Although you do not think small ideas will do much, you provide a good list of small ideas that would improve the cost and availability of health care. Some of them would be more helpful than you indicate. (Health savings accounts help middle-income Americans and do not primarily help the wealthy, for whom the few hundred dollars in tax savings are not worth the paperwork.)

Americans have rightly become suspicious of big, bad, expensive ideas that are adopted only because they pay off a laundry list of special political interests. They would not object to small ideas that actually work and that don't need bribes to get votes in Congress.

Richard E. Ralston
Executive Director
Americans for Free Choice in Medicine
Newport Beach, Calif., Feb. 15, 2010

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Scott Harrington rhetorically asks, "How can a new entitlement reduce deficits?" As he concludes, a massive new entitlement cannot and will not reduce government debt. As our experiences with Medicare and Medicaid have clearly demonstrated, whenever the government promises a "free" service, costs will necessarily rise as more and more people scramble to receive their share of "free" health care. Ultimately this can only lead to ballooning deficits and health-care rationing.

It is precisely this type of government intrusion in what should rightly be a free market that has caused health-care expenditures to skyrocket.

You cannot have your cake and eat it too. This focus on costs, however, misses a more fundamental issue with the proposed nationalization of health care -- the rights of physicians and patients.

Under ObamaCare, patients will lose their freedom to choose what health care they receive and which doctor treats them. Physicians will lose the last of their freedom to practice according to their best judgment.

The battle for medicine will be lost or won not on actuarial analysis of costs, but rather on the more fundamental principle of the rights of individuals.

Richard Parker, M.D.
McKinney, Texas

Labels: LTE

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Why to condemn insurance companies

Is the for-profit insurance industry a "predator" that "prevent[s] us from having a decent health care system"? Letter writer Bruce Robinson says so (Daily Camera, December 1). He's partially right. The real predators are politicians who inhibit needed health policy reform. But insurers are guilty for concealing how they benefit from Congress's predatory practices, which shield them from competition and accountability to patients.

Predators gain value by using force or threats of force. Politicians prey upon patients who prefer to finance their own medical care in "politically incorrect" ways. As a result, insurers need not compete for your business. Politicians punch you with a tax penalty for buying insurance directly from an insurer instead of through your employer. They prohibit you from buying affordable policies available in other states. They tax you more for paying cash for routine medical expenses rather than buying an expensive health plan with tax-deductible premiums.

Like a true predator, politicians support legislation that backs you into a corner -- where as the patient, you are the consumer but not the customer. Hence, neither insurers nor doctors aim to please you. They cater to who pays them. Employers pay the insurers and insurers pay the doctors.

So don't condemn for-profit insurance. The profits are "anemic," reports the AP. Condemn insurers for supporting an un-free market, where profit is disconnected from pleasing consumers. Only in a free market insurers' profits would depend on satisfying you, the patient, rather than satisfying employers and politicians.

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Compare Screening Of Breasts and Shoes

The U.S. Preventative Services Task Force feels that mammograms are a waste of time and money because of false-positive exams, and anyway, the risk is evaluated at a meager 0.05% (Letters, Dec. 2). If, indeed, mammograms for women under 50 are not cost effective, and only save a few lives, then why are we taking our shoes off at every airport in the country?

Lee Mundy
Ellensburg, Wash.

Labels: LTE

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Health care reform and the public option

Say your neighborhood deli rigged its scales so that customers who paid for a pound of meat left the store with less. Does such fraud justify a government-run "public option" for delicatessens?

Surely not, but this is how Colorado AFL-CIO Director Mike Cerbo argues for a new government-run insurance plan. Cerbo says it should "impermissible" for insurers to "drop coverage due to pre-existing medical conditions" -- presumably when patients had been honest about medical histories.

This is called "post-claim underwriting," and it violates the insurer's contract with the policy-holder. But this is no justification of a "public option." Rather, if it happens frequently and without penalty, it shows that government has been lax in one of its legitimate duties: enforcing contracts.

Brian T. Schwartz, Boulder

Labels: Insurance, LTE

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Health pitch a violation of basic American rights

The health care legislation in Congress contains mandates to obtain individual health insurance coverage. With this provision, Congress would violate my rights, rather than protect them, which is Congress's constitutional mandate.

This provision is a clear violation of my right to voluntarily associate and contract with health care professionals and insurance providers to our mutual benefit without the interference of a predatory third party.

It violates my right to economic freedom by forcing me to purchase health insurance services against my will. It violates my right to property by forcing me to pay penalties for declining to participate in a coercive program. It violates my right to liberty by forcing me to submit to incarceration for nonpayment of penalties or additional taxes.

It violates my right to self-determination. It violates my right to use my mind to make judgments regarding my own interests and actions.

In short, this legislation violates my right to peaceably live my life as I see fit. I oppose these violations. I say "no" to the coercive mandates contained in this proposal.

And it is my hope and wish that Senator Hagan will stand with me and say "no" to this rights-violating health care bill.

Tim Peck, Asheville

One of the principal stated purposes of the Democratic Party's proposed health care legislation is to better meet the health needs of those who are currently uninsured. As a self-employed man of 59 who cannot afford health insurance, I am strongly concerned with that issue, and have followed it closely over the past year and a half. I regret to say that the passage of the proposed legislation will make my situation worse, rather than better. I urge you to protect the uninsured by voting against it.

The reason I'm uninsured is that health care, and therefore health insurance, costs too much. But the proposed legislation would require me to purchase health insurance from the same insurance industry that is now failing to restrain the growth of health care costs, either from the uncompetitive private firms that now dominate it, or from a government-run system that is likely to charge even more. It offers subsidies for this purchase so inadequate that they would be laughable, if not for the real hardship they will inflict on people who pay them. And when the many people who still can't afford insurance remain uninsured, it fines them nearly $1,000 yearly... which will only make it harder for them to get health care. The CMS estimates that of the uninsured people who won't be eligible for Medicaid, 12 million will become insured, but 18 million will remain uninsured and suffer punishment for it.

Advocates of this punitive approach attack the irresponsibility of people who remain uninsured, and who depend on emergency rooms for health care. But under this bill, the people added to Medicaid will largely continue to do exactly that, as most doctors don't want to take patients at Medicaid rates. And the many millions of people who can't afford insurance will often have to do the same... until they are diagnosed with some serious and costly illness, when they will be able to sign up for insurance, and insurance carriers will be compelled to accept them despite their "preexisting conditions," further driving up insurance costs and premiums. And in any case, the reason many self-employed people and employees of small businesses don't have insurance is not irresponsibility, but fear of financial ruin if they have to pay for it.

If buying health insurance remained voluntary, and you came up with a system under which it cost too much, the uninsured could remain uninsured, and at least not be any worse off... and send you a message that your efforts weren't good enough. By resorting to compulsion, you are making it a violation of law to send that message. And that very fact is the strongest reason to believe that your plan will not make health care affordable, but make its costs even more ruinous.

I urge you to reconsider, and reject this proposal.

