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From: cliff@unmvax.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Seat-belt laws
Message-ID: <659@unmvax.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 9-Feb-85 23:08:22 EST
Article-I.D.: unmvax.659
Posted: Sat Feb  9 23:08:22 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 12-Feb-85 05:00:45 EST
References: <321@gargoyle.UChicago.UUCP> <630@unmvax.UUCP> <599@tty3b.UUCP>
Organization: Univ. of New Mexico, Albuquerque
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> 
>  >From: cliff@unmvax.UUCP
>  >
>  >Want to reduce medical costs for everybody?
>  >Get rid of medicare and deregulate the medical industry.
> 
> Sure, it's worked so well, let's have more!  Medicine in the U.S. is
> less regulated than in just about any other industrialized western
> country.  The result is predictable: two tiers of service, one for
> those who can pay and another for those who can't; one of the largest
> shares of GDP going to medical payments in the world; and overall an
> unimpressive set of health statistics.
> 
> Mike Kelly

Whether it is "less regulated" than others or not, there is still so much
regulation that it is not surprising that the costs are enormous.  It is
not uncommon to hear of people who want to build hospitals that are not
allowed, because they can't show proof that they are needed.  I can not
decide that I need a particular drug, write a prescription and go purchase
it.  As long as the number of hospitals is kept down and the number of
people allowed to perform the most rudimentary medicine is likewise
restricted, the cost will remain be enourmous.  BTW, when you say we are
less regulated do you mean the qualifications of doctors are lower or
do you mean that Uncle Sam doesn't directly set the rates that our medicine
people can charge?


						--Cliff