Freedom Dies With Thunderous Applause: Democrats Shove Government Health Care Down Our Throats

The vote on a government takeover of Health Care last night was sickening. What was even more sickening was the fact that when the final tally was in, the Democrats stood up and gave themselves a standing ovation.

It reminded me of what Amadala said in Star Wars: Episode III: "So, this is how freedom dies. With thunderous applause."

If this bill is not killed in the courts for it's unconstitutionality, in addition to higher taxes, here is what we will be looking forward to:

Cruel And Neglectful Care Of One Million British Patients Exposed

Man Collapses With Ruptured Appendix ... Three Weeks After It Was Removed

More Reasons Why We Do Not Want Socialized Medicine

Statement From The American College Of Surgeons Regarding Disinformation Being Spread By Barack Obama

Oregon Woman Denied Medicine, Offered Assisted Suicide Instead

Another Look At Socialized Medicine From A Canadian Doctor

A Look At Socialized Medicine Through The Eyes Of A British Oncologist

Another Example Of The Horrors That Socialized Medicine Will Bring Us

Socialized Medicine: Enforcing Your Duty To Die

Another Example Of What Awaits Us In A Socialized Medicine System: Father Dies In Waiting Room While In Intense Pain

Socialized Medicine: Handing Out Premature Death Sentences

No, this is not a scare-tactic. It is a bonafide news item from the Daily Telegraph over in the United Kingdom.

From Kate Devlin:

In a letter to The Daily Telegraph, a group of experts who care for the terminally ill claim that some patients are being wrongly judged as close to death. Under NHS guidance introduced across England to help doctors and medical staff deal with dying patients, they can then have fluid and drugs withdrawn and many are put on continuous sedation until they pass away.

I've actually seen this done in the United States. My family requested that my father be kept sedated until he passed. But we already knew that there was no hope for his recovery and we wanted to make sure that he did not become conscious or feel any pain.

That isn't always the case over in Britain.

Read on:

But this approach can also mask the signs that their condition is improving, the experts warn.

There is a major difference in a family making a decision and a doctor following a government guideline that was hammered out by bureaucrats who had never been to medical school or even knew the first thing about any particular patient.

Here is the real kicker:

“Forecasting death is an inexact science,”they say. Patients are being diagnosed as being close to death “without regard to the fact that the diagnosis could be wrong. “As a result a national wave of discontent is building up, as family and friends witness the denial of fluids and food to patients."

When the government pays the bills, the government makes the decisions. That is what makes socialized medicine so unpalatable to Americans. We want as little government as possible in our lives. Dems and libs seem to have a great deal of difficulty understanding that.

But, even more importantly, it highlights the "end-of-life" concerns that people like Sarah Palin and others have expressed over the past few months:

The scheme, called the Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP), was designed to reduce patient suffering in their final hours. Developed by Marie Curie, the cancer charity, in a Liverpool hospice it was initially developed for cancer patients but now includes other life threatening conditions. It was recommended as a model by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice), the Government’s health scrutiny body, in 2004. It has been gradually adopted nationwide and more than 300 hospitals, 130 hospices and 560 care homes in England currently use the system.

But there are major pitfalls in determining whether a patient is actually entering their final hours. Medications can cause unresponsiveness or unconsciousness. Dehydration can lead to symptoms completely unrelated to the patient's primary ailment.

Further, poor care can lead to other conditions that can be mistaken for signs of impending death.

As a result, many people are put on the Pathway prematurely.

Just another wonderful contribution to medical care from the practitioners of socialized medicine.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

Sentenced To Death On The NHS
Kate Devlin
Daily Telegraph
September 2, 2009

Cruel And Neglectful Care Of One Million British Patients Exposed

There must be something in the water over in the United Kingdom these days. Lately, there seems to be no end of news items exposing how poorly the socialized health care system they have is serving its intended goals. That is to say, NHS is shaping up to be a huge failure.

From Rebecca Smith of the Telegraph UK:

In the last six years, the Patients Association claims hundreds of thousands have suffered from poor standards of nursing, often with 'neglectful, demeaning, painful and sometimes downright cruel' treatment. The charity has disclosed a horrifying catalogue of elderly people left in pain, in soiled bed clothes, denied adequate food and drink, and suffering from repeatedly cancelled operations, missed diagnoses and dismissive staff. The Patients Association said the dossier proves that while the scale of the scandal at Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust - where up to 1,200 people died through failings in urgent care - was a one off, there are repeated examples they have uncovered of the same appalling standards throughout the NHS.

