Who

You may recognize my description yesterday on health care administrators was not entirely correct. For specific treatment items, they usually hold a negative view: the government should not pay.

But we are not the Prince of Denmark; the question is actually not should or should not, but government or who else ?

And there comes the conflict. The general public and many of our noble council members would argue, "Of course it is the government. All men (and, for sure, all women) are equal. We need a fair society and everyone should have the right to receive medical care; government has the responsibility to provide it all."

They would often add, "At least for life-saving measures in emergency situations, the treatment should be free and available to all." (Sounds familiar, eh ? Remember the story of NovoSeven ?)

At this point, I must pretend to be Lee Tien Ming (李天命) for a moment and ask: What is life-saving ?

Alas, in theory, I should also ask what are the emergency situations, but that seems not a major problem. The common illusion, however, is: The situation is urgent (or critical), and therefore the treatment is life-saving.

"If you do not see the difference of the two, you do not see anything." said Hercule Poirot (in Murder on the Links).

PS. For a few times in the history, our country used the word government for situation, and revolution for treatment. I don't think I need to elaborate on the result.