It’s been a little over a 100 years since medical licensing laws were introduced in the US. If people doubt that slippery slopes are real, they should reflect on that history.
In our latest video, Anish Koka and I discuss a “white paper” jointly written by Jeffrey Flier, former dean at Harvard Medical School, and Jared Rhoads from the Dartmouth Institute, calling for some deregulation of the apparatus that rules the supply of physicians and their scope of work. The paper gives an exhaustive account of the bureaucratic mess and offers some possible remedies.
Anish and I a fun conversation, although we barely scratched the surface of this important topic. Anish is concerned that opening the flood gates willy-nilly without addressing other aspects of the healthcare boondoggle will mainly decrease the quality of care and do little to reduce costs. I feel that Flier and Rhoads are way too timid in their proposals and could at least call for competition among regulatory and accrediting bodies.
We touch on the question of safety, patient sovereignty, alternatives to licensing, and whether protectionism is ever a legitimate option. I’m sure we’ll have occasion to revisit this question. By the way, the can subscribe to the YouTube channel…