VOX MED

AMA Votes Against Patients and Physicians

2011-06-22T06:24:00.007+02:00

The American Medical Association (AMA) recently voted to reaffirm its support of compulsory health insurance. A majority of AMA delegates proved oblivious to the fact that whenever and wherever mandatory insurance schemes are implemented they invariably: a) taint doctor patient relationship with high degrees of bureaucratic intrusion and paperwork, b) lead to loss of physician professional autonomy c) erode patient responsibility and choice.

Doctor dissatisfaction in countries such as Germany and even Switzerland, recurrently demonstrated by research studies and surveys is but one symptom of the many ills brought about by mandatory insurance.

As is generally the case for most medical corporate groups seasoned to lobby trade-offs in various parts of the world, AMA representatives end up bowing to power, even if this means betraying the legitimate interests of front-line working doctors and of suffering patients

Dual Tracking explained

2011-05-02T20:21:00.009+02:00

Bart Madden's "Dual tracking" concept, speeds access to innovation for patients suffering from life threatening or incurable disease. These interviews featuring Bart Madden and Jim Doti president of Chapman University explain how:

New MedLib Study - Doctors want more freedom to practice

2011-04-07T20:53:00.007+02:00

A new MedLib survey of 1,000 doctors in four key countries points to high levels of dissatisfaction with degree of freedom in deciding how to best treat patients.

D'Adam Smith à Karl Marx et retour... en passant par le groupe de Coppet

2011-03-22T13:51:00.020+01:00

NEW in downloadable E-book formats by Institut Coppet:

French version of "From Adam Smith to Karl Marx... and Back: Lessons from the Swiss Classical Liberals" including original essay (in english). A reappraisal of the contributions of Rousseau, Necker, Germaine de Stael, B.Constant and Sismondi to modern political thought, shows how to move from Marxism and social-democracy to a free society.

Par l'Institut Coppet en format téléchargeable

Version française de "From Adam Smith to Karl Marx ... and Back": Comment Rousseau, Necker, Mme de Stael, Benjamin Constant et Sismondi nous aident à transformer le marxisme et la social-démocratie pour avancer vers une société libre.

Alban Schmid, ami libertarien Suisse, tué par une avalanche

2011-03-19T16:24:00.012+01:00

Alban Schmid était une des forces vives du mouvement libertarien suisse. Une avalanche lui a coûté la vie ainsi que celle de son fils le 13 mars dernier. Voici ce qu'Alban écrivait dans Prolibertate association libertarienne qu'il avait contribué à lancer il y a quelques années déjà:

"Du droit sur sa propre personne découle le droit de propriété sur les choses qu'on produit. Ainsi, le libéralisme défend la notion de propriété privée, qui implique également le droit de transférer celle-ci librement. La liberté, c'est le fait que l'on ne porte pas atteinte aux droits de propriété. Elle est moralement juste. Une législation qui défend les droits de propriété l'est donc également. Inversement, toute atteinte initiale aux droits de propriété d'autrui (personnes ou biens) - ce que nous définirions ici comme une agression - est toujours illégitime, quel que soit le prétexte."

Lire le texte entier

Les vrais libertariens se comptent en Suisse sur les doigts d'une main. La perte est d'autant plus cruelle.

Swiss med students yearn to treat patients not paper!

2011-02-27T12:17:00.014+01:00

Swiss medical students see through the bureaucratic rationing and paper work that looms behind DRG's (Diagnostic Related Groups) in hospital care. They prove it in three powerful video clips produced by their association (SwiMSA).

Government Goliaths against WikiLeaks' David

2010-12-23T20:04:00.017+01:00

WikiLeaks unveils only marginal and anecdotic aspects of political hypocrisy. Yet this proves sufficient to unleash the wrath of government Goliaths peeved by Julian Assange's quixotic challenge. Inquisitors set on his trail are more comfortable with the chronic double talk of political "elites" than with the freedom of speech of potential whistle blowers.

Intellectuals such as Daniel Ellberg, Noam Chomsky and others have identified the stakes at play. They have signed a petition launched by FAIR to support WikiLeaks on the grounds of freedom of the press.

Go to the petition:

La Philanthropie ou l'Etat

2010-10-23T15:32:00.009+02:00

«Là où est l’amour de l’homme est l’amour de l’art.» L’aphorisme hippocratique place sans ambiguïté la philanthropie au coeur de la médecine. Depuis l’Antiquité, le médecin traite sans discrimination riches et pauvres: il adapte ses honoraires aux moyens de son patient, y renonçant au besoin. Un économiste viennois m’asséna, un jour où j’exposais cet aspect de notre éthique: «Vous vous adaptez simplement aux possibilités du marché: un peu comme le fait le discounter pour élargir sa clientèle.» Il n’avait pas entièrement tort. Ce n’est que lorsque la médecine quitte le marché que l’homme de l’art cède la part comptable de son altruisme au prêtre, au prince ou à l’assurance sociale.

Délogée par la sécurité sociale, la charité privée s’est éloignée de l’homme malade. Elle n’a pas disparu. Les plus-values du marché libre aboutissent tôt ou tard dans l’escarcelle d’un philanthrope. Rares sont les grandes réussites qui n’engendrent pas leur fondation caritative: Roger Federer fait rebondir une partie des millions captés par sa raquette vers les enfants de Soweto; George Soros, spéculateur sans pitié, est devenu un des cinq plus grands donateurs de la planète, la fondation Bill Gates a fait du titan du monde virtuel un géant du monde vertueux.

