Health for life

Want to better understand the perpetual anguish of a chronic illness?  Well, thanks to online streaming from the Harvard School of Public Health, readers can better appreciate the eerie similarities between hyperprogressive liberalism and incurable diseases like elevated blood sugars.  Both can go on for decades, are irreversible, cost a lot of money and are ultimately caused by inappropriate choices.  The Disease Management Care Blog is, of course, writing about this hour long video of former Massachusetts Governor and former Democratic Presidential candidate Michael Dukakis.

Sadly for health orm Obamaists, the supremely competent and confident Mr. Dukakis trashes the concept of accountable care organizations at about the minute 35 mark, dismissing it as a reincarnation of 1990s style HMOs and capitation.  And he doesnt stop there. The additional problem, he says, is that well waste ten years analyzing what he foresees will be a foregone conclusion: ACOs are destined to fail. 

Whats more, since health care markets are such a dismal option, he concludes the only choice thats left is price-setting "regulation."  Assume State Insurance Departments have power over hospitals, call everyone into a room, assume theyre decent people, appeal to their economic self interest and everyone will be happy.

Yet, once the DMCB got over Mr. Dukakis "legend in his own mind" persona, it believed the former Governor has a good point: if ACOs fail, well be left with two choices:

1) a governing class who is ready to step in with enlightened top-down governance or

2) a reintroduction of market forces that seeks bottom up competition and consumerism.

In the interest of fairness, if readers want to see a counter-argument in favor of markets, check out this one-sided nine minute Cato Institute video that teaches us weve havent really had a health care market for decades. 

Alternatively, if youre in the mood for neither of the above videos, perhaps your time would be better spent on viewing something that offers far more than either of the options above. 

You Go Bizzle!



Image from Wikipedia

When asked in the July 23rd Democratic Presidential Debate what he would do to keep entitlement programs such as Medicare from going broke, New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson replied:


Heres the transcript:

QUESTION: Whats the dirtiest little secret in Washington? The U.S. is going broke. With the retirement of the baby boomers, things are only going to get worse. Fed Chairman Bernanke has said Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security need to be radically changed to avoid this crisis, yet everything is business as usual in D.C.

There are two solutions, both of which are politically unpopular: Raise taxes or cut benefits. Which would you choose, and how would you convince the public to support you?

COOPER: Governor Richardson?

RICHARDSON: The best solution to those two issues is a bipartisan effort to fix it.

Medicare - 33 percent of it is diabetes. Lets have major prevention programs, and also ways that we can ensure that we find a cure.

Is that true? Does diabetes account for a third of Medicare spending? Apparently, yes. The Department of Health and Human Services states:

"About 18 percent of Medicare beneficiaries have diabetes, yet they account for 32 percent of Medicare spending."
- US Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services

Its certainly worth finding a cure!________