Health Care Woes - Theirs and Ours

Apparently, there are some like John Edwards who want to go around claiming that we need nationalized health care because there is some percentage of Americans who don't have access to health care. Never mind that such statements are patently untrue - everyone has access to health care. The crux is that not everyone has health insurance, which is a separate and distinct issue no matter how much Democratic party presidential candidates like Edwards of Hillary Clinton fudge the issue. Insurance portability is an issue, but one that doesn't require government intervention or replacement by a government plan or diktat limiting consumer choice.

They'll often point to our brothers and sisters in Europe to show just how enlightened they are over dealing with health care and why we're spending so much money on health care while some aren't able to have health insurance.

There are two stories should make anyone's skin crawl over the possibility of nationalized health care delivery systems:

1) Don Surber notes the extremely disturbing story of a pregnant woman who will have her child taken away in twisted version envisioned by the likes of Philip K. Dick in Minority Report:

A pregnant woman has been told that her baby will be taken from her at birth because she is deemed capable of "emotional abuse", even though psychiatrists treating her say there is no evidence to suggest that she will harm her child in any way.

Social services' recommendation that the baby should be taken from Fran Lyon, a 22-year-old charity worker who has five A-levels and a degree in neuroscience, was based in part on a letter from a paediatrician she has never met.

Hexham children's services, part of Northumberland County Council, said the decision had been made because Miss Lyon was likely to suffer from Munchausen's Syndrome by proxy, a condition unproven by science in which a mother will make up an illness in her child, or harm it, to draw attention to herself.

Under the plan, a doctor will hand the newborn to a social worker, provided there are no medical complications. Social services' request for an emergency protection order - these are usually granted - will be heard in secret in the family court at Hexham magistrates on the same day.

From then on, anyone discussing the case, including Miss Lyon, will be deemed to be in contempt of the court.

Miss Lyon, from Hexham, who is five months pregnant, is seeking a judicial review of the decision about Molly, as she calls her baby. She described it as "barbaric and draconian", and said it was "scandalous" that social services had not accepted submissions supporting her case.

"The paediatrician has never met me," she said. "He is not a psychiatrist and cannot possibly make assertions about my current or future mental health. Yet his letter was the only one considered in the case conference on August 16 which lasted just 10 minutes."

The woman has committed no crime. Her doctors have found no such problems, and may lose her child to the NHS because some nameless faceless doctor who has never actually met her has decided she's a threat to her soon to be born child for a disease that she might not actually have.

If you think dealing with insurance companies are difficult, you haven't met a government bureaucracy that has taken upon itself the notion that it will decide what is best for someone - predicting events in the future based on dubious conclusions (and that's being charitable to the doctors who rendered such decisions).

That leads me to the next story that should make your skin crawl. The NHS wants to cut costs by dropping coverage to those don't take the advice of health professionals:

Patients who refuse to change their unhealthy lifestyles should not be treated by the NHS, the Conservatives said today.

In a bid to ease spiralling levels of obesity and other health concerns, a Tory panel said certain treatments should be denied to patients who refuse to co-operate with health professionals and live healthier lifestyles.

And those who do manage to improve their general health by losing weight and quitting smoking, for example, would receive "Health Miles" cards.

Points earned could then be used to pay for health-related products such as gym membership and fresh vegetables.

The aim is a shift in the NHS towards preventing disease and ill-health rather than having to treat it.

Actually, the idea is to cut costs - it's more expensive to treat someone who is a smoker or who is overweight, and such a plan would make the health of smokers or those who are overweight worse. Claiming that this would improve lifestyles is a more palatable way of phrasing what the plan would do.

This proposal is for the British NHS. This isn't some private insurance company that is cherry picking those individuals who are in excellent health to reap the benefits of having them pay premiums for services they are unlikely to use. They're looking to cut the most expensive people out of services, or limit their access to services because of 'the inability to comply with health professionals' directions and care.

It's one thing for an insurer to offer incentives to their customers to improve their lifestyles and promote healthier living. It's quite another to punish those who can't comply with such plans by cutting their health care services.

Yet, that's exactly what some in Britain are proposing to cover the spiraling health care costs.

That's what we have to look forward to here in the US if the likes of Edwards or Clinton are elected President and have their health care proposals made into law.

UPDATE:
Others blogging the health care stories: Blue Crab Boulevard, memeorandum, and Astute Blogger.