Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : A US National Health Care System? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Mary Cluney who wrote (4863)	2/24/2008 7:18:52 PM
From: John Koligman	Respond to of 42652

Front page article in today's NY Times concerning genetic testing and how many people are paying for it themselves so their doctors don't see the results as they are afraid insurance companies will see the data and make them harder to insure or uninsurable... John The DNA Age Insurance Fears Lead Many to Shun DNA Tests Brendan Smialowski for The New York Times By AMY HARMON Published: February 24, 2008 Victoria Grove wanted to find out if she was destined to develop the form of emphysema that ran in her family, but she did not want to ask her doctor for the DNA test that would tell her. She worried that she might not be able to get health insurance, or even a job, if a genetic predisposition showed up in her medical records, especially since treatment for the condition, alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, could cost over $100,000 a year. Instead, Ms. Grove sought out a service that sent a test kit to her home and returned the results directly to her. Nor did she tell her doctor when the test revealed that she was virtually certain to get it. Knowing that she could sustain permanent lung damage without immediate treatment for her bouts of pneumonia, she made sure to visit her clinic at the first sign of infection. But then came the day when the nurse who listened to her lungs decided she just had a cold. Ms. Grove begged for a chest X-ray. The nurse did not think it was necessary. “It was just an ongoing battle with myself,” recalled Ms. Grove, of Woodbury, Minn. “Should I tell them now or wait till I’m sicker?” The first, much-anticipated benefits of personalized medicine are being lost or diluted for many Americans who are too afraid that genetic information may be used against them to take advantage of its growing availability. In some cases, doctors say, patients who could make more informed health care decisions if they learned whether they had inherited an elevated risk of diseases like breast and colon cancer refuse to do so because of the potentially dire economic consequences. Others enter a kind of genetic underground, spending hundreds or thousands of dollars of their own money for DNA tests that an insurer would otherwise cover, so as to avoid scrutiny. Those who do find out they are likely or certain to develop a particular genetic condition often beg doctors not to mention it in their records. Some, like Ms. Grove, try to manage their own care without confiding in medical professionals. And even doctors who recommend DNA testing to their patients warn them that they could face genetic discrimination from employers or insurers. Balance of article: nytimes.com

To: Mary Cluney who wrote (4863)	2/25/2008 12:35:57 PM
From: TimF	Respond to of 42652

I would compare it to when President Kennedy declared our goal was to send a man to the moon and to safely bring him back. Except that's was a much smaller project, even on a per year basis, and it doesn't have any continuing costs (unless you count the fact that we have a national debt as meaning we are paying interest on anything the government has spent since the last time there was no debt). Also it wasn't messing around with the things that effect the every day lives of ordinary people. It was one big spectacular project, that except perhaps as a source of inspiration had very little impact on people's every day lives.