Pay Up, Patient!
The New York Times
December 12, 2001
To the Editor:
"A New Health Plan May Raise Expenses for Sickest Workers" (front page, Dec. 5) points out the downside of a new approach to corporate expense reduction. The employers' share of a new health care product would decrease, as would the average premium, but the burden would be shifted to sick people!
This is unwise public policy. When seriously ill, most patients are not working, and their families are burdened by additional expense already. And if the major costs of modern medicine are shifted directly to patients, they are more likely to defer diagnostic procedures and filling prescriptions, and therefore get sicker. Sooner or later, we will all get the bill.
When are we going to realize the humanity, and the wisdom, of community-wide risk pools, which would spread the burden fairly to all? When will we realize the economy and efficiency of a national insurance system?
Steven Wolfson, M.D.
New Haven, CT
<http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/12/opinion/L12HEAL.html>http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/12/opinion/L12HEAL.html