Letter to the Editor
New York Times
Published: December 22, 2008
To the Editor:
Re “Necessary Medicine?” (Week in Review, Dec. 14):
The problem with President-elect Barack Obama’s supposed emphasis on the costs of health care is that his proposals fail to deal with the biggest source of wasteful expenditures, our dependence upon private health insurance.
Mr. Obama’s plans, by continuing to embrace a role for private health insurance in our system, wed us to the waste, profiteering and venality of an industry that exists only to take our money and spend as little of it as possible on the objective.
The private insurance industry seeks to increase the proportion of its revenue reserved for profits by spending as little as possible on health care, instead directing its expenditures to marketing, underwriting, “product development” and executive compensation.
I’d prefer my health care dollars to be spent — surprise! — on health care. Only a move toward “Medicare for all” can do that.
Aaron M. Roland
San Francisco, Dec.
The writer is a practicing family physician and clinical associate professor of medicine at the University of California San Francisco.