Destroying Health Care in America
After years of government / corporate cronyism, and rampant insurance company fraud, the picture has dramatically changed for healthcare in America. Today, we have a health care crisis that may drive America into bankruptcy.
Health insurance costs are rising faster than wages or inflation, and “medical causes” are increasingly being cited by bankruptcy filers in the United States. Americans pay, on average, nearly $7,000 per person for medical costs, whereas citizens in the next-highest-cost developed pay around $3,200 per person.
We’re told that costs are so high because we get the best health care in the world.
That may have been true once, but not any more. A recent report from the Commonwealth Fund rates American health care quality to the lowest among 19 industrialized nations. The World Health Organization ranks the U.S. 26th in quality of health care of the advanced countries. Americans are waiting longer to see doctors and are more likely to die of preventable or treatable illnesses. We squander money on wasteful administrative costs, illnesses caused by medical error and inefficient use of time, the report concluded. We lead the world in spending, with 7.5 percent of health expenditures made on insurance administration, for example.
“For decades, the U.S. healthcare system was the envy of the entire world. Not coincidentally, there was far less government involvement in medicine during this time. America had the finest doctors and hospitals, patients enjoyed high-quality, affordable medical care, and thousands of private charities provided health services for the poor. Doctors focused on treating patients, without the red tape and threat of lawsuits that plague the profession today. Most Americans paid cash for basic services, and had insurance only for major illnesses and accidents. This meant both doctors and patients had an incentive to keep costs down, as the patient was directly responsible for payment, rather than an HMO or government program.” – Dr. Ron Paul
In a paper titled “Death by Medicine” compelling evidence is presented that today’s system frequently causes more harm than good. This fully referenced report shows the number of people having in-hospital, adverse reactions to prescribed drugs to be 2.2 million per year. The number of unnecessary antibiotics prescribed annually for viral infections is 20 million per year. The number of unnecessary medical and surgical procedures performed annually is 7.5 million per year. The number of people exposed to unnecessary hospitalization annually is 8.9 million per year.
The most stunning statistic, however, is that the total number of deaths caused by conventional medicine is an astounding 783,936 per year. It is now evident that the American medical system is the leading cause of death and injury in the US. (By contrast, the number of deaths attributable to heart disease in 2001 was 699,697, while the number of deaths attributable to cancer was 553,251.5)
The History of Modern Healthcare
Alex Jones talks with Peter Glidden, a doctor of Naturopathic medicine. Mr. Glidden is an outspoken advocate of wholistic health. He has lectured to thousands of people over the last two decades and is a regular speaker at Health Freedom Expo and Youngevity regional meetings. Glidden is the author of The MD Emperor Has No Clothes, a book that describes how society is on the verge of a health care meltdown.
AMA Directed Health Care puts Profits above Patients
Devolving over the past 100 years from a patient centric health care system to a profit centric system, the modern health care system has been co-opted by private corporations with the emphasis today on maximizing profits.
No longer does the medical industrial complex seek to treat or cure the cause of disease. Instead, they have turned to the more profitable activity of managing the symptoms of disease. If a patient is “cured” the income stream for the drug companies stops. On the other hand, if they can manage your symptoms, keeping you comfortable, they have a lifetime customer.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Cancer Institute, the American Cancer Society, the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA), the American Diabetes Association, the American Heart Association, the Alzheimer’s Association, and nearly every major medical school in the U.S. have all calluded with the American Medical Association (AMA) to protect the profits of multi-national pharmaceutical corporations and to keep cures for most chronic diseases away from the marketplace. While cancer may be the most profitable chronic disease, cures have also been found for diabetes, alzheimer’s, muscular dystrophy, heart disease and nearly every chronic disease.
There have been a number of cancer cures discovered in the past 100 years, but none of them have been allowed into the mainstream health care system. Why?
Because there is no “profit” for Big Pharma in a cure for cancer but there are huge profits in the treatment of cancer.
Problem – Reaction – Solution
The elite ruling class have pretty effectively been manipulating dumbed down Americans to join their New World Order program of universal health care using a technique called the Hegelian Dialectic. The corporate/government cooperative created the problem in the first place with their ERISA law, tax laws, and regulatory agencies driving good doctors out of practice and forcing them into the Corporate sector where profits are put ahead of people. Access to health care services declined and costs rose.
As the corporate health care monopoly grew, drug companies and HMOs continue to lobby Congress for more socialized medicine and more money. As more fiat money is poured in to the health care system by the Federal Reserve, prices skyrocket, services decline, and more and more desperate people react by demanding relief.
As usual, government intervention in the private market failed to deliver the promised benefits and caused the consequences we now suffer, but Congress never blames itself for the problems created by bad laws. Instead, we are told more government – in the form of “universal coverage” – is the solution.