Has Howard Dean made any public comments on SICKO?

[GreenPartyVoter]

I would love to hear him endorse the film and the universal health care as a counter to slams Michael has gotten from stupid people at CNN and other RW media outlets.

What other docs would you like to hear speak up for SICKO? Is Patch Adams still around?

[Strawman]

1. If I remember Dean's position correctly

it was essentially to do incremental sorts of things to get everyone covered ASAP by expanding Medicare/Medicaid eligibility, expanding coverage for children then ironing out the details later on. The rationale being that once everyone is covered and sees health insurance as an entitlement, the conservatives can't take it away. I remember him being primarily concerned about getting over that political hump.

My guess is that he would be very sympathetic to Moore's film but would part ways with Moore's strategy to fix it. I think Dean favors a more incremental approach similar to Obama and Edwards. Where I'm less sure is whether or not he sees those measures as a means to the end of government run single payer universal health insurance or not.

But yeah, I'd love to hear what he has to say about Sicko. I was thinking the same thing yesterday.

[Warpy]

2. Docs are in a bind

because they see all sorts of people coming in to be helped. Docs want to do what is necessary to cure the patient, but they know if they tell the person the truth about all the charges the insurance company is going to sock them with, a lot of patients will elect to tough it out or seek "alternative" treatments that will result in a dead patient instead of a potentially cured one. The simple truth is that docs are finding more and more that even with insurance, their desperately ill patients can't afford treatment.

If they speak out, they won't be able to help anybody. If they let people know what they're really up against should they become seriously ill, people will simply elect to live out a shorter life so that their families will not be financially ruined.

Add to that fact so many docs are working directly for insurance plans. Speaking out means getting fired and some places are so choked with HMOs that there is little hope of finding another position.

Face it, we've been thrown to the wolves as far as health care goes. Not only will we be financially ruined, but a diagnosis can render us uninsurable for the rest of our lives. Docs know this, but it's a choice between helping a patient and scaring him away.

Don't expect too many to speak out.

[GreenPartyVoter]

3. That makes me unutterably sad

:cry: