Can "Left and Right" meet over 'health and wellness'?

Can free-market healthcare really happen, given the essential Balkanization of political views in America? On so many issues, hardline positions on some aspect of the question have been preventing even civility from prevailing, let alone allowing the synergy of issue-based coalitions to form.

However, health concerns might finally be one of those areas where agreement across conventional barriers might actually become possible. The fact that we are all human, and all mortal, is starting to unite people who would normally cross the street to avoid confronting one another (or at the other extreme, be prepared to draw down at the slightest provocation?), around the concepts of wellness, self-responsibility and community-based and voluntarily funded healthcare.

Examples abound. In fact just in today's (Tuesday) stories, right here in the Medical Freedom Channel, there are encouraging signs. The five commentaries are about vaccinations and mercury poisoning; the misuse of power in the AIDS battle (comparing it to the War on Iraq); the dangers of ADHD medications; the Massachusetts healthcare reform proposal; and . an advice column on healthy exercise in "pollen season." Four out of five are current-event topics in the news today. The irony is the sources of those four pieces .

The vaccination story comes, not from the expected "right-wing" sources, but from the progressive site, Common Dreams. Similarly, the AIDS story is from Lew Rockwell.com, normally seen as conservative or right-libertarian in nature, but taking a rather "progressive" view on this subject. And the other two are also unexpected: ADHD meds is attacked by a Sierra Times poster, while MassCare is under scrutiny from a columnist who normally splits time among the Boston Globe and more progressive sources like The American Prospect.

Where am I going with this? Essentially I am noticing more and more often that the traditional left-right schisms are blessedly beginning to fade, at least among those who truly do believe they are fighting a battle intended to increase liberty and allow freer exercise of our lives. It may well be that, even while the imperialist neo-cons (and the liberal-socialists who purport to "oppose" them) continue to have "slap fights" over how to divide their power - as the Leviathan state just keeps on growing and denying our liberties - a coalition of erstwhile enemies is forming around them, perhaps creating bridges that might end up leading us to a freer and healthier world in spite of the power-brokers. And it may also be that the healthcare issue might be the catalyst for creating this unity.

If progressives can be concerned about "purity of essence" and cry out against additives in vaccinations . If conservatives can be concerned about the impurities in our foods and embrace "natural healing" options . If there is common ground between the absolutist positions on birth control and emergency contraception methods, or on hospital clinics and health insurance .

What if healthcare issues turned out to be the thing that wakes up Americans, and others around the world who truly care about freedom and the right to make choices, and begins leading us to that brighter future we all say we want to create? What if the simple act of putting power battles aside, and focusing our attention on promoting self-responsibility, compassion for others and a sense of prosperity that knows that "there is enough" to go around . leads us to the free(r) society so many of us claim we really want?

Source





Medicare Beneficiaries Rush To Enroll

After procrastinating for weeks, Medicare beneficiaries flocked to senior centers across the country and made frantic telephone calls to insurers Monday to beat the deadline for getting prescription drug coverage as the initial enrollment period ended. "There seems to be a panic out there right now," said Brian D. Caswell, who runs a pharmacy in rural Baxter Springs, Kan. "Many of the people who waited this long spend only $30 a month on drugs, and they're being asked to spend about $30 a month on premiums for a prescription drug plan."

Carol H. Carter, an insurance counselor at LIFE Senior Services in Tulsa, Okla., said Monday: "It's pretty crazy around here. We are overwhelmed. We can't help everyone who has called. At the end of the day, there will be some people who do not receive individual help because they waited to the last minute."

First lady Laura Bush and Michael O. Leavitt, the secretary of health and human services, went to a church here to broadcast a final message. "Even if you are not taking any medications, it's really important to go ahead and sign up now," Bush said. "As you age, it's likely that you will add medications to your health care." Leavitt said the administration opposed extension of the deadline, and he defended the financial penalty that will be imposed on most people who are eligible now but defer enrollment to 2007 or later.

Others in the administration and members of Congress from both parties said they supported the idea of waiving the late enrollment penalty for 2006. The penalty will increase future premiums 7 percent or more, for an expected surcharge of $2.50 a month next year.

For months, the Bush administration has been urging insurers to hire additional telephone operators to cope with the expected last-minute surge in enrollment. But stark differences were evident at the two biggest Medicare insurers, UnitedHealth Group and Humana, which together have 45 percent of the market. Calls to United's toll-free number on Monday were generally answered within two minutes. People calling Humana's line often had to wait more than 30 minutes. The wait on Medicare's toll-free line often exceeded 15 minutes.

Source

***************************

For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL hospitals and health insurance schemes should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the very poor and minimal regulation. Both Australia and Sweden have large private sector health systems with government reimbursement for privately-provided services so can a purely private system with some level of government reimbursement or insurance for the poor be so hard to do?

Comments? Email me here. If there are no recent posts here, the mirror site may be more up to date. My Home Page is here or here.

***************************