Le secteur philanthropique «vaut» en Suisse plus de 30 milliards de francs. Il distribue chaque année aux Etats-Unis plus de 250 milliards de dollars, ce qui relativise le qualificatif de «sauvage» attribué au capitalisme de ce pays. L’Etat, dont la fonction essentielle est de gérer l’obéissance - prétend depuis Bismarck et ses clones, se preoccuper du sort des malades. Cette tâche est foncièrement étrangère à sa nature. Rien d'étonnant à ce que la grande philanthropie redécouvre que même les pays riches ont besoin d’elle. Comme le démontrent les généreux legs et donations privées dont bénéficient régulièrement en Suisse hopitaux et centres de recherche médicale.

La Force du Guérisseur

2010-10-17T14:40:00.003+02:00

L’orthodoxie médicale est confrontée aujourd’hui à la concurrence de thérapeutes proposant mieux-être ou guérison par les fleurs, les couleurs, l’imposition des mains ou même le simple coup de fil. A l’heure où l’on ne pardonne rien à la médecine curative et où sa pharmacopée devient aussi suspecte que le CO2, le crédit accordé à ces guérisseurs aux mains presque nues interpelle. Avant de sacrifier ce qui lui reste d’autonomie au culte de l’«evidence-based», notre corporation se doit d’analyser ce phénomène.

Les sceptiques reprocheront aux alternatifs un discours holistique plus proche de la pata-médecine ou de l’attrape-gogo que de la philosophie ou de la science. Le cartésianisme médical attribuera leurs miracles aux méandres neurobiochimiques complexes de l’effet-placébo; la foi des thuriféraires démultipliant sans doute l’effet de grigris plus flamboyants que le comprimé d’amidon, lesuppositoire au beurre de cacao ou l’ampoule de NaCl. La véritable force des alternatifs ne provient pas de l’efficacité (relative) de leurs secrets. Elle doit être recherchée dans leur refus – par principe – de subir la tyrannie des statistiques. Leurs évidences se fondent sur la vérité de l’être unique qui sollicite leurs services. Le patient-client se réapproprie la définition de ce qu’est la guérison. Il rétablit avec son thérapeute, et sans l’intrusion detiers, l’équilibre perdu du colloque singulier… naguère la force d’Hippocrate!

Hippocratic Entrepreneurship

2010-08-22T16:55:00.011+02:00

Aritstotle identified the entrepreneurial substance of medicine. Hippocrates his contemporary, also understood the contractual nature of patient-physician partnerships and laid down basic rules to maintain the financial interface of medical services within an ethical framework. This did not stop him from earning money from his trade or from the teaching of his art.

The capture of medical services by the "solidarity" principle (i.e. by collectivist ideology) has removed the entrepreneurial spirit from physicians. As a result, the control & management of their professional tools has been relinquished to bureaucracies and third parties not bound by the same ethical principles or obligations.

Many doctors are ashamed to admit that they are actors in a market, and that medical services entail a commercial interchange. They willingly accept third parties as their paymasters as this, in their eyes, keeps financial transactions separate from their service to the patient. When rationing steps in, they look the other way, as long as their fees are not overly affected.

There are however, physicians who uphold the Hippocratic mission. They have vowed to keep their practice totally free from third parties. In the US, the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) shows the way. Patients are the first to gain from such medical entrepreneurship. By keeping overbearing third parties in line, they regain control of their physician and make sure that they will get treatment to the best of his ability,

Singapore's Health Savings Accounts Model Intrigues Swiss Media: Socialists Bark!

2010-07-23T16:18:00.008+02:00

The Courrier du Medecin Vaudois a Swiss medical journal, published a special feature this month on Health Savings Accounts (HSA's) including articles from Guillaume Vuillemey, Georges Lane and Alphonse Crespo. Proposals to look at Singapore's Medisave success story and bring back common sense and patient empowerment to cure Switzerland's declining health care system were relayed by journals such as Le Temps and the Swiss Radio Journal. They were met with howls from socialists allergic to individual responsibility and hooked on "solidarity" (i.e more state bureaucracy & rationing of care at the lowest common denominator).

US Health Care Reform - Pyrrhic victory in view?

2010-03-21T21:07:00.004+01:00

An armada of log-rollers, rent-seekers & pork dealers led by irresponsible demagogues head towards Pyrrhic victory for American health care. The "will of the people" is irrelevant to House supporters of Obamacare. However, they will not be able to twist the arms of voters as they did with wavering democratic congressmen. Rasmussen poll on health reform reflects the discontent of taxpaying citizens who'll pay the price of a costly, bungled health "reform"... and who'll remember the names of those who supported it .

US Health Care Reform: Latest Rasmussen Poll

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A Doctor's view on Prescription and Risk

2010-03-04T20:04:00.002+01:00

Alphonse Crespo
Stockhom Network Meeting Brussels on "Are Your Medicines Safe?", February 2010
stockholmnetwork. - Regardez les dernières vidéos d'actu.

