Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site cybvax0.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!harvard!think!mit-eddie!cybvax0!mrh From: mrh@cybvax0.UUCP (Mike Huybensz) Newsgroups: net.politics.theory Subject: Re: Credentials, State vs. private Message-ID: <756@cybvax0.UUCP> Date: Mon, 16-Sep-85 16:36:33 EDT Article-I.D.: cybvax0.756 Posted: Mon Sep 16 16:36:33 1985 Date-Received: Fri, 20-Sep-85 00:37:01 EDT References: <1208@ihlpg.UUCP> <4297@alice.UUCP> <750@cybvax0.UUCP> <568@x.UUCP> Reply-To: mrh@cybvax0.UUCP (Mike Huybensz) Organization: Cybermation, Inc., Cambridge, MA Lines: 44 Summary: In article <568@x.UUCP> wjr@x.UUCP (STella Calvert) writes: > No, no, no! I will be carrying (probably on the back of my medicalert > necklace) a toll-free number to notify my medicare plan that I am in need of > service. That plan will have some qualified (by my standards) personnel on > the scene as soon after I call (or you as my agent) as I am willing to pay > for. Response time is important. So is quality of care. I'll pay for both, > and make it easy (dial 1 100 MED HELP) for you to carry out my wishes. But I > will have chosen the flavor of medical care I want before I need it. If you > find me without my tag, I will possibly suffer for my error as you take me to > the brand of doctor you think best, so be assured, I will be wearing that tag. If you are rich enough to afford that sort of medical service, you can buy it right now. The only thing that might make it slightly more expensive is that you still need real doctors. People who can't afford high medical premiums (many plans cost about $2000 a year) will still have difficulty. Assuming a real libertaria, then your flavor of medicine is quite likely to be Dr. Smith's Astrological Aura Manipulation. Once you remove medicine and medical practice from regulation, you end up with the full spectrum of snake oil and other fraud, only now with better advertising. Look at all the people who use fraudulent (unregulated and sometimes lethal) diet plans. Advertising dollars generate much better profits than research or training dollars, and advertising reaches a much larger audience than product comparisons. If you were brought up within a libertaria, bombarded with propaganda and counterpropaganda, with no statistics you could trust, you would probably pick a popular, well advertised quackery. After all, it would probably be cheaper than the best medicine. Kidney machines too expensive? Oh, then they're bad for the aura. Pills cheap? They brighten the aura. And let's not forget the addictive "health" prescriptions, whose ingredients need not be divulged. But wait, you need psychic surgery for your muffler bearing (oops, that was the "doctor"'s previous employment.) > I will also be paying, in my premiums, for the right to call my plan if I > encounter a John Doe who does not appear to have medical coverage. Very generous of you. I'm sure that your provider will provide enough disincentives to reign your generosity in, and thus prevent your distribution of medical services to everyone in libertaria. -- Mike Huybensz ...decvax!genrad!mit-eddie!cybvax0!mrh