Tuesday, June 26, 2007

How to argue for nationalized health care

The NYTimes has a short piece today on the affects of cutting employees' drug benefits. Integrated Benefits Institute is releasing a study tomorrow that claims reducing employees' medication benefits actually loses money for companies. And while IBI, a nonprofit I'd not heard of before, has a board of directors that includes Kaiser, Pfizer, and a host of other parties whom I'm sure are pushing for that "objective research" the "about" page says they do, I can believe the results nonetheless. Apparently it takes less than a $30 a month cost burden on an employee before someone with, say, chronic arthritis will just stop getting medication. That unmedicated arthritis-sufferer has a much higher chance of missing work, being less productive, or filing a disability claim.

My first thought on reading the article was "Duh," but then my second thought was--this is the way to push for nationalized health care--make the case that it saves corporations money.

That may constitute the sum of my brilliance for the day. I have to go get a depo shot now and then go to PT--because birth control and bending knees are both pretty high on my priority list.

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