Health needs have existed longer than there has been an American medical industry. People have died of cancer and heart disease far longer than we have known of their existence. So what has changed? Technology.
When it was common for a doctor to visit the sick’s home and order, “Take two aspirin and call me in the morning,” aspirin was the state of the medical art. How ridiculous would it seem if the people of that age complained that access to aspirin was a basic human right, to be provided by the government at taxpayer expense? How ludicrous would it have seemed if someone would have suggested that we all pay taxes to hire people to buy the aspirin from Bayer and then deliver it to us for “free”? That generation would have wrinkled their noses at such a suggestion and said, “No thank you, I can buy my own aspirin.”
Continue reading Take two aspirin and meet me at the DMV in the morning.