Health Reform and Cancer

[dgriffin]

Wall Street Journal

Health Reform and Cancer


"The danger is that ObamaCare will stifle medical innovations that could save patients like me. Patient-as-person will be a lost concept under the new health-care plan, where treatments will be based not upon individual patient needs, but upon what’s best for everyone. So cancer drugs for seniors might take second place to jungle gyms and farmers’ markets—so-called preventive care—which are covered under both the House and Senate versions of the health bill. "

By MYRNA ULFIK

I have been battling non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, an incurable blood cancer, for the past nine years. Last year, I was also diagnosed with uterine cancer.

I didn’t run to Canada for treatment. Medicare took care of my needs right here in New York City. To endure, I just need the freedom to choose my insurance, my doctors, and get the diagnostic scans and care I need. And one more thing: I need hope that a treatment will be developed that can control my diseases the way insulin controls diabetes.

Every cancer patient needs these things, especially hope. But the government’s plan to reform the health-care system in this country threatens all of this—particularly the development of new treatments.

When I was first diagnosed in 2000 I had chemotherapy. It put me in remission, but nearly killed me.

Three years later the lymphoma was back and I faced more chemo. This is so often the pattern of cancer: recurring disease and repeated chemo. In the end patients often die not from the disease, but from the treatments.

I took a different path, seeking a cancer vaccine. One had been developed at Stanford University 12 years earlier that had given 90% of patients very long remissions and cured some entirely. Unlike chemotherapy, there were no severe side effects.

CONTINUED:

online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204886304574306693989102298.html?mod=googlenews_wsj


I think she hits the nail on the head. It isn't the bureaucracy of socialized medicine that is so worrisome ... we have that today with the insurance companies ... it's the "good of the many, best use of funds" concept that could kill you.

[chris]

A friend of mine sent me this link:

www.ncregister.com/daily/health_care_duty_to_die/#When

Just as scarry. Is this where we are heading???

[dgriffin]

I think it is indeed where we are headed and I'm not surprised. The days of rugged individualism are gone. But so are the days when we left the disabled, the poor and the hungry by the side of the road to fend for themselves. Only a truly innovative, thoughtful and mature society can tend to the needs of its citizens without trampling on their rights and expectations. And that society also needs to be wealthy. We are becoming less affluent in the western world. As for intelligence and maturity, I give you the media coverage of Michael Jackson, the television industry in general and the corrupted oligarchy of the State of New York.

I think people of my generation have a false sense of the world. We grew up during an unprecedented period of boom years for the economy. Also, the march of technology during my lifetime has been stunning, although probably not as much so as for my parents, who began with horses and passed on more than a decade after the Moon Rover. And we may have been the first generation to really believe what we were taught in Social Studies classes about America, Land of the Free and the Brave. The goverment as benefactor. Because of a real life experience in penury, I think my father knew as a child what the Brothers taught him was idealized. I didn't. I thought it was all true.

So we believe any difficulty can be solved. But since we're busy running down to Best Buy or tuning in to American Idol, we hand over to officialdom the problems we used to solve by ourselves in our neighborhoods and churches and homes. It's true that many situations are better solved by larger groups of participants, but the cost will eventually include the drive for efficiency.

[concerned]

The completion to the cycle of death within the law of abortion logically leadt to Euthansia.

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6293695.stm

Eight out of ten of people support a law change to allow doctors to actively end the lives of terminally ill patients who want to die, a poll shows.

cannella.tumblr.com/post/130628722/euthanasia-discussion
Here is the artical:

The fact that death can be painful, long known to man. There were stories in some ways to solve this problem, such as «the dagger of mercy». But all these were cases of private, no new laws or the public will not buzz.

But the last 40-45 years, the debate on euthanasia is not terminated, the intensity of the discussion is growing, from the public, she moved to the area of political, there are countries and territories, which have laws that permit euthanasia. Recently a law approved by the Parliament of Luxembourg, there were similar attacks in the Netherlands, Belgium and in the U.S. state of Oregon.

What are the causes of this process? In order not to go deep in a difficult ideological dispute, try to only trace the main stages of formation and tolerance to euthanasia in a society. The first society in support of euthanasia occurred in 1934 in England and 1935 in the United States. The activities of these associations has been theoretical. Task was simple: the release of public consciousness of such Christian «bias», as the ban on murder and suicide. The next round of discussion has arisen in the 60-ies. in connection with the emergence and success of the first reanimatology. There were issues of professional practice: How long a person alive and continue reanimation? Supporters of euthanasia can not miss this good case: Why have you, doctors, human suffering? Give quietly die. This was a new word in medical ethics and deontology. It turned out that the struggle for the life of the patient and not so sacred duty doctor. The struggle for the liberation of pro-euthanasia of torment unendurable pain bogey «unbearable suffering», in which doctors condemn the patient for many years were the main arguments in debates and discussions.

An interesting detail: in the debate on euthanasia is almost always involved the priests of the world’s main faiths - Christianity and Islam. Everyone knows that the two faiths do not accept euthanasia, and such participation does not cause issues. But all is not so simple. Arguments cleric, by definition can not have at least some relevance to human unbeliever, for the atheist, or as they like to call themselves, know-nothing. Among the supporters of euthanasia is not faithful. Consequently, and a common theoretical framework does not exist. References to God for the agnostic can not have values, and for believing that the main arguments. Why are these meetings and debates not be terminated? The point is that the reasoning agnostics since the Montaigne is not only irreligious, but knowingly and voluntarily is a totally anti. Protection of faith and an attack on it - this is the real basis for settlement of believers and agnostics, and euthanasia - it is one of the many reasons for this never-ending battle.

