Medical Care Money

Neal R. Peirce, in his June 6 column, "What Else Can We Try?", made one very important observation. Many states are making their own independent changes in an attempt to improve the inadequacies of our present medical care delivery system.

In a few years we should be able to judge which of these alterations are beneficial and which are not.

Since the present arrangement is so complicated, contains so many vested interests and the costs of many of the suggested changes can only be guessed, this slower approach is better than immediately locking us into a federal program which might only later be proven to be disastrous.

Unfortunately, Mr. Peirce failed to address two vital problems with our present system: the need for tort reform and the tremendous cost and waste of medical care dollars now absorbed by our medical insurance system.

In a country that is generally acknowledged to provide the highest quality of care for those who can afford it, it is inconsistent that we should also have the highest incidence of and highest cost for medical malpractice.

No one should object to those injured by sloppy practice being compensated.

However, the stimulation of questionable suits which require costly defense, the high percentage of the awards siphoned off bythe legal profession and the billions of dollars wasted by the practice of defensive medicine, all must be eliminated if we hope to alleviate the excessive costs of our present medical care delivery system.

Also, insurance companies with their costs of advertising, excessive paper work, profits and waste are estimated to consume 20 percent to 25 percent of all of the dollars devoted to medical care.

It is reported that one large medical insurance carrier in the state of California bought out another at the cost of billions of dollars. When this becomes an economic reality, it is obvious that entirely too much of the money supposedly earmarked for medical care, and which should be paying hospitals and other medical providers, is being improperly diverted into the pockets of non-medical people.

Until we address these inequities, as well as those alluded to by Mr. Peirce, we shall not really solve our delivery system dilemma.

We don't need to spend more of our gross national product on health care. We need to spend it more wisely.

Marion Friedman, M.D.

Baltimore

The writer is chairman, Manpower Advisory Committee, Maryland Academy of Family Physicians.

Clinton Is Doing Pretty Well

The headlines about President Clinton reversing his stand on most favored nation trading status for China were all I could take. When will the unjustified, inaccurate, ludicrous criticisms of President Clinton stop?

He has been lambasted for indecisiveness regarding Bosnia and Haiti, for some investments he and his wife were supposed to have made 15 years ago, for the unsubstantiated and marginally believable accusations of a questionable woman, and now for China.

Bill Clinton was elected to (1) strengthen the economy, which had become moribund under George Bush, and create jobs; (2) reduce the budget deficit, which had reached the gaudy figure of $290 billion in the final year of the Bush administration; (3) find some sort of resolution to the nation's crisis in health care (with nearly 40 million Americans having no arrangement to pay for health care); (4) break gridlock in Congress, pass legislation that helps individuals and families, and solve problems instead of indulge inmindless pandering to ideological groups such as the Christian right.

How has President Clinton done so far?

Well, the gross domestic product grew at 3 percent in 1993 and the first quarter of 1994 (average for 1981-88 was 2.9 percent).

A net increase of over 3 million jobs has occurred since January 1993. The budget deficit has been reduced sharply (to an estimated $165 billion for fiscal 1995).

Health care? President Clinton has either proposed or initiated the discussion on several viable plans, and if it were not for the stonewalling crust-heads in the Republican Party, one of them ,, probably would be benefiting us as law now.

As for congressional gridlock, the president has steered through Congress the Family Leave Act, the Brady Bill, several initiatives protecting a woman's right to reproductive freedom and the North American Free Trade Agreement.

Why are we so suddenly so concerned with President Clinton's personal life, with his wife's personal investments, with reversing himself on China?

Mr. Clinton was never a pristine virgin; we knew that when we elected him. If laws were broken in Mrs. Clinton's investments, it seems to me that they were broken by those who managed the investments for the Clintons.

As for China, Mr. Clinton realized that much more economic and eventually social good comes from keeping the Chinese and U.S. markets interacting, rather than by separating them.

He deserves praise for this, not criticism.

As for Bosnia and Haiti, there is no vital American interest in either conflict, and accordingly no Americans in danger in either place.

Before we render any criticism of President Clinton, let us realize that he is doing the things he was elected to do, plus a great deal more.

We should support him where we can, and elect qualified people to Congress to help him advance his agenda.

Raymond P. Frankewich

Columbia

Tax-Free Zones

I read your June 7 editorial concerning the rehabilitation of properties in East Baltimore and the area surrounding the Johns Hopkins complex.

Knowing a bit about real estate, I can tell you that this plan would be great, subject to the fact that people must first have jobs.

We cannot rebuild a city without giving people an opportunity to work and to maintain their self-respect.

Maryland is undergoing great changes in the next decade or two. It is going to become one of the high-tech states of the United States.

This will be accomplished with the incubator that is to be established in the Gaithersburg area. Here, new ideas will be created for the future development of the United States and the world.

Maryland will receive a fair share of this business. Also, because of my connection to industrial development between the United States and Israel, I am aware that there are many projects "in the hopper" and these projects will bring jobs to the area.

I highly recommend that we all get behind the idea of creating a large tax-free zone in the Baltimore area. This will create a large number of jobs for under-educated and educated people so Baltimore does not lose out in future years as the rest of Maryland and the United States move ahead.

We have a great opportunity now. If we formulate a plan and

approach the federal government and the president and say, "Let's use Baltimore City as an incubator -- an incubator for jobs, an incubator for housing," we would have a chance.

We need leadership in the state and the city, and we need help from the media to give us publicity and to pressure the community to move forward and solve some of Baltimore's problems.

Fellow Marylanders must understand that crime on the streets will not stop unless a man has enough money in his pocket to take his girlfriend for a sundae, for a bottle of beer, to feel independent and have his self-respect.

There is a simple way of doing it, tax-free zones. Industry will not move into this area until we provide incentives and reasons to do so.

Marvin S. Schapiro

Towson

God and Faith

In response to a letter June 5 concerning Pope John Paul's "unjust" words concerning women as priests (that that will not come to be), let me pose this question: "Excuse me, who do we think we are that we might know better than such a holy man?"

For too long, Catholics have been questioning all of the tough issues concerning our faith -- abortion, birth control, married priests, etc.

Isn't it time that we stop looking to ourselves for the answers, and look to God and our Catholic faith?

Patricia Gray Di Rito

Bel Air

Union Busting

I am not a parent, a school employee or a unionist, but as a taxpayer I must take issue with your union-busting editorial of June 3.

It was poor timing at the least for Baltimore City School Superintendent Walter Amprey to send out those 10,000 letters just as he was leaving for an overseas trip and wouldn't be here to answer for his actions.

It is unrealistic for you to criticize the teachers' unions. Any union worth its salt must defend its members.

The downfall of this nation's union labor in recent years is due to its adoption of conciliatory attitude. Unionists have forgotten their past history, that their size and power grew by confrontational tactics.

Shame on you for agreeing with the Baltimore school system's ". . . experimenting with different models."

Educational Alternatives Inc., a profit-making company, had no proven track record when it came here. But with Dr. Amprey's blessing it is using Baltimore's school children as guinea pigs in an attempt to prove itself, to obtain more business in other school districts and to restore its stock-market image.

We don't need an expansion of that here, or any more union-busting privatization.

Harry E. Bennett Jr.

Baltimore