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Letter: To fix medical costs, fix Congress

(J. Scott Applewhite | The Associated Press) In this Jan. 25, 2017, file photo, the Capitol in Washington at sunrise. Democrats hoping to use health care as an issue in the midterm elections will have to decide how they’ll do it. One strain that’s popular with liberals, pushing for government-financed health care, is causing a tactical divide.

Medical costs in this country will not be fixed until Congress is fixed.

In one sentence, the problem in this country is that the “medical business model” drives the “medical model,” and not vice versa. If, that is, there should even be a business medical model.

Astute observers of our government criticize when our Congress receives re-election money from the military-industrial complex, yet fail to realize that the pharmaceutical-industrial complex donates four times that amount to keep senators and congressmen in bed with them.

Several years ago, the state of Massachusetts passed a law outlawing kickbacks from pharmaceutical company to doctors for writing prescriptions for specific drugs. The rotating door between big pharma, the AMA and the FDA minimizes the fact that pharmaceutical drugs are a leading cause of death in this country.

Bruce A. Nieveen, Riverton

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