Health reform lacks personal responsibility

I read the piece by Stephen Jennings (Jefferson County Public Health planner) on health care as a human right. It's headed as a North Country Perspective; not my north country.

It seems apparent he is a very liberal bureaucrat. Nobody is talking about personal responsibility.

The Constitution I learned says "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." It did not guarantee happiness or success. That's what you work and strive for. His title says he is a government planner, just what we don't need.

He decries the emphasis on costs in defining what health reform should look like. If we can't afford it, we can't have it, no matter the lofty goals. The bursting of the housing and related financial bubble put the country's finances in a perilous state. (The roots of that debate were in the "right of home ownership" to everyone, regardless of ability to pay.) We'd better know we are clear of that and have some sense of what we can afford before going forward with yet another massive rollout of entitlements.

With every right comes some responsibility. How do personal responsibilities attach to this reform? Are there any disincentives for people who do not maintain or try to improve their health? Are there any incentives to reduce costs or use of this system that everyone has access to?

Aren't our largest public health problems in the areas of alcoholism, drug use, smoking-related illnesses, obesity and diabetes? Aren't most of these cases in the group that will receive completely subsidized care? Isn't there room for great improvement in the health of many of these cases, which would lower system costs for everyone? Shouldn't a responsibility fall in part on them?

If you're going to make those who buy coverage pay for themselves and those of poor health, what regulation of personal conduct should apply to the recipients of free care? How does the reform propose to do that?

Unless I missed something, "reform" proposes we all have about the same insurance. If we pay for better coverage, we pay for additional tax. We have no incentive to limit our use of the system to save ourselves or the system money. For instance, I don't see any nonsmoking differentials. It's all a "right." Go use it, until it fails, and it will.

Health care cannot be free for anyone. Everyone must pay something and have a stake in minimizing costs.

Donald M. Hunt

Brantingham