One Nutter Saves the World: Adequate Medical Care

Let's actually care about other people again. I know, I know, that's such a controversial statement in this day and age. What about the single mother with seventeen kids from twenty different dads? What about the mentally disabled person who can't work an hour to save their lives? What about the drug addicts who are injecting/snorting/smoking their lives away and wasting everyone's time and money? Do they deserve all that care and attention?

Short answer - yes.

Yes, they fucking do.

They are human beings just like you and you have no idea of the story that lead to their circumstance. Say it with me: Human Beings Deserve Respect And Care.

You may not care, and that's your sin, but you don't have to cram your hideous beliefs about deserving help down everyone else's throats. You may even be whining about who could possibly pay for it all, and for that, I direct you to my essay on ending poverty. That said, initiating an income ceiling would probably prove worthy as well.

As I have said before, some of my policies would require me to actually rule the entire world so that skeevy rich people won't be able to escape my wrath the rule of law. Back to medical care. Lots of things need to change.

Pharmaceutical companies need more responsibility thrust onto their shoulders. Too many of them pay to circumnavigate all the safety tests in their mad rush to get their product out on the shelves. Therefore, they should be automatically fiscally responsible for amending any harm to anyone who purchases their product. No exceptions, no expiry clauses, the company pays for literally everything that goes bad because of their bad medicine and the knock-on effects and even the funeral.

No extensive proof that waits for the patient to die. If they recall the medicine because of X unforeseen side-effect, then they are paying for all of that in all patients who took that medicine, as well as anything that can be linked to that side-effect by a moderately sensible mind.

I can hear the hue and cry now. "Nutter, you brilliantly creative author, that would absolutely destroy the pharmaceutical industry!" Great! Brilliant. Then maybe the practice of medicine will become about making people actually be healthy rather than squeezing every last penny out of Sick Everyman.

"Ah, but what about medical research?" Well, with the income cap on billionaires, there's more motivation to spend that profit on frivolous things like... adequate wages. Or actual humanitarian efforts. Or lessons on not being a giant douche.

So... assuming the pharmaceutical industry and it's love of profit is the only thing that drives medical people to help other people... How about we hit that on the head. Instead of hiring egomaniacs with deity complexes, how about the people who actually want to look after people. Actually, I think that will sort itself out. People in it for the profit will not want to be in it for the gratitude.

With Guaranteed Basic Income in the mix, and profit out of the equation, you only have the people who want to help who would be actually helping. Let's emphasise that as a culture. How one can help another can be a virtue instead of being rich or pretty. Once people are in a helpful mindset, the petty bickering about who's prettier or richer can fucking end. Yay.

Now onto the fun stuff - drug addiction.

Free medicine for all doesn't have any Shirley Exceptions ["Surely there's an exception!"/"No there isn't and stop calling me Shirley."] That means that an addict gets all the help they need.

As for the drugs themselves - legalise the lot! Make sure they're pure [aka: not 'cut' with anything at all, so it's less hazardous to those who partake] of course brews like whiskey and beer come out of the making process like they are, so they get an exemption in regards to purity.

Yes I am planning to class alcohol and tobacco as drugs. They are drugs. Stop being a weiner about this. Just because they're socially acceptable drugs doesn't make them not drugs. Yeesh.

So yeah, if the chemical content is part of actually making the thing and a tradition [aka: a process older than a century] then it's allowed to continue as is. Beer, wine, and assorted spirits can continue as they are. Cigars can, too. Cigarettes, which have been chemically augmented since probably the 1950's [I did zero research on this and it shows] have to go back to containing only unadulterated tobacco.

I won't force the world of smokers to go back to rolling their own. I know I can't. That said, roll-your-own cigarette smokers are the politest and most considerate smokers I have ever met.

More modern drugs have to have their processes analysed and existing stores chemically investigated as well. For that, you need an amnesty on anything that gets you high so people in science can find out what's going on, including the inevitable effects on the patients.

Once all the drugs are identified, legal, and purified, the addicts will join a register. Alcohol addicts won't be allowed to operate heavy machinery. Smokers wouldn't be allowed in environments that need clean air. Those who have their senses or reaction times impaired should not be allowed to do things where they become a risk.

If said addict wants to do those things, they will be encouraged to quit. Since you need your registry card [and hand it in once you quit] in order to indulge, the supply would be limited for new users. Unless, of course, said drug actually has medicinal value and you're under prescription.

It's happened with marijuana. It can happen with cocaine and all the other stuff.

Once it's all legal and the addicts are no longer a trouble, there won't be much call for organised crime. Well, the organised crime that involves supplying people with nasty chemical mood augmentation, cut with who-knows-what, anyway. We still have the organised crime that pays for laws in their favour, otherwise known as Big Business.

I'll deal with them soon enough. Next week: I cover why we need an income ceiling for all those who don't already know all the reasons.