Just over 25 years ago now, Dr. Alan Lindemann and I wrote a book about the high cost of health care in the United States and what needed to be done to make any real changes in the way health care in this country was heading. This was an exciting time in health care policy. Hillary Clinton had just adopted reforming health care as one of her major efforts as the new First Lady. If you’re old enough to remember those times, Hillary Clinton’s ideas were stomped into oblivion by a political system unwilling to go up against the entities which were causing the problems in the first place.
The issues Dr. Lindemann and I discussed in our book, Modern Medicine: What You’re Dying To Know are still with us. Only predictably worse. Actually, even worse than we had anticipated. With the election of President Obama, real health care reform was supposedly put on the agenda once again. At least now we no longer heard IF, but WHEN. A country with the most expensive health care system on the planet provides at best mediocre quality of care to many of us, and to thousands of others, no health care at all. The book is now available again on Amazon.
We said it then and we can say it just as accurately now. If you want expensive miracles in health care, there’s perhaps no better place to be than in the U.S. But if you want good, preventive health care for all, there are many countries around the world where every resident can get affordable health care without having to choose between health care and putting food on the table.
Dr. Lindemann and I wrote our book before the internet had opened up a whole new world of ways to communicate about health care issues. There are already hundreds of blogs on health care reform, but as with any public discussion, there’s always room for another opinion…
