Health care

"Colonoscopies Explain Why U.S. Leads the World in Health Expenditures" is important reading and met some of its ambitions. But the article overplayed over-treatement and underplayed under-treatment, failed to appreciate the importance of searching for the best treatment, and needlessly overdramatized price variability.

"Colonoscopies Explain Why U.S. Leads the World in Health Expenditures" is important reading and met some of its ambitions. But the article overplayed over-treatement and underplayed under-treatment, failed to appreciate the importance of searching for the best treatment, and needlessly overdramatized price variability.

A second look at the phenomenon by which health care policy has come to be dominated by a single-minded desire for cost control, while concerns about maximizing the quality of care have been downgraded or ignored entirely.

Limited debate keeps public from knowing the full scope of the potential health benefits it is being asked to give up.

Limited debate keeps public from knowing the full scope of the potential health benefits it is being asked to give up.

Market-based prescriptions hawked; focus on quality supplanted by focus on cost.

The rise of “competitive,” for-profit health insurance from the ’70s to the ’90s. Concerns about quality of care lose out. First in a series.