Rationing Health Care is "Unpleasant"

Rationing Health Care is "Unpleasant"

The Des Moines Register reports on one aspect of national planning for the event of a disaster that overwhelms the nation's medical resources

Doctors know some patients needing lifesaving care won't get it in a flu pandemic or other disaster. The gut-wrenching dilemma will be deciding who to let die.

Now, an influential group of physicians has drafted a grimly specific list of recommendations for which patients wouldn't be treated. They include the very elderly, seriously hurt trauma victims, severely burned patients and those with severe dementia.

The suggested list was compiled by a task force whose members come from prestigious universities, medical groups, the military and government agencies. They include the Department of Homeland Security, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Health and Human Services.

Representation from DHS, CDC, DHHS suggest that SOME people working for the Bush Administration take health threats seriously.

The proposed guidelines are designed to be a blueprint for hospitals "so that everybody will be thinking in the same way" when pandemic flu or another widespread health care disaster hits

...

... proposals resemble a battlefield approach in which limited health care resources are reserved for those most likely to survive.

...it's not the first time this type of approach has been recommended for a catastrophic pandemic ...

While the notion of rationing health care is unpleasant, the report could help the public understand that it will be necessary ...

I think the unpleasantness of rationing health care described here means rationing health care for people with health insurance.

... members believe it's just a matter of time before such a health care disaster hits

I've read that an influenza pandemic occurs about once every 70 years, which suggests the world is about 20 years overdue.

Posted by Mark Ganzer at 12:23 PM