Say Anything Blog

And some of us are still trying to tell the proponents of universal health care the same thing about government-run hospitals and clinic.

“How Veteran Hospitals Became the Best in Health Care”
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1376238-1,00.html

“For the sixth year in a row, VA hospitals last year scored higher than private facilities on the University of Michigan’s American Customer Satisfaction Index… Males 65 years and older receiving VA care had about a 40% lower risk of death than those enrolled in Medicare Advantage, whose care is provided through private health plans or HMOs… Harvard University just gave the VA its Innovations in American Government Award for the agency’s work in computerizing patient records.

And all that was achieved at a relatively low cost. In the past 10 years, the number of veterans receiving treatment from the VA has more than doubled, from 2.5 million to 5.3 million, but the agency has cared for them with 10,000 fewer employees. The VA’s cost per patient has remained steady during the past 10 years. The cost of private care has jumped about 40% in that same period.”

Woah Rob, check that headline.

It failed because of the Wi-Max effect.  Wi-Max will eventually deem Wi-Fi obsoloete.  I think they did the right thing.  Wi-Fi is a dying technology.

And all that was achieved at a relatively low cost. In the past 10 years, the number of veterans receiving treatment from the VA has more than doubled, from 2.5 million to 5.3 million, but the agency has cared for them with 10,000 fewer employees.

The scale is different.  Veterans seeking care from the VA is a fraction of America’s overall population.

Also, the VA benefits from operating within a free market system which acts as a relief valve for people who can’t get care from the VA.  The VA can outsource the needs of some patients to private hospitals/clinics.  If we had national health care that “relief valve” wouldn’t exist.

Woah Rob, check that headline.

Whoops.  Sorry about that!

Rob’s recently listened-to songs:

You know, you can tell a lot about a business plan when it specifically requires public funding.  Specifically, you can tell that it won’t work.  I believe that St. Louis Park here in the Twin Cities had about the same experience; evidently the geniuses putting it together didn’t count on the fact that there were trees and rain in the city, and that caused so many outages,the whole thing imploded.

It didn’t help, either, that the city insisted on solar powered transmitter stations--generally mounted whole YARDS away from the power available on their city light poles.  Silicon is a cool way of getting electricity, but it ain’t exactly well advised when you can get juice from the grid.  (great way of blowing your budget, though)