Medicine: The Death of a Profession
by Dr. Leonard Peikoff
Total Time: 1 hour, 25 minutes
Dr. Leonard Peikoff contrasts the heroic profession of medicine historically with the corruption of modern socialized medicine. He examines the philosophy behind the statist reforms that corrupted medicine and illustrates how this is, at root, an attack on the mind. Peikoff explains the role that the ethics of altruism play in medicine and offers a way out for those in the profession and those who hope to fix it.
Study Guide
This material is designed to help you digest the lecture content. You can also download a printable PDF version below.
| What is the nature of a doctor? |
| How do most doctors conduct themselves ethically? |
| What event precipitated the problems in the medical field? |
| What philosophic premises were Medicare and Medicaid based on? |
| What practical consequences ensued from their adoption? |
| Why is increased technology not the cause of rising costs? |
| What dilemma do doctors face under managed care regimes? |
Q&A Guide
Below is a list of questions from the audience taken from this lecture, along with (approximate) time stamps.
| 1:04:42 | Can you tell us a little about the Ayn Rand Institute? |
| 1:05:59 | What does the American Medical Association do with respect to the problems you’ve presented today? |
| 1:07:22 | Are there any other works by Ayn Rand on epistemology other than Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, or is there anyone else doing any work on this? |
| 1:08:47 | Please comment on inefficiencies in hospitals and the rising number of DON and CON applications and the impact that has on rising health care costs. |
| 1:12:19 | If cost containment, on the one hand, reduces expenditures and fear of malpractice increases expenditures, do they balance each other out by resulting in hospitals spending just the right amount? |
| 1:14:23 | In addition to impact upon the patient care system, are there any impacts of this medical reimbursement system upon research? |
| 1:16:08 | Would you favor continued support of the elderly, the blind, the disabled, and those who have been under the system for a very long time? |
| 1:18:35 | Are the same risks involved in a government funded program also the same risks involved in a 3rd-party paid program? |
| 1:21:02 | Is there any mechanism to help support doctors defending themselves? |
| 1:22:26 | Does the American Medical Association’s monopoly have a tendency to produce the results you have discussed? |