Two stories have been published recently that have to do with government oversight of medical items. The first one began to come out in very early March of this year:
It took fast-acting doctors at a Colorado hospital to flag problems with tainted alcohol wipes now tied to a massive recall and growing reports of potentially deadly infections, including the case of a 10-year-old boy already battling leukemia.
The second one is from right here in Alabama and came out just recently:
Alabama health officials seeking to find the source of bacteria suspected in the deaths of nine hospital patients and the sickening of 10 others announced Thursday they found the same bacteria in a pharmacy in Birmingham. …
The pharmacy, IV Meds, of Birmingham, had prepared the intravenous feeding solutions that were administered to all of the patients in six hospitals in the state. Bacteria in their blood matched bacteria in a bag of the suspect product found in the pharmacy, he said.
Why do I bring this up? Well, the Tea Party has been arguing that government is the problem. They have also been arguing over and over again that government regulation has been stifling the USA economy.
Well, that is only until a problem turns up that is the result of lack of government involvement. At that point, Tea Party member suddenly become incredibly in favor of government involvement. I could keep citing cases in which there is a strong outcry from most in the USA for strong government involvement. But, I doubt that this would convince any Tea Party member. Government is bad, well, that is until they fail to protect a Tea Party member. At that point, the government is wrong for not having interfered with private businesses. The fact that this is a contradiction is totally lost on conservatives. Tea Party members are only against government until they are the ones impacted by the lack of government intervention. Sadly, the Tea Party members will never believe that.
Keep writing about this, Father. This needs to be kept before people’s eyes. There’s a lot I could say, don’t have time now, but it’s extremely important that what you point out here doesn’t ever get drowned out by Tea Party howling about taxes and regulation.
Ditto, the keep writing on this Father. Not that I know much about the Tea Partyers or your context (although they’re trying to foist such models onto the rest of the world too) but the notion that the state shouldn’t be involved in providing healthcare (and other basic services) strikes me as profoundly barbaric. And of course inconsistent.
“Profoundly barbaric” is right;. Well put. I’m saddened and dismayed every day by the way Christians here are eagerly taking up this view, so hostile to the state’s provision of health care and services. How long until it finally bites them back? Then what will they think? Fr. Ernesto concludes that some will never recognize the contradiction. I hope it doesn’t take a lot of suffering for them to come around to realize it, but it seems that if they really got rid of as much regulation as they want to, eventually, they’d face the consequences themselves, too, right? Lord have mercy on us all.