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

Peace Loving Muslims

I think I can still count on one hand the number of Muslims who have come out and condemned terrorist attacks committed by other Muslims. But, they are so few and far between that I can't remember their names anymore. I think there was one last year and then another one the year before that.

That is the point of Dr. Walter Williams' latest column. It is short, simple and to the point. Here are some excerpts:

We're told it's only that 1 percent, out of 1.2 billion Muslims, who are fanatical jihadists who believe America is the Great Satan, cause of all evil, and should be attacked and destroyed.

By the way, 1 percent of 1.2 billion is 12 million.

Think back to the 1930s when the Japanese murdered an estimated 3 million to 10 million people in China, Indonesia, Korea, Philippines and Indochina; and on December 7, 1941 when they attacked Pearl Harbor, killing over 2,400 Americans. I'm betting that most of Japan's at-the-time 60 million population were peace-loving people and would have wanted nothing to do with the brutal slaughter in China and the attack on the U.S. In formulating our response to the attack, should President Roosevelt have taken into account the fact that most Japanese are peace-loving people ruled by fanatics? ... Horrible acts can be committed in countries where most of the people are peace-loving and simply want to be left alone to attend to their affairs. I imagine that described most of the people in the former Soviet Union; however, that did not stop the killing of an estimated 62 million people between 1917 and 1987. The same can be said of the Chinese people, but it didn't stop the killing of 35 million of their countrymen during Mao Zedong's reign. ... At this particular time, fanatical jihadists are calling the terrorism shots in many Muslim countries. Their success in committing terrorist acts is in no small part the result of the actions by the millions of peace-loving fellow Muslims. First, there is not enough condemnation of their terrorist acts by the Muslim community. More important is the direct or indirect assistance terrorists receive through the silence of their fellow Muslims. There is no way terrorists can carry on their operations, obtain explosive materials, run terrorist training camps, raise money without the knowledge of other Muslims, whether they're government officials, bankers, family members, friends or neighbors.

During the liberation of the Concentration Camps in Germany and other parts of Europe, the people living in nearby towns said they had no idea what the Nazis were doing. It was a lie. They knew full well what was going on, just as Muslim communities know full well what is happening within their own strata.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

Peace-Loving Muslims
Dr. Walter Williams
TownHall.com
March 19, 2008

Big Corn And Ethanol Hoax

Remember the Energy Act of 2005? Remember how ethanol was to be our savior from high gas prices and was supposed to help us get off of our dependence on foreign oil? Well, those promises were as empty as the space that fills the light-years between solar systems.

As you have probably noticed, gas prices have gone up and you've probably also noticed that we are still just as dependent, if not moreso, on foreign oil as we were before. You've probably also noticed the unintended side-effect of higher food prices for us consumers to pay.

Anyone schooled in basic economics would have seen this coming. Further, anyone schooled in basic economics can see where it is going and more importantly, why.

Dr. Walter Williams notes the following in his latest column:

Ethanol contains water that distillation cannot remove. As such, it can cause major damage to automobile engines not specifically designed to burn ethanol. The water content of ethanol also risks pipeline corrosion and thus must be shipped by truck, rail car or barge. These shipping methods are far more expensive than pipelines. Ethanol is 20 to 30 percent less efficient than gasoline, making it more expensive per highway mile. It takes 450 pounds of corn to produce the ethanol to fill one SUV tank. That's enough corn to feed one person for a year. Plus, it takes more than one gallon of fossil fuel -- oil and natural gas -- to produce one gallon of ethanol. After all, corn must be grown, fertilized, harvested and trucked to ethanol producers -- all of which are fuel-using activities. And, it takes 1,700 gallons of water to produce one gallon of ethanol. On top of all this, if our total annual corn output were put to ethanol production, it would reduce gasoline consumption by 10 or 12 percent. Ethanol is so costly that it wouldn't make it in a free market. That's why Congress has enacted major ethanol subsidies, about $1.05 to $1.38 a gallon, which is no less than a tax on consumers. In fact, there's a double tax -- one in the form of ethanol subsidies and another in the form of handouts to corn farmers to the tune of $9.5 billion in 2005 alone. There's something else wrong with this picture. If Congress and President Bush say we need less reliance on oil and greater use of renewable fuels, then why would Congress impose a stiff tariff, 54 cents a gallon, on ethanol from Brazil? Brazilian ethanol, by the way, is produced from sugar cane and is far more energy efficient, cleaner and cheaper to produce.

Because this whole thing has been a sham and a hoax. The only results are that we have less efficient fuels, higher prices for food, use of even more oil to produce the ethanol and only the big corn and ethanol companies and interests are showing any profit from it.

Dr. Williams goes on:

But politicians, corn farmers and ethanol producers know they are running a cruel hoax on the American consumer. They are in it for the money. The top leader in the ethanol hoax is Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), the country's largest producer of ethanol. Ethanol producers and the farm lobby have pressured farm state congressmen into believing that it would be political suicide if they didn't support subsidized ethanol production. That's the stick. Campaign contributions play the role of the carrot. The ethanol hoax is a good example of a problem economists refer to as narrow, well-defined benefits versus widely dispersed costs. It pays the ethanol lobby to organize and collect money to grease the palms of politicians willing to do their bidding because there's a large benefit for them -- higher wages and profits.

So, when are the socialist Dems going to investigate "Big Corn" for price gouging?

Congress needs to end this madness now, before it costs us so much that we won't be able to afford any new research into truly viable alternative energy.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

Big Corn And Ethanol Hoax
Dr. Walter Williams
TownHall.com
March 12, 2008