Why Instructions for Mammograms is Statism

Would an individual woman decide differently than a group of insurers or the federal government as it pertains to screening for breast cancer?

That indeed is the question. Read this Washington Post article or NY Times editorial to get up to speed. The issue at it's core involves the fact that women in their 40's shouldn't get every year mammograms because the risks outweigh the benefits.

It is a "recommendation by United States Preventive Services Task Force, a government-appointed group of 16 outside experts created 25 years ago to advise the Department of Health and Human Services... That recommendation was based on an analysis showing that every-other-year screenings could provide 80 percent of the benefits of annual screening while cutting the risks almost in half." From NY Times.

A quote from the Post article has a different angle:

"The only conclusion I can come to is it's economically motivated," said Carol H. Lee, who chairs the American College of Radiology's breast-imaging commission. "In this climate, when we are all paying attention to how we can decrease the cost of health care, in my opinion that's the primary motivation." From Washington Post.

The NY Times editorial claims that this issue has nothing to do with healthcare and thus should stay out of the debate. And yet, no matter how much anybody scours any article on this issue, the only risks discussed are unnecessary biopsies, radiation and stress. Now the first one isn't a risk for the patient, really. Exposure to radiation only happens if somebody actually finds real cancer (Admittedly, some of the articles parse the different between more harmless cancers and more dangerous cancers. Even still, this doesn't seem like an important distinction as it relates to radiation exposure. If somebody has cancer, they want it gone). So the only real risk is stress. And so the real question becomes: why does the government care about our levels of stress?

The answer is because the government doesn't care about our stress. Insurers care about reducing costs, and so does the government. But if you were a women in your 40's, do the risks outweigh the benefits? Of course not. You're getting that mammogram done.

And herein lies the danger. When the government starts to tell its people what to do on a collective level regarding our health (or our right to exist, or what role religion is supposed to play- just to name a few examples), we run the dangerous risk of statism: the idea that the state is the answer to all human problems. And the state isn't. It's run by imperfect people in an imperfect system and cannot answer deep questions on human existence.

The further we continue to go down this road, beware. While this issue isn't directly related to the healthcare bill currently in the Senate, they both have the same statist aims in common. The more the government runs things, the more it will have a stake in wanting to reduce costs, and thus have a significant say in the role of a human life, and ultimately whether we live or die. Death will be couched (and often already is) in compassionate terms, either for the unborn infant or the elderly. Beware, and fight back with the power of ideas.