Rupture médicale novatrice: le grand défi institutionnel

2010-02-13T08:47:00.001+01:00

Le progrès médical se heurte à un cadre institutionnel de la santé figé dans des concepts idéologiques conçus au 19e siècle. L'inadéquation entre rupture novatrice et stagnation institutionnelle plombe l'accès à l'innovation et affecte le financement des soins. L'avènement d'une médecine de plus en plus prédictive et curative, Internet et l'accès en temps réel des patients à l'information médicale amènent à la fois une révolution thérapeutique et un nouvel équilibre dans la relation médecin patient. Ils exigent également une remise à jour de nos systèmes institutionnels de santé.

La société doit s'affranchir de concepts d'assurance sociale, de redistribution, régulation et planification étatiques hérités de Bismarck et d'idéologies obsolètes, pour se doter de modèles d'organisation de soins, d'accès à l'innovation, d'assurance et de prévoyance à la hauteur des percées technologiques du XXIe siècle. L'explosion novatrice exige l'abandon d'algorithmes rigides régissant l'autorisation et la mise sur le marché de produits thérapeutiques nouveaux. Patients et médecins doivent pouvoir accéder aux fruits de la recherche sans entraves bureaucratiques et en fonction de critères décisionnels qui leur sont propres. La "double voie" d'accès aux médicaments expérimentaux issue de l'école neuro-économique américaine , propose dans ce domaine un modèle institutionnel concret en adéquation avec la dynamique actuelle du progrès.

La réussite des réformes de santé dépendra de la capacité politique de dissocier clairement financement des soins et assistance sociale; de restituer à l'assurance sa mission première de couvrir le risque et enfin de développer l'épargne santé pour faire face aux échéances physiopathologiques de plus en plus prévisibles de chacun. Des pays tels que Singapour l'ont compris: leur système de Santé, un des plus performants du monde, s'appuie sur ce principe.

Turgot meeting on health care paradigms at French National Assembly, Paris

2010-02-12T20:28:00.001+01:00

Médecine et technologie - Discussion published by Henri Lepage and Institut Turgot on Vimeo.

Speakers: Dr Guy-André Pelouze and Dr Alphonse Crespo

US Senate majority invites Bismarck to run US health care. Welcome to European decadence, America!

2009-11-22T21:27:00.004+01:00

The US Senate has chosen the Bismarckian road to decadence. Americans will be faced with rationing of medical technology, downgrading of care for the elderly, ever rising insurance premiums, health inflation and higher taxes. Europeans are familiar with the scenario.

Regulation costs money. The minute coercion steps into any market (and mandatory insurance is coercitive by essence), it sparks an exponential growth of controllers & bureaucrats.

Conversely, over regulated health care leads to a scarcity of nurses and physicians - as Europeans now realize. Their doctors end up spending more time filling forms than writing prescriptions while patients queue for treatment!

American medicine long led the world in terms of innovation. This is unfortunately doomed to change: irresponsible ideologues have voted mediocrity into US health care. Europe will no be able to piggyback on American therapeutic advances for much longer.

Voting makers of bad laws out of office will not root out mandates from health care. Politicians from all horizons can live with them. For ordinary citizens, of course, it's another matter.

The battle however is not lost! Civil disobedience , in particular when constitutional principles are at stake, shows the way citizens may have to combat infringements to their fundamental liberties in health care...

Envy, demagogy, Obamacare and the destruction of wealth

2009-10-31T12:50:00.009+01:00

The tax surcharges crafted in the latest version of the Obamacare bill will hit hardest those considered wealthy.

THE VOICE OF DOCTORS - Medical Independence in America

2009-10-15T20:21:00.007+02:00

The eloquent voice of physicians that care for their patients heard loud and clear.
Watch the latest video released by Medicine & Liberty & AAPS on youtube

Kill Altruism in the Name of Morality

2009-10-11T19:56:00.010+02:00

Barak Obama equates compulsory health insurance with "a core ethical and moral obligation". However, compelling citizen A to pay provider B for care of patient C is not the same thing as “looking out for one another.” The moral premise that claims to drive Obamacare is tainted by coercion. It will deliver nothing but bureaucratic hubris, patient suffering and taxes.

Read AAPS News of the Day

Public welfare and its clones invariably kill altruism and charity whenever and wherever they are instituted. The minute government takes the reins of health care into its hands, it submits providers to the tyranny of political expediency while patients have to compete with other far more powerful groups to obtain their share of government redistribution. A cancer patient or his family will never meet the clout of industrial lobbyists or of environment fanatics. Obamacare already openly targets Medicare budgets.

In health care as in any other field of life, government coercion is never moral: it ultimately leads to strife or to slavery.

Read: "The End of Welfare and its effect on the poor"

Spin & Tax, Tax & Spin: The Treacherous Trail to the Bismarckian States of America

2009-09-13T07:28:00.015+02:00

America's spin doctor in chief demonstrated - in a forceful attempt to impose his views on health care - how deep the gulf can be, that separates political rhetoric from reason. His eloquence did not suffice however to blur hard facts. Forcing Bismarckian iron social security blueprints into the American way of life will come with more taxes. Who will be the most hit by health tax furies is still a matter of speculation. Stirring envy however is a well known tool of socialist plunder: successful executives are already on Obamacare's tax hit list. Health industries will predictably come next. Middle class income earners will not be spared for long.

Patients may have to wait more time for their turn to come... not only to get care! It took 15 years of mandatory health insurance before soaring insurance costs got the Swiss parliament to start digging into patient's purses. And this is only a beginning.

