Health Care Reform Debate

Let me suggest a headline for your next story on Hillary Clinton’s health commission: “Hillary and the Sacred Cows.”

Sacred Cow No. 1: The insurance companies; 1,500 of them, each chewing the cud of its own bale of paperwork, and taking its cut off the top, while passing medical judgments on doctors’ decisions. That cow give milk; the insurance industry was the second largest contributor to Clinton’s campaign.

Sacred Cow No. 2: The American Medical Assn., which gave Clinton $1 million to maintain the U.S. doctor in his average income of $160,000 a year, plus pharmaceutical companies--paid seminars on Caribbean cruises and golf resorts.

Sacred Cow No. 3: The pharmaceutical companies, which raised their prices on drugs 20% faster than overall medical costs, and 250% faster than the Consumer Price Index from 1985 to 1991. This is Monopoly for real.

It appears that these beasts loom so large that no one in Washington can see the Canadian plan, right over our shoulder. That plan covers everyone with one card and one sheet of paper. But then, Canadian doctors average $100,000 a year, and insurance companies mind their own business up there.

FREDERIC E. PAMP

Santa Ynez