Focus on facts in health care debate

A letter by John Moran claims insurance companies are "paying millions of dollars to get people to write letters to the editor of local papers and filling town halls with operatives."

I should have asked for the money upfront. I met many well-meaning people at our town hall meeting but was approached only by an operative, from MoveOn.org.

The letter claims that our health care is ranked 37th. A recent Wall Street Journal article by Jerome Groopman and Pamela Hartzband, both staff physicians and medical educators, addressed some health care "facts" and some excerpts follow: "The World Health Organization ranks the U.S. 37th in the world in quality. This is another frightening statistic. It is also not accurate. Our country's composite score fell to 37 primarily because we lack universal coverage. The World Health Organization ranks the U.S. No. 1 among all countries in "responsiveness". This is what Americans rightly understand as quality care and worry will be lost in the upheaval of reform."

The article examined President Obama's push for physicians to "do the right thing" and follow "best practices", but there is great disagreement as to what those are and how dramatically best practices change.

Aside from the article, we know that there are many who need health care or insurance who cannot obtain it in a practical fashion. I hope that my fellow haves will press for solutions lest the day comes when one of us becomes a have-not.

Our health care is the best, but it is not perfect. Left unopposed, we will be trillions poorer and far worse off because the administration wants to "do something" and upend our good system in pursuit of the supposed perfect. The most important something to do is to advance the debate in a fact-based not agenda-based fashion.

Kevin M. O'Donnell

Arlington Heights