Seemingly Endless Failure

Fight Aging!

Do you want to live a longer life in good health? Simple practices can make some difference, such as exercise or calorie restriction. But over the long haul all that really matters is progress in medicine: building new classes of therapy to repair and reverse the known root causes of aging. The sooner these treatments arrive, the more lives will be saved. Find out how to help »

A few of the seemingly endless failures of centralized, regulated health systems are illustrated in this News-Press piece. In a free market, needs - and the accompanying price signals - become opportunities for entrepreneurs to fund development and people to provide the needed services. In a centralized, regulated system, needs are problems; the price signals and profit motives are not there, so shortages, rationing and poor quality service result. Only socialized medicine can turn the wonderful lengthening of human life span into a massive problem and squash the prospects for future longevity research at the same time. As one libertarian writer pointed out, "If telomerase inhibitors were a new kind of computer chip, they would have been on every Wal-Mart pharmacy shelf and selling for ten dollars a bottle by now."

Link: http://www.news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060101/NEWS0106/601010396/1075