Health Care

My brother in law is an MD, my sister manages three offices in a medical group owned by the Warren hospital, and I am a casual, part time worker for that hospital. Everyone agrees that the system is broken, but no one agrees on the solutions, and either way escalating costs and an aging population will force future changes. As I have filed charts this past year I have noticed that many of the patients are the same people over and over-about 35% of the total population-and some of the more costly patients are the elderly, such as my own mother, age 85. In the past five years she has amassed at least $50,000 in bills, mostly paid for by Medicare and her private insurance, for problems that can best be described as normal for her age bracket. I regularly pick up her six or seven medications, which often have co-pays of one or two hundred dollars a month. At some point in the future the question of whether it is economically feasible to pay exorbitant amounts for people only a few years from death will need to be answered. Call that rationing or call it bankruptcy, it will happen;the national debt cannot afford either limitless entitlements, lawsuits, or compensations. Of the other 35%, many have self induced lifestyle problems caused by smoking, drinking and obesity, so unless the system includes incentives to change peoples behavior, it will fail. One must also remember that the high cost of healthcare occurs within a system that employs thousands of volunteers- more than any other business, so efficiency is not it's strength.
Basically, I observe the health care system-and Americans generally-as having a profound fear of illness and death, which is understandable considering how removed our society has become from the natural world. At root that also indicates to me a profound lack of faith-as though all the lip service to God and Heaven have no conviction. If one expands one horizon, it is easy to make the case that our moral will is misguided to suppose that $50,000 spent keeping an elderly woman alive could not be better spent treating malnutrition or dysentery in impoverished children. Tough choices, but not that tough if one lives a good life and accepts death as part of life.