Sovietizing health care: here comes the time of "official truths"and unofficial censorship

2009-08-22T18:00:00.008+02:00

Sovietization of society did not only include massive State intrusion into health services, it also implied tight control of public opinion and ruthless persecution of dissenters. The times of Pravda - obedient servant of "official truths" and party line in the former USSR - is indeed behind us. Today's "official truths" elbow their way in more subtle ways... as the unofficial censuring of a thoughtful League of American Voters ad opposing Obamacare demonstrates.

Watch the Ad banned by ABC

Spin doctors might save Obamacare. They will not save patients!

2009-08-14T22:30:00.003+02:00

An armada of spin doctors has been called at the bedside of Obamacare. Their mission is simple: to save the health overhaul project from a growing tide of grass root objections that rise from all corners: taxpayer groups, physicians, seniors.

Considerable resources are being spent in campaigns designed to discredit or intimidate opponents to Obama’s pet project while little is done to explain how much it will cost & even less to clarify what it will look like. Obamacare spin doctors use classical dialectic and propaganda recipes familiar to readers of Machiavelli and Schopenhauer (I prefer to keep Lenin & Goebbels out of the picture… out of respect for America!) .

A well worn stratagem consists in distracting attention from essential objections by focusing on what appear like unfounded critics or exagerations: such as those that predict that Government-driven reform will lead to euthanasia…

Seniors are the first logical victims of regulated medical services. However, mandatory euthanasia is not a likely outcome of modern Government-driven health reforms. Socialized health care systems such as those of the UK, Canada or even the Netherlands (that boasts an euthanasia-friendly legal framework) do not need active euthanasia to reduce the burden of senior citizens on their faltering redistributive pensions or health care systems. Physician scarcity, overcrowded hospitals and waiting lists achieve this just as efficiently.

Can common sense defeat health care demagogy? US polls tend to prove so!

2009-08-09T14:18:00.002+02:00

Reason seldom has an easy way when it challenges charismatic leaders who fuzz reality with unrealistic promises to satisfy ideology. And health care is particularly vulnerable to emotional arguments... One could have feared that Obama and his advisers would have a smooth ride to socialized health care. Yet current polls show that a majority of Americans begin to see through the demagogic smoke that obscures the bottom line of irresponsible road maps for health reform... and that they are making their voices heard.

Click to latest poll on US health care reform

Swiss citizens demonstrated the same wisdom when 71% (!!!) of them told their politicians that they did not need a single payer (i.e. a single decider) to manage their health care. This was not in polls mind you, but in a referendum vote on March 11th 2007 that international media largely ignored. By the way: close to 80% of Oregon voters did the same in 2002!!! (read more)

More on the demise of Swiss Social insurance

The 4 Toxic T’s that Take you to Nobamacare

2009-08-06T10:54:00.001+02:00

When they promise more taxes, most politicians love to keep their word. Health care allows them to get away with this unscathed… Indeed citizens ultimately find out that they have payed more (surtaxes & premiums) when healthy, to get less (care and compassion) when sick. By then it’s too late for them to protest!

Read about the health surtax

Aug 6th: The Overhaul - How to Pay More TAXES for LESS CHOICE

Obama and others explain how American health care will be moved towards public system... but say little about its corollary: a single decider system. And the decider won't be you!

View:The Public Plan Deception - It's Not About Choice

Source: www.youtube.com

Aug. 3rd: Obama Officials WANT THEIR HEALTH TAXES

Health care taxes not only mean more pork, they also mean veterinarian care for humans... When we're old and ailing, officials will decide whether we get treatment or a mercy shot!

Obamacare puts Obamacracy at test

2009-07-30T20:28:00.005+02:00

The Swiss democratic system ensures that no major reforms are implemented without careful and lengthy parliametary assessments that examine all opinions and aim at some degree of consensus. Although their seasoned democratic process is not foolproof and has not stopped the Swiss from implementing reforms that fail to yield expected results (particularly in health care), it has protected them from the mischiefs of demagogy and has kept tributes to special interests within affordable limits.

Americans may not be so fortunate. The scramble of US legislators to push health care reforms (that have failed elsewhere) without due consideration of caveats from professional and patient groups puts Obamacracy at test. AAPS Myth-busters blow one more whistle:

Read the AAPS article

The 5 F’s you will not find in Government run healthcare

2009-07-24T18:03:00.006+02:00

Americans have started reading the small print in socialized health reforms pushed by president Obama. Unsurprisingly, they do not really like what they see. Shawn Tully editor at Forbes Magazine has already identified five freedoms Congressional health reform schemes would do away with. Loss of freedom to choose your doctor is only a starter!

Read the article

Fax-a-thon launched against socialized medicine in America

2009-07-23T18:44:00.001+02:00

Californian Chuck de Vore’s VoterRight website offers a free fax tool to Americans who oppose social-fascist health care reforms. Over 1000 faxes reached the White House on July 23rd, the day of Obama’s speech on healthcare. The tool is still available at http://voteright.us.com/fax/ .

Obama's Pied Piper Rush to Rationed Health Care

2009-07-16T20:41:00.015+02:00

Obama wants new health care laws voted by October. Two declared objectives: cutting health costs and “taking care of the uninsured”. The true name of the game is to increase the power of insurers at the expense of patients, doctors and health industries. A classic recipe for rationed care. Costs will indeed be cut. So will access to diagnosis, treatment and care. The same cannot be said of non productive expenses (paperwork, control, lobbying): they will go uphill, but… husssh, bureaucrats are good at spin, nobody will notice !