Those who read my blog on a regular basis know very well what the mention of Mid-Staffordshire refers to.

And I cannot stress enough that if this had happened here in the United States, it would be the lead story for CNN and the front-page headline for the Washington Post and New York Times for at least a month-running.

Here are some more examples of how a socialized haelth care system would treat its patients, especially those for whom care is to be rationed:

Pamela Goddard, a piano teacher from Bletchingley, in Surrey, was 82 and suffering with cancer but was left in her own excrement and her condition deteriorated due to her bed sores. Florence Weston, from Sedgley in the West Midlands, who died aged 85, had to remain without food or water for several days as her hip operation was repeatedly cancelled.

Treatment of seniors under any socialized health care sytem is especially bad, and would still be bad under a U.S. socialized health care system.

Socialized health care has been a disaster everywhere it has been tried. We do not want to bring that disaster here to America.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

'Cruel And Neglectful' Care Of One Million NHS Patients Exposed
Rebecca Smith
The Telegraph
August 27, 2009

Man Collapses With Ruptured Appendix ... Three Weeks After (British) NHS Doctors 'Took It Out'

The hits just keep on coming from Great Britain's National Health System (NHS). In this case, a man went in for an apendectomy, and a month later, after his appendix had supposedly been removed, his appendix ruptured, endangering his life and leaving him in intense pain.

From Daniel Bates at the UK Daily Mail:

After weeks of excruciating pain, Mark Wattson was understandably relieved to have his appendix taken out. Doctors told him the operation was a success and he was sent home. But only a month later the 35-year-old collapsed in agony and had to be taken back to Great Western Hospital in Swindon by ambulance. To his shock, surgeons from the same team told him that not only was his appendix still inside him, but it had ruptured - a potentially fatal complication. In a second operation it was finally removed, leaving Mr Wattson fearing another organ might have been taken out during the first procedure.

Wow! Such efficiency in socialized medicine, isn't there? But, all sarcasm aside, this is yet another in a long line of oversights (many of which resulted in the death of the patient) inflicted by the NHS on the people of Great Britain.

More:

The blunder has left Mr Wattson jobless, as bosses at the shop where he worked did not believe his story and sacked him. ... Following the second operation his incision became infected and he was admitted to hospital for a third time for treatment. He said: 'I had a temporary job at a sports shop but when I took in two medical certificates saying I had my appendix out twice they didn't believe me. 'Now I'm helpless. I can't go out and find a job, I can't go to interviews, I can barely walk and am in constant pain. Before the first operation they told me I had to have my appendix removed and when I woke up afterwards they said it had been a complete success.

So, not only did the NHS doctors have to go in a second time, but the second incision got infected too?

If this had happened in the United States, Mr. Wattson would be on the verge of becoming very rich due to the lawsuits that would be filed against the doctors and hospital.

So, what did the NHS overseers have to say about the whole, sorry affair?

Paul Gearing, deputy general manager for general surgery at Great Western Hospital NHS Trust, said: 'We are unable to comment on individual cases. 'However, we would like to apologise if Mr Wattson felt dissatisfied with the care he received at Great Western Hospital.'

No, I don't think it was "dissatisfaction" Mr. Wattson was feeling. It was intense pain because the NHS medical system that was supposed to take care of him failed miserably, just like a typical socilized medical system.

You can access the original article on-line here:

Man Collapses With Ruptured Appendix ... Three Weeks After NHS Doctors 'Took It Out'
Daniel Bates
UK Daily Mail
August 26, 2009

More Reasons Why We Do Not Want Socialized Medicine

My son was born in December of 2008. We had the plans made long beforehand. And since it was to be an induced labor, we already had the hospital, staff and emergency contingencies all lined up before we even left home that morning. For us, it was no more difficult than planning a vacation.

When I contrast that experience with what I read in the following news story, I thank God that my family and I live in America and not Great Britain.

From Jenny Hope and Nick McDermott of the UK Daily Mail:

Thousands of women are having to give birth outside maternity wards because of a lack of midwives and hospital beds. The lives of mothers and babies are being put at risk as births in locations ranging from lifts to toilets - even a caravan - went up 15 per cent last year to almost 4,000. Health chiefs admit a lack of maternity beds is partly to blame for the crisis, with hundreds of women in labour being turned away from hospitals because they are full.

Again, I have to point out that if something like this ever happened in the United States, it would be the lead story on CNN and the front page story in the Washington Post and New York Times for at least a month.

