Hospitals, Policy

Here’s how to feel about Ben Carson running for president

Washington doesn’t understand healthcare. We know this. But will a presidential run by Dr. Ben […]

Washington doesn’t understand healthcare. We know this. But will a presidential run by Dr. Ben Carson make it any better?

Let this sink in. As long as Carson is part of the 2016 presidential campaign – and all signs say he’s in and a GOP contender – the celebrated Johns Hopkins Hospital pediatric neurosurgeon may as well be Spokesman For Healthcare In The United States of America.

In a country bereft of true political leadership on healthcare, a front-running presidential candidate with MD attached to his name will have the public’s ear and run point on any topic related to the medical industry.

That would be good, if Carson were the man we read about in his eloquent Johns Hopkins bio. He could leverage the innovative thinking that made him the first to separate conjoined twins and equate it to the modern state of medical innovation.

It would also be a great thought if Carson considered himself a niche candidate and strategically focused on issues like the Doc Fix, NIH funding, tinkering with Obamacare, healthcare technology policy, and other, massive structural problems Washington could help solve. Then those issues could get into the GOP platform for whomever wins the Republic nomination.

But that’s not what we’re getting. Instead, we’re getting Whackadoodle MD. He’s compared Obamacare to Nazis and slavery. He thinks health insurance companies should be non-profits. He got caught plagarizing one of his books, America the Beautiful: Rediscovering What Made This Nation Great. He was recently connected to a questionable supplements company.

He’s fearless and willing to stand up for what he believes in (remember, he got on GOP radar for criticizing Obamacare in the presence of the president). But that attribute is just being leveraged for cheap digs and half-brained thinking.

Dr. Ben Carson’s shoot from the lip, crackpot quips, digs, and insults at women, blacks, Democrats, and especially President Obama are fast becoming the stuff of legend. This time he almost outdid his past inane cracks with the zinger that the Affordable Care Act is the worst thing since slavery.

Carson has parlayed his zany potshots into a plum spot as a Fox News Network commentator. This is the sorry case of a man who at one time had the respect of many for his moving, inspiring story of overcoming hardships to become a highly respected medical professional and who now has prostituted himself to grab a quick headline from a soundbite-driven, titillation media that hungrily eats up anything that someone like a Carson dishes out.

In other words, he’s occupying a spot in the race reserved for Rick Santorum or Pat Buchanan. That would be fine if it didn’t mean the cause of advancing healthcare would be sent spiraling in the opposite direction every time Carson was asked about it.

Some of Carson’s 50,000-foot talking points on healthcare policy aren’t half bad. But, remember, his specific Obamacare alternative outlined in the middle of last year has been annihilated by other healthcare experts. Carson’s concept: the government gives everyone $2,000 for a health savings account. The reaction:

“For a person who has serious health problems or for a person who has a low income, a $2,000 health care savings account is worthless, or near worthless” said Timothy Jost, professor of law at Washington and Lee University who specializes in health care regulation and law. It would not either allow them to buy health insurance or allow them to afford health care or anything other than very routine primary care and some medications.”

The presidential primaries are still far away. Candidates like Carson will fine tune or even change their messages. But things don’t look good.

Get ready. If things hold serve and Carson runs he’ll likely have a monopoly on the headlines on all things medicine.

More sway than Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy.

Than Dr. Eric Topol.

Than Dr. Oz.

Well, at least there’s one plus. But a Carson presidential run won’t help the real attempts to transform healthcare get anywhere.

[Photo from Flickr user Gage Skidmore]

Nicole Oran contributed to this report.

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