Word: holding
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...worst result of the system of third-party payments, however, is a far more insidious one: since the government and private insurers pick up most medical bills, no one in the system has an incentive to hold down those bills. On the contrary: if a doctor or a hospital substitutes an inexpensive treatment for a costly one, he or it merely collects less money from Medicare, Medicaid, a Blue plan or a private insurer...
...lack of necessity to watch costs would be inflationary in any business. In health care it has been catastrophically inflationary, because powerful underlying forces?economic, psychological and technical?would be working to drive up bills even if a determined effort were made to hold them down. Among these forces...
...contact with family." A few doctors indeed hint that they are underpaid?or observe that they earn less than corporation chiefs and top sports stars, though their value to society is at least as great. Whatever one may think of that argument, the physicians' attitude obviously does nothing to hold down medical costs...
...bills are covered by insurance companies supported by tax funds, doctors charge so much that their incomes average $100,000, far higher even than in the U.S., and medical costs consumed 12.8% of G.N.P. last year. The government, reluctant to raise taxes further, is pressing doctors and hospitals to hold down charges...
...Sweden, where the government provides free medical service, health costs have risen from 9.5% of G.N.P. in 1974 to 11.3% last year. As in Germany, the government is pressing for a hold-down; among other things, Sweden routinely denies expensive organ transplants to people over 70?a cruel but necessary form of rationing. Britain's National Health Service has done a better job of holding down costs; medical outlays as a percentage of G.N.P. (5.6% at last count, in 1977) have been fairly stable. But there has been a price to pay. The nation is suffering from a doctor shortage...