Opponents of physician-assisted suicide are fired up this summer, and rightfully so, over an ethically questionable provision of the Oregon Health Plan. The conflict came to light in a recent report in The Register-Guard of Eugene. The newspaper described the sad plight of Barbara Wagner, a 64-year-old Springfield woman with lung cancer. After her oncologist prescribed a cancer drug that would cost $4,000 a month, the newspaper reported, “Wagner was notified that the Oregon Health Plan wouldn’t cover the treatment, but that it would cover palliative, or comfort, care, including, if she chose, doctor-assisted suicide.”
That presents an unacceptable conflict. The state health program should not be in the position of denying chemotherapy to terminally ill patients while offering to pay the cost of helping them die. The dust-up over this conflict comes at a poor time for backers of a Washington state initiative that mirrors Oregon’s aid-in-dying law. That’s too bad, as Wagner’s story could cloud what Washington voters really ought to know about Oregon’s 10 years of experience with the law. Critics’ dark warnings about it have not panned out. Instead, the debate over it has revolutionized public attitudes about palliative care at the end of life, and Oregon now stands at the forefront. Just this month, researchers at the University of Wisconsin rated the pain-management policies of Oregon and four other states as best in the nation.
In Wagner’s case, administrators of the Oregon Health Plan had to make a difficult call. But that’s what they do every day in performing the tough, thankless job of rationing government-paid health care to the needy. What’s unacceptable, however, is that Wagner’s rejection letter included the offer of payment for doctor-assisted death. Such notification creates at least the appearance of an ethical conflict: state encouragement of dying as a cost-saving measure. As the only state that both allows assisted suicide and tries to ration health care, Oregon has created a fine ethical line for state officials to navigate.
Is anyone really surprised?
Thought this sounded familiar. This case happened at the end of May – reported first week in June that the drug manufacturer agreed with folks discussing the silliness of the original response and decided to provide the medication for free.
So, while everyone else can wander off into politics, at least Barbara Wagner is receiving care. Though I wonder why the person who wrote this opinion column just got round to being upset. Maybe they just got their copy of xhristian talking points? 🙂
What’s with the picture? This is government health care.
It also has the slippery slope of death with dignity becoming duty to die.
#2
Still doesn’t change point. The Government told her we won’t help you get better but if you don’t want to suffer we’ll help you die quicker. Your info even makes McCullough’s Picture even more wrong. Since an Evil Drug Company gave the woman the drugs for free, while the ever helpful Government-supplied health care said Fu** Off.
>>”Wagner was notified that the Oregon Health Plan
>>wouldn’t cover the treatment, but that it would
>>cover palliative, or comfort, care, including, if
>>she chose, doctor-assisted suicide.”
The part that goes unnoticed here is if the for-profit Denial of Health Care industry were in charge here, they wouldn’t even have paid for palliative or comfort care, much less doctor-assisted suicide.
Sure, this is a loophole that needs fixing.
However, the alternative (no health care, no right to die with dignity for those who so choose) is far, far worse. And that’s what we’ve go in most states right now.
Effen morans !!! Read the effen article.
They wouldn’t pay for the drug as it is not a listed drug. Most plans do that and in this case, it is a $4,000 per month experimental drug.
To meet the requirements, the drug must still have 5% of the patients still alive after 5 years. That is not a very high standard.
To date the Oregon Health Plan has paid thousands of dollars on treatment and will continue to pay, including for other chemotherapy. They won’t pay for experimental drugs.
Even with treatment, she may be luck to survive a year; Five year prognosis is a whopping 15% Lung cancer.
What is needed more, to allow a 64 year old woman live 1 or 2 more years, or cover 20+ births with that money. Hmmmmm
Terminally ill people with no hope of recovery should have a duty to die. The only real issue is how much “pressure” should be put on the terminally ill to die, or alternative phrasing, how readily the expensive alternatives should be made available.
It will all come with increased population, increased cost of heroic life extending methods, and the decline of dopey religious folks that for some reason don’t want to meet Jesus any sooner than they have to.
Just wait until we get the utopian national health care jammed down our throats. This is just the very tip of the iceberg of the kind of health-care rationing that will result. I doubt very much that grandma will get her CABG on demand or her dialysis or…. you name it.
Socialized medicine = rationed medical care
Just ask the Britains or the Canadians.
jbenson2, As a Canadian I can tell you that our health care system wouldn’t work in the US.
1. Our system could not handle 15,000 gun shot wounds per day
2. Americans like choice, that’s why 50 million Americans choose not to have health care coverage
#11
Aw, come on QB, your health system handles 15,000 moose stompings per year…. getouttahere
#12 We’re politically correct up here, we prefer to call it inappropriate moose touching.
Is there a copayment?
#9, Montana,
Just wait until we get the utopian national health care jammed down our throats. This is just the very tip of the iceberg of the kind of health-care rationing that will result. I doubt very much that grandma will get her CABG on demand or her dialysis or…. you name it.
How many private plans pay for experimental drugs? Gee, not too many. How about none.
How many private plans pay for treatment on demand? Gee not too many. They almost all require prior approval.
Every year thousands of people go without treatment because their insurance decided they didn’t need it. Their rationing of health care though isn’t because of lack of dollars, its because paying would hurt profits.
