Dear America,
You made your choice. You determined that it is in your best interest to surrender power and control over your health care decisions - and deliver America's physicians - into the hands of medical bureaucrats in Washington DC. In coming years, you will- of course- begin to see clearly the consequences of this choice. I suspect that it will not be very long before you will experience a bad case of buyers' remorse.
As you celebrate the attainment of your aspirations for government security over individual responsibility, individual freedom, personal choice and self-determination, be aware that those whose freedoms you have now destroyed may not be as eager to become unwilling beasts of burden and sacrificial victims to serve your life- at their own expense.
You will soon discover that there are some who do no believe that they were put on this earth to *serve you*. Rather, they too, believe that they have an equal right to their own lives, their own liberty, their own property and to the pursuit of their own values and happiness in this world. The medical profession is in fact, a noble profession, where doctors defer gratification for many years to invest tremendous amounts of time, energy and personal resources in the attainment of life saving and life -preserving skills.
Note, here, the use of the word "invest"- rather than "sacrifice"- since the majority of us do so in the rational expectation of reaping personal rewards from entering into- and continuing to practice in- the profession and of bettering our own lives- not just yours.
The vast majority choose medicine not out of some sort of misguided streak of masochism or monk-like rejection of a personal life in the real world to seek rewards in some kind of after-life. Rather, they choose it for the personal and professional satisfaction they derive from the independent exercise of their own reasoning minds and scientific skills and abilities- in the hope and expectation to better their *own* lives and earn a satisfying living practicing their trade.
For this reason, from those who resent being voted into unchosen government - enforced involuntary servitude to their fellow man, do not be surprised to hear some variation of the below principled statement of self-assertion and self-preservation in coming years, articulated here by Dr. Rich Fogoros:
(In the interest of disclosure, Dr. Rich does indicate that he did borrow liberally in the first 3 paragraphs from the original John Galt speech in Atlas Shrugged. The rest of this eloquent piece, however, is his own.)
A John Galt Speech For Physicians:
“You demand to know what has happened to us, the physicians you thought you controlled. You have cried that our sins are destroying the world and you have cursed us for our unwillingness to practice the virtues you demanded. Since virtue, to you, consists of sacrifice, you have demanded more sacrifices at every turn. You have sacrificed all those evils which you held as the cause of your plight. You have sacrificed justice to mercy. You have sacrificed independence to unity. You have sacrificed wealth to need. You have sacrificed self-esteem to self-denial. You have sacrificed happiness to duty.
“While you were dragging us to your sacrificial altars, we physicians who value justice, independence, reason, and self-esteem – we finally came to see the nature of the game you were playing, which we had previously been too innocently generous to grasp. And we have chosen to play no longer.
“All the physicians who have vanished from your system, the doctors you hated, yet dreaded to lose, we are gone from you. Do not cry that it is our duty to serve you. We do not recognize such duty. Do not cry that you need us. We do not consider your need a claim. Do not cry that you own us. You don’t. Do not beg us to return. We are making our own way, apart from you.
“In your cynical attempt to control the healthcare system, you have coerced us – with your threats to our livelihood, threats of massive fines, threats of jail – to abandon our sacred obligation to our patients. Society must come first, you say.
The needs of the collective are paramount, you insist. We must do what the experts tell us to do, you demand. And in the process you have destroyed the doctor-patient relationship which is the backbone of our profession. You have reduced physicians to ciphers, to puppets. And you have reduced our patients – the living, loving, hoping, striving people who come to us, who place their trust in us and their lives in our hands – to interchangeable members of a vast herd. You have demanded that we guard society’s interests, and abandon our sick to their own devices in your cruel and parsimonious healthcare system.
“Your process is now firmly established. Your methods have been legislated by Congress, embodied in volumes of rules, regulations and “guidelines” (strictly and ruthlessly enforced), upheld by the courts, and finally (and most tellingly) sanctioned as being entirely “ethical” by your allies, the leadership of our own professional organizations. You have made the healthcare system untenable for doctors who value true medical ethics.
“You have placed us into a position where we must either resign ourselves to an unethical, demeaning, health-destroying style of practice, or get out. We have gotten out.
“We have gotten out. We have left your Program. We refuse to sacrifice ourselves for you any longer. We will not sacrifice our livelihoods, our morals, our independence, our minds, or our patients for your bastardized idea of virtue.
“We will practice medicine in the only manner that still permits us to behave ethically toward our patients, in the only way that we can honor the true doctor-patient relationship, in the only way we can legitimately regain the title of professional. We have chosen to be paid directly by the people to whom we provide our services, by the people to whom we dedicate ourselves as professionals. We have chosen to cut you out...."
MORE HERE:
No comments:
Post a Comment