William Stoddard

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Governor's proposal to tax candy and soda

The Post reported on Gov. Bill Ritter's proposal to tax candy and soda pop. Ritter said, "We thought that people would be willing to pay 3 cents on a dollar candy bar." How utterly arrogant of him to decide what any citizen would be willing to pay for anything. What I do with my money and property should be my business in a free society.

America's local, state and federal governments are becoming ever-more authoritarian, serving themselves instead of protecting individual liberty. Wake up! Our individual rights are in serious jeopardy. The people must fight against this creeping and metastatic growth in governmental power or America will die.

Gina Liggett, Denver

Labels: LTE

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HB3962, Insurance, and Preexisting Conditions

Should government force you to pay more for medical insurance so others can pay less? Dr. Laura Rosenthal thinks so, calling it "compassion and kindness." It's more like charity at gunpoint.

In a recent Camera article, Rosenthal advocated making it "illegal for health insurance companies to discriminate on the basis of pre-existing conditions." That is, insurers must sell policies to everyone at the same price.

These mandates have dire consequences, including more people without insurance. "Individual insurance markets deteriorated," concludes a Milliman actuarial study. "Insurance companies chose to stop selling individual insurance," "premium rates tended to increase, sometimes dramatically."

This legislation encourages insurers to design products that sick people don't want, as insurers lose money by insuring the sick because it's illegal to charge higher premiums. Such policies lack features higher-risk customers want, like comprehensive coverage and minimal bureaucratic obstacles to doctor-recommended treatments.

These political controls cause a "death spiral:" premiums increase, so the healthiest stop buying insurance, the remaining risk pool is less healthy, and premiums rise again. Repeat. To prevent this, politicians want mandatory insurance, which Massachusetts imposed in 2006. Since then Massachusetts insurance premium costs have skyrocketed, affordable policies become illegal, and patients have poor access to care.

Preexisting conditions are a problem because the tax code favors non-portable employer-based insurance. This prevents people from buying guaranteed renewable policies before contracting a chronic condition. A free-market in insurance would also offer innovative products such as health status insurance, which would pay for premium increases should you get sick.

Labels: Insurance, LTE

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The Incentives Aren't to Help You

The proposed Massachusetts "global payment" system creates a tremendous incentive for physicians and hospitals to render as little care as possible ("Your Massachusetts Future," Review & Outlook, Oct. 14). If your care costs less than the annual allotment, then they keep the unused amount. If your care costs more, then the difference comes out of the providers' pockets. Such a system thus pits your doctor's interests against your own.

Suppose the state has already used up 85% of your annual allotment. You then see your doctor for a severe headache. He examines you and says, "No, you don't need a $1,000 MRI scan of your brain. Why don't you take two Tylenol and call me in the morning."

Would you be 100% sure that he's giving you unbiased medical advice?

And even if your doctor continues to conscientiously practice in your best interest, he must constantly battle hospital administrators seeking to reduce spending on your care.

Advocates of government-run health care like to claim that it is morally superior because it "doesn't put a price on human life." But when the government sets an annual spending cap for each patient, then that's exactly what it is doing. A government big enough to "guarantee" you health care will also be big enough to limit it.

Paul Hsieh, M.D.
Sedalia, Colo.

Labels: LTE, MA, States

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The issue of whether President Obama supports a public option is a red herring. The proposed health care reforms, even without a public option, will devastate the quality of health care in the U.S.

President Obama has portrayed a false alternative: more government involvement or no reform at all. Yet there are other options.

The only reforms that will address the actual problems with our health system are removal of the government mandates and tax distortions, which are the cause of the rising cost of health care.

The only way to control costs is to restore the free market in health care. This is imperative both between consumers and providers as well as between consumers and insurance companies.

The government should take a cue from doctors and adopt the creed "First, do no harm." Increased government involvement in health care would be extraordinarily harmful to the well-being of all Americans.

Doug Krening, Larkspur

Labels: LTE

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Health care statistics

Life expectancy and infant mortality statistics are notoriously poor measures of the quality of a nation's health care system. For instance, more Americans are killed in car accidents and homicide than in Canada and Europe. According to ABC News, if one adjusts for these fatal injuries, then U.S. life expectancy is actually higher than in nearly every other industrialized nation.

International comparisons of infant mortality rates are similarly suspect. The U.S. counts any premature infant born with a heartbeat as a live birth even if it survives only a few hours. Many European countries count such children as "stillborn" if they weigh less than 1 pound even if they show a heartbeat. Japan doesn’t count such infants as "live births" unless they survive for more than 24 hours.

Flawed statistics make a poor basis for public policy.

Paul Hsieh, M.D., Sedalia
The writer is co-founder of Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine.

Labels: Countries, LTE

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Bravo, Mike Rosen, for identifying the fundamental, moral health care issue -- there is no right to health care.

True health care reform protects the fundamental right of patients, doctors and insurance companies to voluntarily exchange products and services in the marketplace without government intervention. Such reform must focus on repealing existing laws and programs, not creating new ones. Repeal laws preventing insurance companies from offering policies with selective coverage and individuals from choosing such policies. Repeal laws making health insurance premiums tax-deductible for corporations but not for individuals. Repeal laws forcing doctors to take on excessive amounts of malpractice insurance to protect themselves against lawsuits. And yes, eventually repeal Medicare and Medicaid.

In health care, as in life in general, the moral is the practical; true health care reform will result in an abundance of health care options for people of all means.

Anders Ingemarson, Denver

Labels: LTE

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Senator Michael Bennet says that "health care reform must shift control from insurance companies to doctors, nurses and their patients." If so, he should oppose the Democrats' so-called health care "reform." Insurance companies have too much control because politicians have handed it to them through tax laws that give preferential treatment to employer-provided insurance.

This punishes employees who buy insurance directly instead of settling for their employer's insurance options. Hence, insurers cater to employers instead of patients. The Democrats' proposals to mandate employer-provided insurance won't solve this problem, but merely entrench it.

Worse yet, tax-discounted insurance has skewed demand in favor of excess insurance to cover routine and predictable expenses. If car insurance similarly covered oil changes and new tires, customers wouldn't compare prices--they'd only ask if "it's covered." Demand and prices would soar, and insurers would wield too much power.

Senator Bennet should support ending a biased tax policy that that favors employer-controlled insurance over patient-controlled insurance.

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Paying for Health Care Reform

The Democrats' proposals would "reform" nothing. Instead, they would entrench problems with the status quo, as economist Arnold Kling explains in "The Non-Debate over Non-Reform."

Consider the country's total health care spending. Patients' out-of-pocket spending accounts for only about 10 percent. Insurers and government split the remaining 90 percent almost evenly. Since physicians, like anyone else, cater to who pays them, patients are left in the lurch. But Democrats ignore this problem.

Instead, they have been in bed with drug companies, Wal-mart, and hospital groups with plans to stick it to taxpayers. For details, see "A Closer Look at Those Industry Deals" at healthcare.cato.org.

Who should finance so-called "reform?" Translation: who should pay for other people's medical care? Anyone who volunteers, and no one who does not. Health care is not a right. Rights are freedoms of action, not entitlements to what others produce.

