79-15-6

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Health Care

Transcript The advocates of government medicine in our country are still at it and one could say probably closer than ever to achieving their goal of compulsory socialized medicine. One can't help but wonder why oh why they won't open their eyes and really look at how government-run medicine is doing in countries that already have it. Our British cousins in the United Kingdom are most often cited as an example of why we should socialize the entire health care field. But what are the British doing while all this praise is being heaped upon them? They're trying to get back to the kind of private, fee for service medicine we have here in the U.S.--that's what they are doing. The British Electrical and Plumbing Trades Union has just negotiated an additional fringe benefit for its 45,000 members and their families: Nothing less than a complete package of private health care benefits. And they aren't alone. The automobile association will soon be offering its 5.3 million members a new plan guaranteeing private medical care whenever admission to a National Health Service Hospital takes more than six weeks. Such a wait, I might add, is rather normal in old blighty. Another firm IBM, has just bought private health insurance for all its 15,000 employees in England. Now all of this doesn't mean England's massive tax-supported National Health service is being discontinued. It just means that people are willing to pay if they can get treatment more quickly, choose their own doctors and hospitals and have such other amenities as private rooms. Britain now has eight private health plans along the line of our own Blue Cross. They have two-and-a-half million members and are adding 100,000 a year. Because of this there has been an expansion of purely private medical facilities. The number of private hospitals is increasing 10 percent a year. An American company, American Medical International, Inc. is investing $85 million in seven new private hospitals in England and Wales. And we can expect even more because the Conservative government of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher is expected to restore the tax exemption for worker of some $110 million in employer financed health plans. The Labor party had imposed the tax to discourage the growth of private health care. It's easy to see why private health care is growing even in the face of the so-called "free" government care. There are three-fourths of a million people on the waiting list of the Nationalized Health Program for operations such as hernias, gallstones, hip replacements, varicose veins--even tonsillectomies. Indeed children are waiting as long as three years to have their tonsils out. Britain has had 30 years to make its government medical program work. What is happening there is typical of other nations with government health plans. Shouldn't we profit by their experience and not follow them down the road of socialized medicine? This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening.		Details Batch Number 79-15-6 Production Date 10/25/1979 Book/Page RihoH-369 Audio Youtube? No
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