While it is true that not all births occur in hospitals (babies have their own schedules regardless of what the parents planned), the fact that women in labor are being turned away by hospitals even though Great Britain's National Health Service promises timely care for all, is a scandal all unto itself.

More:

Additionally, overstretched maternity units shut their doors to any more women in labour on 553 occasions last year. Babies were born in offices, lifts, toilets and a caravan, according to the Freedom of Information data for 2007 and 2008 from 117 out of 147 trusts which provide maternity services. One woman gave birth in a lift while being transferred to a labour ward from A&E while another gave birth in a corridor, said East Cheshire NHS Trust. Others said women had to give birth on the wards - rather than in their own maternity room - because the delivery suites were full. Tory health spokesman Andrew Lansley, who obtained the figures, said Labour had cut maternity beds by 2,340, or 22 per cent, since 1997. At the same time birth rates have been rising sharply - up 20 per cent in some areas.

Shut their doors to women in labor? Women giving birth in toilets?

Is that the utopia of socialized medicine that was promised to the British people?

I dare say it isn't. And I also say that I don't want such government-run travesties over here on this side of the pond.

Read on:

'It shows the incredible waste that has taken place that mothers are getting this sort of sub-standard treatment despite Gordon Brown's tripling of spending on the NHS.

They tripled spending and they still turn women in labor away from hospitals? Where did all that money go? Who accounts for it all?

Yet another reason why we absolutely do not want socialized medicine in the United States.

You can access the complete atory on-line here:

The Babies Born In Hospital Corridors: Bed Shortage Forces 4,000 Mothers To Give Birth In Lifts, Offices And Hospital Toilets
Jenny Hope and Nick McDermott
UK Daily Mail
August 26, 2009

And here is another horror story for good measure:

Father Turned Away From Hospital With Pregnant Wife Delivers Baby On Bathroom Floor - And Saves His Daughter's Life
UK Daily Mail
August 18, 2009

Kennedy Health Care Chart

Does anyone here really think that government run health care will be more efficient and help more people than private health care? The horror stories coming out of Canada and Great Britain are ample evidence that socialized medicine is a disaster.

But here, we can see one of the reasons why. Click on the following chart (requires Adobe reader):



Given all the new bureaucrats who will now be involved in your health care decisions, how long do you think it will take before certain treatments are approved? Do you think that if you or someone in your family needs urgent care that you will get it in a timely manner? That has not been the experience of people in Canada and Great Britain. And it won't be the experience of people here if we move towards this disastrous health care system.

Go to the following website and get the facts about patients' rights:

Conservatives For Patients' Rights

Another Look At Socialized Medicine From A Canadian Doctor

I find it interesting that the Dems are all about looking to other nations when it comes to interpreting American law, but when it comes to socialized medicine, they want to ignore the experiences of other nations.

The Wall Street Journal has a column by Canadian-born physician Dr. David Gratzer concerning socialized medicine in his home country.

Here is what he has to say:

Born and raised in Canada, I once believed that government health care is compassionate and equitable. It is neither. My views changed in medical school. Yes, everyone in Canada is covered by a "single payer" -- the government. But Canadians wait for practically any procedure or diagnostic test or specialist consultation in the public system.

Not just in Canada, but in Great Britain as well and any other country that practices socialized medicine. And the waiting is extremely detrimental to patients who need care as soon as possible:

The problems were brought home when a relative had difficulty walking. He was in chronic pain. His doctor suggested a referral to a neurologist; an MRI would need to be done, then possibly a referral to another specialist. The wait would have stretched to roughly a year. If surgery was needed, the wait would be months more. Not wanting to stay confined to his house, he had the surgery done in the U.S., at the Mayo Clinic, and paid for it himself. Such stories are common. For example, Sylvia de Vries, an Ontario woman, had a 40-pound fluid-filled tumor removed from her abdomen by an American surgeon in 2006. Her Michigan doctor estimated that she was within weeks of dying, but she was still on a wait list for a Canadian specialist. Indeed, Canada's provincial governments themselves rely on American medicine. Between 2006 and 2008, Ontario sent more than 160 patients to New York and Michigan for emergency neurosurgery -- described by the Globe and Mail newspaper as "broken necks, burst aneurysms and other types of bleeding in or around the brain."