If you want to pay for other people's medical care, donate to or volunteer with a charity. Don't ask politicians to compel others to fund government charities, like Medicare and Medicaid. Forcing others to donate to charity is neither virtuous nor compassionate.

Hence, if Democrats want a "public plan," they shouldn't force taxpayers to pay for it.

Citizens do not earn money to fund politicians' pet projects. Politicians should pitch their great ideas to investors or philanthropists. Using tax dollars is just robbery cloaked in conceit and elitism.

Brian T. Schwartz

Labels: LTE

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Having a health care "system" is itself the problem. It implies that politicians dictate your medical choices, at your expense, regardless of whether their "system" serves your individual needs and preferences.

Consumers are frustrated with the low-quality politicized school systems and the regularly-jammed highway systems. We are quite pleased with our iPods and laptops. But there is no government-run consumer electronics "system;" instead, there's a relatively free market. A free market would do the same for medicine.

But politicians have imposed their will upon what should be individual medical decisions, resulting in an un-free market. The tax codes punishes you for not buying insurance through your employer, so you're stuck with your employer's few options. This coddles insurance companies, who are accountable to your employers instead of you. Politicians manipulate the tax code so we buy excessive insurance coverage, which discourages both price competition and prudent medical spending.

Politicians forbid us from buying more affordable insurance available to residents of other states. They force us to buy expensive policies loaded with mandated benefits many customers don't want. They force taxpayers to fund Medicaid and Medicare, which cause medical inflation, increase insurance premiums, and will bankrupt the country.

Politicians empower the FDA to enforce a default ban on all new drugs, which stifles innovation and deprives patients of life-saving medications.

Politicians should not dictate your medical and insurance decisions, you should. Only a free market empowers patients in this way, requires makes insurers and physicians to be accountable to them.

Brian T. Schwartz,

Labels: Analysis, LTE

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"The 'public plan' will be the only plan" says health care economist Scott Harrington of the proposed government-run health plan.

Be suspicious: "public plan" supporters want it to be the only plan.

President Obama uses rhetoric of "choice" and "competition" to push the "public plan." But his ideal is single-payer health care, where there is -- by definition -- a government monopoly that prohibits both choice and competition. If "public plan" supporters honestly wanted choice and competition, why do they oppose policies that would make Medicaid and Medicare compete? For example, vouchers that Medicaid and Medicare recipients can use to buy commercial insurance. Or better yet, allow taxpayers to opt out of funding these programs by getting tax credits for donations to comparable charities.

A "public plan" would not even compete fairly with insurance companies. It would have access to tax dollars, and many other advantages. As professor Harrington concludes, "equal competition between a government health-insurance plan and private plans would be impossible.

"If a government health "program were to be stripped of any special advantages it would cease to be a government program. It would be just another private insurer," writes Michael Cannon of the Cato Institute.

If politicians truly want more competitive insurance markets, they should remove the tax code's bias for employer-provided insurance, which shields insurers from competing directly for patients' business. But politicians covet votes most. Since the biased tax code empowers unions, Democrats are not likely to touch it without giving unions special treatment.

Brian T. Schwartz

Labels: Insurance, LTE

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State seeks to revamp way doctors, hospitals are paid

...Commission [Special Commission on the Health Care Payment System] members said they will urge Governor Deval Patrick and the Legislature to replace the current system, in which insurers typically pay doctors and hospitals a negotiated fee for each individual procedure or visit, with a set payment for each patient that covers all that person's care for an entire year.

Massachusetts would be the first state to broadly adopt such a system, which would essentially put doctors and hospitals on a budget in an effort to restrain health spending.

A single, yearly fee is intended to discourage doctors and hospitals from providing unneeded tests and treatments, so patients could find it harder to get procedures of questionable benefit. And because doctors and hospitals would have to work together more closely to manage the budget, the hope is they will better coordinate care for patients, which could improve quality.

Patients' care would be compromised

Adopting a system to pay doctors and hospitals a single, yearly fee for each patient is neither bold nor experimental. It's just another variation of capitation: a system that would lead to the government rationing and ultimately compromising patient care.

Before making another costly healthcare mistake, Beacon Hill lawmakers should ask themselves how they would react if their doctor said, "We've already spent your annual healthcare allowance, and anything else we could do to treat your condition would put us deeper in the red." My guess is that it would only take one really sick lawmaker (or governor) to realize the error of their ways.

Scott Keays
Allston

Labels: LTE, MA, States

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Prepare For More Expensive Medical Insurance

The Senate Finance Committee has approved Colorado House Bill 1293. The Denver Post claims that this bill would reduce your insurance premiums. Not so. They will increase.

The Post claims HB 1293 would "increase the number of those covered by government insurance and thereby reduce cost-shifting" from the uninsured and under-insured. Sure, this cost-shifting increases premiums costs. But the cost-shift from those with government insurance far exceeds that from the uninsured.

In Colorado, the cost-shift from the uninsured increases annual premiums by $85 per insured Colorado resident. For the data behind this, search on-line for "uninsured cost-shift scam." Compare this to Medicare and Medicaid: Bloomberg recently reported that "Medicare and Medicaid increase the annual cost of covering a family of four by $1,788." As if the taxes we must pay to fund Medicare and Medicaid weren't enough.

If politicians want more affordable insurance they should repeal prohibitions that make it so expensive. For example, HB 1256 would allow Coloradans to buy insurance available in other states. In four states average annual premiums for individual plans cost $500 less than in Colorado. For family plans the potential savings increases to $1,000 in five states, according to America's Health Insurance Plans.

Government-controlled health care in the U.S. is a disease masquerading as its own cure.

Brian T. Schwartz

Labels: CO, LTE

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Re "A Health Plan for All and the Concerns It Raises":

To the Editor:

It would be just as wrong for the government to compete with private insurers to provide health insurance as it would be for the government to compete with G.M. or Ford to build taxpayer-subsidized "public automobiles."

The unfair competition from a public plan would destroy the private health insurance industry. The inevitable result would be the rationing and other horrors of a Canadian-style single-payer system, which most Americans neither wish nor deserve.

Paul Hsieh
Sedalia, Colo., March 25, 2009

The writer, a medical doctor, is a co-founder of Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine.

Labels: Insurance, LTE

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Single-payer health care has failed in every other country

Response to your story, "Dems' bill shoots for universal health care" from 2/5/2009 by Ed Sealover.

Single-payer health care has failed in every other country that has tried it. Canada controls health costs by forcing patients to wait months for MRI scans and cardiac surgeries that Americans can get in a few days.

Single-payer advocates mistakenly claim that health care is a "right".

Health care is a **need**, not a right. Rights are freedoms of action (such as the right to free speech), not automatic claims on goods and services that must be produced by another.

Instead of single-payer health care, America needs free-market reforms, such as allowing patients to purchase insurance across state lines and use health savings accounts for routine expenses. Insurers should be allowed to sell inexpensive, catastrophic-only policies to cover rare but expensive events.

Such reforms could reduce costs and make insurance available to millions who cannot currently afford it, while respecting individual rights.