The current share of GDP that Americans invest in their health care results in great part from the sum of innumerable individual choices. Other countries face overt or occult rationing of medical services: they spend less of their GDP on health because administrative third parties (and not those in need of care) choose how much is to be spent on patients and who is allowed to get the care. That's where American "health care overhaul" pied pipers want Congress to go. All the rest is wind.

Before you invite Government into health care: Don't forget you will be a patient one day!

2009-07-11T12:21:00.005+02:00

Experts interviewed on the advantages and drawbacks of European state-run health care systems by Associated Press medical writer, Maria Cheng, all voice the same caveat: Be VERY careful before allowing Government into health care. (Read More)

Demagogic health predators claim that high costs of health care justify more Government action in the field: Those who know how to count and compare know that inflation in health care is a direct outcome of government intervention. A recent Fraser study shows that health bankruptcies are also part of Government health packages. (Read More)

Swiss Doctor Associations Bow to Mandatory Insurance Predators

2009-07-01T21:27:00.005+02:00

After calling for “pencil strikes” to protest against lab test rationing, Swiss doctor associations now lamely ask physicians to get back to the paperwork… despite the fact that federal health authorities regally ignored their demands. The causes of this inglorious retreat remain unclear. What is evident is that once again, predatory health insurance cartels will have the last word… and as always at the expense of practitioners and patients.

The 4 Insidious I's of Government Run Health Insurance

2009-06-25T21:23:00.005+02:00

Irresponsible use of health services by consumers
Inflation in the health care sector
Interference of bureaucrats with patient care
Indifference to human suffering

Obama's Doctor's Diagnosis of ObamaCare... and the Neurosurgeons

2009-06-21T12:08:00.019+02:00

Chicago physician David Scheiner who was Obama's doctor for over 20 years, believes his president's health reform concept is cut off from the realities of patient suffering and will hurt primary care. No one will contradict him there. Yet at the same time Dr Scheiner calls for more government intrusion through an extension of Medicare and proposes savings by capping neurosurgeon incomes.

***

Scheiner is 71 years old. He is an internist. He may be unaware of breakthroughs in the neurosciences that will ultimately enable neurosurgeons to cure costly chronic neuro-psychiatric conditions. Leaving aside the predictable alleviation of human suffering (that has by and large become irrelevant in current health care reform debate), such progress also entails major and durable savings in terms of health care dollars. Litigation costs have already spawned a worrisome scarcity of specialists in one of the most difficult and yet promising areas of surgical practice. Intrusive targeting of neurosurgeons' incomes will only make this shortage worse.

The Voice of Patients

2009-06-13T13:40:00.008+02:00

Socialized medicine drives altruism out of health care. It also dulls the compassion of doctors. Except for groups such as the AAPS, physicians fail to speak out against political agendas doomed to increase patient suffering. Compassionate and articulate voices are now rising from other quarters. Amy Menefee, who conducts Patients United Now and Betsy Mc Caughey former Lt Governor of NY State are making compelling cases for patients threatened by intrusive health reforms.

Links:
http://www.youtube.com/user/aapsonline
http://patientsunitednow.com/?q=videos
http://www.medlib.ch/en/pages/video-vox

The 4 deadly R's of Social-fascist health care Reform

2009-05-27T17:43:00.025+02:00

Ransom: All pay for health care through mandatory premiums & taxes

Redistribution: Politicians & interest-groups decide where booties go
Regulation: Bureaucrats tell caregivers how to give care
Rationing: The aged & the severely ill get queues but not cures

Dear American citizens: Allow your country to remain a caring nation

2009-05-24T21:01:00.006+02:00

"Dear President Obama (...) There should never be anyone standing between a person and his/her caregiver..." This blatant truth hammered by an American citizen in an open letter to his president is unfortunately only evident to those who need care. Statistically: 4% of any population at any given time (though close to 100% of humans sooner or later)... To make things worse patients seldom vote! And politicians (including probably President Obama) know this. This makes the health care sector fair game to all kinds of interest groups... mostly alien to those whose lives depend on caregivers.

Egoism and short-sightedness of citizens in good health leads them to accept the political line that health care is tantamount to costs and that these need to be reduced. In fact, the more of its GDP any nation chooses to invest in health care the more it can be said to be a caring nation. Provided of course that regulators and other intrusive third parties are not entitled to confiscate part of these investments on the way... as that is where investments against human suffering become costs and waste!

Swiss Voters' Blow to "Evidence based" Medicine Will Muddle Regulators

2009-05-18T18:38:00.009+02:00

Two thirds of Swiss voters called for mandatory insurance to include coverage of alternative medicines. This vote reflects the growing popularity of "natural" therapies and exotic imports such as Chinese or Ayurvedic medicine. The inclusion of complementary medicines will predictably increase global costs in mandatory insurance and lead to higher premiums.

***

The intrusion of paying third parties and their bureaucratic watch dogs in the alternative therapy sector will alter the crucial one to one relationship between patient and health healer: this will inevitably dull the placebo effect linked to the faith and magic that goes with alternative therapies. The good news is that mandatory coverage of non-scientific complementary therapies will make it difficult for mandatory insurance regulators to continue using the "evidence based" myth as a tool for rationing orthodox medical care.

