How Certificate Of Need Laws Endanger Americans

The Federalist posted an article today about Certificate of Need (CON) laws and how they are hindering America’s response to the coronavirus.

The article reports:

During a Tuesday press conference, Cuomo lashed out at the federal government for not sending enough ventilators as the Wuhan coronavirus continues to rattle the state. “Four hundred ventilators? I need 30,000 ventilators,” Cuomo said. “You want a pat on the back for sending 400 ventilators?” The state is projecting it will need approximately 140,000 beds in 14 to 21 days, which is higher than its previous estimation of 110,000 beds by early to mid-May.

However, New York, along with 35 other states and the District of Columbia, have in place what are known as certificate-of-need (CON) laws. According to Reason, “Their stated purpose is to keep hospitals from overspending, and thus from having to charge higher prices to make up for unnecessary outlays of capital costs. But in practice, they mean hospitals must get a state agency’s permission before offering new services or installing a new medical technology. Depending on the state, everything from the number of hospital beds to the installation of a new MRI machine could be subject to CON review.”

The article notes the impact of CON laws on patient mortality rates:

In addition to causing a lack of proper equipment, these rules harm patients. According to a study by the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, states with CON laws have a 2.5 to 5 percent higher mortality rate than those without. Wait times have also been affected, with the average delay in New York City emergency rooms ranging from seven to 10 hours before the virus outbreak added strain to an already poorly operating medical system.

The article concludes:

Luckily, efforts to eradicate this onerous red tape have already begun, as South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster issued an executive order suspending CON law enforcement in the state. Governors like Cuomo would be wise to follow suit and slash these burdensome regulations to allow for the expansion of new medical facilities and COVID-19 treatments.

More government control of our health-care industry is the exact opposite of what should be happening in Washington, D.C, and states around the country. Instead, lawmakers across the nation should be focusing on getting rid of these big-government barriers that make it more difficult for doctors and medical experts to treat patients. Letting the market solve its own problems is the answer to many of our problems in health care. The government needs to know when to step out of the way.

On March 23, I posted an article about how CON laws are impacting New Hampshire’s response to the coronavirus. Hopefully the problems caused by these laws during this health crisis will cause states to revisit them. Unfortunately, hospitals like the monopolies the laws give them and are willing to put forth massive lobbying efforts. Lawmakers need to rise above the politics and lobbyists and do what is best for the people they are supposed to represent.

A Small Update On Some Of The Fake News You Are Hearing

PJ Media posted a list today of the top ten lies the news media has told about President Trump’s response to the coronavirus. Please follow the link to the article to read the details–I am simply posting the list:

10. Trump downplayed the mortality rate of the coronavirus

 

 9. Trump lied when he said Google was developing a national coronavirus website

 8.  Trump ‘dissolved’ the WH pandemic response office

 7. Trump ignored early intel briefings on possible pandemic

 6. Trump cut funding to the CDC & NIH

 5. Trump ‘muzzled’ Dr. Fauci

 4. Trump didn’t act quickly and isn’t doing enough

 3. Trump told governors they were “on their own”

 2. Trump turned down testing kits from WHO

 1. Trump called the coronavirus “a hoax”

The sources for this misinformation vary. The sources include MSNBC, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Politico, Joe Biden, and Michael Bloomberg. If you are still depending on these sources for accurate reporting, you are being mislead. The article at PJ Media lists the source for each lie, so you can see where the lies came from.

Meanwhile stay safe, and be careful who you listen to.

Who Paid For This Study?

Yesterday The Washington Post posted an article reporting a study that showed female-named hurricanes kill more people than male-named hurricanes.

The article reports:

Female-named storms have historically killed more because people neither consider them as risky nor take the same precautions, the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences concludes.

Researchers at the University of Illinois and Arizona State University examined six decades of hurricane death rates according to gender, spanning  1950 and 2012.  Of the 47 most damaging hurricanes, the female-named hurricanes produced an average of 45 deaths compared to 23 deaths in male-named storms, or almost double the number of fatalities.  (The study excluded Katrina and Audrey, outlier storms that would skew the model).

The difference in death rates between genders was even more pronounced when comparing strongly masculine names versus strongly feminine ones.

We have been naming storms after women since 1950 and men since 1979. That means that there were 30 years of female-named storms before there were male-named storms. Of course there would be more female storms with higher death rates–there were more female storms. I really do wonder about the validity of their research.

The article explains that the study was based on questions to individuals–not actual storm history:

To test the hypothesis the gender of the storm names impacts people’s judgments about a storm, the researchers set up 6 experiments presenting a series of questions to between 100 to 346 people.  The sexism showed up again.

Respondents predicted male hurricanes to be more intense the female hurricanes in one exercise.  In another exercise, the hurricane sex affected how respondents said they would prepare for a hurricane.

“People imagining a ‘female’ hurricane were not as willing to seek shelter,” Shavitt said. “The stereotypes that underlie these judgments are subtle and not necessarily hostile toward women – they may involve viewing women as warmer and less aggressive than men.”

Hurricanes have been named since 1950.  Originally, only female names were used; male names were introduced into the mix in 1979.

That’s not a study–it’s a survey.