Labels: CO, LTE, States

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Kefalas readies comprehensive health-care bill

Every country with a single-payer system saves money by rationing and waiting lists. You can save a lot of money by forcing women to wait months for their chemotherapy for their newly diagnosed breast cancer. You can save money by limiting the numbers of cardiac surgeries per year. This is commonplace in Canada. But the patients pay the ultimate price. Do we really want this in America?

Paul Hsieh, MD

Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine (FIRM)
www.WeStandFIRM.org
Sedalia

Labels: LTE

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Three Big Problems With Obama's Health-Care Plan

You are probably correct that a major new national health-care program will be rushed through the next Congress without substantial debate through some mechanism such as budget reconciliation. That is because many of its elements would not survive close examination. The fatuous claim of Sen. Max Baucus that placing the nation's medical care under the rule of an "independent" council of presidentially appointed experts would not constitute government management of care is only the most conspicuous example. Others include the claim that computerizing those remaining medical records still on paper would reduce insurance costs by $2,500 a year per family.

But the main reason for the big rush is that nobody has a clue how the government will pay for it -- anymore than they know how the current unfunded liability of Medicare and Medicaid can be honored.

The last thing that proponents want is for anyone to ask where the money will come from, except perhaps questions about such details as the individual rights of patients and physicians to make their own medical decisions without the approval of presidentially appointed experts.

Richard E. Ralston
Executive Director
Americans for Free Choice in Medicine
Newport Beach, Calif.


Businesses expecting to save money under President-elect Barack Obama's universal health-care plan are going to be in for a rude awakening. President-elect Obama's plan includes an employer mandate in which businesses must either pay their employee health insurance or else pay into a government fund to cover the uninsured.

A similar mandate has already been in place in Massachusetts for two years. As health costs there have skyrocketed, the state government has asked for more and more "contributions" from businesses. During this financial crisis, the last thing America needs is yet more economic burdens on the businessmen who create jobs and prosperity.

The fundamental problem with Mr. Obama's plan is the premise that health care is a "right" that must be guaranteed by the government. Health care is a need, not a right. Rights are freedoms of action, not automatic claims on goods and services that must be produced by another. Attempting to guarantee an alleged "right" to health care must necessarily violate actual individual rights and will destroy the American economy in the process.

Paul Hsieh, M.D.
Sedalia, Colo.

Labels: LTE

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Steer clear of making purchase mandatory

The insurance industry proposal to force all Americans to purchase health insurance would be as wrong as Detroit automakers asking Congress to force all Americans to purchase a new GM or Ford car every year. Americans have the right to purchase (or not purchase) insurance in a free market, based on a rational assessment of their needs. When health insurance is mandatory, the state must necessarily define what constitutes "acceptable" insurance, meaning that individuals must purchase insurance on terms set by lobbyists and bureaucrats.

Instead of mandatory health insurance, America needs free-market reforms, such as allowing patients to purchase insurance across state lines and to use health savings accounts for routine expenses, and allowing insurers to sell inexpensive, catastrophic-only policies to cover rare but expensive events. Such reforms could reduce costs and make insurance available to millions who cannot currently afford it.

Dr. Paul Hsieh
Sedalia, Colo.
The writer is cofounder of Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine.

Labels: Insurance, LTE

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The government should not be guaranteeing "universal healthcare." Healthcare is a need, not a right. Rights are freedoms of action, not automatic claims on goods and services that must be produced by another. There's no such thing as a "right" to a car or an appendectomy. Whenever the government attempts to guarantee a service such as healthcare, it must control it, leading to Canadian-style rationing and waiting lists.

Instead of universal healthcare, we need free-market reforms, such as allowing patients to purchase insurance across state lines and use health savings accounts for routine expenses, and allowing insurers to sell inexpensive, catastrophic-only policies to cover rare but expensive events. Such reforms could reduce costs and make insurance available to millions who cannot currently afford it.

Paul Hsieh, MD
Sedalia, Colo.

Labels: LTE

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The apparent defeat of Proposition 101 in Arizona strongly suggests the ultimate goal of the single-payer wonks is to delegitimize, or frankly outlaw, private medical contracting. Based on experiences in Canada and the U.K., the only way a government-run health-care system can survive (finances notwithstanding) is with a private pay option to handle the excess demand such systems always create.

If private medicine is outlawed in the U.S., doctors will no longer work for patients, and a basic freedom will be lost. I hope my colleagues, many of whom naively endorse the single-payer concept, are paying attention.

Richard Amerling, M.D.
Director
Outpatient Dialysis
Beth Israel Medical Center
New York

Labels: AZ, LTE, States

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Whose health plan is best?

Sen. Barack Obama's claim that health care is a "right" typifies a dangerous political trend.

A right is a freedom of action (such as the right to free speech), not an automatic claim to a good or service that must be produced by another. Attempting to guarantee a supposed "right" to health care must necessarily violate actual rights of providers or of citizens forced to pay for others' medical expenses. This is just state-sanctioned slavery or theft.

Instead of another massive government program to guarantee "universal health care," we need free-market reforms that would allow individuals to purchase health insurance across state lines, use Health Savings Accounts for routine expenses, and purchase inexpensive catastrophic-only policies for rare but expensive problems. Such reforms could cut costs by as much as 50 percent, making quality health insurance affordable to many who want to purchase it but currently can't.

Paul Hsieh, Sedalia

Labels: LTE

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Freedom to choose

SIR – The Massachusetts system of "universal" health care remains afloat only because of hundreds of millions of dollars in federal support ("In need of desperate remedies", October 18th).

One reason costs are so high in Massachusetts is that individuals are forced to purchase benefits they neither need nor want. Under any system of mandatory insurance, the state must necessarily define what constitutes an acceptable insurance policy, meaning that individuals are buying insurance on terms influenced by lobbyists and bureaucrats, rather than based on a rational assessment of their needs.

If the federal government adopts the Massachusetts system on a national scale, it would merely multiply those problems fifty-fold.

Dr Paul Hsieh
Co-founder Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine
Sedalia, Colorado

Labels: LTE, MA, States

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Running for cover, October 4th

SIR - Governments should not guarantee health care as a "right" ("Running for cover", special briefing on the US election, October 4th). Rights are freedoms of actions (such as the right to free speech), not automatic claims on goods and services that must be produced by others.

Individuals are legitimately entitled to services such as health care that they purchase with their own money, are promised by prior contractual agreements, or are given to them via voluntary charity.

Otherwise, government programs to guarantee health care as a "right" must necessarily violate someone's actual rights - either the rights of those compelled to provide medical care or the rights of those compelled to pay for it. Such programs then become just another form of state-sanctioned slavery or theft.

Dr Paul Hsieh
Co-founder
Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine
Sedalia, Colorado

Labels: LTE

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Obama's plan would move us toward government health care

Thank you for your healthy skepticism about Obama's proposed health care "reforms". The last thing this country needs is a massive new bureaucracy that would crowd out private health insurance. The Obama plan would be just another step towards a complete government takeover of American medicine.

We've already seen this with Medicare, which has essentially destroyed primary private health insurance for American over age 65. Older Americans essentially live under a system of socialized medicine, and every year we see how their health care is held hostage to partisan political wrangling.

