welcome to the future.
Posted on 01/19/2009 11:17:28 PM PST by FocusNexus
In Britain, a government agency evaluates new medical products for their "cost effectiveness" before citizens can get access to them. The agency has concluded that $45,000 is the most worth paying for products that extend a person's life by one "quality-adjusted" year. (By their calculus, a year combating cancer is worth less than a year in perfect health.)
Here in the U.S., President-elect Barack Obama and House Democrats embrace the creation of a similar "comparative effectiveness" entity that will do research on drugs and medical devices. They claim that they don't want this to morph into a British-style agency that restricts access to medical products based on narrow cost criteria, but provisions tucked into the fiscal stimulus bill betray their real intentions.
Report language accompanying the House stimulus bill says that "more expensive" medical products "will no longer be prescribed." The House bill also suggests that the new research should be used to create "guidelines" to direct doctors' treatment of difficult, high-cost medical problems.
The bill gives incoming Health Secretary Tom Daschle wide discretion to set priorities, and he's long advocated a U.S. approach modeled on the British agency, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE). Mr. Daschle argues that the only way to reduce spending is by allocating medical products based on "cost effectiveness." He's also called for a "federal health board" modeled on the Federal Reserve to rate medical products and create central controls on access.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Cancer? Report to the suicide booth, citizen.
I think you are mixing your dystopic books. They got Victory Gin.
Nazi Persecution of the Mentally and Physically Disabled
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/disabled.html
Forced sterilization in Germany was the forerunner of the systematic killing of the mentally ill and the handicapped. In October 1939, Hitler himself initiated a decree which empowered physicians to grant a “mercy death” to “patients considered incurable according to the best available human judgment of their state of health.”
The intent of the socalled “euthanasia” program, however, was not to relieve the suffering of the chronically ill. The Nazi regime used the term as a euphemism: its aim was to exterminate the mentally ill and the handicapped, thus “cleansing” the “Aryan” race of persons considered genetically defective and a financial burden to society.
More from the above article about Nazi Germany:
“Physicians, the most highly Nazified professional group in Germany, were key to the success of “T-4,” since they organized and carried out nearly, all aspects of the operation. One of Hitler’s personal physicians, Dr. Karl Brandt, headed the program, along with Hitler’s Chancellery chief, Philip Bouhler. T-4 targeted adult patients in all government or church-run sanatoria and nursing homes. These institutions were instructed by the Interior Ministry to collect questionnaires about the state of health and capacity for work of all their patients, ostensibly as part of a statistical survey.
The completed forms were, in turn, sent to expert assessors physicians, usually psychiatrists, who made up “review commissions.” They marked each name with a “+,” in red pencil, meaning death, or a “” in blue pencil, meaning life, or “?” for cases needing additional assessment. These medical experts rarely examined any of the patients and made their decisions from the questionnaires alone. At every step, the medical authorities involved were usually expected to quickly process large numbers of forms.
The doomed were bused to killing centers in Germany and Austria walled-in fortresses, mostly former psychiatric hospitals, castles, and a former prison — at Hartheim, Sonnenstein, Grafeneck, Bernburg, Hadamar, and Brandenburg. In the beginning, patients were killed by lethal injection. But by 1940, Hitler, on the advice of Dr. Werner Heyde, suggested that carbon monoxide gas be used as the preferred method of killing. Experimental gassings had first been carried out at Brandenburg Prison in 1939. There, gas chambers were disguised as showers complete with fake nozzles in order to deceive victims — prototypes of the killing centers’ facilities built in occupied Poland later in the war.”
welcome to the future.
“Next month, Obama will convene a “fiscal responsibility summit,” where participants will discuss the spiraling growth of Medicare and Social Security — popular but costly programs that may require a combination of tax increases and benefit cuts to remain viable.”
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/washingtondc/la-na-obama-orders20-2009jan20,0,1377449.story
Denying the medication to keep people alive will be one of the “benefit cuts”. Just wait and see. You get sick, you die, and the state won’t have to pay Medicare costs, or keep paying you Social Security.
Obama is a genius for figuring this out and implementing it — he will have the legacy of “having solved the Social Security and Medicare Problem” (sarc)
You have to admit there is an elegant simplicity to the whole thing. He can just let the sick fruits "whither on the vine" < /sarc >
Obama’s utopia will waste no money extending the lifespan of elderly useless eaters.
Speaking of “Obama’s Utopia”, I found this — it’s about Hillary, but it’s more appropriate for Obama.
Someone should update it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6h3G-lMZxjo
When I was still active duty, prior to my retirement, my son needed surgery to fix a hole in his ear drum.
We were scheduled for his operation at Bethesda Naval Medical Center and we arrived about an hour prior to our appointment time.
As our time arrived we were told to go home as some jackass Senator's wife, child, whatever, was going to arrive with a possible ear infection and our surgery time was rescheduled to accommodate the possibility that they may need to put tubes in the ears of said Senator's relative.
The nurse told us this with a tone of disgust and gave us this information even though she said she was just supposed to tell us they had to cancel my son's surgery.
I was not told a name but we were pretty ticked off and were rescheduled later that month at a Air Force facility.
This is what Obama and his two-bit wife want for everyone. They fully believe they are better than others and they can feed their egos by ruling every aspect of the lives of all the lesser people.
That policy will also alleviate much of the Social Security deficit problem.
Do not think they do not see that aspect too!
Why not just start handing out shotguns to nurses? Much cheaper, though a little messier. /s
“Your morphine is ready Mr. Carter.”
Logan’s Run...
I’ll try not to say it in sing-song when I give it to ya.< sarc>
bttt
Economic Crisis May Break Medicare by 2016, Three Years Earlier than Last Forecast
http://www.seniorjournal.com/NEWS/Medicare/2009/20090119-EconomicCrisis.htm
The news release last Friday focused on the issuance of Quality Measurement, Resource Use Measurement, and Value-Based Purchasing Roadmaps for the traditional Medicare Fee-For-Service Program.
Rationing is coming...
GeronL wrote: “They are going to pass as many leftist things as possible very very fast. They know Obama’s honeymoon will be pretty short.”
I wish I could agree with you GeronL, but I fear that most people will just jump into the political Gimme game, and fight over the spoils. Rather than advocating less regulation, they will push for more, regulating all the things that upset them. And push for more spending on the things they like. People don’t understand the concept of non-government involvment any more.
You write “The “rationing” here is what the government will pay. I didn’t see any limitations on what a private individual or insurance carrier can pay.”
I don’t know about that — the article says “He’s also called for a “federal health board” modeled on the Federal Reserve to rate medical products and create central controls on access.” It sounds like the government might make it illegal to manufacture them.
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