That is one of my central points: that despite the heavy - and costly - federal regulations in place, the same kinds of mistakes are being made. That tells me (and anyone who actually thinks for themselves rather than depending on mommy government to do it for them) that the regulations currently in place are pretty much useless.
Ahhh, but you have to THINK beyond the point you stopped at.....what is being proposed is REFORM. In other words, that nifty little collusion between the FDA and pharmaceutical companies would have to be overhauled under new proposals and regulations....and THAT is what is being resisted by the status quo. One cannot consistently promote the fantasy that private enterprise is so much better without gov't control when you are consistently bombarded with all the corruptions and shyster moves by said companies to avoid what gov't regulation there is, while at the same time AVOIDING the responsibility owed to the public when their products cause harm.
We have regulations that delay the introduction of pharmaceuticals by as much as a decade - yet new drugs with bad side effects keep popping up and are later withdrawn. We have regulations (supposedly) keeping track of bad medical decisions, yet nothing happens from the data that federal regulations mandate medical facilities gather and report. And THAT is the fault of the FDA and the Pharmaceutical companies....outsourcing certain lab work to companies that are coincidently financed by the pharmaceuticals....congressional lobbying by pharmaceuticals to pass regulations that hinder certain FDA protocols. We have regulations requiring minimum levels of malpractice insurance (Side note - nowhere did I mention frivolous lawsuits, did I?) creating an artificially inflated market for the insurance companies. Yet we have doctors practicing who should not be practicing because all the malpractice industry does is get injured people (and some not-so-injured people, but that is not my point) large (sometime overly large, but again is not my point) settlements while doing NOTHING to address the problem of malpractice itself (and THAT is my point). What you leave it is that it's up to the individual hospitals and the AMA to address the isssue of incompetant and/or negligent doctors or hospital practices. And since hospitals have legal teams that treat the hospital as an individual with rights, and the doctors have lawyers and UNIONS who are quite adept at fighting lawsuits, the people who are honest victims have nowhere to turn but the federal gov't.
In short, the problems lie in the fact that we have innumerable regulations and other factors keeping a bunch of D.C. fat asses employed on the public ticket, keeping ambulance chasing lawyers in their BMWs; all factors in creating vast expenses for the medical industry that are, by necessity, passed onto the consumer; while there is little to no demonstrable GOOD coming from these self same regulations and infrastructures to justify the added costs of medical treatment in our society. See my immediate above response. To place the entire blame on the federal gov't is inaccurate.
I do not object to regulations on the pharmaceutical industry, medical equipment industry, etc. It keep out the snake oil salesmen. But when there are so many regulations and requirements that, in the end, do nothing but add to the development costs of a new medical technology, then the regulations, how they affect medical research, how they affect costs, and if they achieve their purpose all needs to be closely examined. That is not wholly true....do some research and you'll see that budgets for research are mostly taken up by the salaries for the researchers......case in point, doctors and medical scientist becoming millionaires on AIDS research....pharamceutical patents that rake in BIG bucks for the companies producing them.
As for conjecture, I asked (did you see the question mark? do you know what a question mark signifies?) if it is possible that the degree and type of some regulations could possibly lead to more mistakes being made, rather than fewer. It is entirely possible that valid research methods are being compromised because a regulation is poorly written thus requiring use of a less valid procedure to meet some federal requirements.
I saw your question marks......and when placed in context with the rest of your posts, skews the question itself. You focus on gov't regulation as the culprit without adequate consideration to the details regarding what I've mentioned above.
It is far from meaningless to ask such things. Asking whether some regulations result in more harm is a valid question to ask. Asking questions about where problems stem from is the first step in actual reform. We ARE talking about reform, right? (Oh, I forget. "Health care reform" is supposed to mean how much MORE regulations and interference should the government add to the mess.)