Do we really want to inflict this on all Americans?

There are genuine problems with the current health care system.

But forcing everyone into a government-run health system to "solve" the problem of the uninsured would be like forcing everyone into government-run housing projects to "solve" the "problem of homelessness".

Paul Hsieh, MD, Sedalia

Labels: LTE, Medicare

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Socialized medicine great, but don't get sick
Tish Jeffers, Centennial

I had the opportunity to live in Canada for almost 20 years, so I think I have a fair background in how socialized, government-orchestrated medicine works.

Keep in mind, there are approximately 32 million people in Canada and approximately 302 million people in the United States.

My assessment then, as it is now when I talk to my aging Canadian friends: Socialized medicine is great... as long as you never get really sick!

What I find interesting is that if socialized medicine ever comes into play here in the United States, Americans will never stand for the waiting, the lines, the paperwork and the bureaucracy the Canadians put up with when they go to the doctor. We won't have the option, like our Canadian friends do, to load up on buses and come over to the United States to get the instant care most of us take for granted!

It isn't medicine that needs reform, it's the insurance companies that need reform. The government has screwed up so many things, like our current issue with our finances! Do we want them messing around with our medicine, too?

Labels: Canada, Countries, LTE

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Keep government out of benefits arena
Dr. Paul Hsieh, Sedalia

I'd like to thank the Rocky Mountain News for opposing Amendment 56, which would force most businesses to offer health insurance to their workers ("Let's make a deal/There's still time to pull some ballot measures," Sept. 3).

Businessmen create jobs through hard work and rational thought.

Consequently, they have the moral right to decide on what terms to offer these jobs to prospective employees, including specific wages and benefits.

Conversely, workers have the right to negotiate for any wages and benefits they desire, and the right to reject offers they don't like. But they have no right to demand a specific salary or benefit (such as health insurance) through government force.

To "solve" the problem of high insurance costs by foisting those costs onto businesses would be just as wrong as "solving" the problem of high gasoline prices by forcing businesses to pay their workers' gasoline expenses. The proper solution is not more government regulations but free-market reforms that address the actual underlying problems.

Labels: CO, Insurance, LTE, States

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To the Editor:

Far from being a "success," Massachusetts health care "reform" has cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars more than anticipated and created long waits for care.

The Massachusetts system is just socialized medicine in a new guise. It is no coincidence that the long waits for care in the state resemble the long bread lines in the Soviet Union.

The fundamental problem with the Massachusetts system (or any system of "universal health care") is that it erroneously treats health care as a "right." There is no such thing as "right" to a good or service that must be created by others — that's just state-sanctioned theft or slavery. The problems in Massachusetts are the inevitable result.

Paul Hsieh
Sedalia, Colo., Aug. 30, 2008

The writer is the co-founder of Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine.

Massachusetts has seen its supply of physicians per capita more than double since 1976, and it now has the highest physician-to-population ratio of any state, in primary care as well as overall.

Labels: LTE, MA, States

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Private surgical centres are an essential relief valve for our overburdened public health care system. To see how, let's follow the case of 82-year-old Mrs. Green from Vancouver. She needs knee surgery and has been on an orthopaedic surgeon's waitlist for over two years. In our rationed health care system, her surgeon is "allowed" only six hours of operating room time per week, and he has 129 people on his list ahead of Mrs. Green.

In desperation, she contacts us. Two weeks later, Mrs. Green gets her new knee, in Quebec. Her surgeon there, Dr. Jones, operates at a public hospital but has used up all of his allotted time in the public system. But happily, he also operates in a private Quebec surgical centre every week, after completing his time "quota" in the public hospital. The extra money he earns for this work keeps him from moving to the United States.

When Mrs. Green travelled to Quebec for her new knee, Mrs. Brown moved up one slot on the public waitlist and will get her surgery a week earlier.

To summarize, by being able to operate in a private surgical centre as well as a public hospital, Dr. Jones has the incentive to stay in Canada, Mrs. Green has cut her wait time down to two weeks from 51 and Mrs. Brown will get her surgery in the public system one week sooner.

What part of this scenario do the apologists for our Canadian public health care system not understand?

Rick Baker, Timely Medical Alternatives Inc., Vancouver.

Labels: Canada, Countries, LTE

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Re: "Guaranteed health care is best for America," Aug. 13 letter to the editor.

Kristen Hannum's letter propagates the myth that government-run socialized medical systems can actually "guarantee" health care.

The British government has just told patients the exact opposite when it stated that the National Health Service should deny life-saving care if it is too expensive.

Whenever governments attempt to "guarantee" health care, they must also control it. Canada and England save money through rationing and wait lists. Rather than being "guaranteed," government-run health care becomes a privilege dispensed at the discretion of bureaucrats. Do we really want this sort of system?

Paul Hsieh, Sedalia

Labels: Canada, Countries, LTE, UK

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More government mandates for health care?

When part of a building is on fire, panic has been known to drive a crowd directly into the fire.

Such is Froma Harrop's call for even more government interference in the health care industry.

She likes the insurance mandate in Mitt Romney's Massachusetts health plan:

"Everyone must get coverage. Those who don't, pay a penalty. The uninsured holdouts tend to be young, male and in good to excellent health. They figure that if something goes wrong, they can report to the emergency room where they'll get free care. Such people are called 'free riders.'"

The problem is real, but what is the cause? Why do people get free emergency room care? It's because of existing government mandates!

So we are to solve the problems caused by one government mandate with another government mandate? Where will it all end?

We are fast approaching the point where every aspect of life will be either mandatory or prohibited.

Clarence Manion, Lyons

Labels: Insurance, LTE, MA, States

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Re the congressional hearing on H.R. 676, "The United States National Health Insurance Act," held in Houston on July 18, 2008.

A "congressional hearing" is meant to find out what citizens think about a given subject. But the July 18 meeting was no hearing. It was a carefully orchestrated power-play presided over by Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee and Congressman John Conyers, Jr., to force socialized medicine down citizens' throats.

From all reports the meeting was held in a manner faithful to dictators and their ilk the world over: The politicians showed up an hour and half late (a tactic designed to reduce attendance by tiring people's patience and driving them away), dominated the podium with interminable talk outlining their point of view (designed to present an appearance of unstoppable force), and refused to take questions from the floor (designed to squash all opposition).

The comic relief was provided by Mr. Conyers who claimed that "This issue isn't about ideas or theories or philosophy or idealism. It's about providing healthcare." Given what's revealed by this statement, one can only conclude that for Congressman Conyers the term "learned" is an oxymoron.

When healthcare does not deal with ideas, theories, philosophy or idealism, it can only deal with "practice" -- the practice of non-thinking, uneducated, brain-dead zombies who will stick a knife into you without an idea, theory, philosophy or ideal to guide their action. That's what socialize medicine boils down to. No wonder those speakers described themselves as "bleeding heart liberals." That organ, too, is no longer viable, having been bled out.

There is no legal penalty against egregious lack of knowledge, but one might hope that there would be punishment for elected officials, such as Conyers and Lee who treated their constituents with such unpardonably arrogant disdain. One might hope they will be booted out of office ASAP.

