Chickenpox

Instapundit has a small blurb about parents mailing each other items infected with the chicken pox virus so they can time their child's illness. All of which is in lieu of having the child vaccinated and places the public at risk because of course the items in question are not packaged as biohazardous material.

What they haven't realized is that you can get a follow up disease later on in life if you had chicken pox as child. Little Mary or Johnny will sure be happy that they got that nasty dose of shingles. Of course Mumsy and Popsicle are probably dead by the time their grown up tots start experiencing some of the worst pain known to medicine.

I really, really hope this turns out to be an Internet hoax.

Homeopathy Works

Robb Allen has proof.

Monopoly

Medical costs have risen faster than in inflation in the US on average for the past thirty years. Oddly enough, the total number of medical school graduates in 1976 (table 1) were 13,634. The total number in 2008 were 16,130. The number of graduates in 1976 was 218,035,000. In 2008 it was 303,824,640. While the American population grew by 85,789,640 (39%) and, even more importantly aged. The total number of new graduates increased by only 2,496 (18%). And most of that growth was in the mid-seventies.

Want to lower the cost of medical care, increase your odds of speaking with a real doctor and allow more people to be able to have a doctor? Increase the number of doctors. It's just a matter of supply and demand. No need for socialized medicine (a/k/a medical rationing) at all.

The AMA has traditionally argued that increasing the supply of doctors would lower medical skill. However, the AMA is a guild and has, at heart, the members interests first and foremost in their priorities. Fewer doctors mean higher fees.

Perhaps we shouldn't be listening to the AMA on the subject of supply and demand. Seems more like a job for an economist.

{edited}

TANSTAAFL

With our aging population socialized medicine is looking more and more attractive to huge swaths of voters. The idea of course being that they could continue to receive the same level and quality of health care as before and have some one else pay for it.

Only things aren't all that rosy over in the UK.