Edwards health care quickie

Sometimes John Edwards almost reaches the level of self-parody when talking about the “two Americas” while building himself a 28000 sq. ft house, etc. Today he got some deserved catcalls from Morrissey and Althouse, especially for his plan to add mandatory mental health testing to his universal health plan. (Mirror, mirror, on the wall….)

But this all got me to thinking a bit about health and health plans, something with which I am sympathetic because, well, I am getting on and, as the Yiddish bubbes famously said “So long as you’re healthy, it’s the main thing.” And who can dispute that?

Or, as another man once said, we are endowed with certain inalienable rights – “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” – only the latter two aren’t worth much without the former. So, call it what you will, it’s kind of disgraceful fifty million Americans don’t have health insurance – what with the USA spending more on medical care than any other country, something like sixteen percent of GNP.

But what to do, what to do…. aye, there’s the rub. Well, what about Switzerland? Those guys with the cuckoo clock – you know, the ones Orson Welles made fun of in The Third Man. They have a plan that seems to be working pretty well…. or maybe I’m misinformed (and there are only seven million or so of them, so it’s nowhere near as tricky). But you can read about it here: Swiss health-care system might serve as model for U. S. And guess what? It’s all private, it costs less money and they did it without John Edwards. (All good in my view). I only have one question – are you allowed to eat cheese? Because my cardiologist says absolutely no. [Fire him.-ed. I’m planning on it.]

UPDATE: Regarding the Swiss system, reader Dennis Vogt sent the following email:

Some years ago I was at a dinner party in Zurich with a group of Swiss docs. I am a US lawyer. The key features of their system, which wasn’t covered in your post was this. All docs are employees of the healthcare delivery organization and there are no malpractice lawsuits. Poor practitioners are assigned to something safe like doing autopsies or admin work. They all agreed the salaries they got were more than acceptable particularly since all they had to do was practice medicine. They didn’t have to be in business or worry at all about back office management issues. To a person, they said they wouldn’t trade what they had for more money in America with all the attendant grief. Don’t know whether Swiss still do this but would be worth checking out. It is certainly a distinction which makes a hugedifference and explains some of their success.