Health “Responsibility”
January 3rd, 2008 by Peter SudermanUniversal health care: It’s free! It’s easy! It’s what the government wants to do for you, right!
Well, if you listen to most of the liberal health care advocates, that’s what you’ll hear. Problem is, in places where it’s actually been implemented, it’s not true. See today’s UK Telegraph for Britain’s National Health Service Minister explaining to residents that they have “responsibilities:”
Despite the NHS commitment to provide free universal care, it is already common for doctors to set conditions on patients seeking treatment.
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence already considers so-called self-induced illnesses in setting the criteria that determine which patients should qualify for new or expensive health treatments.
And this year Leicester City Primary Care Trust was given Government approval to ask smokers to quit before they are given places on waiting lists for operations such as hip replacements and heart surgery.
Obese people also face more conditions from doctors who say being very overweight unnecessarily complicates many procedures.
For example, fertility doctors have argued that very obese women should be denied access to IVF treatment.
This is one of the huge problems with government health care that consistently goes unnoticed: As soon as the public is responsible for paying for your health, the government gets to tell you how to live. When you let others take responsibility for paying for your care, you naturally give up a certain amount of agency.
What’s hilarious, though, if also kind of sad, is that this is being portrayed as some sort of feint toward individual responsibility:
“We will describe how we will achieve our shared ambition of an NHS which is more personal and responsive to individual needs,” the Prime Minister writes.
“Personalised not just because patients can get the treatment that they need when and where they want, but because from an early stage we are all given the information and advice to take greater responsibility for our own health.”
If you want people to take responsibility for their health, how about taking them off the government health rolls and letting them?
January 4th, 2008 at 12:51 am
You miss the point entirely. It’s very unhealthy to be obese or to smoke. Smokers have a much higher likelihood of not healing well from surgery too. Why shouldn’t the govt. try and ecourage people not to do that?? Your “freedom” isn’t the freedom to be an undue burden on the rest of us. We all end up paying for people who harm themselves in the long run. We’re all in this together!!
January 4th, 2008 at 11:48 am
We should never trust the Government to tell us anything, it is the responability of each individual to make certain their future ,the strenght of this country is based on individuals taking controll of themselves not some nanny state
January 4th, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Mister Guy-
Why should the government “encourage” anyone to do anything? Why is it the government’s job to encourage?
We all know full well that the government never stops at “encouraging.” It always moves to “mandating” and “forcing.” These small steps are how freedom is taken away.
January 4th, 2008 at 10:01 pm
@Theodore u r a moron, u believe that you should make up your own mind in these matters, yet you are following what this stupid ad campaign, that is clearly being put fourth by privatized medical institutions, to ensure they dont loose money.
You think things are OK with your privatized system? HAH have fun trying to get your insurance provider to pay for your big surgeries when you need a quad-bypass and they decide that you are “too high a risk” to ensure.
Dont believe me? watch sicko.
This healthcare system that hillary is proposing wont force-feed you meds as this campaign would have you believe, it would allow everybody access to healthcare, regardless of the surrounding circumstances.
I have heard news of a teenage girl’s insurance provider backing out of paying for a life-saving surgery momments before she was to undergo the operation….she died, now in Canada (where i live) if you need a major surgery you get it (yes there may be a waiting list for certain operations)
In short its your ignorant attitude that is the problem with americans these days…
January 6th, 2008 at 12:56 am
James is mightily misguided.
I recommend he read this site’s content. That should fix the problem.
January 7th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
The govt., your family, friends, etc. should always be encouraging you to be healthy and not be an increased burden on the rest of us by smoking or being obese. There are many other things that we all together try to discourage others from doing because they are destructive behaviors. There is nothing wrong with this…you are way, way too fearful of govt. Govt.’s are made up of regular, everyday people just like you and me…stop being so fearful and join the rest of us in the real world.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:55 pm
So, Mister Guy, what are “destructive behaviors,” and who gets to tell us what they are? That’s a mightily subjective area.
It’s just like a liberal to assume they know what’s best for everyone.
January 13th, 2008 at 5:23 pm
Glad to see some kind of response from you guys…I thought you were all asleep, out counting your piles of money, or you just didn’t care to have an actual dialogue about issues and just spew your side of the issues. I’ve noticed a distinct lack of caring what your readers say about these posts here…it’s interesting to watch…
Are you an idiot? Let’s see…alcoholism, drug use, stealing, violence, gambling, overeating, anorexia, over-consumerism to the point where you have no credit, workaholism, etc., etc., etc… Those all sound like destructive behaviors to me…how about you?
Oh wait, maybe you’d like to take the position that we should make theft and killing legal. I mean…”freedom” is everything to you guys right? We can do even better…let’s let the govt. continue to encourage people not to save anything, spend and gamble more than they take in (I mean, that’s what you guys do whenever you get your hands on govt., right?), under-eat or overeat until they are sick and a drain on society as a whole, and have to work 3 or 4 jobs because none of them alone will allow them to make ends meet. Sounds like a GOP utopia to me…
It’s just like a “conservative” to think that human nature is bad and that groups of individuals acting together through a democratic process can’t improve things for everyone.