A few articles
Thursday, September 10 2009
These have been sitting in my browser for a while, and each is worth reading in full:
From Slate, “The Fix is In” – about how a quasi-official panel of doctors called the RUC establishes prices for medical care. This is a good overview of the basic mechanism beneath the health care market.
That article has a link to an old New Yorker article by the incomparable Atul Gawande, “Piecework“, which explains that mechanism and the logic behind it in more depth.
On a slightly different note, the Washington Post answers “8 Questions About Health Care Reform” – a helpful summary of what’s going on in Washington.
Finally, Wired has a lengthy but excellent article on medical research: “Placebos Are Getting Stronger. Drugmakers Are Desperate to Know Why.”
