Step Away From The Hammer

Steve Chapman:

It’s true that the United States spends more on health care than anyone else, and it’s true that we rank below a lot of other advanced countries in life expectancy. The juxtaposition of the two facts, however, doesn’t prove we are wasting our money or doing the wrong things.

It only proves that lots of things affect mortality besides medical treatment. Heath Ledger didn’t die at age 28 because the American health care system failed him.

One big reason our life expectancy lags is that Americans have an unusual tendency to perish in homicides or accidents. We are 12 times more likely than the Japanese to be murdered and nearly twice as likely to be killed in auto wrecks.

In their 2006 book, “The Business of Health,” economists Robert L. Ohsfeldt and John E. Schneider set out to determine where the U.S. would rank in life span among developed nations if homicides and accidents are factored out. Their answer? First place.

That discovery indicates our health care system is doing a poor job of preventing shootouts and drunk driving but a good job of healing the sick. All those universal-care systems in Canada and Europe may sound like Health Heaven, but they fall short of our model when it comes to combating life-threatening diseases.

Chapman points out that Obama and the left (redundant) are trying to use a hammer to drive this “reform” onto the American public. They are demonizing, denigrating and now dismissing those who oppose the vast expansion of government power into our everyday lives. There are things we can do better, but it is not necessary to tear the entire system apart to rebuild it in the image of Obama.

I think most people in this country understand intuitively that the system is basically sound, but that there are some things we could work on. I suspect that is why the polls are trending against the statist plans of the left. We still have a long way to go, but we are making real progress. Keep up the pressure. Keep calling, keep writing, keep showing up at those town halls (when they are not canceled, of course).