Uman's Healthcare Plan

So what is Uman's health care plan? Here's my plan:

1) Pharmaceuticals & Research
The Pharmaceutical industry has the highest profit margin of any industry in the world (including oil!), reaching as high as 26%. This is achieved in two steps:
(a) the government uses our taxes to pay pharmaceuticals millions of dollars, in the form of research grants to develop new drugs. In essence, the government is contracting with the pharmaceutical industry to develop & provide a product just like they do with every other kind of contractor.
(b) through lobbying and patent laws, pharmaceuticals get to have exclusive production and charge high prices for their medicines to "recoup" the cost of R&D that they didn't actually pay for.

The first step in the Uman Healthcare Plan is this. If a pharmaceutical takes American tax dollars for R&D (and they all do), then the drugs they develop are owned by the American people. That means no exclusive production. That will immediately bring prices down.

It is, of course, a myth that this would lead to a drop-off in advanced medicine. The government is ALREADY paying pharmacies to develop new drugs.

This is not limited to drugs of course. The same thing happens with all high-tech diagnostic equipment like MRIs. A *huge* portion of our tax dollars are spent in these two areas: drugs and lab work. My last CT Scan cost $1400. For an hour's worth of work. That is simply ridiculous.

2) Re-enable advertising regulation.
Since the Clinton years, pharmacies have been able to advertise directly to consumers instead of to doctors. The result? Patients self-diagnose, walk into a doctor's office and say, "I have such-and-such, prescribe this new drug I saw on TeeVee." And it works. It means that doctors are giving out FAR more prescriptions now since this advertising than before. The second plan in Uman's Health Care system is to stop pharmaceutical and lab companies from advertising prescription drugs and tests to consumers.

3) Life expectancy and culture
We are living longer. And we live in a culture that is too afraid of death. So we keep people alive under every possible circumstance instead of allowing people to die with dignity. Terry Schiavo's care cost $80,000 a year just for the nursing home! That's $1.2 million for the 15 years she was there. Let's put this in perspective: a whopping 30% of our total health care bill is spent on end-of-life care. More than half of all Medicare expenses are spent on people who live less than two months. The third, and doubtlessly the least popular plank in the Uman Healthcare Plan is two-fold. First, educate and pass good laws that permit people to die with dignity, and second, pass guidelines and regulations that limit the amount of money spent on hopeless end-of-life treatment.

4) Although there is no government panacea, a single-payer plan (universal health care), has the greatest potential to provide the best care for everyone. Already studies show that the government is currently paying out more than what it would spend on universal health care! There would be a massive simplification and streamlining of hundreds of different processes from eligibility to claim payment, as well as underwriting, sales, and so forth, which would immediately make the system far more efficient. The fourth plank in the Uman health care system is to institute universal health care similar to that in Cuba, Canada, France, and nearly every other western nation in the world. At least 8.5% of the health care premiums is spent to offset services for uninsured patients.

5) Reform malpractice litigation. I want to tread carefully here because I believe that a person ought to be able to sue in the case of negligence. But, I do see many problems in our present malpractice litigation. To wit:
1) it is never guaranteed that a surgical procedure will have a positive outcome. People need to stop expecting too much. An imperfect outcome should not be grounds for litigation.
2) Awards should be based on the facts of the case, not how bad we feel for the victim. Large awards typically reflect a jury's empathy for the victim, not a determination of negligence on the part of the health care team. For example, in Terry Schiavo's case, the husband was award $1million because the obstetriction failed to recognize a diagnosis of bulimia (which was later disputed). In my mind this is an award based on empathy, not on the facts.
3) there needs to be sane limits or regulations/guidelines on how much can be awarded, and how much lawyers can take as a contingency fee. It is insane to me that lawyers "get rich" out of other people's problems, so much so that out of a relatively large award, the lawyers get such a large share that the victim is not much better off.

6) Along with the single-payer plan, institute a federal common-chronics plan that deals with the largest and most common utilization of health care: asthma, diabetes, heart disease, arthritis. A national common chronics plan would lower the cost of treating these diseases. Of course, some of these diseases can be helped by making other sensible regulations. Malpractice suits account for about 10% of the healthcare cost.

Now, can I be President please?