Posted on 05/27/2009 12:14:34 PM PDT by John Semmens
Health and Human Service Undersecretary Mortimer Graves cited figures on iatrogenic morbidity and mortality in rebuttal of criticism that national health care would increase delays in treatment.
“While, in theory, the extra caution and review that will accompany the President’s reform of health care could cause additional deaths and suffering, the fact is, doctor error killed nearly 100,000 people last year,” Graves said. “It seems to me that when it comes to medicine, haste makes waste. If government intervention impedes access to physicians by elongating the process, less damage will be done.”
Graves also contended that “in 90% of cases, the patient gets better without any medical intervention. So, adding more bureaucracy will allow natural healing to cure the patient without incurring either the cost or risk entailed by actually consulting a physician.”
(Excerpt) Read more at azconservative.org ...
He might as well say it. He has already admitted it would rationing healthcare.
Humans can rationalize anything.
don't laugh, it makes about as much sense.
This is such utter crap on so many levels.....I don't know where to begin.
Fake but accurate.
Nationalized healthcare will also reduce lawsuit abuse because you cannot sue the government.
I was getting steamed, John, until I looked up and saw your byline. Great work....
.....Bob
This actually is more true than satire.
Iatrogenic deaths (deaths by doctors/nurses - mistakes, wrong meds, errors etc) kill a conservatively figured 750,000 people a year. That figure doesn’t take into account people injured (mildly or moderately) by medical mistakes.
Satire.......Good ole Semmens
How would you like this meathead to be your doctor?
Good Lord, what a putz.
RATION and KILL saves lives. How exactly again?
Abortion on one end, kill granny on the other. That’s where we are headed. Once you start down the road with cheapening life with abortion, the rest just naturally falls into place. Eugenics, the NAZI super race.
Had to look up “iatrogenic”. Thanks for the daily snicker though.
“Iatrogenic deaths (deaths by doctors/nurses - mistakes, wrong meds, errors etc) kill a conservatively figured 750,000 people a year.”
That’s ridiculous unless it purports to be a global figure. If it’s restricted to US, it would imply that 1 in 3 deaths is due to iatrogenic causes. 46,000 to 98,000 are caused by medical errors (not all of them negligent) according to national Institute of Medicine. What’s the source of your claim?
Thanks for this compilation. I don’t have time to examine every study, but it appears there is at least some double-counting among the categories listed in the table. Starfield (2000), cited in the table, comes up with a figure of 225,000 to 280,000 deaths due to iatrogenic causes, for example, yet she is listed in the table as a source for the 199,000 “outpatient” deaths figure—a category that does not even show up in her compilation (12,000 due to unnecessary surgery, 7,000 due to medication errors in hospitals, 20,000 due to other hospital errors, 80,000 from nosocial infections and 106,000 from nonerror adverse effects of medicines). She gets to 280,000 by swapping the IOM figure of 98,000 deaths for her first 3 categories.
Admittedly, she only focuses on hospital and outpatient deaths, so the deaths listed for starvation and bedsores in nursing homes aren’t included. So the true figure appears to be in the 500,000 range—certainly higher than I’d previously believed, but lower than 783,000 etc.
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