Denver Movie Event Planned for September 19th to Debunk Socialized Health Care Proposals
Face the State Staff Report
DENVER — Liberal documentary filmmaker Michael Moore has raised national attention concerning health care issues with his latest effort “Sicko,” but health care policy experts are hoping to get the last word as they prepare an organized response that includes films of their own.
Leading the effort is Stuart Browning, a film director and health care policy commentator. Browning produced "Free Market Cure," a collection of short films available at www.FreeMarketCure.com, that are designed to educate the public about what Browning calls the “dangers of collectivized medicine and the benefits of free markets.”
The effort comes as Moore travels state-to-state, heavily promoting his documentary and proposal to socialize American medicine, entitled a “prescription for change.” It calls for universal health care coverage, the abolishment of all health insurance companies, and the strict regulation of all pharmaceutical corporations. Moore uses examples of socialized medicine provided by other nations, including Cuba and Canada.
While Browning concedes that the American health care system has problems, he says many of them begin with the fact that America's system is already too socialized, with the government funded about 51 percent of all health care costs. "The problem here is that consumers are so detached from the product they are buying that there is no legitimate effort to control costs or limit waste," he said.
Browning, whose film projects are largely self-funded, is adamant that he receives no funding from any health industry corporations or officials. He eagerly dismantles Canada as a role model for change. In a four-minute short titled “Two Women,” Browning and co-director Blaine Breenberg tell the story of two Canadian women, including one seeking surgery to correct a bladder problem. Ultimately, due to bureaucratic delays within the system, she says on camera that she was forced to have her bladder removed.
According to Browning, Moore's film misuses basic statistics and facts to serve the purposes of his agenda. While Moore highlights in his film a World Health Organization report from 2000 that ranks the U.S. health care only thirty-seventh globally, Browning says viewers need to take a closer look at the methodology behind the report. "25 percent of the ranking is based on 'fairness', or basically how socialized a system is," Brown said. "But who in their right mind is going to go to Morocco (ranked higher than the U.S.) for cardiac surgery?"
In his film, Moore states that the U.K. spends less than half of what the U.S. spends on health care as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product. Moore maintains that much of the funding in the U.S. system is eaten up by unnecessary private sector profit. Browning passionately disagrees. "When government takes over health care, the way it keeps health care costs down is by denying care," he said. "Anyone who denies this is in denial of the facts."
To back his view, Browning cites a recent study, accessible on his Web site, highlighting mortality rates for various cancers in nations across the world. According to Browning, prostate cancer patients in the U.S. face a 19 percent mortality rate. He says the percentage nearly triples in the U.K., largely because 40 percent of all British cancer patients ever have access to an oncologist. Breast cancer death rates, according to Browning, nearly double from 25 percent in the U.S. to 46 percent in the U.K.
In addition to Browning, other free market filmmakers are now gaining interest in rebuking Moore's perspective. Logan Darrow Clements, an independent producer, is currently completing a documentary titled “Sick and Sicker,” a feature-length movie that “explores the ethics and realities of a government take-over” of America’s health care system. A preview is available here.
A coalition of Denver free market health care advocates is currently organizing a movie event, where several of Browning’s shorts will be shown, on September 19, 2007. Face the State will release final event details as soon as they become available.
The "best" at what?
On August 19th, 2007 ZenCueist says:
Our health care policy and system are the best at fleecing everyone and screwing the sick, weak, and elderly. That's the policy, and it's done very systematically.
Let's take just pharmaceuticals.
I priced one month's worth of four meds at Walgreens.com - $452.96. Add to that at least $75 to see a doctor every three months for a prescription that hasn't changed in six years. Total: $527.96 plus shipping.
Inhousedrugstore.com - same drugs, no Rx required, including shipping from the South Pacific island nation of Vanuatu: $216.57.
I've received meds from both sources regularly for six years. There is absolutely no difference in efficacy, longevity, or manufacturer.
The U. S. pharmaceutical system is more expensive because it's safer? Not according to the Naitonal Academies, which says medication errors are the most common health care screwup in this country. "Medication errors injure 1.5 million people and cost billions annually":
http://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?RecordID=11623
Big Pharma won't ship drugs to Canada if they can be purchased by Americans for less money. Why? Just because it cuts their profits, not because Canadian pharmacists are any more negligent or criminal than the U. S. pharmacists who water down chemotherapy drugs to line their pockets.
The FDA and U. S. Customs enforce the captive market of Big Pharma, for no other reason than to boost the industry's profits.
This is the so-called free-market health care solution. Feh!
