Las Vegas: Giving ammo to the socialized medicine drive

This story about a clinic in Las Vegas resuing hypodermic needles and potentially infecting thousands with Hepatitis or HIV (and who knows what else could have been transmitted) is absolutely disgusting and tragic.

The article (and it's hardly the only one; the story is all over the news - as it should be) cites "cutting costs" as the reason why the clining reused needles, medication vials, and likely other items that are supposed to be single use only.

I'm shocked that The Cackler and The Empty Suit haven't jumped on this one yet as why we have to completely nationalize and socialize health care. Obviously, the government could have done better. Yeah, right.

Health care costs can be controlled by free market principles, not government control. Right now, health care costs are dictated by the insurance companies, because "networked" health care practices are required to accept what the insurance company offers as full payment - even if the amount does not meet their costs, much less allow for profit. That logic breaks down very quickly.

What should happen all the time is what is going occur to when I get a endodontic procedure done. The endodontist I'm seeing isn't part of my insurance plan, so I have to pay out of pocket. My insurance is going to reimburse me what they would have paid a "network" endodontist for the same thing. The difference is that what my insurance company is reimbursing me is about 1/2 what the actual fee is for the procedure! Yeah, I could stay in business if I only got paid for 1/2 of what my goods or services were worth.

Want to fix health care? Allow providers to recover full economic cost of their services. At that point, competition between providers will control prices - not insurance companies.

Trust the free market; it works every time it's tried.