Born and raised in Canada, I am all too familiar with the “compassion” of government-run health care—the waiting lists, the shortages of physicians, the pain and suffering.
There are, of course, profound differences between Canadian and American health care. But the direction of American health reform—toward greater government intervention—is unsettlingly familiar. It’s like watching a car accident unfold in front of me: a series of small events, leading to a disastrous final conclusion. I wanted to write a book to outline a different path, one in which we emphasize choice and competition. The book considers how to reduce health expenses but increase quality, insure millions along the way, and shore up Medicare.
Inspiration for The Cure
I learned my most important lesson in medical school, not in a classroom, but on the way to one. On a cold, Canadian morning about a decade ago, late for a class, I cut through a hospital emergency room, and came upon dozens of people on stretchers—waiting, moaning, begging for treatment. Some elderly patients had waited for up to five days in corridors before being admitted to beds. They smelled of urine and sweat. As I navigated past the bodies, I began to question everything I thought I knew about health care—not only in Canada, but also in the United States. In fact, though I didn’t know it then, I had begun a journey into the heart of one of the policy disasters of modern times.
So begins The Cure, literally at the beginning of my story—when, as a Canadian medical student who supported HillaryCare, I began to reconsider my views on health care. Today, I work in the United States and I have had time to think long and hard about American health care. I’ve also had conversations with senior administration officials, economists, advocacy group directors, executives, doctors, patients, and others.
This book asks the most basic questions: If medicine is better than ever, why are we so dissatisfied with our health care? And why is it so expensive? Why are millions uninsured, and how can we help them? What to make of Medicare and Medicaid?
The Cure provides answers. Not—thank goodness—in the dry way that too many policy books are written. But, instead, with stories and anecdotes. After all, health care is personal—shouldn’t a book on this topic also be?
In The Cure, we look at ways to infuse the system with choice and competition today, thereby giving working families more control over their health care, insuring millions presently without coverage, revamping Medicaid and Medicare, and making the FDA work better so that pharmaceuticals are safer and more affordable. Most of these solutions—a how-to guide for policymakers—are nonpartisan, having been embraced, at some point, by both Republican and Democratic politicians.
We also consider the often-touted “solution”: government-run health care. Far from providing meaningful solutions, public systems are rife with politics and ever-intrusive bureaucracies. In fact, realizing these problems, governments are working to privatize health care in countries like Britain, Sweden and France.
Finally, with an eye on the future, we outline 3 bold ideas that would completely change American health care—and would ultimately save the Treasury money. We consider eliminating the huge tax subsidy that supports employer-based coverage and replace it with a system of portable insurance; returning the FDA to its original mandate of approving drugs for safety (but not for efficacy), thus creating a market for medical progress; and shoring up Medicare, America’s largest unfunded liability.