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Profit Keeps Health Care Healthy

2009-05-17T09:38:00.010+02:00

Healthy Profit
by R.Durana
(An INESS book)

Profit benefits all whereas deficits and losses punish many. Health care is no exception as Richard Durana's healthy study on the value of profit in health care demonstrates. Entrusting health services to government management or subsidy is a recipe for for deficits and waste. It inevitably leads to regulatory harassment of providers and to the rationing of care. Richard Durana's case for more market in this crucial sector of society is based on solid economic analysis. Beyond economics, there is also a moral case to be made for profits that reward professionals and industries that work towards the common good. Wealth gives them incentives and resources needed to pursue their battle against human suffering and disease. Government regulation and rationing does just the opposite.

Constricting Growth of Healthcare Stakeholders : A "Simple Formula" for Mismanaged Care

2009-04-25T15:23:00.021+02:00

The US managed care industry proposes a "simple formula" for health care reform that hinges on the reduction by 1% of the annual growth of "all stakeholders in the debate" and indicates it has already started working on trimming its own growth (Source: BioPharma Today). Should BioPharma follow suit?

***

The ultimate (and noble) mission of BioPharma tech industries is to create products that diminish human suffering. Growth of these industries is mainly achieved by the production and marketing of successful therapeutic products. If you forcefully cut down by 1% the annual growth of Bio-Pharma technology you jeopardize cures of chronic disease in the same proportion and perpetuate the costs of many chronic illnesses. Such a "solution" is not only economically counterproductive (chronic illness is ultimately more costly than cure) it is also immoral insofar as it favors human suffering. As for the managed care industry's vows to reduce its own growth by 1% : one can suspect that this will be achieved by incremental rationing of care and restricting access to cure; a seasoned way of passing on the costs of irresponsible "simple solutions" to suffering patients.

***

Patients are the central stakeholders in the health care debate (although for obvious reasons, their voice is not a loud one). Reducing the "annual growth" of the number of patients by 1% can be done in two ways: by curing more patients through growth of Bio-pharma innovation; or conversely by killing more patients by restricting innovation or rationing access to cure. The US managed care cartel seems to have made its choice!

Grèves médicales et cancer bureaucratique

2009-04-01T13:49:00.007+02:00

La grève est contraire à la tradition médicale. Elle traduit des frustrations profondes de professionnels exacerbés. Grèves et manifestations n'existeraient pas si l'intrusion de tiers ne venait pas perturber le contrat Hippocratique qui regit tacitement les rapports entre médecins et patients dans un marché libre.

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Aujourd'hui, le médecin ne peut plus se contenter de soigner ses patients. Il doit également combattre une bureaucratie pathologique qui l'empêche d'exercer correctement son métier. Malheureusement les grèves de médecins sont le plus souvent menées sans analyse étiologique. En s'attaquant au symptôme Couchepin, les meneurs du movement actuel de protestation FMH en tête, ne s'attardent pas suffisamment sur les questions morales soulevées par la réglementation arbitraire de notre profession. Nous n'avons pas encore saisi l'enjeu d'une bataille d'idées qui oppose l'Etat et ses saprophytes à ceux qui se battent pour une société plus lbre.

The Hidden Cause of "The Crisis of Capitalism": War Destroys Capital

2009-03-03T12:27:00.024+01:00

Exactly a year ago, in March 2008 Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz, estimated the global costs of the US military adventure in Irak at $3 trillion and predicted that this would severely harm the US economy. Stieglitz was being optimistic. He did not foresee that when the finances of the first industrial nation of the world collapse, a domino effect on all industrial partners follows.

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War does not produce capital. It creates suffering and destruction. In past times, these were mainly circumscribed to warring states. Globalization has changed this. Peaceful countries are punished almost as harshly as military ones.

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Wars are ruinous ventures that no nation can afford but that only states can launch. It is unfair and incorrect to blame the current woes of world finances on a failure of capitalism. They are the consequence of carefully encrypted war economies of nations heavily involved in military quagmires... Our economic crisis stems from eight years of hard state destructive action in places such as Irak, Afganistan, Gaza, Georgia... Further state action to correct it (eg. by printing paper money to fill the the financial craters caused by war) will only make this crisis worse.

Regulated Health Insurance is not a Deus Ex-machina

2009-02-22T11:03:00.020+01:00

America's $90 billion cut of "stimulus" booty captured by Medicare, together with further plans (currently estimated at $65 billion a year) to expand regulated health insurance will only stimulate overgrown health bureaucracies and create more mandates (i.e. more pork) at the expense of taxpayers. Whether this will help a single patient is another matter.

Insurance is no more than a tool amongst others designed to parry unpredictable risks or unpleasant certainties that afflict the course of human existence. It does not make people healthier, it does not make doctors more efficient, it does not create hospital facilities and will not stop individuals from passing away when their time has come. By crediting regulated health insurance with magical powers that it does not have and at great expense, politicians shove out other market forces that address provision of health care more efficiently and humanely than big government and its bureaucracies.

Human progress stems from incremental trial and error learning processes that span over generations. Some lessons are learned the hard way. It took more than half a century of gulags before eastern Europe discarded totalitarian utopias spawned by hardcore socialism. Democratic societies may take longer to discover that keynesian wishful thinking applied to worn out social security recipes delivers neither health nor security but costs dearly: not only in terms of wasted resources but also in terms of liberties.

