At 10:13 PM 5/12/2011, Gar Lipow wrote:
>http://www.grist.org/article/2011-05-11-i-have-cancer---a-personal-meditation-on-technology
>short URL: http://bit.ly/kXLM1U
>I have cancer—a personal meditation on technology, sustainabity, and
>social context
>5-May-2011 by Gar W. Lipow
>
> have cancer, but thanks to modern medicine, in terms of health it may
>be no big deal. The surgeon will use a scalpel to remove a thin layer
>of tissue from the floor of the mouth along with a tiny bit of the
>connection to the tongue. Then a laser will cauterize it, minimizing
>bleeding, killing microorganisms that stray from my mouth into the
>wound, and sealing off nerve endings, reducing soreness. The surgeon
>has asked me several times not refer to this as a "slice & sear".
>Since the odds are the cancer is encapsulated, they will send me home
>with pain killers and antibiotics and after a week or two that will
>probably be that.
>
>But it takes a truckload of advanced technology to make this no big
>deal. Before anesthesia was first invented in the 19th century, the
>shock and pain of the operation might have killed me (assuming a
>pre-anesthesia dentist or doctor could have diagnosed the problem at
>this early a stage). Today's anesthetics have much lower odds of
>killing me that ether would have. Similarly, large scale commercial
>production of antibiotics was an early 20th century invention. Lasers
>only became useful for medical procedures beyond eye surgery in the
>late 20th century.
>
>People like Derrick Jensen who want to eliminate technology want to
>let me, along with billions of other people, die. Since extreme
>anti-tech sentiment is small but with an intense following it is worth
>engaging a bit.
>
>One argument is the kind of treatment I'm getting is expensive. Jensen
>and others would argue that we can't afford modern medical treatment
>for everybody, and should use the resources to provide a more basic
>low tech level of care. Now I can confirm that treating cancer is
>expensive from personal experience. I pay $600 per month for insurance
>between copayments and deductibles treatment will cost me about
>$2,000. Adding what the insurance company will pay brings total social
>cost to between $6,000 and $8,000.
>
>This ignores social context. The Netherlands provides as good or
>better quality health care than I'll get in the U.S for a bit more
>than half the cost the U.S. cost(pdf)[1]. In addition, in the
>Netherlands I would not have been stuck with a third of the cost all
>at once, but would have had it included over the years in tax bills.
>Out of pocket cost for this to me at this moment would have been well
>under one hundred dollars. If you have something against the
>Netherlands, you can find a large number of nations where medical
>costs are lower and medical quality is higher than the U.S., mostly
>because they use various means to prevent their residents from insurer
>milking - including socialized medicine, single payer insurance, and
>public/private hybrids that include a large public component and tough
>consistent regulation of private insurance companies.
>
>That is the beginning of an answer. But poor nations can't afford the
>medical costs of the Netherlands or France, even if the Netherlands
>and France spend much less than the U.S. for better care. Fortunately
>they don't need to. Worldwide PPP GDP per capita (ability per person
>to provide goods and services) is around $11,200 per person[2]. The
>ability of nations with per capita GDP at that level or less to
>provide decent health care to their people pretty much demonstrates
>that our current world economy could support decent health care for
>the entire world. The fact that people go without healthcare is a
>matter of political will, not economic ability. Examples of nations
>with decent healthcare and GDP in that range include Cuba and the
>Dominican Republic - nations with very different economic and
>political systems. Cuba had a 2010 PPP GDP of slightly under $10,000
>per capita[2], and a life expectancy about that of the U.S.[3]. The
>Dominican Republic had a 2010 PPP GDP of slightly less than $9,000 [2]
>and a life expectancy again a fraction below that of the U.S[3].
>Though, as would be expected of poor nations, good heath results are
>larger due to healthier lifestyle and preventative care, both nations
>do have adequate technology, include lasers.
>
>Cuba suffers shortages of certain medical equipment and supplies, due
>largely to the U.S. sanctions against them. Although Cuba's economy is
>highly flawed it produces enough goods for export that it could easily
>afford to buy any medical goods it cannot make itself, if allowed to
>do so. In fact Cuba has enough high tech equipment that it earns
>income by treating medical tourists with them.
>
>Dominican Republic, in spite of massive corruption and an underfunded
>public health system also manages to provide decent health care to
>most of its people. The public health system provides good
>preventative care and basic treatment for most common illnesses. That,
>combined with certain types of regulation, means health insurance to
>cover what the public system does not provide is available to most
>people in the Republic. It is far from perfect, but it shows that a
>poor nation which is not only corrupt, but dominated by foreign
>international corporations still manages to provide health care of
>around the same standard as the worst of the rich nations.
>
>One last argument that Jensen in particular would make is that even if
>our current economy could provide decent health care for everyone a
>sustainable world economy would be too small to do so. But, according
>to Jeanette Chung and David Meltzer, our current inefficient medical
>system is responsible for about 7.5% of US emissions[4]. Since most of
>that is electricity which could be generated by wind and solar power
>instead of coal, and because our medical system uses energy very
>inefficiently in ways which detract from rather than improve health,
>there is no reason a decent medical system for the entire world should
>result in emissions of more than .5% of the world current total
>greenhouse gas pollution, perhaps less.
>
>We can provide not only medical care sustainably, but all of our needs
>and many of our wants if we choose to. But to do this we have to
>understand that we have a cancer that needs to be overcome. To be a
>cancer survivor our species needs to stop saying: "Cancer, Schmancer
>as long as we're healthy."
>
>[1] Davis, Karen and Cathy Schoen and Kristof Stremikis. 2010. Mirror,
>Mirror on the Wall: How the Performance of the U.S. Health Care System
>Compares Internationally - 2010 Update. DC: Commonwealth Fund.
>http://www.commonwealthfund.org/~/media/Files/Publications/Fund%20Report/2010/Jun/1400_Davis_Mirror_Mirror_on_the_wall_2010.pdf.
>
>[2] Central Intelligence Agency. 2011. COUNTRY COMPARISON :: GDP - PER
>CAPITA (PPP. The World Factbook.
>https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2004rank.html
>Accessed 11-May-2011.
>
>[3] International Database queried for 2010 world Life Expectancy by
>country. http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idb/region.php. Accessed
>11-May-2011. Note IDB database does not let you save queries. You must
>repeat query yourself after reaching link.
>
>[4] Chung, Jeanette W. and David O. Meltzer. 2009. "Estimate of the
>Carbon Footprint of the US Health Care Sector". JAMA:
>302(18):1970-1972.
>http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/302/18/1970
>
>
>--
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