The Triangle

Issue date: 5/14/04 Section: Ed-Op

Media Credit: The Triangle

Universal health care is one of the worst ideas of all time. Universal health care is a system by which tax money is used to give health care for everyone who doesn't have it via a job or some other means. To put it in more realistic terms, it means that hardworking people who pay taxes are required to pay for a huge number of irresponsible people, a huge number of vain or hypochondriac people and a small handful of people who genuinely need help.

Universal health care does nothing more than punish reasonable people for the excesses of others. Why should I, a young man who stays in somewhat decent shape, smokes and drinks only in moderation and eats more or less correctly be required to pay the hospital bills for people who are too lazy to exercise, too weak-willed to resist the siren call of a triple whopper with cheese three times a day, too addicted to break their smoking, drinking, or narcotic habits, or too clumsy to prepare a bagel without accidentally amputating a finger?

Obviously, not all medical expenses are accrued through a person being negligent or acting recklessly. Sometimes, fate and nature conspire to visit disease upon people. Bear in mind, however, that according to the National Center for Health Statistics, in 2001 there were 193,000 emergency room incidents directly related to cocaine overdoses. 509,000 people were sent to the emergency room for attempted suicides or self-inflicted wounds (30,600 died.) In that same year, 67,100 people were diagnosed with cancer. This also includes preventable cancers, such as lung cancer that is a direct result of tobacco use. More people are sent to the hospital because of the abuse they give their own bodies than for all other reasons combined.

The fact of the matter is that more people fall ill or injure themselves through their own irresponsibility than don't. If a person ever came up to you and said that their years of chain-smoking have had a negative effect on their health, and that you are the one who should pay for the treatment, you'd laugh at them. That's why the entire premise of universal health care is ridiculous. The Constitution is quite clear on two subjects. First, that the sins of the father shall not be laid on the son; in other words, only the person who has done a wrong shall pay for a crime. Second, that collective punishment for one person's actions is absolutely not allowed. That one's even in the Geneva Convention.

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