Why would we want to move to a system that is so inefficient and so low-quality? The failures of socialized medicine are myriad:

Only half of ER patients are treated in a timely manner by national and international standards, according to a government study. The physician shortage is so severe that some towns hold lotteries, with the winners gaining access to the local doc. Overall, according to a study published in Lancet Oncology last year, five-year cancer survival rates are higher in the U.S. than those in Canada. Based on data from the Joint Canada/U.S. Survey of Health (done by Statistics Canada and the U.S. National Center for Health Statistics), Americans have greater access to preventive screening tests and have higher treatment rates for chronic illnesses. No wonder: To limit the growth in health spending, governments restrict the supply of health care by rationing it through waiting. The same survey data show, as June and Paul O'Neill note in a paper published in 2007 in the Forum for Health Economics & Policy, that the poor under socialized medicine seem to be less healthy relative to the nonpoor than their American counterparts.

Rationing. That's what socialized medicine comes down to. The government will decide who gets what treatment and when. That is the main reason why cancer survival rates are lower in places like Canada and Great Britain. Delayed detection and delayed treatment allows cancer to spread and grow in a patient until, in many cases, the treatment comes too late and the government then decrees that the patient is now a "hopeless diagnosis" and should be left to die.

But, it seems as though the people of Canada have learned their lesson. Dr. Gratzer asks a very profound question while presenting some good evidence that privatized medicine is the way to go. Make sure you read the following excerpt all the way through:

Ironically, as the U.S. is on the verge of rushing toward government health care, Canada is reforming its system in the opposite direction. In 2005, Canada's supreme court struck down key laws in Quebec that established a government monopoly of health services. Claude Castonguay, who headed the Quebec government commission that recommended the creation of its public health-care system in the 1960s, also has second thoughts. Last year, after completing another review, he declared the system in "crisis" and suggested a massive expansion of private services -- even advocating that public hospitals rent facilities to physicians in off-hours. And the medical establishment? Dr. Brian Day, an orthopedic surgeon, grew increasingly frustrated by government cutbacks that reduced his access to an operating room and increased the number of patients on his hospital waiting list. He built a private hospital in Vancouver in the 1990s. Last year, he completed a term as the president of the Canadian Medical Association and was succeeded by a Quebec radiologist who owns several private clinics. In Canada, private-sector health care is growing. Dr. Day estimates that 50,000 people are seen at private clinics every year in British Columbia. According to the New York Times, a private clinic opens at a rate of about one a week across the country. Public-private partnerships, once a taboo topic, are embraced by provincial governments. In the United Kingdom, where socialized medicine was established after World War II through the National Health Service, the present Labour government has introduced a choice in surgeries by allowing patients to choose among facilities, often including private ones. Even in Sweden, the government has turned over services to the private sector. Americans need to ask a basic question: Why are they rushing into a system of government-dominated health care when the very countries that have experienced it for so long are backing away?

You can access the complete column on-line here:

Canada's ObamaCare Precedent
Dr. David Gratzer
Wall Street Journal
June 9, 2009

A Look At Three Socialized Health Care Systems: Dr. Walter Williams Column

As the United States gears up to become the world's newest socialized health care provider, it would be a good idea to look at historical precedent and see how well socialized health care has worked for other countries and what the results were.

Dr. Walter Williams, writing for Town Hall, has come up with some very crisp, clear, concise examples and summarizes them nicely.

First, Great Britain:

A recent study by David Green and Laura Casper, "Delay, Denial and Dilution," written for the London-based Institute of Economic Affairs, concludes that the NHS health care services are just about the worst in the developed world. The head of the World Health Organization calculated that Britain has as many as 25,000 unnecessary cancer deaths a year because of under-provision of care. Twelve percent of specialists surveyed admitted refusing kidney dialysis to patients suffering from kidney failure because of limits on cash. Waiting lists for medical treatment have become so long that there are now "waiting lists" for the waiting list.

And next, Canada:

Canada's government system isn't that different from Britain's. For example, after a Canadian has been referred to a specialist, the waiting list for gynecological surgery is four to 12 weeks, cataract removal 12 to 18 weeks, tonsillectomy three to 36 weeks and neurosurgery five to 30 weeks. Toronto-area hospitals, concerned about lawsuits, ask patients to sign a legal release accepting that while delays in treatment may jeopardize their health, they nevertheless hold the hospital blameless. Canadians have an option Britainers don't: close proximity of American hospitals. In fact, the Canadian government spends over $1 billion each year for Canadians to receive medical treatment in our country.

