Pastor of the Shady Grove Presbyterian Church in Memphis, and long active in health care reform
Tom Mainor, provides two responses (before and after Dr. Reinhardt's "bread and circus games" single payer commentary):
Aug. 14, 2001
I can understand that after all these years, Uwe Reinhardt is somewhat cynical and depressed at the current state of things. But Kip Sullivan is on target when he suggests that the American people have never been permitted to look at true alternatives without the pejorative labels attached. We have never really been provided a public examination of comparable health care systems and costs in other advanced nations. Nor has the press proceeded to examine why we are number one in spending and number 37 in results.
Corporations, with all their vaunted analytical resources and employee benefits, are pouring good money after good money into the corporatization of a resource that should be basic to civilized society. We would not corporatize fire departments and only put out the fires of those who had proper insurance. We would not allow ships to sink off our coasts because they did not have Coast Guard insurance... at least, I don't think we are at that stage.
Our hospitals have been built in communities across the land, and funded by public (local, national and state), private, corporate and community-based fund-raising. They have been built for the simple reason that all of the above elements in society felt a need to have these resources. The sentiment and instincts to care for the vulnerable go back centuries. We do the same with VA and other health resources. St. Jude's Children's hospital here in Memphis is not in the business of making a profit off health care. They use abundantly provided resources to provide care for children--most often, children whose parents would never have the resources if the larger community had not provided such a place. This is multiplied across the land and the world.
The notion of publicly provided health care has a long tradition. HEALTH CARE IS TOO IMPORTANT TO BE LEFT TO THE MARKET PLACE. The bottom lines are the needs of the community, and how best to provide them. Universal access and globally budgeted health resources--including medical groups--is a way to use the abundant resources now being used for excessive administrative costs and for-profit entities. Salaried physicians in hospitals, e.g. trauma surgeons and others, as well as salaried medical professionals in medical academia provide often superior care to their for-profit colleagues....
Well, didn't mean to go on so long... Cheers. Tom Mainor
Aug. 16, 2001
Masterful! Amazing! Sobering! Frustrating! Not the whole story! Perhaps with the brain power you have responding, there may be a way to begin to educate health professionals, some business and responsive and articulate journalists, and even a few political figures on various levels. One medical CEO here in Memphis told me he assumed the post as a right-leaning Republican. Now he is so disillusioned, he feels he has arrived at an almost socialist position. He is a good physician and CEO. More importantly, he really cares about how it all turns out.
One can understand Uwe's despair, but we shouldn't let the Limbaugh's and the BushCheney's of this world continue unchallenged. Ayn Rand's philosophy may rule the day, but more fundamental human instincts, and the JudeoChristian (as well as other religious insights) still advocate providing for the care for and cure of the vulnerable and the sick in most societies. There are also progressive economic reasons for single payer/regional global health care budgeting that obtain which would improve both society's and corporate well being. The Constitution also talks about providing for the general welfare, and advances the notion of a true Commonwealth.
Thanks to Uwe and his friends for the dialogue... Tom