David Langford <ansible@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> Niven said a good way to help hospitals stem financial losses is to
> spread rumors in Spanish within the Latino community that emergency
> rooms are killing patients in order to harvest their organs for
> transplants.
Can anyone confirm that he actually said that?
Even if the rumors would be believed by most Spanish speakers without
spreading to many English speakers, which seems dubious, not all
Spanish speakers are illegal aliens, not all English speakers are
*not* illegal aliens, and not all illegal aliens are deadbeats.
Anyhow, as long as emergency rooms are required to accept all comers,
belief in such a rumor would just cause Hispanics to be admitted
only when they keel over unconscious in public, at which time their
treatment would be more expensive.
Also, what about people with contagious diseases? Does Niven really
think they should be encouraged to remain untreated and continue to
spread their diseases to the whole population? I doubt that would
save much money.
There is a problem, but the solution involves finding ways to provide
good treatments for reasonable costs. There have been too many
iterations of ten percent better treatments that cost ten times as
much. How about an insurance plan that provides 1970 level medicine
for 1970 prices? Nothing invented since 1970 would be covered unless
it was cheaper than the 1970 treatment.
And how about an end to taxpayer financing of research to find new
treatments that most taxpayers can't afford?
--
Keith F. Lynch - http://keithlynch.net/
Please see http://keithlynch.net/email.html
before emailing me.
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