And now, Sweden:

Sven R. Larson tells about some of Sweden's problems in "Lesson from Sweden's Universal Health System: Tales from the Health-care Crypt," published in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons (Spring 2008). Mr. D., a Gothenburg multiple sclerosis patient, was prescribed a new drug. His doctor's request was denied because the drug was 33 percent more expensive than the older medicine. Mr. D. offered to pay for the medicine himself but was prevented from doing so. The bureaucrats said it would set a bad precedent and lead to unequal access to medicine. Malmo, with its 280,000 residents, is Sweden's third-largest city. To see a physician, a patient must go to one of two local clinics before they can see a specialist. The clinics have security guards to keep patients from getting unruly as they wait hours to see a doctor. The guards also prevent new patients from entering the clinic when the waiting room is considered full. Uppsala, a city with 200,000 people, has only one specialist in mammography. Sweden's National Cancer Foundation reports that in a few years most Swedish women will not have access to mammography. Dr. Olle Stendahl, a professor of medicine at Linkoping University, pointed out a side effect of government-run medicine: its impact on innovation. He said, "In our budget-government health care there is no room for curious, young physicians and other professionals to challenge established views. New knowledge is not attractive but typically considered a problem (that brings) increased costs and disturbances in today's slimmed-down health care."

Is this the change you voted for? I certainly didn't. But, with a socialist President and a socialist controlled Congress, it is going to be shoved down our throats whether we like it or not.

You can access the complete column on-line here:

Sweden's Government Health Care
Dr. Walter Williams
TownHall.com
March 4, 2009

Associated Press Rips Obama's Infomercial, Ad Skips Over Budget Realities

Now, the Associated Press is not what anyone would call a bastion of right-wing philosophy. In fact, it is a very leftist organization. That is why it is fairly big news when such an organization takes a leftist candidate for president to task over statements made during a half-hour long infomercial.

Calvin Woodward looks into a few of Barack Obama's claims and separates the fiction from the fact. From his article:

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama was less than upfront in his half-hour commercial Wednesday night about the costs of his programs and the crushing budget pressures he would face in office. Obama's assertion that "I've offered spending cuts above and beyond" the expense of his promises is accepted only by his partisans. His vow to save money by "eliminating programs that don't work" masks his failure throughout the campaign to specify what those programs are - beyond the withdrawal of troops from Iraq.

Just like John Kerry, who claimed he had a plan, but refused to reveal that plan to the American people. Here are some examples of what Obama claimed versus the truth:

THE SPIN: "That's why my health care plan includes improving information technology, requires coverage for preventive care and pre-existing conditions and lowers health care costs for the typical family by $2,500 a year." THE FACTS: His plan does not lower premiums by $2,500, or any set amount. Obama hopes that by spending $50 billion over five years on electronic medical records and by improving access to proven disease management programs, among other steps, consumers will end up saving money. He uses an optimistic analysis to suggest cost reductions in national health care spending could amount to the equivalent of $2,500 for a family of four. Many economists are skeptical those savings can be achieved, but even if they are, it's not a certainty that every dollar would be passed on to consumers in the form of lower premiums.

This same system has been tried in Canada and Great Britain and each time were colossal failures. Even the Canucks and Brits admit that they don't have universal health care but rather that they have rationed health care. The quality of their care is now among the lowest in the industrialized world.

Obama's socialized health care plan is analyzed here:

Barack Obama Proposes A Disastrous Socialized Health Care System
84rules
June 18, 2008

And that plan would be rife with fraud:

Medicare Rife With Fraud: The Dems Model For Socialized Medicine
84rules
August 26, 2008

THE SPIN: "Here's what I'll do. Cut taxes for every working family making less than $200,000 a year. Give businesses a tax credit for every new employee that they hire right here in the U.S. over the next two years and eliminate tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas. Help homeowners who are making a good faith effort to pay their mortgages, by freezing foreclosures for 90 days. And just like after 9-11, we'll provide low-cost loans to help small businesses pay their workers and keep their doors open. " THE FACTS: His proposals - the tax cuts, the low-cost loans, the $15 billion a year he promises for alternative energy, and more - cost money, and the country could be facing a record $1 trillion deficit next year. Indeed, Obama recently acknowledged - although not in his commercial - that: "The next president will have to scale back his agenda and some of his proposals."

Just a short while ago, it was a tax cut for working families making less than $250,000 per year. Joe Biden has put that figure at $150,000 per year. But history shows us that it is a campaign promise that he cannot keep. Bill Clinton promised no new taxes for anyone making less than $90,000 per year in 1992. The reality was that in order to fund his spending porgrams, people making as little as $30,000 per year were gouged for more taxes. Barack Obama would find the same problem in keeping his promise of a lower threshold. Economists from several different institutions have worked the numbers out and have predicted that families making $45,000 per year will have more taxes taken from their paychecks.

