Why I will never shop at Whole Foods again.
I refuse to put more money in this fucker's pocket.
The co-founder and CEO of Whole Foods offers his suggestions for health care "reform": get rid of insurance regulation.
Just a couple of suggestions from him:
• Repeal government mandates regarding what insurance companies must cover. What, so they can screw over sick people even more than they do now? Health insurance is to cover *sick* people. Not to allow insurers to only cover healthy people.
• Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines. We should all have the legal right to purchase health insurance from any insurance company in any state and we should be able use that insurance wherever we live. Health insurance should be portable. Right, so that insurers only have to comply with the lowest level of regulation.
He does have one suggestion I agree with: equalizing the tax treatment of employer provider and individual purchased insurance. I think * both* should be tax-deductible.
His attitude is summed up neatly by this:
Many promoters of health-care reform believe that people have an intrinsic ethical right to health care-to equal access to doctors, medicines and hospitals. While all of us empathize with those who are sick, how can we say that all people have more of an intrinsic right to health care than they have to food or shelter?
Funny thing, most of the civilized world manages it. Except for the U.S.
He goes on to reiterate untruths about the Canadian and UK systems:
Health care is a service that we all need, but just like food and shelter it is best provided through voluntary and mutually beneficial market exchanges. A careful reading of both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution will not reveal any intrinsic right to health care, food or shelter. That’s because there isn’t any. This “right” has never existed in America
Even in countries like Canada and the U.K., there is no intrinsic right to health care. Rather, citizens in these countries are told by government bureaucrats what health-care treatments they are eligible to receive and when they can receive them. All countries with socialized medicine ration health care by forcing their citizens to wait in lines to receive scarce treatments.
Everyone I have talked to online who lives in countries where healthcare is available states that this is a lie. And in the US, healthcare is rationed by insurance companies.
Although Canada has a population smaller than California, 830,000 Canadians are currently waiting to be admitted to a hospital or to get treatment, according to a report last month in Investor’s Business Daily. In England, the waiting list is 1.8 million.
That would be the Investor's Business Daily which thinks that Stephen Hawking would die if he were a U.K. citizen subject to dealing with the NHS. Oh, wait, he is a UK citizen?
Rather than increase government spending and control, we need to address the root causes of poor health. This begins with the realization that every American adult is responsible for his or her own health.
Unfortunately many of our health-care problems are self-inflicted: two-thirds of Americans are now overweight and one-third are obese. Most of the diseases that kill us and account for about 70% of all health-care spending-heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes and obesity-are mostly preventable through proper diet, exercise, not smoking, minimal alcohol consumption and other healthy lifestyle choices.
Recent scientific and medical evidence shows that a diet consisting of foods that are plant-based, nutrient dense and low-fat will help prevent and often reverse most degenerative diseases that kill us and are expensive to treat. We should be able to live largely disease-free lives until we are well into our 90s and even past 100 years of age.
Right. My fibromyalgia and bipolar disorder -- both expensive -- can be cured if I just eat healthier. And my niece's diabetes. And hey! Maybe if I find the right diet my son won't be HFA anymore and need doctor's visits and medicine! I guess women shouldn't get pregnant; many insurance companies won't cover that. Any of these make me and my family uninsurable. But hey, too bad, because health care should not be a "right." We just need to suck it up.
Bastard.
[I undeleted my LJ because I had to post this.]
ETA: Rereading "how can we say that all people have more of an intrinsic right to health care than they have to food or shelter?", it strikes me that this man does not believe that there is any intrinsic right to food or shelter, either. No right to the things which will sustain life, should you find yourself in a situation where you do not have them. In short -- he does not believe in a social safety net.
How very... Dickensian of him. In any case, not someone I need to be financially supporting.
The co-founder and CEO of Whole Foods offers his suggestions for health care "reform": get rid of insurance regulation.
Just a couple of suggestions from him:
• Repeal government mandates regarding what insurance companies must cover. What, so they can screw over sick people even more than they do now? Health insurance is to cover *sick* people. Not to allow insurers to only cover healthy people.
• Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines. We should all have the legal right to purchase health insurance from any insurance company in any state and we should be able use that insurance wherever we live. Health insurance should be portable. Right, so that insurers only have to comply with the lowest level of regulation.
He does have one suggestion I agree with: equalizing the tax treatment of employer provider and individual purchased insurance. I think * both* should be tax-deductible.
His attitude is summed up neatly by this:
Many promoters of health-care reform believe that people have an intrinsic ethical right to health care-to equal access to doctors, medicines and hospitals. While all of us empathize with those who are sick, how can we say that all people have more of an intrinsic right to health care than they have to food or shelter?
Funny thing, most of the civilized world manages it. Except for the U.S.
He goes on to reiterate untruths about the Canadian and UK systems:
Health care is a service that we all need, but just like food and shelter it is best provided through voluntary and mutually beneficial market exchanges. A careful reading of both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution will not reveal any intrinsic right to health care, food or shelter. That’s because there isn’t any. This “right” has never existed in America
Even in countries like Canada and the U.K., there is no intrinsic right to health care. Rather, citizens in these countries are told by government bureaucrats what health-care treatments they are eligible to receive and when they can receive them. All countries with socialized medicine ration health care by forcing their citizens to wait in lines to receive scarce treatments.
Everyone I have talked to online who lives in countries where healthcare is available states that this is a lie. And in the US, healthcare is rationed by insurance companies.
Although Canada has a population smaller than California, 830,000 Canadians are currently waiting to be admitted to a hospital or to get treatment, according to a report last month in Investor’s Business Daily. In England, the waiting list is 1.8 million.
That would be the Investor's Business Daily which thinks that Stephen Hawking would die if he were a U.K. citizen subject to dealing with the NHS. Oh, wait, he is a UK citizen?
Rather than increase government spending and control, we need to address the root causes of poor health. This begins with the realization that every American adult is responsible for his or her own health.
Unfortunately many of our health-care problems are self-inflicted: two-thirds of Americans are now overweight and one-third are obese. Most of the diseases that kill us and account for about 70% of all health-care spending-heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes and obesity-are mostly preventable through proper diet, exercise, not smoking, minimal alcohol consumption and other healthy lifestyle choices.
Recent scientific and medical evidence shows that a diet consisting of foods that are plant-based, nutrient dense and low-fat will help prevent and often reverse most degenerative diseases that kill us and are expensive to treat. We should be able to live largely disease-free lives until we are well into our 90s and even past 100 years of age.
Right. My fibromyalgia and bipolar disorder -- both expensive -- can be cured if I just eat healthier. And my niece's diabetes. And hey! Maybe if I find the right diet my son won't be HFA anymore and need doctor's visits and medicine! I guess women shouldn't get pregnant; many insurance companies won't cover that. Any of these make me and my family uninsurable. But hey, too bad, because health care should not be a "right." We just need to suck it up.
Bastard.
[I undeleted my LJ because I had to post this.]
ETA: Rereading "how can we say that all people have more of an intrinsic right to health care than they have to food or shelter?", it strikes me that this man does not believe that there is any intrinsic right to food or shelter, either. No right to the things which will sustain life, should you find yourself in a situation where you do not have them. In short -- he does not believe in a social safety net.
How very... Dickensian of him. In any case, not someone I need to be financially supporting.