Sincerely,
Sylvia Bokor
Albuquerque, NM

Labels: LTE, TX

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Reform health care

Paul Hsieh, M.D., Co-founder, Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine - Sedalia, Colo.

Mandatory insurance does not solve our underlying health care problem, which is government interference in the free market. This approach has already been tried in Massachusetts and has led to long waits, skyrocketing costs and frustrated patients ("Individual health policies leave many in the lurch," Cover story, News, Thursday).

Instead of government-imposed "universal health care," America needs free market health reforms -- reforms such as eliminating mandatory insurance benefits, repealing laws that forbid purchasing health insurance across state lines, and allowing individuals to use health savings accounts for routine expenses and low cost, catastrophic-only insurance for major expenses.

Such reforms would respect individual rights, allow patients to choose from the best offerings from all 50 states, lower costs and make health insurance available to many who currently cannot afford it.

Labels: Insurance, LTE, MA, States

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Parents, not society, should care for kids

Gov. Bill Ritter touted his health-care reforms as the "building blocks" of a larger plan when he signed them into law ("Ritter signs 11 'building blocks' of health agenda," June 4). That larger plan is socialized medicine.

The principle underlying these new laws is Karl Marx's dictum, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need." Colorado taxpayers (the able) are now forced to fund expanded Medicaid benefits for children of less wealthy parents (the needy). Colorado health insurance buyers (the able) are now forced to fund a hearing aid benefit for children (the needy).

Colorado does not need more creeping socialism. Children are the sole responsibility of the parents who chose to bear them, not society as a whole. If unable to provide for them, parents should rely on voluntary charity, not forced welfare. If Ritter wants real reform, let him begin with those free-market principles.

Diana Hsieh, Sedalia

Labels: CO, LTE, States

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More mandates mean more expense for all of us

It is unfortunate that all of Gov. Bill Ritter's 11 health-care bills were touted as a success ("Ritter signs 11 'building blocks' of health agenda," June 4). Most of the bills were mandates to insurers.

Consumers should be aware that when the word "mandate" appears in legislation for health care, it simply raises the premiums. Colorado has more than 45 mandates on the books required for health insurance companies. By comparison, Kansas has six mandates. Based on this fact alone, one might ask which state's insurers could offer the lowest premiums?

Most of these mandates started appearing in Colorado exclusively in the early '90s. Since then, we have seen competition among insurers dwindle in Colorado. How about some significant legislation like hospital transparency, illegals paying for the cost of their care, or reducing the number of Colorado state mandates? Another thought would be to stop government intervention and let the health products be consumer driven; let the market dictate coverages and plans, not politicians and legislators trying to secure their office.

Russ Dorfler, Littleton

Labels: Insurance, LTE

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The big lie behind politician-controlled medicine

Re: "Who has your health at heart?" May 22 guest commentary.

AFL-CIO executives John Sweeney and Mike Cerbo perpetuate the big lie behind politician-controlled medicine: that the free market is not working and that costs have been spiraling out of control because of markets.

But costs have been increasing precisely because of the employer-based insurance they espouse, which is a consequence of a biased and non-free-market tax code. It favors employer-based insurance and penalizes other types of medical insurance.

We consume medical care like a business traveler dining on the company's expense account: Since someone else pays the bill (insurers), patients need not shop around, so providers don't compete on price. Why?

Tax-discounted insurance encourages us to buy more costly insurance than we probably need, hence penalizing saving for future medical expenses. Our "insurance" has become prepaid health care.

Employer-based insurance also coddles insurance companies, which have little incentive to please consumers. They know we're essentially locked to our employer and the costly insurance plans they offer. To buy a competitor's product, we must change jobs or pay a stiff tax penalty.

The AFL-CIO should be ashamed of promoting self-serving policies that both empower labor unions and result in expensive medical care and insurance.

Brian T. Schwartz, Boulder

Labels: Free Market, Insurance, LTE

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To the Editor:

The skyrocketing costs of health insurance are the result of onerous government regulations, such as mandatory benefits.

Many states require insurance plans to include benefits like chiropractor care or in vitro fertilization. Such mandatory benefits raise insurance costs by about 20 percent to 50 percent, according to the Council for Affordable Health Insurance.

More fundamentally, mandated benefits violate an individual’s right to contract freely with insurers and providers according to his rational judgment for his best interest. Instead, a bureaucrat decides how the individual must spend his own money.

Eliminating these mandates would make health insurance available to millions of Americans who desperately want it but cannot now afford it.

The proper solution to the health insurance crisis is not more government, but a free market.

Paul Hsieh
Sedalia, Colo., May 4, 2008

The writer, a doctor, is co-founder, Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine.

Labels: Insurance, LTE

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Health-care market dominated by federal government

...Government interference in the health-care marketplace is the elephant-in-the-room that supporters of single-payer health care ignore. The negative unintended consequences caused by massive government involvement in health care should be part of the discussion, but Goodman, like so many other advocates of single-payer, makes no mention of that.

Politicians should take the blame for the health-care mess that they created. Instead, they blame the market and propose that the solution is even more political control of medicine. But more political control is not the solution. Political control is the problem!

...End Medicare and Medicaid. End bans on the importation of drugs from other countries. Abolish the FDA. End health-care mandates and government bureaucratic red tape.

Instead, expand Health Care Savings accounts. Make health care expenses 100% tax deductible. Allow health-care consumers to control all of their health-care dollars and decisions. Consumers will be better off and health care will be more affordable (e.g., there will be Walmarts and Costcos of heath care) when politicians are not in control of health care.

Labels: LTE

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Insurance headed in wrong direction

Darla Stuart ("Break for the insured," Speakout, April 22) writes that since "Colorado's citizens and businesses deserve to know the real cost of the health-care insurance products they are buying," politicians should force insurance companies to provide "transparency." But we really deserve to know how politicians have inflated insurance costs in the first place.

Tax policy encourages employer-based insurance, which essentially chains us to one insurer. Shielded from competition, insurers need not compete on price very much.

State-level bureaucrats succumb to special interests by burdening small-group policies with many benefits we do not need. The Congressional Budget Office reports that such mandated benefits increase premiums by at least 6 percent, and possibly more than 10 percent. It also reports that community rating laws increase premiums by 9 percent.

What's becoming increasingly transparent is where allegedly well-intentioned controls like House Bill 1389 will lead: politician-controlled health care and insurance where bureaucrats make decisions that rightfully belong to us and our physicians.

Labels: Insurance, LTE

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Yet another bogus Families USA story
Linda Gorman, Director, Health Care Policy Center, Independence Institute, Golden

On April 22, Rocky Mountain News.com carried "Report ties Medicaid cuts to job losses". The story simply repeated the substance of a press release from Families USA.

In fact, the Bush administration has not proposed Medicaid budget cuts. Its FY 2009 budget proposal increases Medicaid spending by $12 billion to $13 billion over expected spending in FY 2008. This is in addition to FY 2005-2007 spending increases of about 10 percent. What the Bush administration is proposing is a slightly smaller budget increase, about 7.1 percent rather than 7.4 percent. The 2009 budget numbers are available on Page 61 at http://www.hhs.gov/budget/ 09budget/2009BudgetInBrief.pdf.

