Let Congress Know John Citizen Needs A Break

Daily Observer

January 22, 1979

Recently an audience collected the by The New Jersey Academy of Medicine was treated to a frontal attack on the high cost of medical care, and/or health care. The speaker, a representative of The Goodyear Rubber Company wanted those in attendance that American industry was honor bound to bring down the cost of medical care, not for any particularly patriotic motives, but simply industry builds health care into its contracts with labor, and industry wants to cut costs at all costs.

It cannot renege on its union contracts, but it can, it thinks, in cooperation with doctors, dictate the price of medical care. Thus industry is responsible for bringing Health Maintenance Organizations (HMO) to the forefront, not because they are better, but because they are cheaper. The speaker admitted that even in the face of HMOs the patient opts for a private physician.

At the same meeting a representative of the federal government working for HEW (now HHS) put forth the same message. If costs do not come down voluntarily, the government will step in and force them down. The government takes this stance because it says the people want it so

Actually the government portion of health care is about 25 billion yearly, less than a quarter ofr the Defense budget. The remainder of the nation pays about 125 billion for medical and hospital care.

This cold be shaved many billions by enforcing the 55 mph speed limit, and treating alcohol and tobacco as drugs instead of as revenue producing commodities.

For reasons that are unfathomable, the government seems to think it is anathema to spend money on health care. It sends its lackeys to the hinterlands and the cities to lecture about the exorbitant cost of health care. Yet when Mrs. Ford and Mrs. Rockefeller developed breast tumors and Senator Edward Kennedy’s son developed a bone tumor, the patients were not sent to HMOs but to their doctors. And neither Ford, Rockefeller or Kennedy worried about cost- After After reading in the papers that the Zenith Corporation is going to fire 5000 workers and that steel companies have laid off a like number, and containerization is costing jobs on the docks, one would think that the government would favor a viable health industry as a giant employer that provides jobs all over regardless of geographic boundaries.

As soon as steel begins to founder or Lockheed foul-up the government panics and rushes to the aid of these industrial giants. They get tax breaks and subsidies and protectionist programs. All this at the expense of John Citizen who is told that he spends too much on his health.

It may be time for the citizens once again to reclaim their freedoms and liberty, and start to let the President and Congress know just exactly what they expect the priorities to be. For certainly if we are spending too much on health care, we are spending too much on everything.