Obama's Raw "New" Deal: A Billion Buck Bid for Bad Medicine

2009-02-18T18:28:00.025+01:00

Future generations may have to pay twice for current political profligacy: Out of their empty pockets when the debts of mind boggling government deficit spending come due. In their flesh, when they test the kind of rationed medicine that their forefathers bought in a frenzy without checking what lay inside the package.

The Cato Institute blows the whistle in:

Michael D. Tanner's The Stimulus and Socialized Medicine

Michael Cannon's Briefing Paper Does Barack Obama Support Socialized Medicine?

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Of Wealth and Philanthropy - The golden legacy of St John Chrysostom

2009-01-23T09:34:00.033+01:00

Nicoleta Acatrinei is an unusual scholar: she is at the same time a professional economist, a graduate in theology and a working mother. Her blend of religious faith, natural curiosity and interest for economic anthropology put her on the byzantine track of St John Chrysostom one of the fathers of the Greek Orthodox church. When we first met in 2005, Nicoleta alerted me on the role of this pivotal 4th Century Antiochian figure whose preachings on wealth and altruism are probably as important to market ethics as are the legacies of Aristotle or of St Thomas Aquinas.

Nicoleta's fascinating economics cum theology anthropological quest has now materialized into a book: "Saint Jean Chrysostome et l'Homo oeconomicus" (ISBN 978-1-933275-20-8) recently published by the Orthodox Research Institute.

The current financial crisis puts entrepreneurial ethics in the line of fire. An immersion into its fundamentals is not a luxury for those who battle for free markets. Nicoleta's revisit of Chrysotom's golden wisdom could not have come at a better time.

Order via Amazon

GAZA in distress - news from a friend

2009-01-21T11:08:00.016+01:00

I met Omar Sha'Ban founder of PalThink for strategic studies a Palestinian think tank, in July 2008 in Alexandria Va. at an Atlas MBA Course. Omar is a man of peace. He lives in Gaza. As a true man of peace he cannot understand the ruthless violence and destruction his land has suffered through four dreadful weeks. Read his first hand eye-witness account of a Palestinian nightmare in: "Old questions in need of new answers".

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Israel is unfortunately no exception. States as institutions are fundamentally made for war. They generally excel in destruction. Humanitarian missions are incompatible with their essence. Entrusting governments with tasks such as providing or regulating health care makes no sense. Patients do not count in the minds of individuals capable of ordering bombs and missiles against fellow human beings... The shelled hospitals of Gaza prove this point beyond dispute.

Gideon Sofer and Bureaucratic Patient Killers

2009-01-15T16:15:00.001+01:00

As Gideon Sofer, who suffers from Crohn’s disease points out in a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed: “The FDA is killing Crohn’s patients”, millions of individuals depend on the rate at which new drugs reach the market. Sofer condemns the FDA for ethically questionable protocols that impose placebos on groups of patients in legthy double-blind randomized clinical trials and withhold their access to potential cure.

One can but sympathize with Gideon Sofer who not only struggles against Crohn’s disease but has also had to endure the frustrations that drug regulatory processes inflict on those afflicted by chronic (i.e. currently incurable) and debilitating illnesses. Bureaucracies such as the FDA, or its European siblings do indeed obstruct access to potentially curative new treatments. The shortcomings Gideon Sofer condemns however, are less due to the « deliberate cruelty » of administrative agents than to the inertia of insensitive policy makers.

The real “patient-killers” are obsolete institutional designs originally designed to protect lay and uninformed citizens of past times but that now lead to therapeutic dead ends while violating patient rights and expectations. Regulatory policies have not adapted to an ever-expanding range of patient information lanes or to the exponential progress of pharmaceutical and medical device industries. Worse, the concepts that guide approval processes fundamentally conflict with research towards genetically guided « custom made » therapy and thus stifle essential medical innovation.

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The market of ideas offers a blueprint that streamlines access to new therapies and brings back health decision-making processes into the hands of those who are primarily affected by such decisions. Bartley Madden, an independent researcher backed by Nobel Price laureate Vernon Smith, has developed a “dual tracking” institutional design that would enable patients such as Gideon Sofer to circumvent lengthy drug approval processes. This model is not designed to replace FDA drug testing but aims to introduce alternate pathways to innovation. It relies: a) on legal and institutional changes that would allow duly informed patients to access to not yet approved curative substances by contracting directly with the producers. b) On an open Tradeoff Evaluation Database necessary to doctor-patient based assessment of risks and potential benefits of taking the fast lane to experimental therapy.

While open databases are currently being developed for orphan diseases and could be easily expanded to cover wider therapeutic fields, an update of legislative frameworks implies change in political mind-sets. In the United States, legislation that accelerates innovation and enhances liberty should theoretically generate bipartisan support… even in health care! The implementation of a “dual tracking” model would stimulate medical progress and help numbers of patients find their way to improvement or cure before it’s too late for them. It would also signal that ailing humans have a right to life and liberty.

Ref: “The FDA is killing Crohn’s patients” by Gideon J. Sofer WSJ Dec. 30, 2008

A Winter Journey to the (Free) Market in Tbilisi

2008-12-17T17:23:00.004+01:00

No tanks. No ruins. Business as usual in Tbilisi. When I say business, I mean free markets.

