Universal-Healthcare & Natasha Richardson

The below is a post/comment by HR Policy Wonk on a Wall Street Journal post/blog. It references this blog, “The 80% Rule.” It is a commentary of where our country is headed if “universal-healthcare” is accepted.

* HC Policy Wonk wrote:

“Squawk, squawk!” LOL More argumentum ad hominem from people who cannot and will not deal with reality and the demonstrable facts. Logic escapes you.

In case anyone’s still interested, here’s an analysis of the situation from galen.org (http://www.galen.org/component,8/action,show_content/id,14/category_id,0/blog_id,1182/type,33/#Richardson)

The relevant parts of the article are:

“Medical reports indicate she had an intracranial bleed, and every pump of her heart put more pressure on her brain. The lack of a medevac helicopter meant she had to be driven in an ambulance from the Mont Tremblant ski resort to the Centre Hospitalier Laurentien in Ste. Agathe, 40-minutes away.

She was there for two hours, but the hospital had no scanning equipment and no neurosurgeon available to do the emergency surgery she needed to relieve the pressure. She then had to be driven another hour to Sacré-Coeur Hospital in Montreal to get trauma care.

Canada’s top head trauma doctor told the Associated Press that that “Our system isn’t set up for traumas and doesn’t match what’s available in other Canadian cities, let alone in the States.”

Government officials decided against paying for a medevac helicopter in the province of Quebec, despite a population of 7.5 million, half of whom live in Montreal. They have repeatedly rebuffed a private air transport company that wanted to offer its services. Instead, government officials opted to buy two airplanes which need much longer landing strips and weren’t an option for Ms. Richardson.

Canada spends less on health care than the U.S. does, but the scarcity of diagnostic equipment and the lack of any medical helicopters in Quebec comes with a different price. Even smaller, neighboring Nova Scotia has medical helicopters.

It is a tragedy indeed. We don’t think about helicopters as being medical equipment, but when a centrally-planned health care system is making decisions about what the government will pay for, the big ticket items are often the first to go.”