Russia is still at the very beginning of the liberalization of society. The results of public opinion polls coincide with the results of many developed countries, 30-40-year-old. But 20% of respondents had already firmly believe that euthanasia is necessary. Many fear that the adoption of the law on euthanasia in our country is impossible, because we have very weak enforcement of laws and habits of a very good experience and corrupt violations. «Here in the civilized countries …» - a very common saying. Since the information from the pillars, and a beacon of liberalism, and civilization can be found, we can refer to it.

Netherlands, «Overview of the five-year experience»: 27% of the doctors conducting euthanasia on demand, 72% of Doctors usually falsified death certificate indicating the cause of natural death. The interval between treatment and the conduct of euthanasia in 13% of the cases was less than one day in 35% of cases - a week (according to the law - two months). In 22% of cases it was a one-time request (by law they should be four, two of them written). In 12% of cases the doctor or who did not discuss the treatment the patient (according to the law - with three doctors).

«Report of the Department of Health» Oregon: none of the patients who were provided medical assistance in committing suicide, there was no evidence of uncontrolled pain. Most of the patients who insisted on euthanasia, suffering from loneliness, misunderstanding the situation, totally dependent on others.

According to «The International Working Group on euthanasia» (www.euthanasia.com), in all countries where euthanasia is available in one form or another, in 70% of cases initiated are the relatives of patients. Repeated polls have shown that most patients dying of incurable do not support euthanasia.

Ludwig Minelli, founder of the Swiss clinic Dignitas, where you can escape from life, demands that he was allowed to apply euthanasia of patients suffering from depression. At the request of the patient, of course.

«Euthanasia» translated «good death». The majority assumes that the person doing the shot and he dies painlessly in his sleep. In practice, not so. The man who can breathe only with the help of a special apparatus, painful to die from asphyxiation when the disconnect device. Terry Shiavo (Theresa Schindler), where euthanasia has been permitted in the United States a special court decision, died three weeks after it ceased to feed. Is this a good death?

Euthanasia - not a medical issue and not scientific, but ethical and - when it comes to religious people - the religious. Insistent promotion of euthanasia has an economic foundation. Maintenance of life of patients with severe indeed require more resources. And so - no man, no problem. But the main objective of promoting euthanasia - it is the institution assess «gravity» of human life. In fact, it is a matter of introducing the category «bad» or «impossible» life. But such an assessment will always remain subjective, and it may be subjected to any living.

[concerned]

Here is part of another artical from SOMA.http://www.soma.on.ca/SOMA37/committees/HRC%20001%20Euthanasia.doc

The end of the artical discusses the legality in the countries and USA States that allow euthansia:

Euthanasia is illegal in most countries. There are some countries that permit euthanasia, though usually in a limited manner. These countries are Belgium, Luxemburg, the Netherlands, Switzerland, the American states of Oregon and Washington, the Autonomous Region of Andalusia in Spain, and Thailand . Each place has its own set of rules and regulations regarding euthanasia. For example, in Oregon, a person requesting euthanasia must follow a specific set of requirements: the patient must be a resident of Oregon, be over 18 years of age, must make 2 oral and 1 written requests for euthanasia, and 15 days must pass between the documentation of the first and the last request . The patient must also be terminally ill with a life expectancy of less than 6 months and a second consultant physician must confirm this prognosis . Both doctors must also confirm that the patient is capable of making this decision. The patient must self-administer the lethal medication . In the Netherlands, euthanasia and assisted suicide are both crimes. The doctor is exempt if the patient has requested to die, is genuinely suffering and there is no other reasonable solution. In no country in the world are all forms of euthanasia legal .

[dgriffin]

Interesting. By the way, who is Canella and why is he posting in English, a language he obviously has little command over.

A few years ago, I saw a program on PBS that took the viewer through each step of a Dutch man's chemical suicide at home, assisted by a doctor. It appeared much more sane than a person dying a terrible death of cancer. Also, I remember listening to a program on BBC Radio around that same year where the host interviewed a British man who had beaten cancer and a woman of some religious background from the US. The man was concerned that his cancer might return. He remembered all he had gone through, and at all costs wanted to avoid a repetition of that experience in the future. His plan was to hop a plane to the Nederlands where he had pre-arranged his suicide at a clinic. Presenting for the opposition, all the woman could offer were nice words about the sanctity of life.

Probably a classically unfair setup of a debate, but the point is that when a patient has had enough, only he or she can make the decision to end his life, not a theologian or a politician or a bureaucrat. That this man could suffer in horrible pain and be kept alive against his will while the woman sits comfortably around playing God is unthinkable.

And yup, JP2's "Culture of Death" arguments certainly ring out clear, but all that might be better left at the sick room door.

[dgriffin]

By the way, I can't imagine Teddy Kennedy hasn't made some arrangement with his physicians to end his life mercifully. Of course I have no evidence, but you'd never convince me that a merciful death for the rich and powerful can't be had much easier than it would for me. So, as a US Senator, he not only has much better medical coverage than I, he also gets a free ride to eternity! hahahahaha!

[concerned]

lol

[Clipper]

Unless he has done some serious repenting since being diagnosed, he will get a free ride alright. His ride will be to that special place where most of our senators and congressmen have spots reserved. Wear short sleeves and bring a fan Teddy boy!