"Perfection is the worst enemy of the merely excellent." The U.S. should evaluate what "free" health care is worthwhile.
My wife and I live on a small farm in a fairly remote, rural area of Panama, up in the mountains. This article is based on several years of observation of the health care system here. For people who have insurance and/or sufficient funds, health care is excellent, and in many respects superior to that in the U.S. It is also dramatically less expensive, and for that reason there has been some medical tourism. However, this article is not about that. It is about the health care provided to people who have neither private insurance nor much money.…
Article comments
26 - Clavos
Cindy,
I'm familiar with PNHP, my brother in law (a physician) showed it to me about a year ago, but I'm not that impressed by their plan (which I've read carefully); I don't think they've thought it through well enough; it raises more questions than it answers.
BTW, I sent your link to him.
27 - Dan Miller
Here is a link to an interesting article on tort reform.
In 2003 and 2005, Texas enacted substantial tort reforms and since then, some 7,000 M.D.s have flooded into Texas, many from Tennessee.
Tort reform has allowed doctors and hospitals to cut costs and even increase the resources devoted to charity care. Take Christus Health, a nonprofit Catholic health system across the state. Thanks to tort reform, over the past four years Christus saved $100 million that it otherwise would have spent fending off bogus lawsuits or paying higher insurance premiums. Every dollar saved was reinvested in helping poor patients.
Dan