If Families USA were a real family making $50,000 a year, these budget numbers would be the equivalent of having an expected windfall of $53,700 reduced to $53,550.

Families USA is known for approaching health care with a well-defined ideological slant and for producing lousy numbers on all manner of health-care issues. One hopes that, next time, the Rocky will take the Families USA reputation for inaccuracy into account, and that it will check before it unquestioningly reproduces their press releases as news.

Legislature has made health insurance so high
Terry W. Donze, Wheat Ridge

RE: Fair Act, HB-1389, RMN, 04-24 and 25-08 Regarding Colorado’s health insurance, Representative Morgan Carroll asks, "Why are our premiums higher?" All she needs to do is get the plank out of her eye and look in the mirror.

The legislature has mandated so many items (40+ and counting) for the health insurance industry to cover, what does she expect? They have run several health insurance providers out of Colorado over the past several years, such that it is extremely difficult to find affordable individual coverage because of limited competition.

Yet more regulation as proposed by her will only add to the costs, not only in higher premiums but also in higher taxes to pay for yet more government.

If she is really interested in bringing costs down, instead of more regulation Carroll should be demanding rescission of the mandates already on the books.

Labels: Insurance, LTE, Medicaid

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Don't Kill Health Savings Accounts With Regulation

Why would a group of politicians want to do anything possible to deny most Americans the means to provide themselves with affordable medical care? Why would those who maintain that most Americans cannot afford their own medical care insist that they can afford to first pay taxes on the money they use to pay for it? ("Health Savings Sabotage," Review & Outlook, April 19). The proposals you describe in the House Ways and Means Committee to require government bureaucratic review and approval of each individual expense funded by a Health Savings Account are a transparent attempt to destroy such accounts.

Perhaps what is really intolerable to these congressmen is the idea of Americans depending on their own choices and resources, rather than being forced to depend on politicians as their only source of medical care. That requires them to relentlessly oppose anything that makes health care affordable for most Americans as an obstacle to implementing politically-controlled medicine. Americans must decide if they want to control the medical care of their own bodies, or if medical and most other decisions of our daily lives must pass through the hands of those whose priority is maintaining a political spoils system.

Richard E. Ralston
Executive Director
Americans for Free Choice in Medicine
Newport Beach, CA

Labels: HSA, LTE

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Politicians shouldn’t force grown-ups to buy insurance

In "Health-care reform for grown-ups" (April 6), the Rocky's editorial board says "it can live with" mandatory insurance proposed in Senate Bill 217 if "value benefit plans are indeed viable and available at modest costs." But real grown-ups can't "live with" politicians treating them like children.

Attempting to justify this nanny-state proposal, the editors perpetuate the fallacy that the "cost-shift from the uninsured" makes insurance so expensive: Such "uncompensated care totals $600 million ... according to the blue ribbon commission." Wrong.

In a January 26 Speakout printed here, Commission member Linda Gorman showed that the Commission's figure was much less, and that the maximum annual cost-shift was "about $85 per insured individual." How much will SB 217 cost taxpayers?

Maybe mothers can force their four-year-olds to eat their vegetables, but politicians shouldn't force grown-ups to buy insurance. As grown-ups, we have the individual right to make that choice ourselves.

Brian T. Schwartz, Boulder

Labels: CO, Insurance, LTE, States

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Piling on Poor Coloradans

In football, in order to forestall injury a player is penalized when he piles on to a player who is already down. In politics a government that has repeatedly injured it's citizens with it's past actions is not only not penalized for the harm it has already done, but is encouraged to pile on to it's citizens a little bit more.

Such is the situation we find ourselves in with our legislature about to pass a bill (Senate Bill 217) that will make it a crime for you to not buy health insurance.

Once again the government in addressing a problem which it is solely responsible for; the skyrocketing cost of health care due to its decades-long continuing takeover of the health care market, will make the situation worse by piling on ever more restrictions.

After over a century of evidence that the more you restrict people's free choices in any particular market, the more expensive and less available everything becomes in that market, our socialistic leaders STILL think that the next batch of restrictions is going to make it all wonderful.

It won't, and several years from now when this latest intrusion into our lives has made health care even more costly and less available than it is now, the same people who are ramming this bill through will be demanding ever more power to dictate what your health care choices will be and how much they will cost.

When this cycle will end is when you/we the people decide to go back to the principles of freedom that this country started with. Until then 'enjoy' the consequences of your government’s latest trampling on your rights and intrusion into your lives.

Russell W. Shurts, Centennial

Labels: CO, Insurance, LTE, States

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I disagree with The Post's editorial praising Senate Bill 217's "foundation for universal health care in Colorado." State Sen. Bob Hagedorn's bill will squash real reform. Real reform means upholding the rights of individual consumers and providers to freely contract for care under mutually agreeable terms. Real reform means that your money isn't taken away from you to subsidize someone else while you're also paying for your own family.

Good examples of real reform are Health Savings Accounts, eliminating legal barriers to obtaining insurance plans in other states, slashing mandates, and stopping the runaway legislative train of government-run programs.

In the words of Dr. Phil, "What were you thinking?"

Gina M. Liggett, Denver

Your editorial offered support of state Senate Bill 217, a study that would move toward a universal health care plan by 2010. The ultimate goal would be to mandate "health insurance for citizens who now lack it, just as motorists are required to have automobile liability insurance."

However, there is a big difference between mandating health insurance and mandating automobile liability insurance. If one gets into a car accident and he is at fault, then he must pay the other driver for damages. Without car insurance, compensation may not be paid. On the other hand, when someone does not have health insurance and gets into an accident, no one other than that person is harmed.

People have limited resources and they must decide where they want those resources to go. People have different needs for health insurance, and if some rationally decide that they do not need health insurance, then they should be able to make that choice. The Senate Appropriations Committee should protect individual choice regarding health insurance and not approve Senate Bill 217.

Jeffrey McCoy, Boulder

Labels: CO, Insurance, LTE

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Rocky off base on health care proposal

Contrary to the April 6 Rocky Mountain News editorial ("Health care reform for grown-ups"), Sen. Bob Hagedorn's proposed mandatory health insurance is the wrong prescription for Colorado. Massachusetts has already imposed a similar system of mandatory insurance for over a year, and it is failing badly. Like Hagedorn's proposal, Massachusetts requires everyone to purchase health insurance, with government subsidies for low-income residents. But rather than creating a health care utopia, the result has been the exact opposite - skyrocketing costs, worsened access, and lower quality health care.

The Massachusetts system violates the rights of individuals to spend their own health-care dollars according to their best judgment. Instead, individuals are forced to choose from plans approved by government bureaucrats. Special interest groups have loaded these plans with costly required benefits that many people might not otherwise voluntarily purchase, such as in vitro fertilization and chiropractor services. Although Colorado politicians promise not to impose similar expensive mandates, how long do we realistically expect this to remain true?

