Is your waist larger than a "Japanese woman's"?

Here's the latest rumor about health care reform. Are you ready? It's a great one. Easily the best one I've heard yet.

Some women are dressing after working out at a local health club, talking to each other in the women's locker room. They begin languishing about "ObamaCare," and how, if Obama has his way, every single woman in the USA will be forced to have her waist measured. If her waist size is larger than "the average Japanese woman's" waist - then she will be denied health care.

The women friends who told me this said that even though they weren't friends with the other women, they had to say "No, that's not true." And the women said "Yes." And my friends said "No." And I guess that's as rough as things get in the ladies locker room.

But can you believe that one? That's terrific. "Now, ma'am, remember, if you can't fit through this tiny hole, then I can't help you medically in any way, under any circumstances." I'm not even sure where this stuff comes from. It sounds like something nine-year-olds would make up sitting on a street corner.

Successful, sustainable preventive medicine doesn't work that way, where you're forced to do something or meet a requirement, and if you don't, then they take away your health care. In universal systems - everyone has health care. They don't take it away. That's the whole point of having universal care. Effective preventive medicine provides monetary incentives for medical personnel to have healthier patients. It would even be possible to give, say, tax breaks to people for maintaining their health within their power to do so, like by joining the YMCA, quitting smoking, altering their diet, taking prescribed medications properly, etc.. But I'm pretty sure there's no point in measuring people's waists, and then denying X% of American women health care based on that. That would be a large percentage, like what, 70%? 80%? How would any official ever be elected or re-elected into office supporting such a plan? What would be the purpose of it? Why wouldn't someone in the market simply pick up 80% of women after they were rejected? The list of faults with this idea is very, very long.

But it does shed light on some of the folks that are worried about losing the health care they already have, at least the kind of person that would believe such a story. I guess it's lost on some people with care that if they're so worried about losing their care that they'll believe the waist line story (when their health plan is not even in jeopardy beyond their imagination), then imagine how stressful everyday life is for people that don't have any health insurance right now. Or for a person dying of cancer in an uninsured household, with bills piling up to tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars.

I'm guessing the next argument will be, "If we cave in to Obama's health care plan, they're going to take our guns away and force our children to be socialist Muslims." I mean, that wouldn't even surprise me at this point.

When you think about health care, think about health care. Ignore politics. What do you think Americans need? Who's talking about what you think is important? Who's not talking about those things? That's what we need to be asking ourselves to encourage strong debate. There are good ideas on both sides, but emotional hysteria solves nothing.