By Teri Ong
The Democrats in Congress and in the White House have promised us that we will have some sort of nationalized health care plan before the next congressional recess. I hope they have over-estimated their ability to pull off such a feat because it will mean nothing but trouble down the line if they get their way.
How can there not be trouble? The demand for care is only limited by the number of people on our soil, but the supply is greatly limited by the number of caregivers available, and severely limited by the amount of money available to pay the caregivers. Some will inevitably receive care while others do not, but everyone will have to pay, whether they want to or not.
And it will be the Devil we pay!
Do you remember the infamous remark made by former Governor Richard Lamm of Colorado way back in the 1980’s? The part that lives in my memory is “the elderly have a duty to die.” Lamm, at the time, was almost universally denounced as an extremist. I also remember reading a book called Winterflight by an author whose name escapes my memory around that same time. It was the story of a handicapped child and an elderly grandparent who eventually committed suicide in order to avoid the organ harvesting that would take place when they checked themselves into a hospital for government- mandated euthanasia. You see, organs were the only things of value that the old and sick could offer to society; they were not worth the public expense of keeping them alive any more.
The book with the very grim plot and theme did not become a best seller. It was probably written by some Christian reactionary who was using hyperbole to make a political point!
So where are we thirty years later?
In a town meeting last week, President Obama was explaining “the public option” to a group of citizens. During the Q&A session, one woman expressed how it had been hard for her to find a doctor who would accept Medicare to give her mother a relatively inexpensive heart procedure. She had eventually found a doctor, and her mother five years later was living a healthy, happy life. In response, President Obama replied that those types of medical decisions would all have to be looked at carefully, and that in some cases it would probably be better if the person went home, took some pain killers, and didn’t have surgery. It sounded like his prescription for universal coverage was, “Take two aspirin and don’t bother calling anyone in the morning.”
I was stunned! It reminded me of the words Charles Dickens put in the mouth of one of his most cold-hearted characters– Ebenezer Scrooge. When confronted with the need for Christian charity to relieve the suffering of the sick and poor, Scrooge replied, “Are there no prisons?.. and the Union workhouses? Are they still in operation?” The men of benevolence respond, “Many can’t go there; and many would rather die.” To which Scrooge rejoins, “… they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population!”
If all of the handicapped and sick people in America were to “roll over and really die,” it would help bail out the government in a couple of ways: 1) The health care “crisis” would be solved, and 2) we wouldn’t need “cap and trade” because dead people don’t make very many carbon footprints. Maybe this is the ulterior motive of the left!
Statistically, half of the dollars we spend on health care over our lifetime are spent in the last week or two of life. People who are about to die of “old age” related diseases typically require heroic measures to try and stave off the inevitable. Joel Belz wrote an insightful column in the July 18, 2009 World Magazine about an 88-year old Christian lady who just found out she has cancer. She is looking at her disease as her ticket to heaven. She is not planning to try and eke out a few more months by having surgeries and treatments. I admire her “freedom from fear.”
When I had breast cancer at age 32, I went through a normal course of surgery and chemo-therapy. I have been cancer-free for 22 years. At the time, I watched a PBS special on people who were going through extreme experimental treatments for cancer. Some of them made it through, and some of them were probably killed by the treatments as much as by the disease. My oldest daughter, who was six at the time, was watching this saga of pain and suffering along with me. She asked, “Mommy, would you do anything to stay alive?” I didn’t want her to think that I would give up easily on staying around to be her mommy, but I had to tell her that there were a great many things I would not do to stay on this earth.
Post-cancer I had four more children who are now 13 to 20 years old. I hope to stay healthy at least long enough to see them all raised to adulthood and starting their own families. But I could die tomorrow falling down the stairs. Even if we have things we would like to do in life, there are no guarantees of a next breath, no matter how much we spend on our “health.”
Belz points out that Christians should assess their choices in a different way than the rest of the world; we should be less fearful and more willing to trust ourselves to our loving Father. Life on earth is precious, but not as precious as eternal life in heaven. But he also points out that medical decisions need to be our own choices, not the choices of doctors, claim adjusters, or medical bureaucrats. If it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the eternal God, it is even more fearful to fall into the hands of an impersonal, omni-competent government.
References:
Belz, Joel. “Freedom from Fear,” World Magazine, July 18, 2009, p. 5.
Dickens, Charles. The Annotated Christmas Carol. New York: Clarkson N. Potter, Inc./Publisher, 1976, p. 65.
