Can Conservatism Save Healthcare?

I roamed the limits of libertarianism and found a bunch of guys having a party on a cruise ship.

It was fun. It was free. But no one could explain how the ship got there.

I started asking, Who made the boat? Where should we sail? And what should we do when we get there?

These are dangerous questions. Anything with ‘we’ in it can trigger a libertarian. (I have even been called a communist recently!)

What exists beyond the libertarian party ship?

Panem’s Peacekeepers stand guard back on shore. (If not Hunger Games, insert Stormtroopers or some other symbol of authoritarianism.)

Does anything exist beyond ship or shore?

Conservatism in Healthcare

I wish we had a better word.

Conservatism is so old and plastered with bad ideas promoted by bad actors, many find it useless. One friend spit out his coffee and teased about his smoking jacket and corduroy slippers. Point taken.

If we can get over the goofy images associated with the word, conservatism offers ways to think which will sound radical to our liberal ears.

As I argued in How to Get Canada of the Healthcare Teeter Totter, we need to start looking beyond liberalism.

The Accad-Koka Report picked up the article and had me on the show to discuss how political conservatism might help healthcare.

If you prefer podcasts, you can listen below:

Or you can watch the interview:

More work …

I realise this falls outside the training and comfort of most doctors. But nothing changes in healthcare unless doctors help lead it. As such, we need to spend time with political philosophy.

Just because you do not take an interest in politics does not mean politics will not take an interest in you.

Pericles, 430 B.C.

Thanks for checking it out!

 Photo credit: Cruise Deals Expert

6 thoughts on “Can Conservatism Save Healthcare?”

  1. Any Rand condemned the Libertarians who she described as being the “ hippies of the right” and advocates for anarchy.

    She had a soft spot for the medical profession , her father having being a surgeon in Imperial Russia, she was very aware of the killing hours , the stress and the omnipresence of death….and the clash between the medical profession and the political class that was threatening the independence and integrity of their medical judgement , the constant pressure for the medical profession to cave in to the arbitrary judgements and economies of the political and bureaucratic classes.

    The medical profession spends half of its time to healing the patient , putting aside the paper work, the other half appeasing the government and the health care bureaucracies….medical professionals are being transformed from being members of a once sovereign profession into being a mere appendage and accessory , a helpless widget , in the hands of the supercilious governmental health care bureaucracies.

    Sadly a new breed of medical professionals is “ evolving” that are willing and eager to practice medicine in these new conditions, ambitious only to climb the greasy medio- bureaucratic political pole so to escape the responsibility of independent thought and judgement , as COVID has exposed and revealed.

    1. This is interesting, Andris. I didn’t know that about Rand.

      You have laid out the tension between care and politics very well, as always. The profession cannot survive as one if the professional managerial class continues to try to lead it. Professions (institutions in the political sense) need to be allowed to grow and develop on their own. If not, a profession withers and the people inside it come to see themselves as providers of a service, not practitioners of a profession.

      I am not entirely convinced of any particular political philosophy. But I’ve been attracted lately to the messiness and complexity of traditional conservatism. At least we should take time to learn about it … and not just the parodies of it.

      Thanks for reading and posting!

      Cheers

  2. I agree with Andris Shawn.
    The new generation of docs have no interest in fighting for a better system,and have learned to work within it and adapt.I can’t blame them.
    Truly,I believed that over my 30 yr career,privately funded care would be introduced for hosp/doc services,but instead have watched the downward spiral in care and doc quality of life in the interest of egalitarianism.Those in power,well connected or with means have accessed care either at home or abroad,leaving others to fight.
    There may be some private care ‘creep’ coming out of the pandemic to catch up on procedures,and once that happens,it will remain,much like virtual care.How fat that will go is anyone’s guess,and the left will howl over the inequity of it all.
    We need conservatism in society to rebalance population thought.

    1. Good points, Ram.

      We now have 3rd generation medicare docs: physicians trained by physicians who were trained by physicians who never knew anything else besides socialized medicine. On top of this, it is never a black and white separation; it’s always a mixed picture. Every villain always has something good in him.

      As you say, privilege abounds in our current, egalitarian system — the left has no right to howl.

      Medicine exists in the middle layer between state and individual. Democratic socialists want a big state plus atomized individuals. Classical liberals want a small state and free individuals (which generally ends up as atomized individuals). Conservatism cares about the middle layer: professions and trades, social groups and institutions. This middle layer is the only thing that can protect us from the monopoly power of the state.

      I realize this is geeky stuff. But docs can’t keep ignoring it. Hiding out in our clinics and operating rooms means the professional managerial class gets to shape the world in which we practice medicine.

      Thanks so much for taking time to share a comment!

      Cheers

  3. The saddest stage is when the slaves start to revere their chains…as the latest generations of medical graduates are doing.

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