A physician friend of mine sent me a link to a piece written by Dr. Marcia Angell about why Congress should consider a single-payer system and suggestions as to how it could be implemented.
Dr. Angell is a senior lecturer in social medicine at Harvard Medical School and a former editor-in-chief of the New England Journal of Medicine. I can only hope that, even though she was not invited to speak in front of Congress, Pres. Obama and the Congress see her words and incorporate this into their discussion.
My 2cent..Its time to modernize the American healthcare delivery system and have a single-payer method that will improve quality and reduce costs.
I sent this article to my dad, who is a retired radiologist. He agreed with it 100%, said she nailed it, head-on. He, I'm sure, has discussed this sort of thing many times with his physician-cronies, as he still talks regularly to a couple of his partners.
I can remember even as a teenager hearing him lamenting costs and the insurance companies that were making more and more money at the ultimate expense of patients. I didn't fully understand it then, but having had a couple of health scares over the years, I've seen the system from the inside as well, and it is ugly. My insurance now is higher because of a "pre-existing condition," due to the fact that I had a hysterectomy in early 1991 for cervical cancer – from which I have had no recurrence. All cancer cells were removed in the surgery; I was spared both radiation and chemotherapy. No relapses or recurrences and I've had regular check-ups since. But still, 18 years later, I am still tagged with a "pre-existing condition," and thus my insurance rates are higher.
Logical? No. Would any DOCTOR say I am at greater risk of cancer than anyone else my age? No. The diseased organ has been gone for years. And since the likely cause of most cervical cancers is HPV, it is not an indicator of predisposition.
Frustrating, at the very least.