government control of medical decision-making.
"Universal coverage promises everything, but guarantees nothing." Brase said. "If we mandate universal coverage, we say goodbye to the ethical and professional practice of medicine and hello to the restrictive realities of socialized medicine. This emperor has no clothes."
Click here for the full story.
Markets Are the Answer to Health Care Problems
Written By: Johnny Munkhammar, M.Sc.
Published In: Health Care News
Publication Date: August 1, 2007
Publisher: The Heartland Institute
Free markets have created prosperity and progress worldwide. The freer a country's economy, the more prosperous it becomes. Goods and services become cheaper and better.
Thanks to economic liberalization, the global economy is booming, especially in Southeast Asia. As a result, poverty is decreasing worldwide, and life expectancy is rising.
But much of Western Europe considers the free market to be incompatible with the provision of personal welfare services. As a result, education and health care are largely run by the state and almost exclusively tax-funded. Strict rules limit competition, entrepreneurship, the free exchange of services, consumer choice, and private funding.
Together with social security, this is the sector where the now-defunct centrally planned economy is still alive and kicking, in the U.S. and worldwide.
Reliving History
The central planning model has severe problems, particularly in health care.
A recent European Central Bank working paper showed the bigger the public sector, the more inefficient it tends to be. Increased tax funding to public health care in several European countries, such as Britain and Sweden, has not led to improvements.
Indeed, in the United Kingdom, quite the opposite has happened, with rapidly declining levels of productivity in the National Health Service.
Several European countries have waiting lists where seriously ill people cannot access care for months or even years.
Click here for the full story.
