title: Medical rationing as a health strategy.
abstract: Notes the problem of rising health care costs in the USA. Considers a highly controversial solution to this problem, which is to consider health care as a scarce resource and to ration access to it. Whether rationing is done by age, ability to pay, or a cost-benefit analysis, the very concept contradicts the US belief in the right to health care. Other industrialized countries currently ration health care through a National Health Insurance Plan. Points out that, in the USA, individual states are beginning to consider health care rationing to combat shrinking budgets and increasing demand for services.
authors.affiliation: School of Business Administration and Economics, California State University, Fullerton, USA.
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Wayland
authors.forename: B H
authors.initials: BH
authors.lastname: Kleiner
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D001294:Attitude to Health; D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D005382:Financing, Personal; D017048:Health Care Costs / Q000639:trends*; D015276:Health Care Rationing / Q000191:economics* / Q000379:methods; D006297:Health Services Accessibility / Q000191:economics / Q000639:trends; D006801:Humans; D013677:Medical Laboratory Science / Q000191:economics; D008875:Middle Aged; D011157:Population Dynamics; D012945:Social Values; D014481:United States