Rob Stone, M.D., an ER physician from Indiana, responds to Pete du Pont's rhetoric on single payer reform
My reply to DuPont is: What about Medicare? Is he willing to criticize Medicare (and commit political suicide) since it is a government program. Of course it does include choice. And is EMTALA un-American? It mandates (a classic unfunded mandate) that all emergency departments treat all comers without regard to ability to pay? As good Americans we already believe that many or most of us DO deserve coverage: the elderly, the emergencies, the poorest of the poor, the pregnant and babies, and as the patches in the quilt get smaller and smaller, the wonderfully inclusive programs covering dialysis and HIV care and the blind and many others. The people whom we discriminate against the most are young taxpayers who don't have coverage from their work. That doesn't sound very American to me. I believe universal coverage is true to the American Dream, even the conservative Republican dreams of Pete DuPont.