His recent article for the Huffington Post, Time to Just Say No to Giant Corporate "Parasites" -- and Recognize Them for What They Are, is a brilliant commentary on the state of business and government relationships in the modern age. He gives several examples of huge bureaucratic entities that exist for no other purposes than to create billable hours and to suck down tax money while performing simple government functions that the government should in fact be doing, and doing with much greater efficacy.

Of course, one of the examples happens to be private health insurance, the worst parasite of all.

Read more.

Sounds like a movie script. Giant parasites stalk the American landscape disguised as benign upstanding participants in the "free market."

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In fact, there are a number of major corporations in America who do very little productive work -- never making products or delivering services that benefit their consumers. Instead, the profits they earn and the big CEO salaries they pay are derived by sucking or skimming a portion of the dollars they have convinced the Government to send through their corporate accounts -- generally to perform a function that is or ought to be an inherently governmental function.

Ironically, many of these corporate parasites are the loudest defenders of "free markets" and the most vociferous opponents of "government takeovers," when in fact they exist by feeding off the taxpayers.

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-creamer/time-to-just-say-no-to-gi_b_291102.html

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-creamer/time-to-just-say-no-to-gi_b_291102.html

Dr. Lundberg makes excellent tactical suggestions and gives specific examples of costly procedures and practices, and how they should be handled differently.

However, Dr. Lundberg focuses this article on the power of the doctor/patient relationship.

I believe that there are still many ethical and professional American physicians and many intelligent American patients who are capable of, in an alliance of patients and physicians, doing "the right things." Their combined clout is being underestimated in the current debate on healthcare reform.

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An alliance of informed patients and physicians can widely apply recently learned comparative effectiveness science to big-ticket items, saving vast sums while improving quality of care.

What Dr. Lundberg fails to address here is the cost-savings and improved quality of care that could result from a greater focus on behavior management and lifestyle changes.

Many of the most costly disease states in the US (such as diabetes, obesity, heart disease, and colorectal cancers) could have their prevelance drastically reduced, as well as minimizing the number of costly procedures associated with complications of those disease states, if Americans simply took a better approach to preventive medicine -- which means eating right and exercising more. This is something many Americans are adverse towards, because they are coddled by allopathic medicine and taught to expect a "magic bullet" of a cure, in drug or surgical form, which will solve their problem.

Many problems, from cancer to depression, could be helped by this magic bullet: avoid processed foods, eat lots of fruits and veggies, eat only clean-sourced organic meats, and get some exercise everyday.

It's not rocket science. It's just not as sexy for the medical community or the media to talk about these things. We need to change that. The power of the physician/patient relationship CAN change that, so we should all focus on empowering that small change.

The idea that humans are changing the global climate system was first developed, elaborated and demonstrated by natural scientists. The scientific evidence backing this basic idea is now overwhelming, even if scientific predictions of future climate changes are still shrouded in uncertainty.

But although science is very good at revealing how things are, and suggesting what physical manifestations might follow a particular course of action, it has limited relevance and reach when deciding what should be done in the face of complex dilemmas — such as climate change.

Oh, but that's right. Their placated by the drugs so many of them are taking for their myriad of health conditions. Wake up people! In a civilized society provide universal healthcare should not be so difficult.

Here's an idea: I'll start a weekly post on the topic until the day comes we actually have a progressive and useful healthcare system that's putting individual health first and foremost--and not coporate profits.

So, for Why We Need Health Reform ¦ 1, may a please direct your attention to a quote Erika Gebel's article on Medscape Today

"Obesity, and with it diabetes, are the only major health problems that are getting worse in this country," said Thomas Frieden, MD, director of the CDC. "This is the first time the CDC has provided a comprehensive approach to obesity prevention and control."

"Childhood obesity has become an obsession of mine," said former president Bill Clinton, who gave the conference's keynote address.

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In his speech, Mr. Clinton announced newly released figures indicating that obesity may have cost the United States $147 billion in 2008 — a sharp increase over the estimated $78.5 billion cost in 1998. The study, published in the journal Health Affairs, showed that an obese (body mass index, >30 kg/m²) person spends $1429 more per year on healthcare than the roughly $3400 per year spent by a normal-weight (body mass index, 18.5 – 25 kg/m²) person with similar characteristics.

It's fine if healthcare if for profit. But, then the profits should be fed back into the system for rewarding practitioners, funding studies, and improving care.

In a recent article in the Huffington Post, Bill Maher talks about how rehabilitating prisoners is bad for business, how news has become The Beverly Hillbillies, and how healthcare has turned into a Jiffy Lube.

Did you know, for example, that there was a time when being called a "war profiteer" was a bad thing?

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The more people who get sick and need medicine, the higher their profit margins. Which is why they're always pushing the Jell-O.Because medicine is now for-profit we have things like "recision," where insurance companies hire people to figure out ways to deny you coverage when you get sick, even though you've been paying into your plan for years.

When did the profit motive become the only reason to do anything? When did that become the new patriotism?

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If conservatives get to call universal health care "socialized medicine," I get to call private health care "soulless vampires making money off human pain." The problem with President Obama's health care plan isn't socialism, it's capitalism.

What disturbs me most is when I hear people with diabetes say they didn't realize that there could be complications associated with the disease. While diabetes can be managed well in most cases, there are serious complications that can present themselves when someone doesn't work towards better blood sugar control.

The Newton Daily News had a good article examining diabetes myths. Understanding the myths that surround diabetes are one good way to raise awareness, so if you're interested, please check out the article.

Diabetes complications are not inevitable. The studies mentioned before — the UKPDS and DCCT — have shown that complication can be delayed and even prevented with good blood sugar control. As we teach in our Diabetes Self Management Education program here at Skiff, diabetes is a serious, common, costly but a controllable disease. There are many things people with diabetes can do to live a full life while preventing or delaying complications.

Why act now? Well, let's turn to some real reporting from the NYTimes and David Leonhardt:

The United States now devotes one-sixth of its economy to medicine. Divvy that up, and health care will cost the typical household roughly $15,000 this year, including the often-invisible contributions by employers. That is almost twice as much as two decades ago (adjusting for inflation). It’s about $6,500 more than in other rich countries, on average.

Andrew Hyman and Jarrod Moses do a good job of sticking to the issue, being fair, and not buying into the pseudo-journalist hijinks. Though, I'm not sure why an entertainment mogul like Jarrod Moses is being interviewed about healthcare? Thoughts? Maybe Fox needed someone and he was available? Mayhaps a connection based decision? I don't question his POV and he seems knowledgeable. But why him?