#10, benson,
Socialized medicine = rationed medical care
Isn’t rationed health care better than what we have now? The leading cause of personal bankruptcy in America is the burden of co-pays after an emergency.
Just ask the Britains or the Canadians.
While I can’t speak for the British, I don’t know any Canadians that would prefer the American system.
#12, Montana,
[the Canadian] health system handles 15,000 moose stompings per year …
And they get treated even if the moose stomped on the health insurance card.
Oregon seems to have it right.
#15, Socialized medicine = rationed medical care.
Isn’t rationed health care better than what we have now?
No. Haven’t you heard the cliche, “If you try to please all the people, you end up pleasing none?” The only people who will be happy will be all the bureaucrats who run it.
People can get healthcare whenever they want it. Most just choose not to get it and sit at home and whine about how bad things are. And bleeding heart looters think the working people of this country should shoulder the burden.
That is the definition of evil.
The Canadians that come to America for health care, they probably prefer the American system.
#10 – Benson
>>Socialized medicine = rationed medical care
Private Denial of Health Care = denied medical care.
It’s not for nothing that they call it the Denial of Health Care industry.
Not sure about you, but I’d rather have my health care rationed than denied. Especially when the my denied health care goes into some dickwad CEO’s $130,000,000.00 honey pot.
#15 – “I don’t know any Canadians that would prefer the American system.”
The ones I know that have money go to Seattle for medical care…
#17 – Tommie
>>People can get healthcare whenever they want it.
Can I have some of what you’re smoking?
#20 – Picnic Table Man
>>The ones I know that have money go to
>>Seattle for medical care…
I guess you must know a better class of Canadian than I do. I don’t know many folks (Canadian or otherwise) who can afford to go to Seattle (or anywhere else) to get serious medical treatment without any medical insurance.
I guess you know folks who don’t mind dropping a half million or so out of their own pocket for a heart or liver transplant.
That’s not really relevant to the problems we’re facing in the US with the creeping cancer of our Denial of Health Care industry and their bloated bureaucracies.
I’d rather deal with the government than to try and squeeze payment for necessary health care out of the private insurance companies that run things around here.
#22 “I guess you must know a better class of Canadian than I do.”
My am I not surprised?
#23 – O’ Furniture
>>My am I not surprised?
Because you’re full of shit. You don’t know any fucking Canadians who go to Seattle for medical care, unless it’s having their bunions shaved or a BoTox injection.
The idea that people will go somewhere else and pay the full cost of medical care out of their own pocket is so ludicrous it doesn’t even deserve a reply.
I know a lot of Canadians from Quebec and Ontario, and I don’t know a single one (and they don’t know a single one) who would come to the US for medical treatment.
Of course, you and your billionaire west coast buddies may be different in that regard. HAW! HAW HAW HAW!!! You are so busted, dude.
#24 “The idea that people will go somewhere else and pay the full cost of medical care out of their own pocket is so ludicrous it doesn’t even deserve a reply.”
It does when you don’t want to wait 3 months for an appointment through the gov’t system. For the productive people of the world, time IS money.
I know having your reality rocked by the truth is hard.
I even knew some who retired to Pt. Roberts rather than deal with Canadian gov’t B.S.
#25 – O’ Furniture
You’re so full of shit you stink. Maybe one of your relatives works as a domestic servant for a Canadian billionaire, but other than that possibility, you could power the world with the methane gas from your oral flatulence.
Sure, time is money. But if you’re trying to come off as some guy who knows people that would rather pay $750,000.00 out of pocket than have the insurance cover their medical care….pffft. Just don’t light a match when you’re talking. You’ll blow yourself to kingdom come.
#26 once again has crow pie for lunch.
“STC puts together complete packages that include visas, air fares, surgery costs, hospital stays, after-care and post surgery resort accommodations. The company has arrangements with hospitals in India, Singapore, China, Belgium, Dubai and the U.S., and patients can have their procedure immediately after arriving in countryďż˝no waiting.
To see the full article click here:
http://en.epochtimes.com/news/6-11-17/48263.html
BTW there are too many articles to read in one lifetime about Canadians going abroad for better medical services (at their own expense)
Regarding ANY SOCIAL POLICY==regardless of what it is, some people are more benefited than others. All too often, the conclusions one announces in this blog do very little to discuss/weigh the pro’s and con’s of such programs, rather the comments only demonstrate which group the speaker perceives himself to be in.
Comments beginning with “I know people who…..” are pure BS for almost any relevant issue, and this one is no exception.
Only group statistics are relevant in these discussions. What are the rates of illness in various groups? What is the average waiting time? What is the percent of people going bankrupt to pay for services? General morbidity and so forth.
It doesn’t hurt to be factual. Don’t worry, there is still more than enough to argue about even when the boundaries are appropriately set.
Cow-Paddy, Lyin’ Mike, and Tommy,
The three of you are full of crap and don’t know any more of what you talk about than what Rush or Billo tell you.
For an interesting and fair comparison of American and Candian health care, try this.
#30, Who’s Rush and Billo?
I don’t need some comedy team to tell me to watch my money and keep looters out of my pockets.