You should take everything Dr. Ezekiel ("Zeke") Emanuel says seriously. Especially the subtitle of his latest long essay in the The Atlantic on Sept 17: "Why I Hope to Die at 75: An argument that society and families -- and you -- will be better off if nature takes its course swiftly and promptly."
As a principal architect of Obamacare, a White House insider, a frequent contributor to the New York Times
and MSNBC's "Morning Joe," a former director of the National Institutes
of Health Department of Clinical Bioethics, and a professor at the
University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Zeke makes pronouncements
on health policy that are likely to become law.
And that means that if he wants to force you and me to "ask whether our
consumption is worth our contribution," we better start asking how soon
Medicare and insurance companies will demand we justify our existence or
be ushered out of this world to preserve America's global
competitiveness.
He uses a graph, "Creativity of People With High Creative Potential," to
show that productivity peaks at age 40. Clearly the message is that if
you are over 40 and have disabilities or diseases that cost a lot, you
are consuming more than you are producing.
My reaction to Zeke's article is one of disgust and outrage. Even if
he is the smartest guy in the room, he's dumb when it comes to
understanding what the average person wants. How dare he claim to know
that someone over age 75 who walks slowly, has some memory lapses, and
has some medical disabilities and limited resources doesn't deserve to
enjoy music, sunsets, or the company of children and grandchildren?
And
why will Zeke stop at age 75? When will he and his political cronies
-- of both major political parties -- decide that a disabled
paraplegic wounded warrior is consuming more than he is contributing?
Emanuel's essay on dying to help balance the federal budget comes not
coincidentally on the very same day the Institute of Medicine, of which
he is a member, released its report, "Dying in America," which not coincidentally terms fee-for-service medicine a "perverse incentive."
But guys like Zeke want to play God, and that never ends well for
society. So get ready to take one for the country. It's your patriotic
duty to die when Zeke says it's time to go.
http://www.medpagetoday.com/Geriatrics/GeneralGeriatrics/47790?xid=nl_mpt_DHE_2014-09-24&utm_content=&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=DailyHeadlines&utm_source=ST&eun=g805656d0r&userid=805656&email=gamegetterii%40yahoo.com&mu_id=6090827&utm_term=Daily
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