We need less socialized medicine, not more
On August 16th, 2007 sheblogger says:
I'm guessing ZC has never had to deal with a life threatening condition. I have--and I'm grateful that there are doctors out there who undertook the investment necessary to ensure that I'm still alive today.
Our system isn't perfect, but it's the best one out there.
We need to move away from socialization--and not toward it--if people could directly negotiate costs with their doctors and know the price of a tylenol before they took it from an ER nurse, we'd all be better off!
what metric? when do you negotiate?
On August 16th, 2007 Steve Balboni says:
"Our system isn't perfect, but it's the best one out there."
By what metric are we "the best"? I work in healthcare policy and cannot for the life of me think of a metric that measures the overall health of a system and population where we rank #1. Saying we are the best over and over again does not make it so. Sorry.
"if people could directly negotiate costs with their doctors and know the price of a tylenol before they took it from an ER nurse, we'd all be better off!"
So you're going to negotiate costs with your doctor like with a car salesman? The reason you can negotiate effectively for a car is because you can spend time, do research and become as educated about the subect as the salesman. This levels the playing field and ensures that you don't pay more than you need to. It also ensures that you don't negotiate away key features, like an engine, because you're too ignorant of the sibject to make a good choice. Unfortunately healthcare is emminitely more complicated than car shopping and lay-persons will never have the background to make smart negotiating decisions. You may very well negotaite away the engine and not even realize it until it's too late, you're sick, and your coverage doesn't help you.
As for your example about the ER asprin. Do you honestly believe that if you are in an ER you'll refuse the asprin or whatever medicine it is they offer you? Remember ER means EMERGENCY room. So presumably you are in there for some sort of serious EMERGENCY. If you're lucky enough to be conscious and able to communicate in what scenario would you decline the medicine that is being offered? Remember, this is an EMERGENCY.
Unfortunately for us healthcare isn't like haggling over a car. Most of the time you are in no position to delay a purchase or haggle over price. Instead something unforseen happens, most likely it is a condition about which you yourself know very little, you have limited options as to who and where to go to to seek treatment and you have a limited window of time to decide on a course of action. The deck is stacked in such away as to severely limit the ability of a consumer to make educated, informed and wise decisions about their healthcare.
I can't wait to see this B. S.!
On August 15th, 2007 ZenCueist says:
Boy, I can hardly wait to see this film event. It will be more fun than spotting the wristwatches on cavemen in "One Million B. C."!
Consumers have virtually NO control over health care costs and wastes, so why are they to be held responsible? How can there be a free market when sellers and payors are on the same page of profit?
Are you seriously suggesting that a guy with a ruptured appendix is in any position to bargain or shop effectively? Or that Grandma can compare and contrast kidney dialysis services to find the most cost-effective deal? If so, you are candidates for brain surgery!
So we turn to insurers and managed care to do the dickering and cost auditing for us. They do it rationally and thoroughly, when they don't need health care in a hurry. They are bigger than individuals and have more bargaining power with megahospitals.
But it's INSURERS who are "so detached from the product they are buying that there is no legitimate effort to control costs or limit waste"! Insurers are not the ultimate payors. They pass their costs along to consumers in the form of ever-rising insurance premiums. Plus, they get to tack on whatever profit margins they can get away with.
"Who in their right mind" will go to Morocco or any other Eastern Hemisphere country for cardiac surgery? How about the father of a U. S. CARDIOLOGIST, whose son helped him get high-quality, bargain-rate heart surgery in New Delhi?
http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_5491281
Who in their right mind will go to whichever hospital an exclusively profit-driven corporation chooses for them? Who in their right mind thinks that an inhuman corporation gives a damn whether humans live, die, or suffer?
Government health care, at the least, eliminates the cost of unbridled greed from the equation. It may be just as uncompassionate as the free market. It may take just as long as private insurers to approve treatment and pay for it. But it isn't inefficient and cruel for the sake of making shareholders richer. We are all better offer even with only the same health care, if it costs a lot less.
"Government health care, at
On August 16th, 2007 Kdog says:
"Government health care, at the least, eliminates the cost of unbridled greed from the equation."
Yes but government adds just as much or more expense do to the lack of profit motive and bueracracy.
No, it doesn't
On August 16th, 2007 Steve Balboni says:
Government does not add "as much or more expense" to healthcare. Some 30% of all healthcare costs are directly related to administration and insurance profits. Single-payer systems eliminate those costs. You can have a system like Australia where coverage is guaranteed for all and the private system has to compete alongside the government's insurance plan. It's cheaper than our current system, expands coverage, improves outcomes. What's not to like? In this instance the private market is significantly less efficient than the government systems. Why Republican's insist on fighting for a bloated, costly, ineffective system is beyond me.