{"id":166,"date":"2009-08-10T22:02:57","date_gmt":"2009-08-10T21:02:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/medical-ethics\/?p=166"},"modified":"2018-08-19T13:57:18","modified_gmt":"2018-08-19T12:57:18","slug":"rhetoric-fail","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/medical-ethics\/2009\/08\/10\/rhetoric-fail\/","title":{"rendered":"Rhetoric Fail"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By David Hunter<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/the-brooks-blog.blogspot.com\/\">Thom Brooks<\/a> on facebook has pointed out this hilarious rhetorical fact checking fail from Neo-conservatives debating the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ibdeditorials.com\/IBDArticles.aspx?id=333933006516877\">public provision of health care in the US<\/a>:<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The controlling of medical costs in countries such as Britain through rationing, and the health consequences thereof are legendary. The stories of people dying on a waiting list or being denied altogether read like a horror movie script.<\/p>\n<p>The U.K.&#8217;s National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) basically figures out who deserves treatment by using a cost-utility analysis based on the &#8220;quality adjusted life year.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>One year in perfect health gets you one point. Deductions are taken for blindness, for being in a wheelchair and so on.<\/p>\n<p>The more points you have, the more your life is considered worth saving, and the likelier you are to get care.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote><p>People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn&#8217;t have a chance in the U.K., where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Now the problem with this lovely piece of rhetorical flourish is of course that Stephen Hawking lives in the U.K. where he supposedly wouldn&#8217;t stand a chance&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>Thanks for the laugh Thom<!--TrendMD v2.4.8--><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By David Hunter Thom Brooks on facebook has pointed out this hilarious rhetorical fact checking fail from Neo-conservatives debating the public provision of health care in the US: [&#8230;]<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"btn btn-secondary understrap-read-more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/medical-ethics\/2009\/08\/10\/rhetoric-fail\/\">Read More&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1240,511,475],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blogosphere","category-in-the-news","category-politics"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - 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