A report out this week from retiring
Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) found that approximately one thousand veterans
have died in the last ten years while languishing on wait lists.
Doctors, nurses, and administrators within the system say that they
faced retaliation when they spoke out about unethical practices. One VA
employee in Phoenix says that deceased veterans’ medical records were
altered post mortem so that it would appear that they did not die on the
VA’s watch.
The VA’s biggest problem, besides dishonesty of course, is timeliness.
Delayed healthcare can mean the difference between life and death, as
this scandal illustrates in vivid color.
If you want to know what US Government-run healthcare looks like, the VA is a pretty good case study.
I understand that some of those vets probably wouldn’t have any
healthcare at all if it weren’t for this system but is that really a
testament to their quality? What healthcare system would adopt as its
motto, “Hey, it’s better than nothin’!”
There is an alternative to the wholly government-run model that is the
VA. Vets could be given vouchers redeemable with private physicians. It
might work better; it could hardly work worse.
Strangely, 31% of Americans polled this month said that they expected
Obamacare to function better than the VA system. In other news, 31% of
Americans are too stupid to vote.
… Of course, Obamacare differs from the VA in that it is not a
self-contained system wholly operated by the US government, or what we
might call the single payer policy that liberals really wanted and may
still get. They will therefore shrug off Obamacare’s faults by saying
that it doesn’t go far enough. If only we allowed the government to take
over healthcare completely we’d have a great system, like they do in
Canada and France!