Small businesses won't do any better under Obama:

Obamanomics Is A Recipe For Recession
84rules
July 30, 2008

You can access the complete article on-line here:

Obama's Prime-Time Ad Skips Over Budget Realities
Calvin Woodward
Associated Press via My Way News
October 29, 2008

Taxpayer Funded Medical Care: 17,000 Deaths

There is alot about the socialized health care systems of Canada and Great Britain that doesn't get reported in Old Media. One of the more recent developments out of Great Britain, a development that I learned about from Glenn Beck rather than ABC News, is that the British government has guaranteed a wait of "no more than four hours" in the Emergency Room.

Sounds noble, eh? Well, wait until you hear how the government run hospitals are putting this "guarantee" into effect. It is a procedure called "patient stacking." Essentially, what they do is they hold the patient in the ambulance outside of the emergency room until the ER staff can assure the ambulance drivers that the patient can be seen within four hours. Some patients have been held in the ambulances for up to nine hours (not including the four they spend waiting in the emergency room) and some medical emergency victims have been kept waiting for over ten hours while waiting for an ambulance to become available to come and get them.

That's just the latest example of how socialized medicine, especially socialist programs proposed by Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, are dismal failures and should be relegated to the dustbin of history.

From Deroy Murdoch at the New York Post:

Great Britain's big-government National Health Service. Low-quality, taxpayer-funded health care killed more than 17,000 Britons in 2004, according to the TaxPayers' Alliance in London. The TPA examined the World Health Organization's latest-available data to contrast the NHS with the Dutch, French, German and Spanish health systems, which are less government-dominated. Specifically, the pro-market group measured "mortality amenable to health care" - those deaths that a medical organization realistically should prevent. While those four countries averaged a 106.6 amenable mortality rate, Britain was almost 29 percent deadlier, with its rate of 135.3. The TPA thus calculates that the NHS took the lives of 17,157 Britons who otherwise would have survived were they treated by doctors across the English Channel. This figure is more than two-and-a-half times Britain's yearly alcohol-related deaths, and is quintuple its annual highway fatalities. Comparing 60 million Brits to 300 million Yanks, this is like a federally-operated health agency eliminating 85,785 Americans in 2004.

Despite the fact that the British socialist health care system is probably the best financed in the world, it is one of the worst health-care performers in the world. Here are some of the other things going on that people should know about before embracing HillaryCare or ObamaCare:

Poor sanitation has become the NHS' latest worry. The BBC's Danielle Glavin worked undercover at a government hospital in Kent. "On my first day, as I emptied bins, swept and mopped, I noticed old blood stains ingrained on the floor," Glavin reported. In one surgical theater, "a blood-stained gown was left on a trolley for 24 hours, and used medical instruments were discarded in a sink for a day." This helps explain why the British government estimated that 9 percent of inpatients in 2000 suffered hospital-acquired infections. The bacterium Clostridium difficile often is associated with hospital outbreaks and extended medical stays. English and Welsh death certificates citing C. diff as a cause or contributing factor grew from about 1,000 in 1999 to 3,807 in 2005. Diseases snuff Britons sooner than they do others in the developed world. A September 2007 Lancet Oncology article found 66.3 percent of American men alive five years after cancer diagnosis. Among male Finns, that figure was 55.9 percent, while only 44.8 percent of Englishmen survived after five years. Across the European Union, 20.1 females per 100,000 under 65 died prematurely of circulatory disease. Among British women, that number was 23.6.

Anyone who believes the idiotic propaganda that Michael Moore put in his informationally challenged movie Sicko should go over to Great Britain the next time they think they might have cancer. We'll see how truly they believe in socialized medicine then.

The parting shot:

Collectively, these data strongly rebuff the notion that America's imperfect health-care industry needs a booster shot of mandates and regulations. What it sorely lacks is more choice, competition and freedom - and loads less government. John McCain's ideas - among them, expanded health-savings accounts; individually owned, portable health-insurance policies available across state lines; and medical-lawsuit reform - are the antidote to the "health care with a British accent" that Clinton or Obama would import, unless American voters stop them.

And once again, despite so-called Conservative opposition, John McCain has the better idea.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

17,000 Deaths
Deroy Murdoch
New York Post
February 24, 2008