A significant portion of America’s health-care bill — caused by violence, vehicular accidents, coronary artery disease, lung cancer, AIDS, Type 2 diabetes brought on by obesity, among other problems — results from behavior widely known to be risky. So as we wallow waist deep in the muddy debate about health care, we should remember that the relationship between increased investment in medicine and improvements in health is complex and tenuous. As Kass has said, in an era of organ transplants and the cracking of the genetic code, it seems boring to suggest that the most important path to health is a vanilla virtue: prudence. Nevertheless, unlike oysters or ostriches or ocelots, featherless bipeds — Plato’s unenthralled description of human beings — are animals that go through their days making choices. And they often make bad ones. Such choices often require ameliorative medicine. Which illustrates this point: Although preventive medicine is real, society’s level of health does not depend primarily on medicine, which too often must be resorted to when our behavior has forfeited our health.
Posted on: Thu, 13 Mar 2014 15:29:50 +0000