A tax on medical innovation [updated]

All through the ObamaCare debate I’ve been at pains to point out that the ObamaCare debate effects us here in New Zealand too: most directly because the whole world relies on American medical innovation, and if ObamaCare means anything, it is a deadly tax on medical innovation.

Think about it.  Think about “Moore's Law, which states that computing power tends to double roughly every two years.” Think about the growth of personal computing power as a model for how medical progress can and should and did happen -- and as a warning as to what sorts of progress we could lose in the future.  Consider that one of the greatly under-appreciated effects of ObamaCare
will be how it will stifle medical innovation—leading to a rapid reversal of the very medical progress that have been accelerating in recent years.

How serious is this?  Very serious indeed, says doctor Paul Hsieh. “ObamaCare, he says, “could dramatically slow the pace of medical progress, leading to millions of preventable deaths.”

Read Dr Hsieh’s article, The Deadly Tax on Medical Innovation.

UPDATE: Patent attorney Dale Halling makes a similar point:

    “The only way of reducing the long term cost of health care is through innovation.  In the few areas of medicine that are not controlled by the government and insurance, such as vision enhancement procedures [like laser eye surgery], costs have plummeted due to innovation.    Unfortunately, we have put numerous roadblocks in the way of medical innovation.  For instances, it cost $1 billion dollars and twelve years to introduce a new drug to the market due to FDA rules.  Frivolous lawsuits in our health care system not only increase the costs of health care, but result in decreased innovation due to excessive caution.  Frivolous lawsuits against vaccine manufacturers have stopped innovation in this area of medicine.  Vaccines are inexpensive medical solutions of the sort that we should be encouraging.  President Obama has proposed a seven year patent term for drug patents, down from a twenty year term, and this will reduce innovation in the pharmaceutical industry.  Drugs are much less expensive option than medical procedures.
    “If the goal is to increase the quality of medical care and reduce the long term costs, innovation is the only solution.  Nationalizing [US] health care will cause medical innovation to disappear.”

And it looks like his blog on intellectual property State of Innovation is worth checking out.  Unlike the various thieves at the Mises Institute who justify theft based on little more than ignorance of the role of the mind in production, Mr Halling understands the role of intellectual property in driving innovation and technological progress—that, as someone said, “Patents and copyrights are the legal implementation of the base of all property rights: a man’s right to the product of his mind.”

I’ll be adding his blog to my sidebar forthwith!

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