Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Why is the GOP Opposed to Comparative Effectiveness Medical Research?

link here to article

Its easier to deal with Social Security than Medicare because we can cut SS benefits by a percentage but its harder to do that with Medicare. There is no such thing as a percent of a surgical procedure. Medicare must decide whether to pay for a particular procedure or not. Thats why we need comparative effectiveness research. The GOP opposes comparative effectiveness research and some wonder why. Krugman's answer is that the GOP comes to bury Medicare not to fix it. Paul Ryan's approach is provide vouchers so that consumers or insurance companies can decide how to spend their money just like consumers do in other markets. Since the value of the proposed vouchers will not increase as fast as the cost of treatment, less well off consumers will be provided with that coveted choice favored by conservatives. They will have to choose not to have a treatment when the voucher does not cover the cost. This is the familiar market based approach to rationing a product of service. The price system will ration the use of medical services.

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