Medical Humanities, one of the hottest new areas of academic research, has just found a new home as a joint Area for both the Popular Culture Association (PCA) and the American Culture Association (ACA). It incorporates Literature, Science and the Arts, Bioethics, Film, Media, Television and anything in our popular culture related to medicine--the human science--the science that allows each of us to live freely.
How would medicine fare in the States under a socialized system? For those of you who think it would be better than our current system, you need to walk in the shoes of a cancer patient for about six months. Socialized means that the government controls the system--pays for the system. But in the States, that really means that our tax dollars are going to rise, and rise, and rise. If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you are forced to pay for everyone else, too. And the care will not get better. If the care was so great in countries with socialized medicine, why are patients from France, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Canada, Spain, England, all flocking to doctors here? Better doctors--yes, we have excellent doctors--now ask why (though why is never really the right question). We have great doctors because we can pay them appropriately (in most cases) for their work. Think docs make too much? Imagine being a neurosurgeon in an area like Boston. Do you think that person ever gets to spend much quality time with family or friends. When you're doing 17-hour surgeries and coming back six hours later for more surgeries and rounds--you deserve to get paid well, very well.
And has anyone seen the US deficit lately? It's bad, really bad. So we're going to make it worse by forcibly raising taxes--and we're not talking your usual 25%-35%, depending on your tax bracket--no. We're talking more like double--imagine 50% of what you make, being taken to pay for socialized health care. Then, you get sick, or your spouse falls ill, or maybe it's your child. You expect, for that cost, to get the BEST health care possible, wouldn't you? But that won't happen. If you have cancer and need immediate surgery, you don't get it. What you do get is a place on a waiting list. You'll become a number. And by the time you get your surgery, your cancer may have spread, metastasized, all over your body--because that's what cancer does. And you could now be beyond the point where medicine would help you. Think you won't get cancer? Think again. The American Cancer Society lists that 3 out of every 5 people will be diagnosed with cancer by age 65. Not worried about your old age? How's this: The ACS reports that approximately one-third of the population is diagnosed with cancer EACH year. I think that means you.
Those who come to the States for our doctors are not the poor, have you noticed? They are the rich. If you're rich, then it matters not if medicine is socialized because you buy the care you need. If you're middle class, you may think you can afford to pay if you needed but if you just make ends meet, must work to provide your source of income, have just a small amount left over after you pay bills each month, can perhaps go on vacations and lease a BMW, but have a mortgage, car payments, credit card debt, etc., then you may want to believe you could pay extra but you can't--at least, not in reality.
You don't want the government deciding what to do about your health care--they can barely decide on how to tie their shoes!
Why would anyone want the government to be MORE involved in their lives? This country was founded on the ideals of liberty--do those who want socialized health care understand how lucky we are to be free, to have that oh-so-precious liberty--the same liberty that foreign students who come here in droves to get, then, try to get their working papers to stay here and eventually become citizens. People want to come here for a reason. We all complain about how Americans are fat, lazy, not as good at science or math as say countries like China or Japan--we have too much debt, we don't care enough about fiscal responsibility, we have too many strip malls and barely enough patches of wilderness--and it's all true. But the reason why we have these "problems" is because of our liberty--and they are good problems to have. I'd rather be fat than not have enough to eat, unable to feed my family because any money I make is taxed for government spending, or I can't make money at all. In the States, anyone can get educated, anyone can work. I'm a PhD today, but 20 years ago, I had no family, no home, my car had been repossessed--I had nothing but the required $25 you needed at that time to have a savings account in a bank. Oh, and I had a baby. Yes, I have enough education-related loans to buy a small house in western New York, but I'm also able to work, to live, to send my own children to school so they might work and live--hopefully, better than I can. I'm describing the American Dream--and even if you feel that dream has been somewhat tainted, most people on planet earth scratch, claw, borrow, beg, sometimes even steal, to get what we have. Opportunity. And the freedom to seize it. Socialized medicine would sharply contrast our current philosophies--freedom will not ring when more government is involved. Death bells, however, will be ringing throughout the land. Because socialized medicine is just a way to wait out the critically ll until their death, then, we all save money--right?
Those of you who disagree, I maintain, have not walked far enough in the shoes of one who is critically ill. How could the system be better under the scrutiny of two very different, often conflicting, political parties? Do you really believe that having less control of your hard earned dollars is a good thing? Please look hard at government history--tell me honestly, do you think a system of socialized medicine, with all good intentions, will stay fair? Our current system is not perfect, but it is still very, very, very good.
Do you know what qualifies me to say this?
I have had three cancer diagnoses in the last sixteen years. I would not be alive, quite simply, if we had any other system of health care but what still exists today. And I'm not alone.
Maybe you yourself are desperate--you work but make too much to qualify for medicaid yet your employer does not provide a health insurance plan. Hospitals--ALL hospitals--are required by LAW to provide free healthcare to those who cannot pay for it--whether you have insurance or not. If you need medicine, you will get it. If you need to be seen, you will be seen.
The above, and many other HOT topics like it, are ALL covered in Medical Humanities, now featured as a NEW Area of the PCA/ACA. Check it out!
And now, back to more creative pursuits, fellow Alchemists...adieu.
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