Re: RUSH NAILS IT AGAIN!

"DGDevin" <DGDevin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

"Bruce Morgen" wrote in message
news:83ibf61926vmegsqbvt2si9757jtqq42j2@xxxxxxxxxx


...and where are there actual
"death panels" (other than in
the bowels of the insurance
giants)? In GOP-controlled
New Mexico, where patients
covered under that state's
Medicaid program are denied
life-saving transplant surgery
based strictly on dubious
reports that contend such
procedures are ineffective.

The other side of the coin is that sometimes extreme treatment at great
expense is inappropriate. There was an example raised by some network show
during the debate prior to passage of the health care bill. Medicare paid
for a liver transplant for a woman about 70 (if memory serves) at a cost of
over $400,000. Okay, the viewer figures, that's what Medicare is supposed
to do. Then they provide the missing information--she had terminal lung
cancer, life expectancy a matter of months.

I don't know who gets to decide cases like that, but IMO that money could
and should have been used for someone whose life could really have been
saved, and not just for a few months. Sure, it would be tough if it was a
member of my family, that I know from experience. But rationally we cannot
and should not pay for every conceivable treatment in every case when it
will only extend life for a short time. There's no easy solution that I
can think of.

Two of the men now being denied
coverage for (admittedly costly)
procedures are the fathers of
young children -- Governor
Brewer cited "other budget
priorities," which apparently
include a multi-million $$
state-financed study of algae.
In the absence of an "easy
solution," one is left with
hard choices -- and sometimes
choices that aren't really all
that hard.

.

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