Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Eleven Years and Counting

How old will I be in 11 years when Medicare’s Trust Fund goes bankrupt?

I’ll be sixty.

Five years before I’m eligible for the program.

I mean, I’m entitled to healthcare! Just like everybody else. Free is for me! Doesn’t anybody care about this?

So, how old will you be when Medicare goes belly-up?

And who will take care of all of us 60-year olds when we start really needing healthcare because we have been unable to “prevent” ailments or impose cost controls because we have to insure the ubiquitous “47 million ” as we accelerate the pace to assure that hundreds of millions more of us will join these ranks in just eleven years?

Probably doctors.

But not just any doctors. There will be doctors who are risk-averse and will stay with the system, and entrepreneurial doctors who have opted out of the rat race: a two-tiered system.

Oh, sure, there’ll be “universal (‘free’) healthcare” for all - after all that sounds so politically-correct. But the system we rely on today is dying a rapid death.

One way or another, look for Americans to shoulder more and more of the healthcare costs through taxes, or mandates, or higher deductibles or more and more rationing as government invades physicians’ space.

Just to support the ridiculous bureaucratic machine that is healthcare today.

But we as patients could make a difference if we just took an interest in our own well-being.

Maybe there’s a better way...

Perhaps we should just declare Medicare dead now and wake up to the reality so we can finally start working on a healthcare reform package that will be sustainable rather than perpetuating this ruse through empty promises.

-Wes

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

No, Dr. Wes, you're wrong. We can have everything we want - we just need to make greedy rich people who pick money off of trees pay for it.

Anonymous said...

OK, we need to take care of ourselves, on one hand. However, illness (real illness) can affect those who take good care of themselves and those who don't. Just what do you see as real health care reform? Spell it out.

Anonymous said...

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money (generous gifts) from the public treasury. From that moment on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most money from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, (which is) always followed by a dictatorship."

"The average age of the world's greatest civilization has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through this sequence.

From bondage to spiritual faith;
from spiritual faith to great courage;
from courage to liberty;
from liberty to abundance,
from abundance to selfishness;
from selfishness to complacency,
from complacency to apathy,
from apathy to dependency,
from dependence back into bondage."

Anonymous said...

Wes -

If you're not part of the solution, there's good money to be made with the problem.

This will be a boon for every carpetbagging consultant out there.

And we still won't have a solution. A tiered healthcare system is already a reality. This is obvious if anyone has family members without significant financial resources to purchase care and have become dependent on state sponsored institutions. Not to mention the presciption boondoggle for Medicare recipients.

I'll be 63.

Mark

DrWes said...

Anony 12:52 -
Here's my thoughts spelled out.

Mark-
Regretably, I think you're right.