Georgia's radical move to market in healthcare is bearing fruits. I visited the brand new Aversi Clinic in Tbillisi. Inaugurated in November 08, this private hospital offers a wide range of services, from genetic testing to lithotripsy and laser eye surgery. Its technical equipment was outstanding while the spotless cleanliness would make even Swiss hospitals blush with envy.

The Aversi group was founded an entrepreneurial Georgian paediatrician, Paata Kurtanidze, who teaming with an economist, moved from prescription of medicines to drugstore distribution and then on to pharmaceutic importation and production. The next logical step was the fast paced development of a fully private "state of the art" hospital network. Five modern Aversi hospitals have opened within the past two years, while more than 100 drugstores and medical outlets currently serve 1'200 000 Georgian customers a month!

Aversi not only keeps the prices of its services tuned to market, a confirmed recipe for success, it also caters for low income customers through discount actions and engages in charitable operations: Aversi has offered free cataract surgery to poor patients and has supplied socially deprived children with free medicine. It is one of the motors of a generous health voucher action targeted at 196'000 pensioneers living in Tbiisi and designed to help them cover part of their medical expenses!

Aversi's successful business model demonstrates how in an unhampered medical market, the natural alliance of entrepreneurial medicine with creative pharmaceutical industry yields high quality, ethical, patient-centered medical service accessible to rich and poor. And when I say high quality, I mean high quality even by Swiss standards. If you don’t believe me: invest in a visit to the market in Tbilisi. We'll organize the tour with pleasure.

Systèmes de Santé Malades: Remèdes toxiques et antidotes

2008-07-14T12:17:00.003+02:00

Il y a les médicaments qui tuent le microbe et ceux qui s'attaquent aux symptômes sans agir sur la cause. Nos systèmes d'assurance maladie souffrent du manque de concurrence, entretenu par les groupes de pression qui le contrôlent et du manque de liberté offert à ceux qui le financent et le subissent. Remplacer un cartel de caisses maladie par le monopole d'une assurance "universelle" d'Etat équivaut à injecter dix grammes d'aspirine à un grand malade, sous prétexte que dix comprimés d'un gramme ne l'améliorent pas. Dans les deux cas, la dose est toxique et ne guérit pas le mal: les monopoles ne réduisent généralement ni le gaspillage, ni les dépenses: seul le rationnement devient plus efficace. Les citoyens hélvétiques l'ont compris en refusant massivement en 2007, une inititative socialiste visant à instaurer une caisse d'assurances-maladie unique... et omnipotente; puis en 2008 en refusant de nouvelles restrictions au libre choix du médecin que voulait leur faire avaler le cartel des assureurs.

Les monopoles publics qui violent «le droit à la vie et à l’intégrité de la personne»

Nombreux sont les médecins à déplorer le déluge de lois, réglementations et tracasseries bureaucratiques qui s'abattent sur eux. Ils ne peuvent plus compter sur leurs associations faîtières pour se faire entendre. Aux Etats-Unis la dissidence combattante est incarnée par l'Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, alternative à une American Medical Association fossilisée et incapable de s'opposer à la tyrannie envahissante des programmes étatiques Medicare et Medicaid (qui réunissent plus de 50 manuels de règlements!). Le Canada est souvent cité en exemple par les thuriféraires de la médecine d'Etat. En acceptant le recours d'un tenace médecin montréalais, Jacques Chaoulli — traité jusque là comme un pestiféré par sa propre association médicale — la Cour suprême du Canada a reconnu en 2004 l'illégalité d'un monopole public dont les files d'attente violent «le droit à la vie et à l’intégrité de la personne», garantis par l'article premier de la Charte québécoise des droits et libertés.

Au Royaume-Uni, le cancéreux du colon a 36% de chances de survie à cinq ans (51% en Suisse, 60% aux Etats-Unis). Malgré des dépenses de santé qui passeront de 6,9% à 8,6% du PNB en cinq ans, les insuffisances du National Health Service britannique restent criantes et conduisent des centaines de médecins à exiger, en marge de leurs associations officielles, la libéralisation en profondeur de leur système de santé.

Comptes d'épargne et secteur social privé

Les alternatives libérales existent. Les comptes d’épargne santé qui commencent à éclore ici et là montrent l’une des voies à suivre: ils offrent aux individus la possibilité de reprendre le contrôle de leurs dépenses médicales et obligent les prestataires de soins à adapter offre et tarifs à la demande du marché. Sur le front pharmaceutique, une défiscalisation audacieuse aurait un effet largement plus efficace sur le coût des médicaments que la promotion obsessionnelle de génériques qui ne profite qu’aux copieurs et coupe les ailes aux chercheurs. En parallèle, le développement du secteur social privé, comme de la philanthropie et de l’entraide volontaire, offrirait des solutions aux personnes de condition modeste. En reconnaissant ouvertement l’échec de la solidarité forcée, l’Etat ouvrirait ainsi le champ à un secteur aussi accessible que dynamique.

Aussi longtemps que l’on refusera de remettre fondamentalement en question la collectivisation de nos systèmes de santé, l’effet des réformettes concoctées dans les fioles législatives ne dépassera guère celui de l’acide acétylsalicylique. Mais l'analogie est sans doute injuste: notre bonne vieille aspirine a au moins la vertu de soulager le mal de tête.