The [1] American Journal of Public Health published a [2] paper written by several people associated with the Harvard Medical School. This paper opens with “The United States stands alone among industrialized nations in not providing health coverage to all of its citizens. Currently, 46 million Americans lack health coverage.” Moving past the obvious point that ALL people in the US have access to health care (although not health insurance), there are a few problems with this paper and its findings. One must keep in mind that the authors of this study are activists for single payer government health insurance. Because this paper has been bandied about the news with people crying that 122 people die every day from lack of insurance, we thought we would take a quick look at the paper. First, and easiest to find, is right in the limitations section. The rate of those insured is based on a snapshot of interviewees on whether or not they have health insurance at the time of the interview. If all participants were experiencing a short lapse in coverage, the entire study would be worth absolutely nothing. The authors make the bold presumption that if a person is ever without insurance, they will perpetually be either uninsured or only intermittently insured. They go on to declare that intermittent insurance is just as bad (as far as risk factor) as being uninsured. Beyond that, the study found that of those interviewed, those rated poor to fair health by physicians were 33% more likely to be uninsured (although still only 4.8%) than all other groups combined; thereby increasing the overall death rate of the uninsured.

Although the authors took great care to make the study appear to control for many factors (such as if a person has smoked more or fewer than 200 cigarettes in their lifetime), one glaring omission is present; cause of death. With those aged between 17 and 34 comprising of 44.2% of the study group, and assuming the 49.8% male ratio holds true, cause of deaths is rather important. Males died at a 33% higher rate overall and were less likely to be insured. Black Americans were also 25% more likely to die than any other group. Mexican Americans, while only 5.5% of the group, were twice as likely and four times as likely to be uninsured as blacks and whites respectively. When a young male dies in a car crash, drug/alcohol related death, gang related death, or some other non-health related death is not removed from this type of study, the results should not be relied upon. If the authors had their way and these young, uninsured males were covered by National Health-care, they would be deaths of those WITH health care. But just as dead.

The study omits those covered by current Government care so we will limit our stupid extrapolations on from those provided by the study.  61 people die every day in this country with adequate health insurance. 99.4% of those uninsured survive every year. Former smokers are over 71% more likely to die than current smokers. Exercise has no effect on your mortality rate. Skinny people are almost twice as likely to die as the obese. Numbers can be manipulated fairly easily and starting with a defective set makes them all suspect. When counting the elderly (people covered by Medicare) just imagine how many people die while covered by government insurance.

The federal government has no business being in the insurance industry. Don’t let people from what you may think are prestigious institutions fool you with bad papers. The presentation may be first rate and you may hear [3] politicians relay them, but it’s BS.

AX