This Medical Device Went to Market...
And the rest languished. A brief history.
It's hard to see the future and not see it get better faster—welcome to my personal pain as a humorist/visionary. There's a problem in American healthcare. I know, which one? I will only write about one tiny part of the problem today.
Today, I present a short history of the problems with medical devices in American medical care. Pharmaceuticals have become a huge industry. They've become a huge industry, not thanks to the free market. Like most things in America, government meddling in the free market makes Pharma such a strange and wildly profitable business. When Medicare and Medicaid were created, the government was denied the ability to negotiate drug prices. This became Medicare Part D. So, unlike everywhere else on earth, drugs cost whatever the manufacturer says they cost. For new drugs on patent at least. And the profitability of something as much money as you can dare to ask for? That can be pretty good. That is to say, to…