Blog Shout Out: John J. Ray, Ph.D.

This is probably as apropos a time as any for me to send a shout out to a blogger I've followed for a long time. Most curious.

You see, John's a doctor, originally from Britain where they already have socialized medicine, now way over down under in Australia where they also already have socialized medicine. And he kinda doesn't like it. And he tells us all about it as a warning to this Last Best Hope. Unlike the debate here, he presents his side in an almost painfully stoic tone, letting facts speak for themselves.

Check it out here: http://socglory.blogspot.com/

You'll run into discussions that just might make ya go "aha" like this did for me:

The reason ... is the profusion of mandatory minimum coverages state
governments require to be included in health insurance policies sold within
their states’ borders. This results in residents being forced into uniformly
high-priced, coverage-heavy “Cadillac” insurance policies as a result of state
law, not their own choice.

While there is no doubt these coverages are both useful to and desired by some consumers, all insured residents of the Ocean State are forced to pay for asthma ed and IVF insurance, even if they aren’t potential consumers of either. Rhode Islanders’ premiums are is also higher than they otherwise would be because every policy sold there is required by law to cover the cost of smoking cessation, hair prosthesis, and acupuncture – along with 65 other treatments, procedures, and conditions.

Or this one:

the drug Avastin is widely used in America to treat advanced colon cancer.
But it costs $50,000 a year -- so Canada's national-health system doesn't permit
its use. As a result, 41 percent of colon-cancer patients in Canada die each
year, as opposed to 32 percent in the United States. (Canada's average
eight-month wait for colonoscopies, another result of national-health rationing,
also contributes to the problem.)

Or this one I totally didn't expect from him:

The Post Office Factor. Americans are deeply cynical about government's ability to do anything right. Putting a man on the moon, building an interstate-highway
system, fielding history's most lethal army -- nothing has changed that. Even
Mr. Obama makes jokes about how standing in line at the post office has
convinced him he doesn't want the government running private firms.