Grassley cites Kennedy’s brain tumor as reason to reject public health insurance option

Under a government-run health insurance program, U.S. Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Massachusetts) would not receive the quality of cancer treatment that he is currently receiving, U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said in an interview with Iowa City radio station KCJJ-AM.

Grassley, a major player in the negotiations currently taking place surrounding health care reform legislation, said the wonderful treatment Kennedy is getting now for his brain tumor would instead go to a younger person because they can “contribute more to the economy.”

Here’s what Grassley had to say:

In countries that have government-run health care, just to give you an example, I’ve been told that the brain tumor that Sen. Kennedy has — because he’s 77 years old — would not be treated the way it’s treated in the United States. In other words, he would not get the care he gets here because of his age. In other words, they’d say ‘well he doesn’t have long to live even if he lived another four to five years.’ They’d say ‘well, we gotta spend money on people who can contribute more to economy.’ It’s a little like people saying when somebody gets to be 85 their life is worth less than when they were 35 and you pull the tubes on them.

Grassley went on to say that not all government health care is terrible. For “the little things,” the government can actually do pretty well.

I don’t want to say that every government run program in every country is bad, because I think when it comes to primary care and the little things people need to get done to get well in a short period of time, that level of care may be adequate. But when you run into more complicated things, in particular with older people, you find a great deal of rationing in other countries.

However, as the liberal blog Think Progress points out, the United States has the 10th highest death rate among cancer patients among developed nations.

But the larger problem Grassley ignores is cost. For Kennedy, access to health care is not an issue. Among most Americans, however, staggering health costs prevent more than half of U.S. patients from gaining access to medical care. Last year, 38 percent of U.S. patients did not receive recommended treatment compared to 11 percent in Canada and 6 percent in the U.K. And even among Americans with insurance, 43 percent of adults with chronic conditions nevertheless had access problems because of cost.

According to a study by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, the U.S. ranks 22nd in life expectancy and 25th in infant mortality. In fact, a study by the policy journal Health Affairs found that the U.S. has more preventable deaths than 18 other industrialized countries, totaling roughly 100,000 a year.

In addition, none of the mainstream health care reform proposals being batted around Congress right now would entail rationing health care services based on a patient’s ability to “contribute more to the economy,” as Grassley claimed.

Below is the portion of Grassley’s radio interview concerning health care and Kennedy, courtesy of ThinkProgress.org.