I don’t get the NYT editorial page. On one hand, it notes that a new study indicates that CT scans can save lives of heavy, or formerly heavy smokers. From the editorial:
A government-sponsored study has found that annual CT scans could reduce the mortality rate from lung cancer in very heavy smokers and former smokers by 20 percent. Its leaders suggest that many thousands of lives could be saved annually.
Great. But wait. The editorial strongly implies that if these results prove true—we don’t know yet—private insurance companies and Medicare should resist paying for it because of false positives and the cost:
This will not be cheap. Initial scans might cost a couple of hundred dollars apiece and are not currently covered by Medicare or private insurance. Follow-up screening and procedures will be more expensive. All told, the costs could reach billions of dollars a year. Government and private insurers that try to limit their coverage of CT scans based on the experts’ judgments — as they should — will need to brace for charges that they are attempting to “ration” health care.
But if efficacious cancer screening—20% saved!—is rationed, only the rich will have cancer screening. And that could result in only the rich with lung cancer being saved. And then the Times will yell about disparities of result based on income.
Is a puzzlement. Or, perhaps not. This is how thinking changes once health care is centrally bureaucratized.
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