Due to the skyrocketing costs, the Boston Globe reports, the government will have to "cut payments to doctors and hospitals, reduce choices for patients, and possibly increase how much patients have to pay." Massachusetts is also asking the federal government to make up the shortfall of "hundreds of millions of dollars."

Instead of another massive government program, we should adopt free market reforms, such as eliminating insurance benefit mandates and allowing Colorado residents to purchase health insurance across state lines. These genuine reforms could reduce insurance costs between 20 percent and 50 percent for thousands of Coloradans, without compromising access or quality. The free market is the only moral and practical solution to our current health care crisis.

Paul Hsieh, M.D., is a practicing physician in the south Denver metro area and a co-founder of the Colorado group Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine (FIRM).

Labels: CO, Insurance, LTE, MA, States

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Requiring health care

Last fall, at a public hearing of the 208 Healthcare Commission, I heard a local citizen proclaim that "We learned our lessons in 1994 with HillaryCare, and we will eventually get universal healthcare by smaller incremental steps." Now state Sen. Bob Hagedorn (D-Aurora), chairman of the Health and Human Services Committee, is trying to make one of those incremental steps.

In February, Hagedorn was quoted in the Rocky Mountain News as saying there would not be any state mandates coming out of this legislative session. Now, a mere two months later, Hagedorn is co-sponsoring a bill (SB-217) that seeks to lay the groundwork for an individual insurance mandate.

I encourage you to read this bill for yourself and form your own opinion, but it basically calls for insurance companies to come up with basic benefits packages that will be utilized when the state does get around to passing an individual mandate, presumably in late 2009 or 2010. To quote the wording of the bill directly, it calls for insurance companies to "Assume that all Colorado residents would be required to purchase health insurance."

Recently, in an excellent opinion piece in the Colorado Daily March 23, Linda Gorman of the Independence Institute describes why that same approach failed in Tennessee and is failing in Massachusetts in just two short years. That article can be found at: http://www.coloradodaily.com/articles/2008/03/23/opinion/our_take/ourtake1.html

Requiring individuals to purchase insurance and then making the taxpayer subsidize that insurance for a large portion of the population is not a public/private partnership. It is coercive, plain and simple. Please let your state legislators know that you are against socialized medicine in any form by opposing SB-217.

JAMES K. SCHROEDER, MD
Grand Junction

Labels: Insurance, LTE

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Repeal laws raising cost of health insurance

Re: "Health coverage gets new push," March 28 news story.

Democrats like state Sen. Bob Hagedorn, and state Rep. Anne McGihon want to force us all to buy medical insurance - as they define it. But government-mandated insurance does not guarantee actual care. Consider Canada, England and Massachusetts.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reports that "109 people had a heart attack or suffered heart failure while on the waiting list. Fifty of those patients died." The BBC reports that "up to 500 heart patients die each year while they wait for potentially life-saving surgery." The Boston Globe reports that in response to soaring costs, Massachusetts "policymakers could face difficult choices: spend more state money or cut back the two programs by reducing enrollment, cutting subsidies, or eliminating benefits."

Sen. Hagedorn says it's "immoral for us to sit on our hands and do nothing." Hence, instead of passing more laws that kill, politicians should do something that is moral and actually works: repeal laws that make insurance prohibitively expensive.

For example, Colorado House Bill 1327 would allow us to buy insurance plans that meet less damaging regulations of other states. This would make quality, affordable insurance available to thousands of Coloradans.

Brian T. Schwartz, Boulder

Labels: Canada, CO, Countries, Insurance, LTE, MA, States, UK

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Free-market options finally being aired

Thanks to the Rocky Mountain News for highlighting some positive free-market alternatives in the health-care debate ("The coming debate over health care," March 9). Measures such as House Bill 1327 (which allow the purchase of insurance across state lines) are good because they allow consumers the choice between the best offerings of all 50 states.

At a more fundamental level, such free-market reforms are good because they respect an individual's right to spend his own health-care dollar according to his judgment, for his own benefit. In contrast, false "reforms" (such as expanding Medicaid or imposing insurance mandates), merely raise costs, decrease access and force more people to become government dependents, as has happened in Tennessee and is happening in Massachusetts.

Bureaucrats then decide how people's health-care dollars may be spent, not the individual patients and doctors.

I'm encouraged that Colorado is finally discussing some genuine free-market health-care reforms!

Dr. Paul Hsieh
Sedalia, CO

Labels: CO, Free Market, LTE

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The government hand in healthcare raises costs

Regarding the March 3 article, "Arguments mount for national healthcare": In David Francis's recent commentary on national healthcare, Shannon Brownlee blames rising healthcare costs on a failure of the free market. In my opinion, the exact opposite is true. It is government interference in the free market that has created the current crisis. Any system of national healthcare would merely worsen the current problems.

National healthcare programs violate the rights of consumers and healthcare providers to contract freely for medical services according to their best judgment. Such programs inevitably lead to rising costs and rationing, as demonstrated repeatedly in Sweden, Canada, and the United Kingdom.

In contrast, the free market consistently lowers costs and increases availability. Those sectors of medicine that are least regulated by the government (such as LASIK and cosmetic surgery) have shown the typical pattern over time of falling prices and rising quality that we take for granted in the rest of the US economy. Because the free market respects individual rights, it is the only practical and moral solution for the problem of rising healthcare costs.

Paul Hsieh, MD
Cofounder, Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine
Sedalia, Colo.

Labels: Free Market, LTE

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Who's responsible?

As documented in the Cato Institute study, "Medicaid's Unseen Costs," (available on-line) Medicaid delivers sub-par medical care and unfairly competes with private insurance companies and voluntarily charities.

Medicaid also erodes personal responsibility. Many recipients avoid higher-paying jobs and saving money because such admirable behavior disqualifies them from benefits. Hence, Medicaid keeps those it "aids" helpless, on their backs, and dependent on government.

Medicaid's defenders want government in the insurance business and assert that their reforms can fix the above problems. If so, then why not let individual taxpayers decide for themselves? For every dollar expropriated from taxpayers to fund Medicaid, private charities lose a potential donation. That's unfair to private charities and condescending to taxpayers -- as if they were too callous or stupid to recognize if Medicaid were worthwhile.

A tax credit for donations to health care charities would partially level the playing field. The threat of lost revenue would motivate Medicaid administrators to be effective, and taxpayers would have more freedom to fund charities they deem most worthy.

Brian Schwartz

Bankruptcy looms

Medicaid is/was the fastest growing component of the state budget.

If left unchecked, it will bankrupt the state of Colorado.

The idea that, somehow, the government can magically create additional medical services out of thin air is an example of the kind of Santa Clause thinking that the government wants people to believe in.

I assert without proof (because no one believes the proof or the truth) that the economy, the delivery of health services to the indigent, and the health of the budget of the government of Colorado would be far better off it the state jettisoned Medicaid and went back to private insurance.

But, of course, actually delivering better services to everyone by privatizing the system is something that those who believe in government-as-Santa-Clause will never accept.

Ralph Shnelvar

Labels: CO, LTE, Medicaid

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