By
It’s coming. Health care reform, Round II.
Republicans pledged to do it as part of their manifesto during the midterm election campaigns. And House Speaker John Boehner, less than a day after the elections, vowed that the GOP would “do everything we can to try to repeal this bill and replace it with common sense reforms to bring down the cost of health care.”
But why was this such a high priority? The lack of cost controls? Unfunded state mandates? Questions surrounding federal funding of abortions? Well, yes, but the go-to critique of health care reform can be summed up in one word:
Rationing.
Recently, as part of a response to the FDA revoking its approval for a late-stage breast cancer drug, several key Republicans criticized this kind of rationing, but set their sights on a much bigger target:
“Unfortunately, this is only just the beginning,” they continued. “The new health reform law — the so-called Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act — creates 159 new boards, commissions and agencies that will destroy the doctor-patient relationship and replace it with federal bureaucrats deciding who gets care and what treatments they can receive,” The Hill’s Jason Millman reported.
And the GOP will have backing in this effort from a pro-life Christian base crying out against ‘euthanasia’ and ‘death panels’ in the new health care law.
But this attitude refuses to admit two undeniable truths about human existence:
We have virtually unlimited health care needs. (All of us will die some day.)
We have limited health care resources. (There is a finite amount of ‘stuff’ out there.)
We will never not be rationing health care. Any other conclusion misunderstands the human condition.
