Posted on 06/01/2011 10:51:04 PM PDT by nickcarraway
DOCTORS are among the most richly rewarded professionals in the country. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that of the 15 highest-paid professions in the United States, all but two are in medicine or dentistry.
Why, then, are we proposing to make medical school free?
Huge medical school debts — doctors now graduate owing more than $155,000 on average, and 86 percent have some debt — are why so many doctors shun primary care in favor of highly paid specialties, where there are incentives to give expensive treatments and order expensive tests, an important driver of rising health care costs.
Fixing our health care system will be impossible without a larger pool of competent primary care doctors who can make sure specialists work together in the treatment of their patients — not in isolation, as they often do today — and keep track of patients as they move among settings like private residences, hospitals and nursing homes. Moreover, our population is growing and aging; the American Academy of Family Physicians has estimated a shortfall of 40,000 primary care doctors by 2020. Given the years it takes to train a doctor, we need to start now.
Making medical school free would relieve doctors of the burden of student debt and gradually shift the work force away from specialties and toward primary care. It would also attract college graduates who are discouraged from going to medical school by the costly tuition.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Man, they are out and out communists, aren’t they, at the times.
First all health care should be free, and then medical school should be free, and I guess everything should be free! And then we would have, uhh, a land where everything is free and NO ONE has to work! And then, uhh, wait...
Somebody should tell the NYSlimes that Canada purposely keeps the number of med school graduates low. That’s one of the main ways they ration. If there are few doctors, that’s less money the government has to pay for the “free” health care.
omg. it would reduce the quality of medical schools down to the level of...public schools.
on the plus side, ‘death panels’ would no longer be necessary
I think newspapers, tv and radio news should all be free. I think none of the people who put out the news in any form should ever be paid.
Anything that is free is worth exactly what you pay for it.
I would not want to be treated by a “doctor” that received a medical degree without sacrificing for it.
And I thought affirmative action caused an increase in incompetent professionals. But, if it is to be free, why don’t they just do it. I mean, the schools should just not charge for the education of doctors. What is stopping them?
I think the NY Times should be free as well. Lets see these commie journalists get paid.
Gee, what could go wrong?
All of the other brilliant ideas that the progs have come up with and gotten implemented have worked out SO WELL for us.
On the up side, I think I’ve finally figured out what the left means by a “free” country.
The implication that specialists only order expensive tests because they make money off them is both insulting and factually flawed. Specialists order pricier tests because their patients have more advanced diseases. As a rule of thumb, most of their patients are referred by primary care physicians who feel the patient is in need of care they’re not trained to provide.
So, if you reduce the number of specialists and put those physicians in primary care, the number of patients requiring specialist care won’t decrease. You’ll just end up with a lot of patients waiting for specialist appointments. Maybe they’re figuring they’ll save money on the patients who die before their appointment date.
The key to saving primary care is to adequately compensate the physicians who provide it. Take us back to the days when it was possible to make a decent living as a G.P. and the market will fix the imbalance.
Why computer science degrees should be free.
Why biology degrees should be free.
Why housing should be free.
Why food should be free.
One word answer: Greece.
And by “free”, we mean paid for by you peasants!
Now pay your taxes, we Ruling Classers need the money. :D:D:D:D:D:D:D
A good friend has a soon in medical school in Philadelphia. The son will owe $200,000 when he graduates. He wants to work in primary care, even though he will earn less. His fiancee, a pediatric nurse supports his wish, and her income will help make up for the higher income he will not be getting by specializing.
We also need a lot more physicians assistants, and nurse practitioners. Much illness can be treated competently by someone with less than a medical degree if they have good backup.
I agree.
On the subject of “death Panels”, did you hear about the case of a man who had been waiting years for an organ transplant match. He was already at the hospital awaiting the delivery of the matched organ, when the insurance company said, oops, can’t let you have it. Don’t know the details, but sounds to me like a death panel at work.
Since insurance companies already can decide who gets treatment and who does not, the death panels are already in place. Incidentally, it is my understanding that it is usually not doctors but insurance bureaucrats who make these dicisions.
>> Why, then, are we proposing to make medical school free?
Because only losers can afford not to repay the loans. And it is after all about installing losers into the Obamacare system, is it not, you Leftwing malcontents?
You dumb #s are complicit in the destruction of this great Nation.
When they legislate that something must be “free,” they are legislating the enslavement of others to provide it.
There is NO such thing as a free lunch.
“Free” medical school will cost all of us a great deal.
The best, most innovative, hardest working, most productive employee is a WILLING WORKER. Not a slave.
Here, let me reply...
How does one make medical school free?
I think everyone should just live in a commune and share our gifts and talents with everyone. No need for money.
No, they decide which treatments they are going to pay for. You decide which treatments you are going to pay for.
The Times only printed the oped piece. Look who wrote the article one of them is special assistant to Obama on Health Care. Looks like Obama and his ilk are out and out communists
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